European demand for American pop culture is insatiable, and Denver’s experimental LIDA Project will feed that hunger by bringing its “Manson Family Values” to London’s Camden People’s Theatre for a four-week run opening April 18.
“Manson” is a stylistic and orgiastic interpretation of one of the grisliest crime sprees in U.S. history, staged as if it were the featured attraction at a two-bit, traveling freak show.
Now it really is traveling. And director Brian Freeland promises to bring along all the blood, sliced flesh and shorn bangs that thrilled and sickened audiences here two years ago.
But not all his original cast members. The women, especially, have been hesitant about again having their heads shaved onstage. “But you can’t do the piece without that component of fanaticism, and there is no better visual example of that than the head-shaving,” said Freeland, who is planning for a cast of six LIDA actors and six Londoners.
“There is definitely an international fascination with American pop culture, and most especially with the monsters of its own creation,” Freeland said. “But the July 7 bombings had such a profound effect on Londoners. When they realized the people who did this had grown up in their midst, they could not look externally for answers.”
There are parallels not only to Charles Manson, who 36 years ago prompted his followers to murder at least nine people, but to Columbine, which LIDA also took on with its “Bingo Boyz.”
“With audiences for both shows, the mantra keeps coming up that these people came from our own schools,” Freeland said, “that we made them what they are.”
The London stop will cost LIDA about $17,000, which Freeland is raising via grants and donations. With seven shows a week, revenue should offset much of the cost. Yes, though only a few hundred braved “Manson” in Denver, “There is most definitely enough interest in London to support seven shows a week for a month,” he said.
“Manson” is not LIDA’s only focus. After leaving what is now the Crossroads Theatre in December, it moved into a new development space at 21st and Curtis streets and cast a core ensemble of seven that includes previous and new members. Its first new development piece, “The Anonymous Mr. W,” debuts in November as a four-
month tour to New York, Los Angeles, Seattle, San Francisco, Albuquerque and Chicago. The piece, based on Georg Buchner’s “Woyzeck,” concerns the aftermath of soldiers returning home from war.
“Although we are not performing in Denver right now, we are just as much a part of the Denver theater community as ever,” Freeland said. “Our home is here, and we build our work here. ”
Pinnacle again on hiatus
The Pinnacle Dinner Theatre’s troubled opening year reached its nadir last week when president David Pritchard canceled “Singin’ in the Rain” seven days before opening, after already having postponed it.
The Pinancle website blames “technical problems,” but make no mistake. It’s out of money.
“I projected we would lose $100,000 doing the show, and it makes no sense to lose that kind of investor money now, when we need to horde every penny of it,” he said. “The concept is, ‘David, secure the future of the theater, not the show.”‘
Pinnacle now goes into a major retrenchment before a planned reopening of “Scrooge the Musical” on Nov. 17.
Pritchard is addressing a long list of problems he calls “real and imagined,” including unpaid wages, bills and rights fees. His top priority is re-establishing trust with everyone – actors, staff and customers.
“That means get funded, get past payroll paid off, and take care of patrons and vendors,” he said. And that will take, he said, “a chunk of new money.”
But with the show cancellation, he also must refund thousands of dollars in group sales he does not have. “We’re hoping to move them all to a later show,” Pritchard said. If not, they go on a refund list that could come with a long wait.
And while the food has been Pinnacle’s greatest asset, Pritchard admits the fare onstage must get much better. He must do that without associate producer Patrick Alan Kearns, who resigned a month ago.
“We do have to strive to improve the quality of the shows, and to find a way to make them more intimate,” he said.
“The bottom line is we are extremely optimistic about the Pinnacle and its future. … I hope we can all look at this as a new start.”
Theater critic John Moore can be reached at 303-820-1056 or jmoore@denverpost.com.
