Friends and Neighbors

It may be a musical comedy by genre, but there were times as I watched the Brainerd Community Theatre’s production of Mean Girls that had me so stressed out I felt like I was wriggling out of my skin. Co-directors Amy Borash and Travis Chaput are able to capture the anxieties of being in high school uncannily well. Of course, when you’re a teenager all of your emotions are magnified tenfold anyway, but in this production the emotional fallout of the shattered friendships and revealed secrets reaches a borderline apocalyptic tone. That makes it all the more impressive by how the show still manages to bring everything together with a finale that manages to be truly cathartic and moving in a way that feels truly earned.

Mean Girls is, of course, Tina Fey’s stage musical adaptation of her hit 2004 comedy about a teen named Cady (Mekayla Van Santen), previously homeschooled while living in Africa with her parents, who enters an American school for the first time in her sophomore year of high school. There’s a fun running gag in the show where Cady, raised mostly around wildlife, compares the dog-eat-dog nature of high school social orders to the actual carnage of the animal kingdom, and she’s not too far off. She learns early on through the guidance of classmates Janise (Sarah Larson) and Damian (Noah Barnhart) that the school is run by a strict hierarchy of cliques, and above all lie the Plastics, led by the imposing Regina George. Gwendolyn Bowen was originally cast as Regina George, but as a result of a medical emergency, the role was played in the performance I watched by Marie Fahey, who originally served as the show’s intimacy coordinator. Watching the performance, you’d never suspect Fahey was a last-minute replacement – she gives Regina all of the charisma, spunk, and deviousness the role requires. She makes a great foil to Mekayla Van Santen, who brings great sincerity to the role of Cady, in a deceptively difficult role. She has to play the earnest heroine who slides into meanness without realizing she has done anything wrong. Van Santen does this so effectively you could risk missing the character arc. At one point I was considering  if the true lead of the show might actually have been Sarah Larson’s Janise, as she’s the one who convinces Cady to infiltrate and subvert Regina’s circle in the first place, and she has an entire arc of her own as the witnesses both the personal and wider consequences of her actions.

This circle includes Natalie Topete as Gretchen, always eager to please, whether it be Regina or anybody else who enters her social circle.  She’s joined by Karen (Mehayla Van Santen), who steals scenes with her dim-bulb tendencies. Some people are said to have difficulty walking and chewing gum at the same time – for Karen, standing and breathing simultaneously seems to be pushing her limit. Cady initially seems if not charmed by Regins at least impressed by the power she holds amongst her classmates (the song “Apex Predator” ties this to the aforementioned wildlife theme) and soon finds herself spending more and more time with them. She also finds herself drawn to Aaron (Leopold Famoso, charming and endearing) a cute guy in her calculus class. Her song “Stupid With Love” is a very charming expression of an awkward crush, one that becomes dangerous when she learns Aaron is Regina’s ex. Not wanting to risk her friendship with Regina by making a move but still wanting to spend time with Aaon, Cady downplays her own mathematical abilities in order to get him to tutor her. But soon Regina learns of Cady’s interest in Aaron, and when Regina takes him back at a Halloween party, Cady becomes driven to finally bring her down.

This is a faithful adaptation of the film, and Tina Fey updated it by incorporating social media into the story. There’s even a very funny song in Act II called “Stop” where Damian encourages Cady to hold back on the posting. This number and a few other places in the show had some audio imbalance, with the sound of the music and dancing drowning out the dialogue, but it only mattered briefly. You can always count on fun choreography from shows Amy Borash is involved in, and this one is no exception. There’s energetic dance numbers throughout and even some fun fight sequences. It’s all very elevated and very funny, but as the show takes pains to point out, the issues surrounding bullying are very real. Everybody’s gotten a thrill of taking someone down a peg, and everybody’s faced the pain of being targeted (ESPECIALLY in the age of social media). A show as goofy as this isn’t going to change the world, but it’s at least nice to know it takes its subject matter seriously – there’s even a song given to Regina’s mother (a character who was a total cartoon in the movie) reminding the audience that despite her pretense of being a “cool mom” it is still hard work to be a parent.

Mean Girls is funny, exciting, and by the end surprisingly moving. I didn’t expect to have tears in my eyes while watching this, but as the cast performed “I See Stars” it truly created an emotional moment that brought it all together. It made being reminded of all the anxieties that came with high school worth it.

MEAN GIRLS plays at the Chalberg Theatre at Central Lakes College through August 1st