Brace yourselves for Olympic levels of merriment and mayhem in Ken Ludwig’s fantastical and dazzling original farce. Junior university Classics professors Daphne Rain and Ralph Sargent unearth a long-lost academic treasure of Greek literature. Fortune, fame, and countless book signings are within their grasp until the fates whisk their newly discovered masterpiece from their scholastic sight. At her wit's end, Daphne calls up to Mount Olympus for help, only to be answered by two irreverent and ludicrous deities. Can these ancient celestials save Daphne in her darkest hour? Or will these haphazard idols destroy all her aspirations in a college cavalcade of buffoonery and pandemonium?
The Gods of Comedy Cast
Daphne Rain………………………….………………Reanna Fornash
Ralph Sargent……………………………..…………CJ Martin
Dionysus…………………………………………….…..Brendan Phipps
Thalia………………………………………………………Lanie Norris
Dean Trickett…..….…………..……………………Racheal Clark
Brooklyn DeWolfe………………………………...Arlette Garza
Ares…………………………………………...........……Nick Marquez
Aristide…………………………………………….…....Hallie Stone
Aleski………….................................................Colten Haliburton
Zoe…………………………………………………….…..Madison Gray
Muses………...................................................Madison Gray, Hallie Stone, Karina Tergerson
Stage Manager…………………………………….…Eden Donley
Ralph Sargent……………………………..…………CJ Martin
Dionysus…………………………………………….…..Brendan Phipps
Thalia………………………………………………………Lanie Norris
Dean Trickett…..….…………..……………………Racheal Clark
Brooklyn DeWolfe………………………………...Arlette Garza
Ares…………………………………………...........……Nick Marquez
Aristide…………………………………………….…....Hallie Stone
Aleski………….................................................Colten Haliburton
Zoe…………………………………………………….…..Madison Gray
Muses………...................................................Madison Gray, Hallie Stone, Karina Tergerson
Stage Manager…………………………………….…Eden Donley
Costume inspiration
Production meeting Notes
The Build
These are fabrics that we had in stock that I'm using to make the chitons out of. I spent a lot of time on a Friday draping them on mannequins to find the right color and texture combinations for the characters. We need one Greek costume each for the Dean as Artemis, Brooklyn as Aphrodite, Thalia, Dionysus, and three chorus Muses that will help with the stage magic.
aRES ARMOR BUILD
I pulled one of the tunics that we made for Funny Thing Happened on the way to the Forum, and the breastplate and boots we made for Theseus for Midsummer Night's Dream as the base of his costume. I had a pathetic plastic Roman Centurion helmet that I could have used, but I chose to make a new helmet out of foam so that it would match the breastplate. We used the Kamui armor patterns from She Kills Monsters to make a base pattern. I had to enlarge it quite a bit for Nick's head and I changed the shape of the front and added another piece to it. Nick wasn't here to fit the paper pattern on, but my son has an equally big head, so I used him as my mannequin. Once I was sure it would fit, I cut it out of foam, glued the pieces together, did two coats of plastidip in red, then two coats of gloss red, then a coat of hammered gold. I bought a child's broom that had red bristles and used it for the coxcomb.
While I was at it, we still had gauntlets left over from Jason's Tinman costume that he donated to our She Kills Monsters Boulette build that we never used. We removed the hot glue rivets and welds, plastidipped them in two coats of red, then gloss red, then hammered gold to cover up the depressions that were left after the hot glue was removed.
I cut two sets of ten strips for the skirt out of hot pink vinyl at 2 inches wide and then cut the ends into points. The first set of 10 I left enough seam allowance at the top for them to be folded over a belt and then sewn down, about 2 inches. I backed them with the second set of ten that were cut two inches shorter to reduce the bulk in the foldover to get the belt through them easier. I glued the fronts to the backs with rubber cement. Then they were spray painted with gloss red on the front and the back. The red looked a little flat by itself, especially on top of the red tunic, so I mixed some gold puff paint with gold glitter paint and gave each strip a light coating of gold to help texturize it and stand out from the tunic. After that dried, I pulled a bunch of silver conchos out of my jewelry stash and spray painted them gold. We used an awl to punch holes through each strip so that they could be sewn onto the skirt pieces. I had enough to do one large concho at the bottom of each strip, one medium above it, and one smaller one above that, for a total of three conchos on each strip. The students used a large needle and heavy duty thread to sew each one of them down and then we hot glued the edges down as well.
The breastplate needed some repair to its straps and buckles. The rivets had pulled out of the foam on one side and we'd lost some of the elastic belt keepers. front had a crack down the middle anyway, so a little heat gun to reshape it and a little foam clay to fill in the crack was needed.At this point it was obvious that the finishes on the new foam pieces was very different to the original finish on the breastplate. So I took the breastplate and resprayed it with the same hammered gold as the new pieces.
