TodayFactory troubles make for love in Oyster Mill musical
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Melissa McKeehan rehearses a scene during Oyster Mill Playhouse’s production of the “Pajama Game.” (Michael Bupp/The Sentinel)
Marlin Rice, left, and Ben Cohen during a rehearsal "The Pajama Game." (Michael Bupp/The Sentinel)
When Oyster Mill Playhouse, ahead of its 30th anniversary season, solicited audience recommendations for future productions, the community theater volunteers didn’t expect “The Pajama Game” to be among them.
Sure, the show with music and lyrics by Richard Adler and Jerry Ross, the team that also created “Damn Yankees,” is entertaining, but it’s not one of the heavy-duty classics.
Still, “The Pajama Game” ended up on the list. And Alice Kirkland, who had directed the show during two previous incarnations of Oyster Mill, was happy to do so again.
“We also try to stay with family musicals for our mainstage shows,” she says.
Of course, the 2006 revival with Harry Connick Jr. in his Broadway debut and Kelli O’Hara (now performing in Lincoln Center’s “South Pacific” to rave reviews) helped highlight the show’s charms.
“I love the music, songs like ‘Hey There’ and ‘Hernando’s Hideaway,’” says Kirkland. “And ‘The Pajama Game’ has a lot of small parts so that a lot more people can do more than sing in the chorus.”
Moreover, “not everybody has to be young and pretty,” Kirkland adds.
Based on the book “7 1/2 Cents,” the musical concerns labor woes in a pajama factory — and the ambivalent (at first) love relationship between Babe, the head of the worker complaint committee, and Sid, the handsome new factory superintendent.
The original Broadway production opened in 1954 and played 1,063 performances. Directed by George Abbott and Jerome Robbins with choreography by Bob Fosse, it starred John Raitt and Janis Paige.
That “The Pajama Game” seems to appeal to a wide spectrum was evident during auditions, according to Kirkland. “I was surprised at the number of young people who came,” she says.
Playing Babe is a first-time performer at Oyster Mill, Carlisle resident Melissa McKeehan.
“I really like the show — I like the music and it’s got a cute story line,” McKeehan says. “All of the characters have very strong personalities and are very different from another.”
The actress finds particular identification with her character.
“Babe is bold and brassy,” she says. “She’s outgoing and says what she feels. She wears her heart on her sleeve. I’m a lot like that.”
The character McKeehan doesn’t identify with is Janet, female lead of the edgy “Rocky Horror Show,” which she is playing at Capitol Performing Arts Center simultaneously.
“I take my 10-year-old son Terrell to rehearsals here, and not there,” she laughs.
Other “Pajama Game” cast members include Seth Martin as Sid; Jonathan “Ben” Taylor as Prez; Andria Marlin as Gladys; Roxanne Morgan as Mabel; Gayle Sicchitano as Mom; and Patrick Wallen as Hines.
Cheryl Crider is the music director; Patrice Price Whitson is choreographer.
