King Kong: The Puppet Show set for Oberlin

Monday, July 14, 2014

OBERLIN, Kan. --King Kong: The Puppet Show, a comedic one-act retelling of the classic 1933 monster movie, will be performed in the Morgan Theater at The Gateway Civic Center in Oberlin on Friday, July 18th and Saturday, July 19th at 7:30 pm. The evening performances, with a run-time of approximately 40 minutes, are FREE with freewill donations welcome following each performance.

Tickets, which guarantee attendees a general admission seat at either the Friday or Saturday performance, are at no cost and available to the public on a first-come, first served basis at Bargain Box Plus, Ward Drug Store, Raye's Grocery, Oberlin City Library, The Oberlin Herald, and Sehnert's Bakery in McCook.

Directed, designed and adapted for the stage by Oberlin-based artist Ladd Wendelin, King Kong: The Puppet Show features a unique mix of both live action performances and puppetry. The show is appropriate for all ages and includes memorable moments from the film, not to mention a few surprises along the way. Joining the cast in performance are puppeteers Curtis Richards, Jillian Peters and Luke Koerperich.

King Kong: The Puppet Show follows the adventures of a floundering nature filmmaker Carl Denham (Daniel Lerew), who learns of a mysterious island from a deranged sailor (Sarah Abernathy). Having captivated a beautiful, unemployed actress (Jessica Richards), Denham and the intrepid crew, including Captain Englehorn (Cassidy Gillespie), Ensign Jack Driscoll (Caleb Koerperich) and Charlie the Cook (Steven Edmiston), set sail for Skull Island, home to savage natives, prehistoric beasts and the king of them all -- a simian overlord known as KONG (Garrett Scott). When Denham seizes the opportunity to capitalize on the great ape, Kong is whisked away to civilization where he unleashes terror and mayhem with tragic results.

King Kong: The Puppet Show originally debuted at the TADA Theater in the Historic Haymarket in Lincoln, Neb. on Saturday, Oct. 14, 2012 before going on to play over a dozen other shows across the Capital City including The Zoo Bar, The Grove, Union Plaza and the Nebraska State Capital Building, as well as countless basements, garages and living rooms.

"This show has been 2 years in the making," Mr. Wendelin said. "It all started with a love for the original film, and has expanded in so many different ways since its original incarnation. The cast is bigger, the set is bigger, and even Kong is bigger. If I said anymore, it'd spoil all the marvelous surprises in store for audiences. It just may change the way people think about theater."

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