Jesus (James Rudolph II) and Bonnie (Amanda Disney) go for a drive in Sloppy Bonnie
SLOPPY BONNIE
No Puppet Co
Through July 15, $10
www.sloppybonnie.com
John Waters’s Serial Mom meets The Dukes of Hazzard in No Puppet Co.’s campy, devilishly sly Sloppy Bonnie: A Roadkill Musical (for the Modern Chick!), streaming through July 15. Yes, it can get overly silly and repetitive and feels stretched out at ninety minutes, but it’s also tons of fun. Filmed in front of a live audience on an outdoor stage at OZ Arts in Nashville in June, Sloppy Bonnie has been enhanced for online viewing with all-out-goofy cartoonish animation, from abstract shapes and handwritten text to such scenic elements as trees, chairs, doors, buildings, signs, animals, and car parts, as if someone was having a blast playing around with various Instagram stickers. (The illumination and design is by Phillip Frank.)
Amanda Disney stars as the title character, a southern gal in a denim skirt and checkered gingham shirt who is on the road in her 1972 pink Chevy Nova to see her fiancé, Jedidiah, a youth pastor in training at Camp New Life Bay on Shotgun Mountain. Her story is being told by Chauncy (Curtis Reed) and Dr. Rob (James Rudolph II), the hosts of Cosmic Country Radio. “Your Morning Moral this morning is the moral of the American Woman,” Dr. Rob announces. This American woman, a special ed teacher in Sulfur Springs, is hell-bent on getting what she wants, willing to use her feminine wiles as she travels through the south, meeting up with numerous dudes, some of whom, for one reason or another, end up dead. (All the minor characters are played by either Reed or Rudolph II.)
Among those Bonnie encounters are Chris and Bryan, who want to do more than just help fix her car when it breaks down; Trucker Joe, from whom she wrangles a ride; her friend Sissy; her estranged momma; high school choir leader Sondra and her bestie, Missy; Dandy the Lonesome Rodeo Clown; and Jesus. Each set piece features a song, with such titles as “You Might Call Me Basic,” “My Way or Bust,” “McNugget of Your Love,” and, perhaps most important, “Let’s Address the Nativity Chicken,” with the score paying tribute to Hank Williams, Kid Rock, Johnny Cash, and Charlie Daniels along the way.
Virtual edition of Sloppy Bonnie features fun visual tricks
“We set out on our journey / While the dew’s still on the grass,” Jesus and Bonnie sing in the duet “Jesus Riding Shotgun.” Jesus: “Bonnie tells her whole life story / Over half a tank of gas.” Bonnie: “Jesus reads aloud the names of all the little towns we pass / With his hand hung out his window / Lettin’ air blow through his nail hole.” As she gets closer to Jedidiah, leaving behind a trail of blood, she doesn’t necessarily come to some hard realizations about faith, family, and free will. She’s also searching to find out why she was cast as a chicken in the Nativity Manger Parade. “What exactly did a chicken have to do with sweet baby Jesus?” she asks. “I suppose there could always have been one in the barn where they had to sleep. But then why would the chicken be parading in with the wise men? Does chicken travel well? Why was there a nativity chicken? Why am I here, Mamma?” (The choreography and chicken movement is by Gabrielle Saliba.)
Directed by Leah Lowe and written by playwright Krista Knight and composer Barry Brinegar of No Puppet Co., who last summer presented the six-part virtual puppet play Crush, made in Knight and Brinegar’s home studio in the East Village, Sloppy Bonnie can, um, get a bit sloppy and the dialogue and lyrics are not exactly razor-sharp, but its DIY sensibility, the carnivalesque music, and the joy expressed every second by Disney, Reed, and Rudolph II are infectious. The show does comment on misogyny, sexism, marriage, motherhood, and feminine toxicity — 3D oval eggs appear often onscreen — so don’t let the message get lost in all the mayhem. And you get it all for a mere ten bucks.