Review: NUNSENSE Lets The Little Sisters Of Hoboken Loose On Unsuspecting Audiences

Reviewed by Barry Lenny, Friday 20th May 2016

It is most surprising that Dan Goggin's musical, Nunsense, is not seen more often in Adelaide. It is decades since I last saw a production. The Blackwood Players have put that to rights with a production in cabaret format; bring your own supper, with drinks available for purchase at the venue. It is such a popular show that there are now six sequels. Perhaps the company will consider adding the others to their list of potential future productions, having seen the success of their opening night with the original one.

The Little Sisters of Hoboken have a financial problem. Sister Julia, Child of God, almost wiped out the entire order with her vichyssoise, 52 succumbing to her cooking disaster. There were only nineteen survivors, who had been out playing bingo at the time. Having raised a large sum of money to bury the deceased nuns, the Mother Superior, Sister Mary Regina, misjudged the amount in the kitty and splurged on a plasma television. This was originally a camcorder and VCR. They now need to raise more money for the funerals of the last four of their past members, whose bodies are in the convent freezer, and to do so they are putting on a concert.

There is a more elaborate storyline, telling the history of the order, but it is this basic premise that permits a series of diverse acts to be performed by the nuns, and we learn a little about the sisters along the way. It is, in effect, a very comical variety show, and who could resist tap dancing nuns clad in the old traditional black outfits.

Sister Mary Hubert, the Mistress of Novices, is the number two in the convent, but has an eye on the number one spot. Since Sister Mary Leo is now the only novice, Sister Mary Hubert's workload is somewhat reduced, giving her more time to compete with Sister Mary Regina, as we see during their show. Sister Robert Anne was a streetwise kid from Brooklyn who was used to taking hard knocks, before joining the order, and poor Sister Mary Amnesia lost her memory when a crucifix fell on her head and cannot remember who she is. These five characters are the normal full cast of the show but, for this production, the company has expanded the forces by adding a few extra nuns as a chorus, joining in on all of the ensemble numbers.

Amanda James is Sister Mary Regina, a former circus performer with a love of the spotlight. James presents her as something of a control freak who, we suspect, would happily do the whole fund raising show herself, given a chance. She is certainly the ring-mistress of this little ecclesiastical circus. James puts in plenty of energy and a highlight is when the Reverend Mother hilariously investigates a package found hidden in the girls dressing room.

Eve McMillan plays Sister Mary Hubert and she creates a strong-willed nun who is a perfect foil for the Mother Superior as they continually try to get one up on each other. It is not hard to see that the Mistress of Novices is the power behind the throne. McMillan has great comic timing can really belt out a song.

Sister Robert Anne is played by Katharine Chase, who gives her role just what it needs to convince as a woman who grew up in Brooklyn, fending for herself. Chase has the audience gasping and laughing whenever the Sister drops an inappropriate comment. She gives the character an edge when assigned to the position of understudy, coupled with a determination to find a chance to perform.

Karina Black plays Sister Mary Amnesia, giving a superb performance as the perpetually vague and forgetful Sister. She introduces Sister Mary Amnesia's far from holy and respectful glove puppet, Sister Mary Annette, in the number, So You Want to be a Nun, describing the life as a member of an order. Black treats her double role in this number as the puppeteers did in Avenue Q, singing in two voices without attempting ventriloquism, which allows her to give the puppet a powerful voice.

Tiffany Barbary is Sister Mary Leo, the novice with an ambition to become the first nun ballerina. Barbary offers some good pointe work in her main number, but she doesn't stop there. Dance numbers run through the performance and she shows skill in many styles, as well as demonstrating that she can sing as well as anybody else on stage.

Koah Barbary, Jessica Knight, Katherine Shaw, Nicolle Vale, and Georgina Lumb form the additional chorus. This makes the ensemble numbers look and sound very impressive and fits in with the story that the best five were picked out of the nineteen remaining nuns for this fundraiser, meaning that there are another fourteen to cover the rest of the functions of staging their show, such as Sister Myopia on the wayward follow spotlight. Adding a few more nuns as a chorus members fits neatly into the production with no explanations needed, and with such a fine group of performers it makes good sense to use them.

The set is close enough to the one in the film made a couple of years after the production was first produced and lighting is relatively straight forward. One criticism of the technical side of the performance, though, is that the cuing of the microphones was too often late, or at a low level to begin with. One can only hope that a few runs will have sorted that out.

Director and choreographer, Selena Britz, and the two musical directors, Kristy Williamson, taking care of the instrumental music, and Lauren Bannard, looking after the vocals, have created a production that is a lot of fun, and a night out that had the audience laughing and applauding from start to finish. Load up the picnic basket and head for the hills to Blackwood to catch this one.

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