This year’s school musical, Little Shop of Horrors, which was performed at The Albany Academies’ on November 7th and 8th, made for an evening full of laughter and surprises. The audience was in awe of the incredible performance the students pulled off. The production was directed by Mr. Matt Streifert, with the help of technical director Mr. Rich Johnson and student artistic director Julia Randall ‘15.

“I hope the audience could just enjoy, and for the few hours of the show, have fun,” said Mr. Johnson before the show. “The cast has done such a great job that I can see the audience being taken away.”

The story takes place in Skid Row, a shabby urban area, where the audience meets the Urchins, who function as the show’s Greek chorus, and the remaining residents, including Seymour and Audrey, two “misfit employees” of a flower shop, Mushnik’s Skid Row Florists. Seymour finds a peculiar plant that looks like a flytrap, which he names Audrey II after his coworker and object of affection. Seymour finds out that Audrey II feeds on human blood and thereafter pricks his fingers every day to feed the plant and keep it alive. Seymour instantly rises to stardom with Audrey II, which becomes the talk of the community, but starts having problems giving Audrey II more blood. Audrey II then reveals that it can talk, telling Seymour that it can fulfill Seymour’s dreams of grandeur when it is fed an entire person. Although Seymour initially refuses, he changes his mind when he sees Audrey abused by Orin, her boyfriend. Preparing to kill him, Seymour sets up an appointment with Orin, a dentist, but cannot bring himself to pull the trigger. However, Orin then suffocates in a nitrous oxide mask as Seymour stands by. Seymour feeds Orin’s body to Audrey II, who subsequently grows bigger than ever.

As the flower shop becomes more successful and Seymour and Audrey become closer, the owner of the shop, Mushnik, is suspicious of Seymour and confronts him about Orin’s disappearance. Fearing that Mushnik could ruin his life, he tricks her into looking inside the Audrey II for the money he says he had hidden there, and she is eaten alive. Seymour takes over the flower shop and decides to kill the plant, but before he does so, the plant convinces Audrey to give it some water and she falls into the plant’s mouth. Seymour arrives and pries Audrey from the plant’s jaws, but it is too late. Seymour, enraged at the plant, tries to kill the plant from the inside, but in vain– he, too, is eaten. The show ends with a finale featuring the entire cast of eighteen persuading the audience not to feed the plants.

The performance was very enjoyable and was filled with comic relief to offset the darker themes of the show. Gordon O’Brien ’15 and Sarah Allen ’16, Seymour, Audrey, respectively, did an excellent job portraying the chemistry between the two characters and the drama of each death. Simultaneously, the Audrey II, voiced by Jeremiah McGowan ’16, Orin Scrivello, D.D.S., played by Kevin Rider ‘16, and Mrs. Mushnik, played by Lizzy Carey-Cassidy ‘15, helped to lighten the mood of each scene with a few morbid twists thrown in. Elizabeth Bryan, Victoria Cottrell, Paige Moynihan, and Aminah Praileau, who played the Urchins, sang with skill and exuberance and added more humor and energy whenever they were on stage.

“It was very fun to play a completely different character from myself,” said Sarah Allen ’16 on playing Audrey. “I had known about the musical before and it was definitely very interesting to take part in a musical that I thought was very enjoyable.”

The set is worth mentioning– as the audience walked into the Chapel, they were immediately brought into the dirty, dilapidated world of Skid Row. The walls were graffitied, a scaffold framed one half of the stage, and three packed clotheslines acted as stage curtain. The design team– consisting of the directors, crew, and pit– had developed the set design. Mr. Johnson’s mini-model of the set was on display for the audience in the front lobby.

The show was made more unique with the use of video clips projected on various screens, further immersing the audience into the world of the play. Soogi Kim ’16, who was the film director responsible for these clips, used Academies faculty members as actors and school facilities as locations for his films.

Little Shop of Horrors was also the first theatrical performance at the Academies in which a student director was present throughout the process. Julia Randall ’15 helped Mr. Streifert and Mr. Johnson in directing the show, often running entire rehearsals by herself while the other two directors were occupied with other aspects of the production.

“I always wanted to try directing, and this seemed like a great opportunity,” said Julia after the show. “I had my doubts going into it, but in the end I was really happy with everyone’s performances.” Julia has played Belle in Disney’s Beauty and the Beast in March 2013 and Meg Boyd in Damn Yankees in March 2014, both previous Academies productions. “Being in a show is always fun, but being in the new role of director really helped me grow a lot as a person.”

Overall, the performance of the musical was outstanding. The audience enjoyed every joke and every twist and turn in the plot. Kudos to all cast and crew members of Little Shop of Horrors for a job well done!