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[Times art: Christian Drury]
Ever want to be in a musical? With the audience participation version of The Sound of Music, now you can.
By STEVE PERSALL, Times Film Critic
© St. Petersburg Times
published February 14, 2002
Charmian Carr, 59, who played Liesl in The Sound of Music, is an ardent supporter of the sing-along version. “It’s a therapy session for me, to watch all these people parade on stage in costumes and have us try to guess who they are,” she said.
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The Austrian hills have sung for a thousand years and never required karaoke-style lyrics. The most devoted fans of Robert Wise's 1965 musical The Sound of Music probably don't need them, either.
But, if you need help listing My Favorite Things or solving a problem like Maria, those superimposed cheat lines can be handy. Gives a viewer time to think about the next line of dialogue begging for a wisecrack or a funny prop. Maybe you can borrow a sprig of edelweiss from the guy dressed as a lonely goatherd sitting nearby.
This is not your grandmother's Sound of Music. Sure, it's still a story of nuns, Nazis, romance and tutorship. Julie Andrews sings again like an angel. But say so long and farewell to letting actors on screen have all the fun.
Wise's movie is 36 years old, going on 37, and enjoying a renaissance as Sing-A-Long Sound of Music, an audience participation event that has packed a London theater since 1999. Now this blend of Rocky Horror interactivity with Rogers and Hammerstein schmaltz is a roadshow making its central Florida debut at Tampa Theatre.
Nobody is more excited about that than Gregory Snell, a 33-year-old hospice worker from Tarpon Springs who fell in love with Sing-A-Long Sound of Music in London. Snell, dressed as a nun, won a third-place prize in the costume contest which precedes each show. His mother superior must have been so proud.
[Photo: 20th Century Fox]
The Von Trapp family join to sing Edelweiss in The Sound of Music.
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"We were in London in October of 2000 to see some West End plays," Snell said. "We knew the (sing-along) show was there, so I figured I'd go prepared. I own a nun's costume, and how many times do you get a chance to wear it? I just packed it with everything else."
Some costume ideas:
[Photos: Sing-Along Productions]
Bright copper kettle, above, and brown paper packages tied up with strings, below.
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About 30 moviegoers answered the call of an emcee dressed as Capt. von Trapp to join the costume contest. Snell got more applause than everyone except the lederhosen boy in leather trousers and a trio of women dressed in brown paper packages and kitten whiskers.
"For some reason, a nun with an Adam's apple and goatee stuck out," Snell said.
First place was a bottle of cheap Champagne. The runners-up shared some "ugly-smelling lilac soap." Snell figures he got the best prize, a 3-inch tapered candle that inspired a crude joke from "Capt. von Trapp" when presented. The Sound of Music is still rated G, but the audience sometimes nudges the vibe into PG-13 territory. Nice but cautiously naughty.
"This has a little more tension than Rocky Horror does," Snell noted. "That's a bawdy show anyway. This is a family film, one of the greatest, and still there's some of that (irreverence) happening."
Charmian Carr, who played Liesl, the eldest von Trapp child, is an ardent supporter of Sing-A-Long Sound of Music, appearing at a recent benefit performance in Tampa. Carr recalled her favorite wisecrack:
"It was right before the captain kisses Maria and he touches her lip," Carr recalled. "Somebody yelled out: 'Get the booger, Captain.'
"I really wish Christopher Plummer would see it because he has never been really happy about being in the film. He called it 'The Sound of Mucus' for years. He would love all of the backtalk to the screen."
Carr, 59, is an interior decorator in California who once counted Michael Jackson as a client. (She assured me that his Elephant Man sarcophagus wasn't her idea.) Carr left acting behind when she became a mother but has cashed in on The Sound of Music in recent years with two books and numerous appearances supporting the sing-along version.
Props can add to the fun:
[Photos courtesy of Sing-along Productions]
Wave pieces of fabric when Maria decides to recycle her drapes.
Queue cards help the abbey nuns to solve a problem like Maria.
Small and white, clean and bright Edelweiss.
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"It's a therapy session for me, to watch all these people parade onstage in costumes and have us try to guess who they are," she said. "I remember performances when I laughed so hard at the remarks that I left the theater with my mouth aching.
"I've heard some raucous, sacrilegious remarks, and I've been approached by people who are upset by that. But those people don't understand that if people didn't love the movie so much they wouldn't bother coming up with all this stuff."
Many participants probably share Snell's fantasy of existing in a place where music and dance do their thinking for them.
"So many musicals are just outrageous," Snell said. "You can't believe them, or that anything like that could happen in the real world. But everyone wonders what it could be like to live in a musical; if I only knew the words, if other people were singing, then maybe my life could be a musical like this."
PREVIEW
Sing-A-Long Sound of Music, today through Feb. 24 at Tampa Theatre. Show times are 7:30 p.m. each day with 2 p.m. matinees on Saturdays and Sundays. Tickets are $17.50 for weekdays and matinees, $22.50 for Saturday and Sunday evenings. Discounts are available for seniors, students and children 12 and younger. Tickets are available at Tampa Theatre box office and Ticketmaster outlets. Call (813) 274-8981 or visit www.tampatheatre.org for information.
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