Review: BUGS’ Urinetown is a Privilege to See
The Alumnae Hall bathrooms flooded on the night I saw Urinetown, which was a little on the nose for a musical about people who can’t visit the bathroom whenever they want. If it had been any other show, one might have been able to make a crude joke here, but Molly Littman ‘21 directs BUGS’ fall show with such self-awareness that any satire of Urinetown is impossible, unless Urinetown is doing the satirizing.
Writers Mark Hollmann and Greg Kotis were inspired by a European pay toilet to write an entire, self-sustaining musical centered on a multinational corporation (Urine Good Company) that charges money in exchange for access to the only bathrooms left in the world. A water shortage has left the world desperate to conserve its resources, and this is the only option. And you can’t just go in the bushes, because… well, the police will catch you, OK? Sure. Any close examination of the plot here isn’t fruitful, because the plot isn’t remotely the point. No one gets a ticket to Urinetown to find out whether the rebellious Bobby Strong (Daniel Kushner ‘20) will defeat the evil Caldwell B. Cladwell (Cooper Cardone ‘23) and win the lovely Hope Cladwell (Kathleen Clum ‘22), his daughter. It’s the fourth-wall breaking and the splashy song-and-dance that we come for.
It’s no surprise, then, that the characters with little-to-no connection to the plot make the biggest splash. Dylan Douglas ‘22 and Lucy Kaufman ‘22 are hilarious as the narrating duo; Douglas sneaks in quite a few opportunities to stray off script, with winning results. Among the (large) ensemble, Littman has established such a consistent ironic tone that it’s impossible to find a weak link. Even when the book waxes sincere, revolutionaries and senators alike wink at the audience with a refreshing enthusiasm.
And the song-and-dance! As the rigid Penelope Pennywise, Alyssa DeVilla ‘23 is given a chance to belt into the stratosphere early in the evening (“It’s A Privilege to Pee”), and the showstoppers only pile on from there. Zoe Zimmerman ‘22 choreographs with such versatility (Kickline! Hora! Cossacks!) that Urinetown very often becomes a visual spectacle, and the stage rarely looks as crowded as one might expect with a cast of 25. By the time Act II was chugging along, inevitably, I was reminded why most musicals write characters that the audience can invest in. I can’t say I was particularly concerned about whether the rebels were going to topple the big bad business, nor was I given to any close-examination of the moral (Urinetown is… here? Urinetown is… death? Urinetown is… me?). I was far more interested in the vessel than the content, and Littman’s staging was more than enough to entertain from beginning to end.
The gentle hum of the vacuum that was battling the bathroom flood only served to make the whole night a little bit funnier.
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