A wickedly fun night of songs and ‘skullduggery’

Conejo Players’ latest drive-in show is scary good



HAUNTING PERFORMANCE—John Wallis is one of the singers featured in Conejo Players Theatre’s “Haunted Broadway” drive-in concert. Courtesy photo

HAUNTING PERFORMANCE—John Wallis is one of the singers featured in Conejo Players Theatre’s “Haunted Broadway” drive-in concert. Courtesy photo

CONCERT REVIEW /// ‘Haunted Broadway’

We’ve heard of haunted houses and haunted mansions, but a haunted parking lot? “Why not?” say the intrepid folks at Conejo Players Theatre in Thousand Oaks, who have refined their “drive-in” concerts to near perfection.

CPT’s latest production, “Haunted Broadway,” was performed Oct. 23 to 25 in the theater’s parking lot. Instead of using a flatbed pickup truck as a stage, and hoping the people in the multitude of cars facing the truck could see who was singing in the dim light, director Renee Delgado-Rose opted for a traverse stage setup, with cars parked on either side of an elevated platform constructed in the center of the lot.

Lighting director Jeremy Zeller set up nonintrusive spotlights, and with a little well-placed stage smoke and skeletons flanking the stairways leading to the stage, the effect was atmospheric enough to be effective for the Halloween season. (Dare we call Zeller’s efforts “skullduggery”?)

The lighting worked best on one of the finer performances in an evening of all-around excellence: Cameron Warren’s chilling “The Confrontation,” from the musical “Jekyll and Hyde,” in which the song is sung as a solo, representing a dialogue between the conflicting lead characters. Zeller made sure to remove all doubt which alter ego was which by alternating red (evil) and blue (good) lights projected on the stage.

The concert featured a ghoulish display of songs from such shows as “Wicked,” with Jacqueline Patrice delivering a marvelous performance of “No Good Deed,” another schizophrenic song balancing good versus evil.

It seems like ages ago when we saw John Wallis’ stunning performance as the title character in CPT’s “Sweeney Todd” (it was only March of 2019), so it was great to see him in the role again, performing the maniacal “Epiphany.”

Sahai Lara portrayed the sea witch Ursula, the dastardly villainess from “The Little Mermaid,” as she sang “Poor Unfortunate Souls.”

Vincent Perez sported a fashionable half-mask, singing a glorious version of “Music of the Night” from “ Phantom of the Opera.” Two other “ Phantom” numbers were performed: Lilli Babb gave a beautifully delivered performance of

Christine’s song “Think of Me” and joined Perez later in the program to sing the duet “Past the Point of No Return.”

“Little Shop of Horrors” was represented by a pair of songs. Sarah Ah Sing, Danica Waitley and Katie Ward teamed up for the prologue and Brigitte Rogerson gave a fine performance of the tender and wistful “Somewhere That’s Green.”

Other songs from the 75-minute program included Courtney Allen’s “Dead Mom” (from the new theatrical version of “Beetlejuice”), Lauren Whitton singing “Monster” from “Frozen,” Shayde Bridges’ emotional title song from “Carrie,” Cecilia Diamond’s “Pulled” from “The Addams

Family” and Kyler Waitley singing the title tune from “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.”

Songs from spooky animated films were spotlighted, too. Joe Mulder sang “Jack’s Lament” from “The Nightmare Before Christmas” and Antonia Villalobos performed the lullaby “Remember Me” from the 2017 Disney/Pixar film “Coco.”

The show was bookended by a 17-person ensemble from Westlake Village’s Born to Perform Studio. The group opened the show with “I’m in Love With a Monster” from the film “Hotel Transylvania 2” and closed it with “Halloween Medley,” which featured a number of popular Halloween hits.

The sound quality was excellent, piped through the audience’s FM car radios, while CPT continued its tradition of encouraging applause by the flashing of headlights, as opposed to the more obnoxious honking of horns that we’ve heard elsewhere.

The producers of “Haunted Broadway” promise another similar showcase come Christmas, so until the time comes when theaters will be permitted to open once again, this isn’t a bad way to enjoy much-needed live entertainment.