Biting comedy-musical

By Denise Dick | October 20, 2015 at 12:00a.m.

Youngstown

It’s not your average theater set.

The set for “Little Shop of Horrors,” which runs at 6 p.m. Wednesday and Thursday at the Chaney Visual and Performing Arts Auditorium, includes a giant foam-and-fiberglass plant, built by VPA students and teacher Craig Popovich.

In the comedy musical, the plant, Audrey II, starts out small but grows when fed human blood. When it reaches full size, Audrey II’s appetite grows, too, and she demands human flesh.

The plant had to be big enough for a person, Audrey II’s meal, to fit in.

“First we made a mold,” said Audrie Pratt, 17, and a junior in the school’s stagecraft theater- tech program.

With Popovich’s help and direction, the plant was plastered, rubber added and allowed to sit for a couple of days before it was filled with foam and then painted. The bottom part of the mouth and the pot it grows in are made from fiberglass.

Strings attached to the monster allow students to open and close its mouth from behind the set.

The students made three Audrey II’s, a small, medium and large size.

Sophomore Desiree Scott, 17, said that when Popovich first told students they were going to make the plant, she didn’t believe it.

“He said we were going to make a human-sized plant,” she said.

The process took about a month.

Sophomore ShIree Wilson, 15, voices Audrey II, lowering her usual soprano singing voice to a bass vibrato.

“Feed me Seymour,” she booms in a demonstration.

“I didn’t see myself as the plant when I auditioned,” she said. “I wanted to be Audrey.”

Audrey is the show’s female lead and portrayed by Arianna Espinosa. Seymour Krelbourn, the male lead, is played by Marckese Williams.

ShIree also participated in the school’s “Footloose” and “Ragtime” productions last year.

“I want to be an actor when I grow up, and VPA has helped me a lot,” she said.

In the show, Seymour and Audrey both work in a flower shop, and Seymour pines for her. He buys a plant, calling it Audrey II after his love.

At first, the plant withers despite Seymour’s care until he pricks his finger on a rose bush and the plant opens its mouth to drink the blood.

Audrey II flourishes on the gruesome diet.