Culture

Fur Rondy Melodrama celebrates 25 years of villains, damsels and preposterous puns

"Déjà Vu All Over Again in Chicken, Alaska" is being billed as the 25th anniversary of the Fur Rondy Melodrama. Dennis Sullivan, who plays the villainous Throckmorton Dirtbag, has been in 24 of them.

"I was working in real estate when one of my colleagues asked if I wanted to be in a show with 65 women," he recalled at a rehearsal this week. "That sounded like a good deal to me."

"I've been the villain for the past 15 years," he added between practicing his dark "Bwa-ha-ha" laugh and adjusting his sinister top hat. "My first part was as Pious Pete the Preacher. I went downhill quickly, landed at the bottom and stayed there."

A quarter century may sound like a long time, but a melodrama has been part of the Rondy roundup for many years more. In fact, stock melodrama productions appear to have been part of the Anchorage scene since before the annual winter celebration started, probably as far back as tent city days.

Easy-to-get-to records show that members of a religious sect from Homer known as the WKFL were staging melodramas in an Anchorage bar before statehood. The show was so successful that it was extended for a couple of weeks past the original run.

By the 1980s an ad hoc group called the Rondy Players were staging the show as part of Fur Rendezvous. The shows flaunted titles like "Airport 1904" (1986); "Jekyll Hydes Again" (1987); "Lily the Virtuous Seamstress" (1988); and "The Secret of Yonder Mountain" (1989).

"Lily" had previously been done by the now-defunct Theatre Guild; many performers worked with both groups. In 1990 the Guild opted to get back into the melodrama game after a previously announced show fell through. The result was the charming "The Perilous Decline of Cora Sline: or Don't Touch My Tutu," the official Rondy show at the Elks Lodge -- now the Snow Goose Theater -- and a hastily put together "The Great Western Melodrama" at Sydney Laurence Theatre.

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"The Guild should have stopped while it was behind," Anchorage Daily News critic Elizabeth Pulliam ?wrote of "Great Western." "The production is a disaster. Not only does the Guild's melodrama compete with the traditional Rondy melodrama, but it does so in the fancy Alaska Center for the Performing Arts, where you can't even throw popcorn."

The Guild moved out of the center shortly after that when it couldn't pay the rent. It soon shuffled into oblivion.

Meanwhile, the Alaska Sourdough Chorus, the local chapter of the Sweet Adelines, saw an opportunity. In the summer of 1990, director Sue Hahn wrote up a script titled "Sophie's Sourdough Saloon" that the chorus presented at the familiar Elks Lodge location. It reveled in the campy stock characters and delivered well-known songs with energy. Described as "lighthearted and well done," it was revised as "The Crudehole Bay Caper, or The Continuing Saga of Sophie's Sourdough Saloon" for the official Rondy Melodrama of 1991. The Sweet Ads, now the Alaska Sound Celebration, has mounted the show every year since.

Not that they've mounted the same show. The rules of melodrama require it to tell the same story over and over again: The bad guy threatens the damsel, the hero intervenes in the nick of time, bad guy is thwarted, happy ending. But the setting and circumstances can be all over the place -- as long as the singing is really good and the jokes are really bad and sort of timely. In recent years we've seen the Rondy Melodrama parody science fiction and horror genres, Indiana Jones and "Pirates of the Caribbean."

"Déjà Vu" will have the same reliable setting that has been featured in most of the previous shows, a sourdough bar during gold rush days.

"It's more of a classic throwback," said director Mike Daniels. "For the 25th anniversary, we thought we'd return to the roots."

Hahn, who has written most of the previous shows presented by the chorus, is back for this one, co-writing it with Holly Karjala. Following the custom of giving characters names that reflect their personalities, we'll see Hugh Demann coming to the rescue of Saran Dippity Springblossom. Names from previous shows have included Illy Amna, Persephone Proudheart, Goldust Gertie, Cyril Twigbucket, Rip Cord, Skalawag Skag Skagway and Sheriff "Dutch" Harbor.

