You're A Good Man, Charlie Brown - just for kids?
Printed From: Community Theater Green Room
Category: Producing Theater
Forum Name: Play Suggestions
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URL: http://www.communitytheater.org/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=3697
Printed Date: 11/22/24 at 7:17am
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Topic: You're A Good Man, Charlie Brown - just for kids?
Posted By: AngelSong76
Subject: You're A Good Man, Charlie Brown - just for kids?
Date Posted: 12/30/08 at 12:09pm
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Hi everyone! I was wondering about something. I'm on the play reading committee at my theater and we are looking at shows for 2010 right now. It's the year we do a musical, so I am working on getting some suggestions for that right now. I came across You're A Good Man, Charlie Brown and absolutely love it! I remember watching the cartoon version when I was a kid (over and over and over!) and am delighted to see that the original songs that I loved are still in it.
Anyway, our audience is made up of adults, almost entirely. Most of our shows are not family friendly, in fact, three out of our four plays this year will carry a Mature rating due to language, violence, and adult content. I was wondering what the audience reaction normally is to Charlie Brown, especially if it's an adult audience. Of course, these adults will probably bring their children, which would be wonderful! So have any of you done this show? If so, how have the adults in your audience enjoyed it? Has it been a good money maker for you? We need to start our 2010 season off with a bang, and I think this would do it. What are your thoughts? |
Replies:
Posted By: tristanrobin
Date Posted: 12/30/08 at 11:44pm
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When we produced "You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown!" it was a big success with our audiences - mostly adults as a rule, but there were more children at this play. It's a fun piece for both those on and off the stage (though, it's a little more work to put together than might appear at first reading). One hint: don't have adults playing the roles! Late teens/early 20's make the characters adorable ... with a cast older than that, the characters don't come off as endearing as much as they come off as vaguely retarded. A middle-aged person acting like a child just isn't 'cute' ... it makes you want to smack them like Cher and say "Snap out of it!"  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0x-fkSYDtUY |
Posted By: spikesgirl
Date Posted: 1/01/09 at 5:59pm
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Now I disagree with that. We had some younger folks along with older doing our "Charlie Brown" and they did quite well. In fact, the older ones were better at 'acting' like kids than the 20 year olds. The funniest thing was two shows later we had all by one member of the CB cast recast in "The Full Monty".
To the OP - I think it can appeal to your audience, but you are going to run the risk of losing some of them for the show. We try for a half/half mixture to appeal for all ages. It was one of our better attended shows last season, right behind Full Monty and "Best Little Whorehouse". It jsut really important that your director works to try to capture the magic and innocent element of the charcaters - that will help transcend the show just a kiddy production to something more.
A question - why are you considering it if you usually go for more adult shows? Just curious - trying to diversify or attract younger theater goers?
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Posted By: tristanrobin
Date Posted: 1/01/09 at 7:26pm
that's why they make chocolate AND vanilla  |
Posted By: Spectrum
Date Posted: 1/08/09 at 6:23pm
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To anyone in the Dallas/Ft. Worth area (shipping some of these pieces across the country might be a bit expensive, due to their bulk), we have the COMPLETE set piece and prop package for rent, right down to the over-sized pencils and over-sized benches. We even have the ability to "fly" Charlie Brown's kite and have it drop to the ground, right on cue. The major set pieces can be seen here:
http://www.theatricalreality.biz/Shows/Charlie%20Brown/Charlie%20Brown.htm - http://www.theatricalreality.biz/Shows/Charlie%20Brown/Charlie%20Brown.htm
This show is always a hit with adults and younger folks alike. Let us know if we can be of service, and "break a leg" with whatever you end up doing. ------------- Growing old is mandatory. Growing up is optional. |
Posted By: patrickcolvin
Date Posted: 1/23/09 at 4:49pm
| I did this show with some college students last year (I played piano). It's a terrific show, and can be successfully done by just about any age group (I would stay over the age of 12). If you have strong singers, the Lippa revival version is lots of fun, with some new songs and more contemporary arrangements. |
Posted By: aravia84
Date Posted: 1/26/09 at 10:42pm
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I played Snoopy in this production, and I'll tell you we were on a zero budget in the middle of bum---- egypt, and we had the largest crowds still. By all means, if you have the talent for this show, put it on and put it out. I wish someone around here was doing it again. Very positive experience for me. Good luck. |
Posted By: MartyW
Date Posted: 1/27/09 at 9:48am
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IMHO... (as always) and allowing for tristans chocolate and vanilla, The best productions I have seen/participated in had no one under the age of 30... And again, IMHO, they shouldn't be acting LIKE a child, they should be projecting that "child like" part of each of us... Adults see that and remember and relate... Kids see Charlie Brown and crew and Love it.. And whatever you do, never do it WITH kids... Then its just a couple of hours of your life you'll never get back... Have Fun ------------- Marty W "Till next we trod the boards.." |
