Take an off-beat concept (turning a Z grade monster movie into a musical), add in great writing and music plus a dash of strong performances and you get a Fringe souffle for the ages with Robot Monster. Andrew Villareal is electric as Roy and leads a great cast to help make this one of the most unique shows you will ever see at the Fringe.
The show is a quirky, fun romp that all fans of movies and musicals should see!...
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If you're not familiar with the original Robot Monster movie, "Robot Monster the Musical" is a nice introduction. The musical revels in all the absurdity and ludicrousness of the original head-scratching movie plot and celebrates its many bizarre iconic moments. The songs are really funny and sung with gusto by the awesome, memorable cast. The "Pooped-out Pinwheel" song is a favorite. The guy who played Roy makes me laugh just to think about him. I really had a fun time and plan to see it again....
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PREVIEW PERFORMANCE: I loved the B movie aspect of the piece. The actor that played Roy and the Little Boy were a shear delight and really got the mood of the piece. The little girl was also quite delightful. Let the monster sing!!! (If not at the Fringe....beyond!) Cut some numbers for the sake of Fringe so it doesn't run over. Great preview try out but it did go too long. I am sure these issues will be addressed. Picking up of cues will help that too!...
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ANONYMOUS
certified reviewerJune 06, 2017
I loved it! Very impressive and entertaining musical adaptation with memorable melodies (I've been humming them ever since the preview) and clever, charming lyrics that got lots of laughs. The cast was terrific! We had a fabulous time!...
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I always operate on the conceit that the stage production came first, and then they made a movie of it. If that was true, then they improved Robot Monster when they made the movie version of the story, based on the musical Robot Monster – The Musical (FB), which was our second Fringe show. And since Robot Monster (the movie) has 1.9 stars on IMDB, and a 31% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes, that should scare you more than any Ro-Man could ever do.
So why did we go? Well, the description made it sound better than it was.
I will say that the musical had all of what was claimed: complete absurdity, hammy acting, charming naiveté and a tortured space gorilla. But often — almost usually — stage musical versions of bad musicals figure how to turn th...
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Robot Monster is one of the best “bad movies”, so it would make sense to turn this into a musical! Some of the best and funniest musicals I’ve seen have been based on bad/cult/B movies. Robot Monster The Musical follows this with 90 minutes of hilarity, camp, and playfulness.
This had me laughing and smiling throughout the show. The cast was great and really played their parts up. Roy (played by Andrew Villarreal) who had the macho, 50’s type, man’s man, down to a T (I’m surprised I didn’t see a sparkle from his teeth every time he’d smile). Any time you have adults playing children is a recipe for awesome. The two “children” (played by Dana Deruyck and Stephanie Thomas) were having so much fun playing the part that it was contagious. And...
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KURT GARDNERblogcritics, artsbeatlacertified reviewerJune 13, 2017
There are a few too many musical numbers, and the show hews too closely to the original film’s moldy plot when it has such an opportunity for higher camp....
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