Review: JURASSIC PARKING LOT at Seattle Public Theater

Dear Readers, hold onto your butts, they’re back!  The mental patients of The Habit, the ones behind the hilarity of previous hits such as “A Very Die Hard Christmas” and “Titanish”, have once again returned to Seattle Public Theater to musically send up another hit film from the past, and this one has teeth.  Rows and rows of teeth in “Jurassic Parking Lot”.  And it’s exactly what you think it is … and more.

Let’s go through the list and make sure it has everything.  Someone doing a spot on Richard Attenborough as Hammond impression (Sean Vale), check.  The two sane people brought into the project, Dr. Ellie Sattler and Dr. Alan Grant (Kayla Walker and Quinn Armstrong), who end up being the straight men against all the insanity around them, check and check.  Another spot-on impression, this time of Jeff Goldblum playing the lascivious Dr Ian Malcom (Ray Tagavilla), check and, uh, check check check.  The two kids who should never have been on this island full of murderous beasts in the first place, Lexi and Timmy (Rachael Uyeno and Julia Kuzmich), double check.  Brandon Felker who must be in every one of these parodies because he’s hilarious, check.  Oh, I should also say he’s playing Dennis Nedry, the mercenary computer genius that causes the chaos (ah, ah, ah, you didn’t say the magic word), so there’s another check.  A frustrated, chain-smoking Samuel L. Jackson technician, Ray Arnold (Jordan-Michael Whidbey), Mother F***ing check.  A grizzled gamekeeper Muldoon (Jacquelyn Miedema), that’s a check.  And of course, dinosaurs, specifically a cadre of raptors (Amelia Dooley, Katheryn Reed, Tessa “Cricket” James, Helen Roundhill, and again Kuzmich), a handful of checks. 

But it’s not enough for writers Jeff Schell and David Swidler, and director Mark Siano to simply have all the elements, now they must twist and distort them and throw everything else their unstable minds can think of onto the stage.  Who would have thought one of my favorite characters from last night would be Clippy?  Why shouldn’t the raptors be dressed and dancing like the ensemble from the musical “Chicago”?  And why shouldn’t the voice of the truck be that of Gilbert Gottfried?  And so much more. 

The cast is top notch as always, from the principal players down to the one person who only had an ensemble credit, Mary Guthrie, who bounced back and forth between many characters wonderfully.  Armstrong managed to take a straight man and weave in a layer of subtle comedy, making him crazier than any of them.  Felker just blew me away as usual and somehow managed to do most of his performance sitting down.  Tagavilla has the comedic timing of a god, and his Goldblum was so spot on it was creepy.  Kuzmich’s Timmy was killing me as he kept putting himself in danger just to feel the thrill.  And those singing and dancing raptors need a musical of their own.  Just to name some of the delightful on that stage.

Is the show as perfect as some of its predecessors?  No.  It’s a new show, newly on its feet and could use some tightening.  Did that keep me from grinning and laughing all night long?  Hell no!  And so, with my three-letter rating system, I give “Jurassic Parking Lot” at Seattle Public Theater a “Life finds a way” YAY.  As Clippy might say, “It looks like you’re trying to have a super fun evening where you definitely want to leave the kids at home.  Can I help you with that?  Go see “Jurassic Parking Lot” before it’s gone and you’re sad.”

Seattle Awards - Live Stats

Best Musical - Top 3

1. THE COLOR PURPLE (Village Theatre)

7.6% of votes

2. REEFER MADNESS (The Spartan Theatre)

6.9% of votes

3. JOSEPH AND THE AMAZING TECHNICOLOR DREAMCOAT (Spokane Valley Summer Theatre)

5.9% of votes

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