This goofy two hander is a tribute to enthusiasm, energy and love, as two barely-knowledgable men launch into an unlikely backers audition of their very-loosely-based-on-fact musical about Johannes Gutenberg (as in, it features him inventing a printing press in a vagely middle-ages German town, beyond that, everything else is made up). Stephen Anderson and Ryan Gonzalez are a delightful pair, Anderson as the one who thinks he knows slightly more, and Gonzalez as the slightly more vulnerable one - but you take them both to your hearts immediately as they attempt to do a mega-musical with a wide cast of characters with little more than a pianist, some hats with characters names on them and some cardboard boxes.
I must admit I was expecting this to be a lot more improv-y than it ended up being - between my previous experience with Anderson being his loose-and-ridiculous Ruth, mother of Rose in "Titanique" and exposure to youtube videos of the cameos in the Broadwan Josh Gad/Andrew Rannels run of the show - instead this is a very tight-but-looks-chaotic show, another triumph for Richard Carroll who's previous goes at the "everybody doubles a lot" aesthetic such as Pirates of Penzance has proved the fun of seeing performers stretch themselves. Gonzalez in particular reveals a fair chunk of range between the Evil Monk, the vulnerable maiden Helvetica and the shy composer Bud. The gimmick of the show means that we have a lot of material that falls just between the amateurish and the professional, but songs like "Creepy German Wood", "Might as Well Go To Hell" and the finale "We Eat Dreams" are goddamn earworms and stick in the brain afterwards quite effectively. Zara Stantos as musical director and as accompanist "Charles" holds the musical side together, and choreographer Shannon Burns comes up with clever ideas for things to do that are dancey for two guys who are not meant to be skilled dancers (never mind that Gonzalez recently choreographed "Head over Heels" and smouldered it up in Moulin Rouge before discovering his inner loveable teddy bear in this role).
This is a delightfully silly, inventive show that plays with musical convention, bringing the audience into the shared delusion of Bud and Doug with a surprisingly warm uncynical finale to bring grins to the audience's faces. And why the hell not.
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