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New York International Fringe Festival
SUV: The Musical
Supersized car culture gets a takedown, crash test
dummies and all, in this song-and-dance joyride. By Karen Hudes
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If it's true, as one environmentally conscious character asserts, that
no one's ever written a love song about an economy car, then that goes
double for the ubiquitous, pernicious Sports Utility Vehicle. This
entertaining musical by Gersh Kuntzman and Marc Dinkin is out to change
all that. Beginning with the opening scene inside Behemoth Motor
Company—maker of the Deforester, the Defiler and the soon-to-be-unveiled
Destroyer, the cast rhapsodizes about the soccer-mom monstrosity with
songs like "Bigger is Better" and a wowing set piece "The New Model,"
sensationally choreographed by Katie Workum. As activist Max Blank fights
to expose Behemoth while falling in love, post-collision, with the owner's
wife, the story also makes room for a rebellious daughter, a shady sheik
and a touching subplot of unrequited love between crash test dummies (who
act as the stage crew). Yes, "SUV" grows bulky as its namesake by the end.
But with some quicker pacing and a finer edge (the song "How Did Your Oil
Get Under Our Sand?" is begging for a riff on the Bush-Saud connection),
this satirical baby could be a real clean-burning machine.
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SUV: The Musical By Gersh
Kuntzman and Marc Dinkin The Village Theatre Sat, Aug 13 at
12:00 p.m.; Mon, Aug 15 at 07:45 p.m.; Fri, Aug 19 at 04:00 p.m.;
Wed, Aug 24 at 10:30 p.m.; Sat, Aug 27 at 08:15 p.m. |
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Published on August 8, 2005 as a web
exclusive. |
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