Little Shop of Edgewater

Little Shop of Horrors is known for the scrawny lead, the abused woman, and a plant hungry for blood. Our drama department performed with a full gray face the story of Little Shop from April 13-15.

   If you’re unfamiliar the summary of the play, without spoiling anything, a scrawny flower shop worker, Seymour (Julian Perez), is working for Mushnik (Max Plocki), and the shop is nearing bankruptcy.  Seymour is clearly in love with his co-worker Audrey (Jessica Hammond) who is sadly involved with an abusive dentist, Orin (Harrison Newton). Seymour creates a new and exciting plant and he names it Audrey II (controlled by Raymond Mills) and the plant saves the business. Seymour finds that Audrey II only feeds only on human flesh and blood. Throughout the play, Seymour tries to maintain his fame along with the bloodthirsty ways of Audrey II.

   Perez’s performance along with the rest of the cast was fantastic. The men and women who walked on that stage took on the role of their characters throughout the entire play. I wasn’t bored for a moment.

I do have to say I was most excited by Newton’s performance as Orin the dentist, he was screaming, projecting, and taking control of everyone in the audience.

   Now, with every good side, there is a bad side. While the acting was magnificent, the band was playing much louder than the actors were talking. At certain points in the play, I couldn’t understand what was going on because I couldn’t hear the actor’s lines. The band played very well but there was no coordination with the sound team throughout scenes.

   If you didn’t get a chance to see the play you really did miss out on an amazing performance. I would give Edgewater’s theater group four out of five stars for their portrayal of Little Shop of Horrors.