Tensions are high. Nerves are fraught. And William Barfee (pronounced “bar-fay,” he insists), the mucus-membrane impaired participant in the local spelling bee just might have an allergy attack onstage. Welcome to KO’s fall production of “The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee,” a musical that features a lovable menagerie of adolescent oddballs competing for the title. 

KO’s Theater Department turned out a raucous and professional-grade crowd-pleaser directed by Performing Arts Kyle Reynolds Part spelling bee and part therapy session, the musical tells the backstories of six quirky spellers who each bring their emotional package to the competition. There’s Marcy Park, a polyglot (count six languages) who lives in a pressure cooker of excellence and receives a visitation from Jesus Christ in the midst of the competition.  And Leaf Coneybear with questionable sartorial style, including a bike helmet and cape and a dinosaur finger puppet, whose kin continually remind him that he’s the dumb one in the family. And poor, neglected Olive ardently awaits her father’s arrival at the bee and saves him a seat because her mother is enlightening herself in an ashram in India. The allergy-afflicted William Barfee dazzles the competition by spelling his words out with his magic foot. Logainne Schwartz-and-Grubenierre is saddled with a speech impediment and two overbearing dads.  Chip is eliminated from the competition due to an unfortunate and ill-timed distracting physical urge.

Due to the Black Box Theater’s use, the audience sat on the stage of the Roberts Theater, adding to he experience of being part of the show. In fact, Rona Parreetti, one of the show’s announcers, interacted with the audience before the show started. The dialogue is snappy, and the one-liners, some written by Teague Shamleffler, who also plays Principal Panch, one of the bee’s moderators, are on point. When the bee contestants ask for their word in a sentence, Principal Panch delivered irreverent and often thoroughly unhelpful guidance. To wit: when asking a contestant to spell “phylactery” (a small box containing a Hebrew text when praying), Principal Panch offers this example sentence: “Billy, put down the phylactery. We’re Episcopalian.” To the audience’s delight, Graham Hegeman,  Stacey Tomkeil, and students Stella Zimmerman ’25 and Olivia Gallup ’25, make cameo appearances as a bee contestants. 

Through the hilarity, one feeling emerges, and that is a soft spot in which the audience develops for the underdog, the vulnerable. The audience roots for each of these kooky characters as they have their moment in the sun and come into their own.

Cast:

Molly Palmer (Rona Lisa Paretti)

Teague Shamleffer (Vice Principal Douglas Panche)

Miles Gruber (William Barfee)

Sarah Balog (Olive Ostroskly)

Leo Kollen (Leaf Coneybear)

Zaire Ramiz (Mitch Mahoney)

Riley Mapp (Rich Tolentino)

Annie O’Connor (Logainne ScheartzandGrubenierre) 

Marlee Diana (Marcy Park)

Brayden Bak (Jesus)

Jason Chen (understudy for Chip)

Bobby Doubleday (understudy for Barfee, Mahoney)

Lilly Jacobson (understudy for Olive, Logainee, Marcy)

Production:

Kyle Reynolds (Director)

Micahel Bane (Tech Director)

Micahel Bane, Matthew Belo (Set Design)

Logan Michalk (Lighting Tech)

Matthew Belo, Own Roy (Sound Tech)

Cameron Hart, Nika Garfield (Fly Operators)

Anna Burnham, Marco Ramirez (Stagehands)