OCU To Open 69th Season With Regional Premiere Of Socially Distanced Monty Python's SPAMALOT

Oklahoma City University's award-winning Oklahoma Opera and Music Theater Company will open its 69th season with its first-ever mainstage livestream: a newly unveiled pandemic version of the Tony Award-winning musical comedy Monty Python's Spamalot.

A masked cast will present the regional premiere of Monty Python's SPAMALOT Socially Distant Concert-ish Version, live from OCU's historic Kirkpatrick stage 8 p.m. Friday, Oct. 9, and Saturday, Oct. 10. Both performances will be live-streamed worldwide. Tickets ($10) are available from https://ocu.booktix.com.

Billed as being "lovingly ripped off" from Eric Idle's 1975 film Monty Python and the Holy Grail, the show is an irreverent retelling of the legend of King Arthur, the Knights of the Round Table and the Lady of the Lake that pokes fun at Broadway classics from Andrew Lloyd Webber's The Phantom of the Opera to Stephen Sondheim's Company.

Clive Barnes of The New York Post called the show "Bloody fantastic. Gorgeously silly. Superlative and better."

The 2005 Broadway production won three Tony Awards - including Best Musical, Best Book of a Musical for Eric Idle, and Best Original Score, shared by co-composers Idle and John Du Prez. Its success led to two acclaimed runs in London's West End where the cast continued to search for the Holy Grail and "always look on the bright side of life."

In addition to Miller, the creative team for the production by OCU's Wanda L. Bass School of Music features Dr. Matthew Mailman, music director, and Sheri Hayden, choreographer.

OCU's Oklahoma Opera and Music Theater Company, the nation's longest-running collegiate-based opera and music theater troupe, has won nine National Opera Association Production Awards in nine years, including seven in the past four seasons. The school was named to Playbill's 2018-19 and 2019-20 "Big Ten" lists of Top 10 collegiate training grounds for Broadway performers.

The Company's mainstage season continues Oct. 30-31 with a livestream of Mozart's Così fan tutte, set in the socially distanced 1950s. For details on upcoming performances, visit www.okcu.edu/music.

THE CAST

The show, which will be double-cast, features Joe Caskey and Jack Supan as King Arthur; Troy Freeman and Colton Stricklin as Sir Robin; Sean Ghedi amd Chance Ingalls as Sir Lancelot, The French Taunter, Knight of Ni and Tim the Enchanter; Reid Saari and Charlie Turner as Not Dead Fred and Prince Herbert; Nick Atkins as The Black Knight; Atkins and Christopher Richie as Sir Dennis Galahad and Prince Herbert's Father; Chloe Byars and Maddie Powell as The Lady of the Lake; Kaley McConnaughey and Brianna Reed as Patsy; Sabrina Brush and Emma Krajicek as Dennis's Mother, Sir Bedevere and Concorde; and Jacob Arnold (understudy Sam Pottinger) as Historian.

In the socially distanced ensemble: Landry Champlin, Catherine Garcia, Francesca Iacovacci, Lauren Micke, Leah Mossman, Jacob Arnold, Brandon Barksdale, Cooper Clack, Kaden Mahle, Sam Pottinger and Rodney Thompson.

Director Karen Coe Miller notes: "Last spring, we were disappointed to have to cancel our final show of the season, Monty Python's Spamalot...But then the creators of Spamalot gave us a gift. Theatrical Rights Worldwide released a version adapted for our times. How appropriate for a musical set in the year 932 during a time of plague!

"We are proud to produce Monty Python's Spamalot Socially Distant Concert-ish Version. Expect sets, costumes, projections, and all of your favorite Monty Python characters and gags. Expect a brilliantly sung, danced, and acted show by a fabulous OCU cast in masks, and safely 10 feet away from each other, performing their hearts out to an empty theater.

"Want to see how we do it? This is a new era of creative staging and performance solutions. Join the fun by streaming with us."

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