If You Ask Me: East Coast Premiere for the Holidays at POP
The Ugly Xmas Sweater Musical at Playhouse on Park, West Hartford
By Tom Holehan, Connecticut Critics Circle
It’s always encouraging when a theatre avoids producing a tried and true holiday production (I’m looking at you, A Christmas Carol) and decide to try something new. Playhouse on Park is offering what is billed as the East Coast Premiere of The Ugly Xmas Sweater Musical and any originality, it seems, was spent coming up with the title of this woefully inept selection by the West Hartford Theatre company. Come back Scrooge, all is forgiven!
Created by Dan Knechtges and Megan Larche Dominick, The Ugly Xmas Sweater Musical is set during the annual office holiday party at the Corporate Office of American Regalia Uniforms. It is there that perky HR Director Cheryl (Michelle Jennings) hosts the employees unaware that they’re about to get some very bad news about the fate of their company.
To save America Regalia and their jobs from the dastardly Olga (Laura Yen Solito), the new CEO, the employees have 24 hours to come up with a rescue plan that involves creating the ugliest Christmas sweaters ever made. That’s it for plot and it takes 100 minutes (without intermission) for the show to spin its wheels as the cast shouts at the top of their lungs while briskly moving furniture. They also sing a slew of traditional holiday songs as, for no apparent reason, dense dry ice periodically envelopes the stage.
With a cast that includes Jef Canter, Miles Messier, Marcel Werder and Cheron Whittley, all directed by Kevin Cronin with a sledgehammer firmly in hand, this is the kind of amateurish entertainment you’d expect from a high school drama club, not a professional theatre. But Playhouse on Park has produced too many worthy productions in the past to let this theatrical misstep tarnish their reputation. Onwards and upwards for the troupe in 2025!
The Ugly Xmas Sweater Musical continues at Playhouse on Park, 244 Park Road in West Hartford, Connecticut through December 22. For further information and ticket reservations call the theatre box office at 860.523.5900 X 10 or visit www.playhouseonpark.org.
Tom Holehan is one of the founders of the Connecticut Critics Circle, a frequent contributor to WPKN Radio’s “State of the Arts” program and the Stratford Crier and Artistic Director of Stratford’s Square One Theatre Company. He welcomes comments at: [email protected]. His reviews and other theatre information can be found on the Connecticut Critics Circle website: www.ctcritics.org.
