Pier One Theatre’s production of the “The Addams Family,” a musical, opens on Thursday. The show will run each evening of the weekend starting at 7:30 p.m. for three weeks in July with a total of 12 shows.
This is the third summer performance at the theater and is directed by Jennifer Norton and Eric Simondsen. Choreography is provided by Maura Jones. The show includes a cast of 23 and a full-size orchestra of 15, providing 20 songs and sound effects.
Rehearsals for the show started in mid-May at the Homer High School band room and stage before moving to the Pier One Theatre on the Spit to accommodate other shows in production there. The first full cast and orchestra rehearsal together was on July 1. The cast includes a full age range of performers; the youngest is 9 with several other youth and a full range of adult ages.
Norton said she and Simondsen wanted to find a musical production that included a full orchestra but a relatively small cast to accommodate size limitations of the Pier One stage. “I think it’s a special thing when we get to host the orchestra on the stage here and include them in the process of what the audience can see and experience with the show.”
The show is premised around the Addams Family annual celebration that takes place the first night of year, during which the family comes to a graveyard for a celebration with their ancestors. “Typically, they wake the ancestors up, and they all have a party, and then they send them to their graves to rest until the next year. But this year Uncle Fester says there’s something afoot, and that Wednesday Addams has fallen in love and is planning to get married,” Norton said.
Fester says that this year the ancestors can’t go back in their graves until love triumphs and Wednesday can sort things out. “I would say love is the biggest theme of the show — love and what it means to be family and finding a true sense of identity.”
“Fiddler on the Roof,” Pier One’s final production of the 2024 season, will debut in the middle of October.
Norton pointed out that there are many similar themes in the two musicals, including a father who wants to accommodate his daughter’s interest in marriage while still holding on to family traditions.
The backstage crew for “Addams” is relatively small with Jesse Bolt running sound and Gulliver Norton helping with lights, Norton said. There has also been substantial assistance in set design, often from the cast members themselves, including Michael Selle, Finnley Stineff, Jenna Garrety and Freya Bartlett. Bobby Copeland McKinney has also provided set assistance.
There are several new performers to the Pier One stage in this production but the more seasoned include Carolyn Norton, Val Sheppherd, Maura Jones and August Kilcher.
