THEATER REVIEW

By SUSAN McCABE

“Xanadu,” a musical continuing this weekend at the new high school theater, is a step back in time two decades to roller skates, leg warmers and headbands (does anyone hear Richard Simmons in the background?). With this final production of Vashon High School’s first season in the new theater, teacher and director Stephen Floyd has introduced a new crop of student performers we’ll all be watching for the next few years.

Drawing primarily on a cast of young and newly minted theater students, Floyd and former VHS principal Susan Hanson provide a delightful evening of memorable music, flashy visuals and tongue-in-cheek satire. Parents and other “elders” will sing along with musical hits made famous by the 1980 film starring Olivia Newton-John, Michael Beck and Gene Kelly. While the film was a critical flop, its musical score by Jeff Lynne and John Farrar, featuring the Electric Light Orchestra, spawned a long-running Broadway hit of the same name.

“Xanadu” follows the journey of magical and beautiful Greek muse Kira, played by Olivia Mangione, who descends from the heavens of Mt. Olympus to Venice Beach, California. She’s on a quest to inspire a struggling artist, Quinn McTighe as Sonny Malone, to achieve the greatest artistic creation of all time — the first roller disco.

Mangione as Kira camps and vamps her way into Malone’s heart and leads him to a successful partnership with the hard-bitten entertainment tycoon Danny McGuire, played by Max Luposzynski. The plot thickens when Kira falls into forbidden love with the mortal Sonny and her jealous sisters take advantage of the situation, thus dooming Kira to eternal damnation from their father god Zeus.

As serious as that sounds, there’s nothing serious about Xanadu the musical. It’s all about following your dreams despite limitations, and, as Zeus says in the play’s final scene, “The greatest achievement of human life and culture is to love someone and create art.”

With instrumental support from pianist Maggie Laird, the VHS cast puts its own stamp on the musical score from the ethereal “Magic,” the romantic duet “Suddenly” and the passionate finale of “Xanadu.” Maya Krah and Hannah Fellbaum mix ominous plot twists with comedy in their duet version of “Evil Woman.” Fellbaum reveals her comic skills throughout the play with hilarious facial contortions and satiric asides. And freshman Isaac Hughes — a veteran Drama Dock performer — teams up with Luposzynski in an imaginatively staged version of “Dancin’” where Luposzynski’s strong voice provides the musical accompaniment for Hughes’ newly acquired tap dancing skills.

This “Xanadu” is a production built from the back out, starting with Craig Hanson’s simply effective set design that takes the story from a California beach to Mt. Olympus with a few skillfully selected set pieces, slides and a lighting assist from lighting designer Tanner Montague. Sue Griffith’s costuming is a star in this production, with more quick changes than the weather during a spring day on Vashon. And freshman stage manager Hazee Montgomery earned high praise from Floyd for her first effort at organizing a musical. Opening night did expose a few kinks in the new theater’s sound system, making the vocals tough to hear on occasion, a problem likely to be corrected in subsequent performances.

It’s worth noting some comments from Floyd in his director’s notes marking the fact that Xanadu is an all-volunteer production by students and faculty who created the show completely outside the school curriculum. Why? Unlike previous years, this school year had no room in the new semester schedule for a musical theater class. Semesters, it seems, reduce students’ opportunities to take elective courses, forcing them to cut demanding theater classes in favor of advanced placement and foreign language classes required for college. Hence, Xanadu is a labor of love and obvious joy from these buoyant young thespians and their adult mentors.

— Susan McCabe is an island writer and Voice of Vashon’s station manager.

“Xanadu” will play at the VHS theater at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Friday and Saturday, and 2 p.m. Sunday. Evening performances are $15 general admission and $12 for students and seniors. Tickets can be purchased at the VHS office, the Vashon Bookshop and at the door.