Skyline College’s production of “The Toxic Avenger,” which began rehearsals in August, held its premiere during the weekend of Nov. 14.
The two-act musical centers around Melvin Ferd III, a shy nerdy archetype who falls in love with a blind librarian named Sarah. After Melvin is pushed into a vat of toxic waste, he becomes the Toxic Avenger (who is nicknamed “Toxie”), a deformed, mutated superhero who seeks to clean up the town of Tromaville and bring the corrupt mayor to justice.
On the opening night of the musical, the audience gave a warm and supportive reception to the performance, with loud applause following every song and scene performed. For Marlon Brown, who portrayed the protagonist, Toxie, the audience’s enthusiasm during the performance helped create a feedback loop where he could play off the audience’s reaction.
“Performing live theater on stage is always so nerve-wracking, but after the first scene or two, after you start to feel surrounded by the audience’s encouragement and cheers and laughs, it really takes over and drives you forward,” Brown said. “I think the audience’s reaction really can either lift up or kind of bring down the actor’s performance because it’s a real source of motivation during the performance.”
Special effects played a prominent role in “The Toxic Avenger” with Brown having to quickly change into Toxie’s costume after his character is dropped into a vat of toxic waste.
Brown spoke about the rush of having to change costumes quickly between scenes.
“[Changing] took a little bit to get used to, but with enough rehearsals, I started to get used to it,” Brown said. “It is a very quick change. If I had to guess, we do it in about 60 seconds or so. 60 seconds or less is what we aim for. And we were able to do it.”
Characters are also disemboweled and get their limbs torn off by Toxie throughout the play, such as when Toxie rips out the heart of an old lady, who later turns out to have run a trafficking ring.
Like special effects, songs played a crucial role in the musical, with each performer having to prepare for weeks to reach high notes and achieve the proper choreography for each song.
Faith Laurel, who portrayed the antagonist, Mayor Babs Belgoody, spoke about the initial difficulties of rehearsing the raunchy song “Evil is Hot” with her co-star, Joseph Madrigal.
“We felt so awkward at the beginning. But as time went on, we were like, ‘oh, it’s just choreography,’” Laurel said. “The sillier we got as we learned the choreography, the less we were like, ‘this is weird,’ and the more we were like, ‘we’re just trying to make people laugh as much as they can.’”
Short compilations of environmental-related news broadcasts and footage played in between certain scenes, emphasizing the musical’s pro-environmental message. Kaylin Alexis, who portrayed Sarah, spoke about how she hoped that audiences would think about the environmental message of the show.
“I hope people have a lot of fun, but I also hope people kind of look into the sort of deeper meaning that is in the show,” Alexis said. “Which is about global warming, pollution, and just the climate crisis in general, and stop and think, ‘hey, stuff like this, even though it’s kind of hyper-exaggerated on stage, is still going on right now.’”
