52nd City

"Reefer Madness": Q/A w/ Donna Northcott

It's the final weekend for the latest Magic Smoking Monkey Theatre production, "Reefer Madness." It'll be playing two shows a night on both Friday and Saturday evenings at the MSMT's now-regular venue at the Regional Arts Commission.

We decided to bug founder/director Donna Northcott on Thanksgiving with five questions about the current show, cast and crew. She was kind enough to put aside the holiday traditions for a bit of impish, cyber-chat.

What was the initial appeal of "Reefer Madness," in regards to a Monkey reworking?
It's classic Monkey: late 1930's, overly intense, a film that takes itself way too seriously. We almost did "Reefer" a couple of years ago, but at that time Scott Miller was planning to do "Reefer Madness: The Musical" with New Line, which would have been running immediately after our production, with both shows at the ArtLoft. =Since we hadn't yet officially announced "RM," I agreed to go with my back-up plan: "The One Hour Star Wars Trilogy." Which worked out well for everyone. So, RM has been on a back burner for awhile, and I was glad to finally give it the Monkey treatment.

Any new actors this time around? Any long-timers taking this one off?
There are a lot of new actors this time around - almost half the cast. I was concerned when several of the regulars (Amy Elz, Julie Layton, Drew Bell, Dave Cooperstein, Donna Weinsting, Oscar Madrid) were not going to be available due to a variety of schedule conflicts. But it worked out very well, and we discovered some excellent new actors: Jessica Jackson, Roger Erb, Jamie Pitt, Kimmie Mason, Leo Barzcewski, Jeremy Thomas, and Kine Brown.

My guess is that a lot of people know of the movie, but haven't actually seen it. Is that true, or are people well-versed with the original?
I think you're right - almost everyone knows the title, but not that many have actually seen the movie. Some are now familiar with it, after having seen the musical version. And some recognize a couple of rather iconic images: Hot Fingers Maloney, the drug-addled piano player, and Ralph Wilkie laughing maniacally while hopped up on reefer.

Any particularly good anecdotes from show nights, to this point? No one's fallen of the stage or lost their wigs or any such thing?
Nothing catastrophic - no walls falling down or anything. But in the final week of rehearsal, there are the odd moments of actors shouting "bang!" before remembering that we now have a sound system, or worrying about Abe Lincoln getting stuck in a doorway. But hey, we have one more weekend left, so we're not out of the woods yet.

Have any of your actors "gone method" and smoked up the mad cheeba to get in the proper frame-of-mind each night?
We have a strict "don't ask, don't tell" policy. What happens in the dressing room, stays in the dressing room. Really. I hear all sorts of frightening, other-worldly noises coming from backstage before the show - some don't even seem human. And the smells... don't ask. My feeling is, the less I know, the better. As long as the show goes on, I don't ask any questions.