Stranger Sings! The Parody Musical
Stranger Sings: the Parody Musical was performed at the Players Theater on MacDougal in the summer of 2021 and was a loving, hilarious parody of the immensely popular Netflix show. The music styles ranged from rock to pop to ballads to techno, so the sound design was flexible in order to get lyrics on top of the various pieces. Since this was a small, long space with few speakers and a live band in the house, our amplification was vital. The actors all had boom mics and we added two small delay speakers to give the back of the house clarity. Lyrics are king in a comedy, so A1 Hayden Bearden and I spent the majority of our finessing time getting vocal intelligibility. Our efforts were successful and audiences laughed out loud every night at the show.
There were also many moments that required cue creation. As a huge fan of the Netflix series, I was thrilled to get my chance at designing the Upside Down. I used moving drones, crackles, and far away moans to create the empty and terrifying world. I also had the opportunity to create the sounds of the Demogorgon. I ended up recording my own roars and processing them with reverb, distortion, pitch shifting and a modeled amplifier. The result was a faithful but malleable creature design that was used throughout the show.
Director: Nick Flatto
Composer: Jonathan Hogue
Choreographer: Ashley Marinelli
Music Director: Michael Kaisch
Scenic Designer: James Ortiz
Lighting Designer: Jesse Scott
Costume Designer: Cassie Endicott
Sound Designer: Megan Culley
Stage Manager: Allison Hartfield
A1: Hayden Bearden
