My overall impression
When it hit me that Kellydawn Malloy has no idea which of the stories she will tell in recounting Hutton’s life (some of them emotionally hefty) until the audience members, playing press, asked questions at random from a long list, I was even more impressed with this show. The actor has be really strong to be able to range between pep and heartbreak without benefit of safely following a script that controls/guides the whole.
At the show I saw, the final one, an audience member threw out a really good, sincere question that unfortunately wasn’t on any list! Malloy seamlessly framed it so that it perfectly fit one of the list topics, and rolled. I watched the woman who made the query as Malloy answered via performance. She was as satisfied as I was, especially when, a little while later, you could see the light bulb go off when she realized what she’d accidentally done.
The format – fake press conference with songs dropped between answers to questions – works very well. Her performance was grand and the stories all solidly written. I don’t know much about Hutton, but the two life incidents that I knew a little bit about to recognize were truthful, and so I assumed the rest were, too.
If this show pops up anywhere near you post-Fringe, worth checking it out! A very nice show. Big bonus points for its largely family-friendly and potential appeal to a wide range of people.