It may sound like idle amusement, but Hahn's work with the chorus in general and with the Rondy Melodrama in particular was cited when she was selected to be Lady Trapper in the 2000 Rendezvous.

If past scripts are anything to go by, one can expect ridiculous situations, preposterous puns and one-liners and over-the-top campy theatricality. At Monday's tech rehearsal I got a glimpse of one scene that would be spoiled if revealed but will likely cause beer to shoot out the nose of anyone trying to take a drink when it happens.

Beer, along with other drinks, is available at each show and a mug or two is recommended for cognoscenti seeking to indulge in an authentic melodrama experience. Food is likewise available, but the most important edible is popcorn, which is not so much to be nibbled as thrown at the villain at specific times. Loud cheers and booing are de rigueur.

In the midst of the mayhem, you'll also hear a lot of good music. The Alaska Sound Celebration chorus is known for excellent intonation and diction. Their part of the bill includes rousing performances of "Holding Out for a Hero" (sung while the principals indulge in a hilarious slow-motion fist fight), "Come Fly with Me," "Can-Can" and a cantata recounting "The Shooting of Dan McGrew," sung while the action is pantomimed onstage.

That's not just my opinion. The chorus is the current Sweet Adelines International regional champion, as they were in 2012. They came in 14th at the international championships. "They'll be trying to get to 12th this year in Las Vegas," said Sullivan. "I'll be there in the audience."

Because his wife, Tammy, will be there in the chorus. They met while doing the melodrama.

Finally, when you're at the show, get a good look at Sullivan's curling and properly villainous moustache. He's previously sported a stick-on piece but for the last year he's been growing his own -- and it's a beauty.

The family-friendly show is one of the most popular theatrical events in town. It repeatedly sells out and the clamor for tickets is so great that it runs for a week after Rondy is over.

Déjà Vu All Over Again in Chicken, Alaska, the Fur Rondy Melodrama

8 p.m. Thursday-Saturday, with a 3 p.m. matinee on Saturday, and 1 and 5 p.m. Sunday through March 14

Snow Goose Theater, 717 W. Third Ave.

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Tickets: $21 to $27 at centertix.net and 263-2787

At a glance

A list of melodramas produced by the Alaska Sound Celebration in the past 25 years (as best as we can figure):

1990 (summer) Sophie's Sourdough Saloon

1991 The Crudehole Bay Caper, or The Continuing Saga of Sophie's Sourdough Saloon

1992 Sophie's Sourdough Saloon

1993 The Deadmoose Gulch Caper

1994 The Shake-Up in Too Damn Cold, Alaska

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1995 Havoc in Helluva Drive

1996 Wacky Wipeout in Wildhorse

1997 Klondike Kate's Mail-Order Bride Business

1998 Show me the Nuggets

1999 Been There Buttercup's Burleycue Boarding House

2000 The Millennium Comes to the Klondike

2001 The Fable of Furbankinthebushes

2002 The Tour de Force that Rocked the World

2003 Detour! Shortkeetna, Alaska Dead Ahead!

2004 No Clue in Kotzebue

2005 The Saga of the Stagger Inn Hotel

2006 The Billiken of Bethel

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2007 Attu2u2 - A Melodrama on Attu Island

2008 Back in the Roarin' 20's

2009 Calamity at Clifford the Big Red Dog Mine

2010 Pirates of the Aleutians: Saloon Girls Gone Wild

2011 The Merry Monsters of Matsylvania

2012 Alyeska Jones and the Viking Crypt

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2013 Turnagain Temptations

2014 The Alaska Avengers -vs- Dr. Despicable

2015 Déjà Vu All Over Again in Chicken, Alaska

Mike Dunham

Mike Dunham was a longtime ADN reporter, mainly writing about culture, arts and Alaska history. He worked in radio for 20 years before switching to print. He retired from the ADN in 2017.

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