‘Zombies’ a soaring sendup of sexless ’50s
It may be Eisenhower’s picture on the wall and men who command the Milwaukee Space Center when things get underway in “Zombies from the Beyond,” the James Valcq musical that’s made landing at Skylight Music Theatre under Pam Kriger’s direction.
But as is true with so much about the 1950s during which this musical is set, appearances can be deceiving: you’ve got to read between the lines to know the score.
In this splendidly satirical and slyly subversive show — filled with more alliteration than I could ever squeeze into a sentence — it’s the women who are alive and the men who act like zombies, even before they succumb to the sexy siren spell cast by the soaring, stratospheric soprano of SaraLynn Evenson as Zombina.
Costumed like Zsa Zsa Gabor as the Queen of Outer Space — and calling to mind femme fatales inhabiting other campy 1950s sci-fi thrillers — Zombina and her Zombettes invade Milwaukee, arriving in a salaciously pink and sexualized spacecraft that would have been right at home in last month’s Women’s March.
Zombina’s voice is her secret superpower; when she sings, men become zombified mush.
Major Malone (the hilariously dimwitted Norman Moses), his sexist wingman (a campy Rick Pendzich) and a seemingly sexless scientist (Matt Frye) are sure they’ve got things under control — right up until it’s obvious they don’t. But even before Zombina and her Zombettes zombify them, it’s been clear to us that the Major’s daughter is the straw that stirs this sparkling soda.
Try as she does to dumb herself down as a demure Doris Day double, Mary Malone (a gorgeously voiced Kathryn Hausman) is easily the smartest one in the room; joining forces with an overlooked secretary (Meghan Randolph) and a terrifically toe-tapping delivery boy (Joe Capstick), Mary seeks to save Beer Town in an epic battle atop the Wisconsin Gas Building.
Reflecting the impressive range Valcq has evinced throughout his career, his pastiche of a score channels period musicals and opera. Sentimental crooners like Day and early rock. Doo-wop and, in the musical’s hardest hitting and timely satirical number, Tom Lehrer.
Although Kriger’s actors are overamped — exacerbated by the occasional opening night zombification of a sound system going snap, crackle and pop — they handle these shifts well.
They also largely follow Valcq’s stage direction that they play this material straight, thereby making its wacky scenario and bent characters even more of a stitch.
It’s a young man’s humor; sharp and smart as “Zombies” can be, it doesn’t dive as deep or evince the heart characteristic of Valcq’s later work.
Then again, this is the 1950s: a world of glittering surfaces and happy days that made little room for the highpitched screams of its many aliens — men and women languishing far from heaven, waiting for the 1960s to bring them home.
“Zombies from the Beyond” continues through Feb. 18 at the Cabot Theatre, 158 N. Broadway. For tickets, go online at skylightmusictheatre.org. Read more about this production at TapMilwaukee.com.