BWW Reviews: Theatreworks' PSYCHO BEACH PARTY Flounders in the Water

You'd think a play called Psycho Beach Party would be a little more, well....crazy. But Charles Busch's affectionate parody of 1960s beach movies seldom seems more unhinged than the cheerful teen romps it draws inspiration from. Oh, it's not all sun and fun in the sand, to be sure. There's a fair amount of sexual kink, a domineering mother who could give Margaret White a run for her money, and revelations of a tragic past, but it all feels so light. The poster for the Theatreworks production, featuring a knife-wielding beach bunny, promises a gruesome good time that the play never really delivers.

Busch, one of the world's premier drag artists, created the role of Chicklet (Doug Atkins), a perky tomboy out on the beach with her pals Marvel-Ann (Anna Faye Hunter) Berdine (Bethany Eilean Talley). While Marvel-Ann looks for a mate and Berdine spouts philosophy, Chicklet wants to learn how to surf. Only the beach bums don't want Chicklet in their boy's club, and her strict mother (Kate Berry) won't approve the money to buy a board. And then there's Chicklet's disturbing tendency to suddenly transform into sexually aggressive femme fatale who calls herself Anne Bowman....

All of this sounds like a setup for some good black comedy, except there's not a whole lot black about it. Things start to look promising with the arrival of Berry as the Joan Crawford-esque Mrs. Forrest, who vamps melodramatically and torments her daughter in a wonderfully horrible fashion. But for all of Mrs. Forrest's ranting about the ways of the flesh, and "Anne Bowman's" professed goal of world domination, things never get much darker than a serial attacker with a penchant for shaving their victims' bodies. How black can your comedy be when the worst atrocities are visited on the character's pompadours?

Still, the cast does have a good time as they cavort on Jonathan Wentz' charming, sandy beach and boardwalk. Jordan Mathews delivers smug machismo (and a sneaking submissive streak) as local surf god The Great Kanaka, and Jessica Parnello is a lot of fun as a sweetly ditzy B-movie actress on the hunt for her breakout role. The laugh lines are delivered well ("Are you incognito?" "No, I'm Scotch-Irish."), and the production does a good job of capturing the silly B-movie feel of the source material. But sometimes it can be very hard to distinguish between what's poking fun at the cheese and camp of the beach movie genre, and what's just plain cheesy.

PSYCHO BEACH PARTY plays now through November 9th at the Dusty Loo Bon Vivant Theater, Wednesdays through Saturdays at 7:30pm, Saturday matinees November 1st and 8th at 2pm and Sundays at 4pm. For tickets, call the box office at 719-255-3232 or visit theatreworkscs.org.