By Mary Brassard
I will give you the bare facts here–The Full Monty appearing at The Ziegfeld Theater in Ogden is for mature audiences only. (See what I did there?) However, the most immature parts of your personality will enjoy this show a whole heck of a lot.
The Full Monty is a comedy book musical based on a 1997 movie of the same name. It is set in Buffalo, New York during a time of rampant unemployment, specifically for men who used to work in factories. These rough and tumble guys can’t find work and it’s affected how they identify themselves as men. In desperation, they make their own job—they become strippers. Average men of all shapes and sizes teach themselves how to boogie and shake their butts, and take it off. We get to see the hilarity and also the tender moments that ensue.
Director Hugh Hanson has put together an impressive group of talent. He shows a deft hand at balancing the high comedy and shocking moments of skin, with scenes of real drama and emotion. The Full Monty opening night began a bit slow, which can sometimes be expected as the cast is still working out jitters, but the night got better and better as the evening went on. By the end, I was sad to see the show coming to an end. I was particularly pleased with much of the staging as Hanson cleverly positions people around the stage in such a way, I always felt I was there in that setting with them, although it was quite a minimalist set (Caleb Parry). It felt inclusive. While there is a fourth wall I also continued to feel invited into the scenes.
Choreographer Joshua S Robinson provides real finesse with the dance numbers. Particularly I feel it would have been a mistake to over choreograph the dance numbers with the six main characters and make them appear to be trained dancers at any point in time. Instead, he manages to put together well-rehearsed fun to watch dance scenes that also believably seem like they are being performed by first timers, by men who aren’t yet 100% comfortable in their own skin.
The cast is truly exceptional, specifically the six leading men.
Jeremy R. Gross as Jerry Lukowski leads this group of six men in an astounding performance. This character is written in a way that could be very hate-able. He is not a particularly great dad, he was not a good husband, he is sometimes questionable as a friend. Yet Gross plays this character with so much sincerity and so much vulnerability, that I came to love this underdog. He plays this character in such a way that his bad decisions seem driven by love and a deep desire to do the right thing although he’s not always sure how to do it. He particularly stood out to me as a great actor but was also a very good singer—he has a very pleasant voice.
Caleb Parry as Dave Bukatinsky has as good comic timing as perhaps I’ve seen on stage. With just his facial expressions and tiny bits of movement I often found myself rolling with laughter. Early in the show there is a scene where he emerges from a bathroom stall, he has just heard some less-than-flattering things about himself from his wife. The bathroom stall opens and when I saw Parry’s face (and I remind you, this was early and it had started slow) that’s when I knew I had nothing to worry about, the show was going to be awesome, and I was going to have a great time. The look on his face is such a perfect blend of shock, dismay, and utter irony, and I just simply can’t describe it any better. And speaking of irony, he is also the actor who delivered, for me, the most tender and gut-wrenching moments. We watch him in his bedroom trying to get up the nerve to caress his wife, he looks down at his overweight belly and again with just his face I felt the full grasp of his pain. I felt how desperately he loves his wife and how desperately he wants his confidence back. I think it takes a powerful actor to display such genuine comedy as well as such tender emotions in one performance. I will be looking specifically for more shows to see Parry perform again.
Nick Morris as Malcom MacGregor is the most loveable of the bunch. He portrays what you might refer to as a stereotypical dork living with his mother well into his 30s. But he is so unapologetically bashful, lovable, soft-spoken, and one of the first to embrace the dancing. Morris gives us a subtle performance, and thankfully never makes a joke out of that stereotype. His romance is one of my favorite surprise elements of the show. There is nothing caricature-like in his portrayal. His singing voice is also very lovely. A very welcome quiet moment in the show is the song “You Walk With Me”. I love the way he sings this, as though he is feeling it and not just as an actor performing a big number and making sure he sounds pretty. He gives us the emotions through his voice and it makes it a powerful song.
Carlos Emjay as Noah T Simmons nearly steals the show in a big, or maybe not so big, way. His first big scene is astonishing. In the song “Big Black Man”, he sings how everyone wants a big black man, and honestly I don’t think I ever understood how much I want a big black man until he sang that song. The way he strokes his walking cane was truly something to behold. There was an elderly woman sitting in front of me, and she was holding close to her Life Alert button thinking he could give her a heart attack at any moment, but she looked very pleased and ready to go. Emjay has his character arc moments as well, and again, is an actor that displays his full range of talent. And I truly love his velvety deep singing voice.
I often leave a musical feeling I have seen a lot of great musical talent as far as singing and dancing, and I don’t think much of the acting even if it wasn’t bad. Musicals just tend to display great musical talent. The astonishing for thing for me in the Zig’s The Full Monty is that as I sit here writing, I am struck with how these actors all came across as great acting talent to me. They are very skilled singers and dancers, yes, but what I truly came away with was a grasp of each actors’ character and emotions, and that speaks to the great acting talent on stage. Truly well-rounded performers.
