Honk! Delights Audiences on Opening Weekend

Honk! opened to rave reviews from audiences members this weekend. A long time audience member said that this was her second favorite show she has seen at KFT (after Sound of Music), and she has seen a lot of shows. She absolutely loved the show, and is planning to bring friends back to see it.

Here is an excerpt from Michael C. Moore's review in the Kitsap Sun, May 25, 2014:

"Much like its main character, the musical “Honk!” is sort of a strange duck . . . and yet . . . there, at the end, was a swan. Director Adam Othman, at the KFT helm for the first time, plays to the show’s strengths (it’s awfully, awfully cute, with some effective songs from Anthony Drewe and George Stiles) . . . much of its humor is quite clever . . .  [You will enjoy] listening to Othman’s and musical director Amy Beth Nolte’s collection of splendid singers and immaculate accompaniment by Greg Smith and Victoria Casteel, watching the lovely bits of business and physical comedy contrived by Othman and choreographer Heather Dawson, and enjoying Barbara Klingberg’s simple but colorful and evocative costumes.

. . . there are plenty of genuine laughs to go with the emotion of Andersen’s original messages; you know, “beauty is only skin deep,” and “it’s what’s on the inside that counts.”

The cast is stocked with great voices — Beaven Walters [as Ida, Ugly’s mom], Meagan Castillo (as Ida’s intolerant friend Maureen), Kelly Goode (as the goose squadron’s aide de camp), Jenny Dreessen and Molly Hall (as a pair of overly domesticated house pets) and 13-year-old Katie Dreessen (as a swan) chief among them. Jason Gingold also sings well and carries a lot of the show’s comic responsibility as a cat who’s planning to have young Ugly over for dinner, hold the “over.”

The show also features a whole barnyard full of cute kids — many of them the progeny of older cast members, playing various chicks and ducklings and even fish.

But man-of-the-match honors have to go to Nick McCarthy, who plays Ugly with the perfect combination of pluck and pathos, getting laughs one minute and setting lower lips a’quiver the next. He bolsters his strong, unaffected acting with a good singing voice and some impressive dance moves."

Three more weekends to come see it – don't miss out on this funny and touching story.