*** Nostalgia! That is what I felt as the start of  Oil Lamp Theater’s “The Marvelous Wonderettes”, a visit to music of my past. This play, or should I say, musical revue with a story built around it, was created and written by Roger Bean with musical arrangements by Brian William Baker. The music is that of the 50’s and 60’s and surprisingly, many of the younger people in the audience knew the songs. As a 1960 high school graduate, I remember most of them and the premise of this production.

Act one is 1958, the Prom. The entertainment for the evening is a quartet of ladies known as the Marvelous Wonderettes. Between the songs, there are many little “read between the lines” stories about these 4 seniors. Cindy Lou ( deftly handled by Trillium Falotico), Missy ( a powerful performance by Jennifer Ledesma), Betty Jean ( played to perfection by Hannah Kipp) and last, but certainly not least, Suzy ( a solid performance by Aneesah Jemei). While these ladies are powerful as a singing group and appear to be buddies, they each have their own “thing” and in some cases, as we get to know them , between musical pieces, we learn more about the personal side.

During the first act, as we meet them and the story opens up we hear songs like “Mr. Sandman”, “Lollipop”, “Secret Love”, “Mr. Lee” and “Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me”. There are segments of many more 1950’s tunes. Note: “Mr. Lee” is where they bring someone onstage to be this character, and later, in the second act, he will revisit the stage- our Mr. Lee was great and he didn’t get a curtain call.

The production is directed by Lauren Katz with musical direction by Aaron Kahn and limited choreography by Dominique Ruffalo. If you know Oil Lamp Theater, you know that this is probably the smallest ( or close to it ) “storefront theater” in the Chicago Area. The stage is tiny and there are only  72 seats. By the way, the four singers are also up for the “queen of our dreams”, so each of us get a ballot and a pencil to use for voting and the results become known right before intermission. I am pretty sure it changes each performance.

The second act is the 10 years reunion and once again these ladies are the talent for the festivities. Their lives have changed and during this act we learn how as they once again open up between songs like “Heatwave”, “You Don’t Own Me”, “It’s My Party”, “Son of A Preacher man”, “Respect” and many more. As I said earlier, this is almost like a memories concert with a little story tossed in to bring the music to a meaningful concept. The ladies are talented singers with decent rage and while they have microphones on stands, I truly think, despite Oil Lamp being small, it might be time to add body microphones. It can only help the entire production.

I know that I found myself thinking about my senior year at GBN and the 5 and 10 years reunions. The big difference in this story is that the four ladies did not change quite as much in ten years as most of my classmates did, but this is theater and is designed to entertain while telling a story. This it did. I am sure it will bring back memories for you as well.

“The Marvelous Wonderettes” will continue Thru – July 20th with performances as follows: