Review of ‘Heathers: The Musical’ at Clear Space Theatre

“Heathers: the Musical” is a black comedy based on the 1989 cult classic film “Heathers.” The musical had a tryout production in Los Angeles and a brief 2014 run Off-Broadway in New York City. It’s currently near the end of a 12-week run in London.

Ostensibly the musical is about an American high school where a nobody becomes somebody by sucking up to a trio of obnoxious snotty girls who constitute the in-crowd. The girl falls for a boy who turns out to be a murderous psychopath who wants to kill all the other students by blowing up the school. Great material for a musical? It’s black comedy!

Black comedy is a style that makes fun of subjects that are taboo. At its best, even though providing entertainment, black comedy can make an audience feel uncomfortable about what they are seeing and hearing. Hopefully, it will provoke serious thought about the painful subjects.

“Heathers: the Musical” is chock-full of horrible behavior: lying, deceit, constant bullying, dirty tricks, sexual harassment, attempted rape, foul language, suicide and threatening with a gun at school. David Button, artistic director of Clear Space and director of the musical, writes in the program that the company’s vision is to provide “artistic endeavors of integrity and risk...to offer more genres that are edgier and more contemporary.” That’s very noble, and Button should be applauded for doing what it takes to achieve those goals, for example, programming challenging plays such as “Wit” and “Rabbit Hole,” and the musical “Fun Home.”

Button’s “Heathers” is slick, fast-moving and has a large cast of talented actors who act, sing and dance up a storm. The show provides tons of star turns for many, and that probably helped recruit such a gifted cast. Clear Space has proved it can do terrific musical productions with mostly local talent.

Clear Space veteran Devon Frieder choreographed the campy 1980s dance with gusto, and she also plays Veronica, the female lead. “Mamma Mia!” is scheduled for 2019, so we’ll probably see lots more of those fun dance moves.

Rodrigo M. Zaragoza plays Jason, the psycho boyfriend, and there is no doubt that he can be very, very scary. Frieder and Zaragoza have played these roles together previously, and they are a good match. They carry their leading roles with aplomb.

Mackenzie Jones, Julia Sturla and Evan Hartnett play the Heathers, spoiled teen beauty queens who are terminally stuck-up. They are obnoxious beyond imagination and lots of fun to hate.

Connor Hall and Jacob Waldron are perfect as the incredibly dumb but cute and hunky high school football stars Ram and Kurt. Think “Hey Dude, Where’s My Car?” Their scenes are over-the-top, sidesplittingly funny. Many in the audience probably enjoyed that they were mostly naked for much of the show.

The fathers of the football players, played by Dan Carney and Andy Nyland, get to strut their stuff in a bold new way in a wonderful scene in the second act. I can’t mention the name of the song without spoiling the surprise.

The most touching moment of the show belongs to Lorriane Steinhoff, whose haunting solo, “Kindergarten Boyfriend” was sung with such delicacy and passion that many members of the audience were moved to tears.

As usual, Eddy Seger effectively created a minimalist set, mostly a backdrop and two side flats. Steinhoff is not only a fine actress but also an excellent costume designer whose ‘80s outfits were spot-on. Music director Melanie Bradley and her small band sounded fine and provided strong musical accompaniment. On opening night, the sound was consistent, but perhaps too edgy and loud.

Both the London and Clear Space productions will close later this month, but Paramount will premiere Heathers as a television series Thursday, Oct. 25. Originally set to begin its run in March, the series was delayed following the Stoneman Douglas High School shootings. Because of concerns about the content, the producers were required to make many cuts and reduce the number of episodes.

Meanwhile, there is one weekend left to catch “Heathers: The Musical” at Clear Space Theatre. It’s worth seeing as a first-rate production, but even more importantly because it’s about critical issues experienced daily, and not just by high school students. Go see “Heathers” for fun but afterward, think about the terrible behaviors and what we can do to prevent them.

Remaining performances are at 7 p.m., Friday and Saturday, and 3 p.m., Sunday. There is a special performance at 7 p.m., Wednesday, Oct. 31. Tickets are $17 to $32.