Critic’s Pick
Hot Damn! The creators of Don’t Cross the Streams: The Cease and Desist Musical, the hilarious hit from the 2012 Cincy Fringe, are back with another entry. And the great news is that this show is even better.
There’s a lot to love about this little gem of a musical. Let’s start with Mike Hall and Joshua Steele, the talented playwrights and songwriters who have crafted a riotously funny but infectiously endearing tale centered around the supposedly true legend of a man-sized frog that’s been terrorizing Loveland, Ohio, since the 1950s.
With splendid witty direction by Mike Sherman and a top-notch Bluegrass band led by music director Steve Goers (also featuring John Jacobs on acoustic bass, Jack Bogard on fiddle and banjo and Brad Myers on guitar and mandolin), this compact 75-minute show is a joy from start to finish.
While the Loveland Chamber of Commerce might not appreciate it, Hall and Steele have created a lovable, over-the-top Loveland that is a sort of redneck heaven, a Dogpatch on the Little Miami, populated with backwater oddballs in search of the elusive monster.
The terrific, funny cast includes Joe Hornbaker as the good ol’ boy narrator, sincere Kelcey Steele and sweet Erin Ward as young lovers, Abby Rowold as a mysterious blind woman, Randy Lee Bailey as a dim-witted moonshiner, Miranda McGee as his sex-crazed accomplice, Reggie Willis as the last living Twightwee Indian, and Bill Hartnett and Myers (doing double duty from the band) as a pair of crooked cops.
It’s a testament to the time and creativity that Hall and Steele plus their cast and crew have put into this show that there are so many wonderful comic bits, lines and lyrics that fly by. I won’t spoil any of the gags for you, but pay attention or you’ll miss a lot.
Opening night for The Loveland Frog was sold out, and this show looks like it’s going to be the hottest ticket of the 2014 Fringe. If you want to see it — and you do, you really, really do — you better hop to it!
HOT DAMN! IT’S THE LOVELAND FROG! will be performed 5 p.m. June 1, 9 p.m. June 3, 8:45 p.m. June 5 and 8 p.m. June 7 at Art Academy Commons (1212 Jackson St., Over-the-Rhine).
This article appears in May 28 – Jun 3, 2014.