Posted By: Mr. Lowell
Date Posted: 2/08/09 at 6:05pm
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In my opinion, "You're a Good Man Charlie Brown" is not a kiddie show, but is a nostalgic slice-of-life comedy for adults by adults. Some of the puns and observational "life humor" goes over the heads of many kids in the audience, (as well as child-age cast members), in much the same way that the puns and topical humor in those classic "Bugs Bunny" cartoons goes over the heads of little kids - kids who just like the campy violence. I feel that the humor in Charlie Brown comes from the juxtaposition of the adult themes reflected in childhood situations. The original "Peanuts" comic strips were cute because tiny kids were spouting adult wisdom, (not unlike Stewie in "Family Guy" today), and because their entire world was seen from a little kid's height, with no adults, (much like the "Our Gang" serials in the 1940's). The laughs that Gary Burghoff got as the teddy bear carrying "Radar" in the movie and TV show "M*A*S*H" could be traced to his Off Broadway portrayal of Charlie Brown a couple years earlier. (And his premature balding on M*A*S*H just made him look more and more like the mellon-headed Charlie Brown!) The original http://www.bestcareanywhere.net/garyburghoff/CharlieBrown.htm - Off Broadway cast of Charlie Brown were all young adults, not actual kids playing kids. When we did this show in high school, the tallest kid in the senior class played Linus, and he got huge laughs! Now every time I see http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0566850/ - Mark McCracken and his big cheesy grin, I can only think of him tightly hugging his security blanket and dancing around the stage in the most hilarious solo ever. Mark IS Linus. I've done this show twice, (plus the sequel "Snoopy!" as my senior set/lighting design project in college). And in every case, I noticed that the critical key to "getting it right" was for the actors to play serious adult-like characters who just happen to be in childlike situations and costumes. (Child actors just don't have the life experience to pull it off for the big laughs). In fact, I have often daydreamed that if I were to direct the show someday. I would have my entire cast attend the first couple rehearsals in adult "suit and tie" attire, in order to establish this subtext. Actors can call up imagery of contemporary adult figures when establishing their characters. For instance, Lucy is sort of a sadistic Oprah, dispensing destructive advice to Charlie Brown. When Lucy grows up, maybe she'll be like Venessa Williams on Ugly Betty. Snoopy is suave, in a tongue-in-cheek way, and is always making wink-wink asides to the audience, like Bruce Willis in Moonlighting. Snoopy also has a Walter Mitty imagination that takes him to World War One and turns him into Bob Fosse for his "Suppertime" dance. Linus is always contemplating deep thoughts, like the stoners that lay on the hood of a car and look at stars, as in "Wayne's World". Little sister Sally has a massive crush on Linus, which if left unchecked, could turn Sally into "Rose", Charlie Sheen's stocker on "Two 1/2 Men". And Schroeder doesn't even notice girls because he's so narrow-mindedly obsessed with Beethoven, just as the Trekkie on "Big Bang Theory" is obsessed with Mr. Spock. Of course our hero, Charlie Brown, is like "Mr. Cellophane" in Chicago, or early Woody Allen, or "Gilligan"...or maybe "Nepoleon Dynomite"...? Whenever I bring up this play title to my directors, they instantly shoot it down as "children's theatre". Somehow they've got the wrong impression about this show. I think "You're a Good Man Charlie Brown" could be done in a black box studio as cabaret dinner theater with no kids around and it would kick butt. (The trick would be getting patrons in their seats before disclosing the name of the show...to avoid misconceptions). Anyway, just my 2 cents worth... Let us know how it goes! -Dana ------------- Mr. Lowell, Lighting/Set Designer & Tech Director, for the Linda Sloan Theatre, in the Davison Center for the Arts, at Greensboro Day School |
Posted By: stagechild
Date Posted: 3/09/09 at 2:34am
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When I saw this, I just had to reply. A few weeks ago I had performed as Linus in this very production and though we had full houses for the children matinee's and small 'intimate' houses during the evenings, the adults understood more of the humour. This show enables adults to look back into their days of childhood and have a fun time doing it. Proof of this is in the Kite song. Placed near the centre of our production, the audience is completly grasped by the story and as the entire cast is looks at the back wall of the theatre (the "kite"), every head on every adult turns back to see Charlie Brown's kite.So, if advertised well, you will get 'bums in seats' and once word gets out, you'll have full houses.
-stagechild
P.S. I would suggest adding in the character of Woodstock. It was very helpful for our production to have someone who could move around props and bring in costume accessories and act as Charles Schultz himself.
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Posted By: whitebat
Date Posted: 3/11/09 at 8:01pm
| I saw "Snoopy" performed by students at my HS, and "You're a Good Man Charlie Brown" at CSU. One of the reasons why the "Peanuts" comic strip is so enduringly popular is that it recognizes that children are people too. It is about the human condition, and the cast just happen to be children. I think there is a major tendency to forget just how terrrible being a child is sometimes. |
Posted By: teejaystudio
Date Posted: 8/28/09 at 3:55pm
"I like it!" We just did it with High School Grads and late 20's folks and I can see it would be spectacular with 30+ actors. We had only two show up and that was what we wanted to do. The cast we ended up with was AHHH-MAZING! Great show whether you do it chocolate OR vanilla - personally I prefer Strawberry Blue Bell, but that's just me. |