TROUBIES’ HOME ALONE-LY HEARTS CLUB BAND


The Troubies are back with one of their most entertaining holiday shows ever, Troubies’ Home Alone-ly Hearts Club Band, a Troubadour Theater Company mash-up of the movie that made Macaulay Culkin a pint-sized star and the album that helped establish the Beatles as arguably the most ground-breaking band in pop music history.

Troubies head honcho Matt Walker stars as Kevin McCallister, “a precocious 6-to-8-year-old upper-middle-class future-drug-addicted kid on the spectrum” and the butt of all his older siblings’ jokes.

As in the John Hughes movie classic, Kevin’s family has been gifted with a trip to Paris by Kevin’s mother’s husband’s brother “because we’re white privilege,” she explains to her son, who then once again suffers the verbal arrows slung by eldest brother Buzz, prompting him to make a wish he doubts will ever come true.

Unfortunately for Kevin, his wish never to see anybody in his family ever again appears to become reality when the entire McCallister clan head off to Paris blissfully unaware that they’ve left Kevin Home Alone(-ly Hearts Club Band).

Beatles fans can rejoice in hearing some of the Fab Four’s Greatest 1967 hits, their lyrics cleverly adjusted to fit the 1990 movie megasmash.

“She’s Leaving Home” accompanies Kevin’s mom and the rest of the McCallisters to the airport, upon which “Good Morning, Good Morning” has Kevin celebrating his new-found freedom. (“I’m being free and I can smile. Just have to not meet pedophiles.”)

At the same time elsewhere in the Chicago suburb Kevin and his family call home, would-be burglars Harry and Marv make plans to rob the family mansion in a tweaked “Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite.” (“We’re crooning as we do our thing, and trying to avoid Sing Sing, and prison rape”)

Meanwhile up in a Paris-bound jet, “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” becomes “Katie In The Sky With Almonds” (the kind only first-class passengers like Kevin’s mother Kate get served).

“A Day in the Life” describes how Kevin spends his first morning alone. (“Found the aftershave and had a dash, and after a splash I made my favorite face.”) And we all know the face he’s singing about.

“Lovely Rita,” retitled “Lovely Sal,” accompanies Kevin’s trip to the local store. (“Lovely Sal, the checkout gal, may I inquire discreetly, ‘When are you free to babysit for me?’”)

And that’s just a few of Act One’s many musical highlights, though it’s not only the tunes that make each new Troubies show special.

Like their many holiday musical spoofs before it, Troubies’ Home Alone-ly Hearts Club Band features jokes as current as the trending adjectives “demure” and “mindful” (Thank you TikTok sensation Jools Lebron) and as deliberately dated as allusions to The Clapper and The Waltons (designed to expose audience “dinosaurs”).

And movie references don’t get more meta than when Kevin’s mom (played by Catherine O’Hara in the movie) is reassured that “the Beetlejuice sequel wasn’t your fault.”

As always, much of the fun of seeing a new Troubies show is witnessing the ingenious new ways in which director Walker and his band of zanies can recreate iconic movie scenes on a minuscule design budget, and Troubies’ Home Alone-ly Hearts Club Band is no exception.

In other words, get ready to be wowed by the pair of audience participants who help Walker’s Kevin convince Harry and Marv that there are still family members at home. (In the movie it involved several string-manipulated life-size mannequins.)

Even cleverer is the use of black light shining on iridescent cardboard cutouts to recreate the many booby traps Kevin sets to trap the thieves.

Along the way, triple-threat cast members Rick Batalla (Harry), John Paul Batista (Pizza Guy, Ticket Agent), Victoria Hoffman (Aunt Leslie), Benji Kaufman (Fuller, Gus), Beth Kennedy (Kate) Lara Lafferty (Tracy), Mark McCracken (Uncle Frank, Marley), Philip McNiven (Peter, Marv), Suzanne Jolie Narbonne (Megan, Sally), Dallys Newton (Linnie), Mike Sulprzio (Buzz), and Walker show off comedic, song, and dance gifts in role after role and production number after production number choreographed by Batista, Narbonne, and Walker.

Oh, and don’t be astonished if a “surprise” 10-foot-tall guest star shows up to elate Troubies regulars and cause first-timers to go, “What?!?”

Ryan Whyman returns as music director extraordinaire, and at performances other than the one reviewed here, he also plays keyboards and conducts the production’s rocking onstage band.

It’s once again Narbonne’s colorful costumes and wigs that steal the show where production design is concerned, though bonus points are shared by Batalla for video production, Bo Tindell for lighting design, Matt Scott for props (and there are a lot of wild and crazy ones on stage), and Robert Arturo Ramirez for a crystal-clear sound design mix.

Eric Heinly is music supervisor. Corey Lynn Womack is stage manager. David Elzer is publicist.

I’ve lost count of how many Troubies holiday musical extravaganzas I’ve seen since It’s A Stevie Wonderful Life back in 2008, but it’s lots and lots and lots, which makes this reviewer enough of an expert to declare Troubies’ Home Alone-ly Hearts Club Band among the very best of the bunch.

I’m guessing the Troubies’ gazillion fans will agree.

Colony Theatre, 555 North Third Street, Burbank. Through December 22. Thursdays and Fridays at 8:00. Saturdays at 4:00 and 8:00. Sundays at 4:00 and 7:30.
www.troubie.com

–Steven Stanley
December 8, 2024
Photos: Ashley Erikson

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