Purchases
We needed to buy more purple pleated silk for Dionysus and some leopard print, as well as sandals, a laurel leaf crown and grapes. Thalia needed gold pleated silk for her chiton and a gold diadem. I bought silver diadems for the other three muses. I bought a beachy sleeveless tunic top, straw sun hat, and jacket for the Dean that's keeping with her green and silver color pallette. I am pairing it with a pair of white cotton drawstring pants and sandals. For her costume as Artemis, I bought a crystal diadem with a silver moon ornament and black and silver sandals. When Dionysus and Thalia come back from exploring the college campus, they are supposed to be dressed in "college spirit attire". I thought it would be funny to put them in Spartan cheer outfits from the SNL skit. We can use the red set of pom poms and the white cheer shoes that I bought last year for She Kills Monsters. I found a great pair of pink/purple flashy dress pants for Brooklyn at Goodwill for $7.99 and then bought a sexy off the shoulder hot pink sweater to go with it off of Amazon and a pair of strappy pink sandals to match. She can also wear them for her Aphrodite costume, since we won't see much of them peeping out from under her pants.
Fittings
Production photos
Greek gods Dionysus (Brendan Phipps, left) and Thalia (Laney Norris) provide classics professor Daphne (Reanna Fornash) inspiration in her quest to recover an ancient manuscript in the McLennan Theatre comedy “The Gods of Comedy” opening on Thursday.
Rod Aydelotte, Tribune-Herald
In his 2019 “The Gods of Comedy,” playwright Ken Ludwig asks the question few ask these days: What would happen if ancient Greek gods visited an American college campus? His answers, of course, come in the form of laughs from what a typical Ludwig comedy provides: colorful personalities, mistaken identities, comic situations spiraling out of control and, occasionally, stage farce. Those comic answers, too, make up most of the reasons McLennan Theatre is tapping “The Gods of Comedy” for four performances beginning Thursday night.
The comedy imagines two college professors of the classics at a momentous, well, moment. Ralph Sargent (CJ Martin) has discovered the manuscript to Euripides’ lost play “Andromeda,” the sort of thing that can make an academic career, fortuitously found in the college library. His colleague Daphne (Reanna Fornash) is thrilled, then promptly misplaces it. Horrified, she calls on the gods for help — a harmless turn of phrase, unless one happens to be wearing an ancient Greek medallion at the time.
The Greek gods Dionysus (Brendan Phipps) and Thalia (Laney Norris) promptly materialize and let’s just say that neither provide the rational help one might get from, say, Athena or Apollo. “It’s a very silly premise,” admitted McLennan Community College theater professor and and play director Kelly Parker. The god of wine and pleasure (Dionysus) and the muse of comedy (Thalia) find unexpected delight in college activities such as eating and sports. They’re also bumblers when it comes to divine powers. It’s the sort of audience-pleasing stage work that Ludwig shows off in his plays “Lend Me a Tenor,” “Moon Over Buffalo,” “Baskerville,” “The Beaux’ Stratagem” and “The Three Musketeers,” the latter two performed by McLennan Theatre in recent years. “It’s verbal and witty and there’s some physical comedy, too,” Parker said.
The 10-person company opens its four-performance run on Thursday at MCC’s Music & Theatre Arts building.
"The Gods of Comedy"
By McLennan Theatre
Performances: 7:30 p.m. Thursday through Saturday, 2 p.m. Sunday at McLennan Community College's Music & Theatre Arts building.
Tickets: $10 and $8. Call 299-8200 for ticket information.
The comedy imagines two college professors of the classics at a momentous, well, moment. Ralph Sargent (CJ Martin) has discovered the manuscript to Euripides’ lost play “Andromeda,” the sort of thing that can make an academic career, fortuitously found in the college library. His colleague Daphne (Reanna Fornash) is thrilled, then promptly misplaces it. Horrified, she calls on the gods for help — a harmless turn of phrase, unless one happens to be wearing an ancient Greek medallion at the time.
The Greek gods Dionysus (Brendan Phipps) and Thalia (Laney Norris) promptly materialize and let’s just say that neither provide the rational help one might get from, say, Athena or Apollo. “It’s a very silly premise,” admitted McLennan Community College theater professor and and play director Kelly Parker. The god of wine and pleasure (Dionysus) and the muse of comedy (Thalia) find unexpected delight in college activities such as eating and sports. They’re also bumblers when it comes to divine powers. It’s the sort of audience-pleasing stage work that Ludwig shows off in his plays “Lend Me a Tenor,” “Moon Over Buffalo,” “Baskerville,” “The Beaux’ Stratagem” and “The Three Musketeers,” the latter two performed by McLennan Theatre in recent years. “It’s verbal and witty and there’s some physical comedy, too,” Parker said.
The 10-person company opens its four-performance run on Thursday at MCC’s Music & Theatre Arts building.
"The Gods of Comedy"
By McLennan Theatre
Performances: 7:30 p.m. Thursday through Saturday, 2 p.m. Sunday at McLennan Community College's Music & Theatre Arts building.
Tickets: $10 and $8. Call 299-8200 for ticket information.