Tommy John Holt as Ethan Girard pleased me as well. I’m not sure if it is Holt who is very tall or the character Ethan, but regardless, he is a dapper, tall drink of water. He also enters with a bang. A confident actor, he displays much of his “special talents” in his first scene. Holt had me laughing many times with an ongoing bit of physical humor. Holt gives a very convincing portrayal as an every man, boy next door with a bit of extra courage. I would have liked to hear him sing more, as his musical moments impressed me with a very powerful melodic sound.
Shaun Carr as Harold Nichols plays the businessman you might love to hate, but there’s no hating this one. The reluctant producer of the strip show, Carr gives us a character that stands out among the others as a bit less of an underdog, or rather, new to “underdogging”. This would be another character that might be a bit too easy to give a harsh performance, but Carr shows us just the right amount of desperation, and we are swept up in his delightful performance.
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The women in this show don’t get to dance in their underwear (much…), but that doesn’t mean they aren’t memorable. Like their characters, these women don’t sit in a corner and knit and let the men have all the glory.
Morgan Parry as Georgie Bukatinsky does an excellent job of showing several sides of a character. In life, people aren’t flat, and don’t act the same way in every situation. Actors sometimes forget to show that versatility of life. Parry does this brilliantly. She shows very believably the confident brash side of a strong woman, one who can goof off in the men’s room with the best of them, and also the soft frustrated side looking to connect to her husband in difficult times. Parry is able to mesh these sides into one complicated character, rather than just doing each scene independently. It is very fluid. In the song “You Rule My World” she not only sings brilliantly, but gives real raw love and emotion.
Heidi Potter Hunt as Vicki Nichols has thunderous stage presence. When she’s onstage, you know it. Her singing voice is one of the best of the evening, as is her sense of comedy. In the song “Life with Harold” there is a section where she isn’t singing but trilling and humming bits of music. This section of non-dialogue is as funny as any scripted joke in the show.
This show is extremely funny. I laughed out loud a lot as did the entire audience. There is a lot of physical humor of course. As you watch six ordinary men trying to wiggle and dance, that allows for a lot of comedy. But there is also a lot of clever and funny dialogue. The jokes are often subtle and they often hit you in the face. I enjoyed this great amount of variation in comedy. Although this show is a comedy it is also a drama about working class people and about men and women going through everyday things. Although you may not feel like trying to put on a show to a thousand women and ripping your pants off at the end is something that everyday men and women go through, somehow, it is. It is regular people looking for some way to get out of a rut. And not just a financial rut but a rut in their marriages, in their lives, and their confidence. The Full Monty is very believable and very inclusive. It brings up issues that some of us don’t often think about. Like, men’s body issues. Questions like, “what happens when your wife is more successful than you?” and “what happens if I feel I’m too good to take a lowly job?”, and “what if I just keep stroking this walking cane?” These are all elements the show explores and it’s done with a careful and adept script.
To be clear, this show gets an R rating. In my opinion there is no debating this. It is not PG-13—it is an R-rated show. There are many many F words (in movies more than two f words gives you an R rating). There is much cigarette smoking (also something that usually elicits an R rating), strong sexual themes and innuendo (shall we talk about that walking stick some more?). And of course, a small bit of nudity. Really, when it comes to the “Full Monty” moment, it’s nothing to worry about. The lights are cleverly done. But there are still several naked butts, lots of naked chests, and some g-string action that I quite enjoyed.
My only disappointment with this show was tech. It wasn’t enough to ruin it for me, but I hope as the run continues they will be able to perfect the microphones and have everyone on mic at the same time and on the same volume level as to not interrupt the scenes and songs.
I had a very fun evening at the Ziegfeld Theater in Ogden. The Ziegfeld is continually putting up good polished and entertaining shows. Their level of talent always impresses me greatly. The Full Monty is no exception and I am very glad to have seen this show. I laughed a lot and I generally just had a great time. The characters are lovable, the actors portrayed them charmingly, and I felt very good leaving the theater. Stripping is often something you see portrayed as sad or dark, and in certain stereotypes. But in The Full Monty, it’s a strong choice and it’s done with fervent reason and everyone involved is getting something out of it. It’s about body acceptance, and acceptance in general. It truly is something that makes for a feel-good show.
The Ziegfeld Theater presents The Full Monty, book by Terrence McNally and score by David Yazbek
The Ziegfeld Theatre, 3934 S. Washington Blvd, Ogden, UT 84403
MAY 4-19 7:30 PM
Saturday 5/12 2:00 PM
Tickets: $17-19
Contact: 855-ZIG-ARTS / 855-944-2787
Ziegfeld Theater Facebook Page
The Full Monty Facebook Event
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