The off-beat musical comedy “The Addams Family” will return to the Pickleville Playhouse in Garden City for the third consecutive year with performances slated from Sept. 24 to Oct. 23.
GARDEN CITY – The old saying goes that “the third time’s the charm.”
But it’s hard to imagine the upcoming reprise of “The Addams Family” at the Pickleville Playhouse will be any more charming than previous productions of the off-beat musical in 2019 and 2020.
The talented Davis clan have announced that they will stage “The Addams Family” as their Halloween show for the third consecutive year. Performances of that crowd-pleasing musical will begin Sept. 24, just three weeks after the close of the rustic playhouse’s summer season, and continue through Oct. 23.
Director Derek Davis says that the playhouse’s loyal patrons played a role in making the decision to present “The Addams Family” for the third time around.
Back in late December of 2020, an online survey was sent to previous ticket holders for Pickleville productions. The Davises had already decided to stage “Peter Pan” in the summer of 2021, but wanted to solicit their patrons’ opinions about their preference for a second summer production.
Given the choice between one of Pickleville’s trademark original musical melodramas and the Broadway musicals “Newsies” or “Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat,” those patrons voted for the former. The result was the wildly successful pairing of “Peter Pan” and the home-grown melodrama “Becoming a Bona Fide Bad Guy” still being offered nightly at the Pickleville Playhouse this summer.
For a fall show, the survey offered patrons the choice of a reprise of “The Addams Family” or a production of either “Into the Woods,” “Little Shop of Horrors” or the more recent musical “A Gentleman’s Guide to Love & Murder.” Among those choices, “The Addams Family” led the pack.
Cartoonist Charles Addams first introduced the bizarre members the Addams Family to America in single-panel comics drawn for The New Yorker magazine for five decades starting in 1938. Addams’ characters were then brought to life in a television series in the 1960s and two feature films in the 1990s.
The musical comedy “The Addams Family” debuted on Broadway in April of 2010 with music and lyrics by Andrew Lippa. The award-winning original production ran for more than 18 months, followed by a national tour.
After the month-long run of “The Addams Family” at the Pickleville Playhouse, the Davis clan will take their holiday show “I Believe in Christmas” on the road. That original production will be staged at the Ellen Eccles Theatre in Logan from Dec. 3 to 6 before moving to Salt Lake City for an extended run.