Yes, it was pretty damn Twisted!
And a whole lotta fun.
Down in the East Village, at The Theater For The New City complex, Joel Greenhouse’s fantastically campy Twisted musical delights in every way possible. A perfect two-hours sans intermission here is a play, wickedly intertwining horror movie tropes, 50s do wop and sexy send-ups with a cast that eat scenery to keep the audience in stitches. It would be more than slightly difficult to actual describe the plot, save it to say a F-grade movie actress frames her daughter for murder then through a series of steps finds herself at a house in a swamp where…well, like I said, I can’t rightly describe the spot-on silliness that ensues, with solo song numbers, a fair amount of dancing and quite a few cast members adopting various roles.
What I can do is list the talent on stage here (although the quick and various changes from the stagehands and lighting effects were spot on as well…os kudos to the crew as well) as I think the folks in this production, directed by Joe John Battista (who is also one of the composers of the songs here with Peter Dizzozza) should be named. The cast includes, Penny Balfour, Brian Belovitch, Robert Z Grant, Maude Lardner Burke, Andrew Ryan Perry, Larry FLeischman, Christine Weiss Beidel, Evan Laurence, Tony Del Bono, Sevin Ceviker, JC Augustin, and Xue Yun Zhang. Each fantastic, truly, working hard to make this zany play move along at a perfectly choreographed clip.
Dizozza plays piano, Kevin Murray drums, Battista guitar and Ron Raymond bass, proving the tight quartet accompainment.
Twisted is a must-see as far as I am concerned, a great time downtown, and a way to sit back and immerse oneself in all the glorious fun a high-wild musical can, and should, be.
