10th Annual Jambiz Christmas Production is CUTIE & THE FREAK

Rehearsals are now in full swing for the theatrical production CUTIE & THE FREAK, the 10th annual Jambiz Christmas Production. The production will open as is customary at Centerstage Theatre on Boxing Day (December 26) at 5pm.

The Patrick Brown penned script is a Jamaican fairytale and is once again geared to provide wholesome entertainment for the entire family. Directing responsibilities this time around is share by Trevor Nairne and Patrick Brown.

The cast will be led again by the Caribbean’s best-known comedic actor, Oliver Samuels. Also included is popular character actor Glen “Titus” Campbell and a brigade of young and exciting actors. Young Sharee McDonald-Russell of the Ashe Ensemble continues her attachment to Jambiz on loan from Ashe. The cast is completed by several graduates of the Centerstage Workshop in Camille Davis, Courtney Wilson, Christopher Hutchinson, Orlando “Casper” Anderson, Megan Lewis and Belinda Reid.

The story revolves around Tiny (Oliver Samuels), the overly protective father of the 22 year-old university student Cutie (Camille Davis). Somehow it doesn’t dawn on Tiny that Cutie is now a young woman and ought to be allowed to at least make basic decisions on such things as the clothes she wears and her male companions.

Urged by Munchie, the feisty and cantankerous household helper, Cutie comes up with a plan to teach her father a lesson – find a most undesirable male companion and present him to her father as her husband-to-be. This way, anyone else chosen by Cutie would most certainly be met with approval by her father. Perennial outcast Frank (Courtney Wilson) provides Cutie with the perfect “undesirable”.

Only the plan has a “kink” which changes the course of things … dramatically. Frank is more than just that which meets the eyes, and like all good fairytales everyone lives happily ever after.

If anyone was in any doubt that Patrick Brown is one of the Caribbean’s best writers of comedy, CUTIE & THE FREAK puts this doubt to rest. The cast members are having a hard time staying focused in rehearsals, breaking out into uncontrolled laughter from the many hilarious moments in the story. And as has become the custom Brown has liberally garnished the story with several local topicalities which at times takes a poke at sensitive personalities/situations in our society (trafigura et al).

After its Boxing Day premier, CUTIE & THE FREAK will play Wednesdays to Fridays at 8pm and on Saturdays and Sundays at 5pm and 8pm. After a short run, the production will then play select venues in rural Jamaica as well as several cities in North America and the Eastern Caribbean.