Bangor show makes musical improv based on a Stephen King book
Lights, music, improv, vampires.
"A Kick in Your Derry'ere!" will bring all these things to life this week at the Bangor Opera when ImprovAcadia and Penobscot Theatre Company take on mega selling author Stephen King in a sendup of one of his earliest works.
The show will follow the story arc of King's second novel, "Salem's Lot," published in 1975, but be different each night based on suggestions from the audience. In the book, author Ben Mears returns to Jerusalem's Lot, Maine, to write a novel about his childhood only to find there is a vampire endangering its citizens.
Jen Shepard, Penobscot Theatre Company executive director, and her husband, composer Larrance Fingerhut, will be joined on stage by three Chicago-based actors experienced at improvisation — Bangor native Andy Bolduc, Alice Stanley Jr. and Cynthia Kmak.
"We've been wanting to do a Stephen King-themed improv show for a long time," Shepard said last week. "We may pull in references to other King books depending on where the audience takes us."
Shepard and Fingerhut created a similar improv show based on Charles Dickens's "A Christmas Carol" in 2019 and 2022 with the Penobscot Theatre Company. The pair also improvised musicals while running ImprovAcadia in Bar Harbor seasonally from 2004 to 2019 and at the close of several Bangor productions since the pandemic.
The group began rehearsing Monday using suggestions that might come from the audience. Fingerhut said that he composes music mostly spontaneously based on what is happening on stage.
"I look for a heightened moment when it makes sense to burst into song," he said last week.
The decision to do an improv musical based on the book by Bangor's most famous resident was made before Max announced the Oct. 3 release of the new film, Shepard said. She also said that, so far, King has not communicated with the theater company about the show.
Bangor area theatergoers are familiar with stage adaptations of King's novels but this is the first professional improvisational show based on his work in Greater Bangor. The theater company staged "Misery" in 2017 and Some Theatre Company has produced "Carrie the Musical" twice, once in 2017 and again two years ago.
"A Kick in Your Derry'ere!" replaces a fall production cut from this season as the theater company was dealing with a large budget shortfall in its 50th season earlier this year.
In addition to the King-inspired show, Penobscot Theatre Company has scheduled other events this month. It will participate in the downtown trick-or-treating event from 2 to 4 p.m. Oct. 26 and will host its Second Annual Costume Gala at 6 p.m. that night at the Bangor Opera House, 131 Main St. Tickets are $75.
Ben Layman will share tales of the theater's three resident ghosts at 7 p.m. Oct. 29 and Oct. 30 and at 10 p.m. Oct. 31. Each tour is limited to 20 attendees and tickets are $15.
On Halloween at 8 p.m., the Opera House will become a movie theater again with the showing of Stephen King's 1982 "Creepshow." This is a pay-what-you-wish event.
"A Kick in Your Derry'ere!" will be performed at 7 p.m. Thursday through Saturday and at 3 p.m. Sunday. For information, visit penobscottheatre.org or call 942-3333.
