(Top, L-R) Ethan Gwynn, Courtney Dease, Anthony Logan Cole. (Bottom, L-R) Najee Gabay-Knight, Sean Stephens and Bryan Songy in Camp Morning Wood. Picture: Michael Wiltbank
Camp Morning Wood: A Very Naked Musical continues at the Peter Jay Sharp Theater, New York until 7 July 2019.
Star rating: three stars ★ ★ ★ ☆ ☆
You can’t accuse Camp Morning Wood: A Very Naked Musical of false advertising. The 10 male cast members spend most of their time in this Off-Broadway offering cavorting in their birthday suits and seem quite happy about doing it.
And the show is definitely a musical as well, with a score of 20 numbers, including reprises, accompanied by lots of dancing and a book and lyrics filled to the bursting point with gay humour, allusions, double entendres, puns and what have you, beginning, of course, with the title.
It also sends out in a larky, pretty perfunctory way messages of sexual inclusivity and acceptance, along with just plain old human connectivity. They’re all fitting themes for a show being performed while New York celebrates World Pride, events marking the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall uprising in which the customers of that Greenwich Village gay bar stood up to police harassment giving birth to the LGBTQ movement.
(June, it should probably be noted as well, also marks the 50th anniversary of the world premiere Off-Broadway of Oh! Calcutta!, the Kenneth Tynan-conceived revue that brought copious nudity to the musical stage.)
The script by Jay Falzone centres on an engaged gay couple, Gabe (Tim Garnham), a struggling actor with a footloose personality, and Randy (Alex Gagné), a bit older and somewhat more conservative, the one and only professor of Colonial Queer Studies at prestigious Columbia University. Their relationship has hit a rough patch and on the advice of their couples-counsellor they go off to spend a weekend at a lake house in the wilderness.
After their car suffers a flat tire and a rainstorm ensues, the two look for shelter, wind up in a deserted cabin and in the morning discover where they are: Camp Morning Wood Meadows. It’s a gay male nudist establishment founded by Jacques (Brady Vigness), a welcoming, almost-always undulating Frenchman.
As the weekend progresses, Randy and Gabe interact with the various campers and reignite their own feelings for each other – even setting a wedding date. Along the way, they also save the camp from the threat of destruction coming from a smarmy politician, Senator Snatch (Courtney Dease). He plans to take over the site for a “a very profitable mega-church” and oil refinery.
Director Marc Eardley, who also conceived the show, keeps the momentum brisk, and the story unfolds with a goodly amount of proficient singing and frolicsome dancing. The lyrics are by Falzone, and the music is supplied by a quintet of composers: Bobby Cronin; Will Shishmanian; Matt Gumley; James Dobinson and Derrick Byars.
The three-member band, conducted by music director Casey Reed, delivers a lot of pulsating sound backing up the sprightly quasi-catchy melodies. A lot of the music might be described as nursery rhyme disco with an X-rated sensibility. Here’s a sampling of the oft-reprised camp song: “Rise and shine,/Morning Wood!/Looking fine/And feeling good!/The ‘flag’ goes up the ‘pole’ – ‘salute’/Come to breakfast in your ‘birthday suit’.”
And here’s a bit from one of Jacques’ big numbers: “You show me your oui oui/I show you my oui oui.”
On the somewhat more serious side, believe it or not, Randy has an affecting introspective ballad, in which he expresses his insecurities about growing older as a gay man. It’s entitled ‘I’m Losing the Race’, sung with appropriate feeling by Gagné.
The show has a bright cartoon-y look in the set designs of David McQuillen Robertson, bathed in the bright hues of Zach Pizza’s lighting. And, yes, there are costumes as well, designed by Izzy Fields. At times, some of the men portray trees with leafy headdresses and other such accoutrements.
With a plentitude of choreography by Ian Coulter-Buford and the multi-tasking Falzone, just about every guy in the cast gets a chance to show off their song-and-dance man skills along with their privates. So, for good measure, here are the additional cast members (including understudies, some of whom appeared at the performance attended): Bryan Songy, Anthony Logan Cole, Sean Stephens, Najee Gabay-Knight, Ethan Gwynn, Michael Witkes, Nick Cartusciello, and Jeffrey Johns.
The big question might be would the show have a raison d’etre if the guys kept their clothes on more often or were adorned, let’s say, with fig leaves. But it’s a hard thesis to ponder when you re also caught up in wondering about the lack of modesty or excess of exhibitionism that enables this crew to perform so proficiently and unabashedly in the buff. Or am I being too prudish?
Ron Cohen
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