Lucky Penny’s ‘The Revenge of the Rebobs’: a legend comes to life (and sings and dances) on Partrick Road
Some writers, myself included, are having trouble writing fiction in our increasingly dystopian times, when daily reality is daily more darkly fantastic than anything one’s wildest imagination might dream up.
Fortunately, this affliction has not affected the artistic duo of Barry Martin and Rob Broadhurst, the Rodgers and Hammerstein of Napa Valley, whose new musical premiered at the Lucky Penny Community Art Center on Oct. 17.
As with their other works, it is set firmly in Napa Valley where it manages to puncture pretensions but also to capture a place — the real one, not the PR invention — in a way that few others could manage.
After poking (mostly) gentle fun at Scrooge-like vintners and randy housewives, the duo has turned their attention to a unique Napa topic: Rebobs.
A woman sitting behind me at an early performance of “The Revenge of the Rebobs,” confessed, “I had never heard of Rebobs.”
What? Clearly, she did not go to Napa High School, where, back in the day, you didn’t graduate without knowing the legend of the winged monkeys that lurked on the local lovers lane, also known as Partick Road, in the western Napa hills. Not that anyone had ever actually seen a Rebob, much less been set upon by one. But there were stories.
So entrenched in local lore are Rebobs that when Napa High set out to choose a new mascot, Kelly Doren, a local artist and graphic designer, earnestly campaigned for the Rebobs, with no luck, however. The school district went for the Grizzlies.
But while grizzly bears are long extinct in the valley, the fate of the Rebobs, like the origin of the legend itself, remains unknown.
This did not daunt the creative team of Martin and Broadhurst (although Broadhust, who is from Sacramento, apparently had not heard of Rebobs either, when Martin presented the new idea).
Although some have opined that Rebobs were inspired by “The Wizard of Oz,” “The Revenge of the Rebobs” opens with a different theory: A post-World War II mad scientist is at work in a lab against a stunning backdrop of redwood trees on Mt. Veeder. In a world that has just met the atom bomb, all limits seem to have been breached; this latter-day Dr. Frankenstein is creating a hybrid of monkey, bat and robot. He subsequently vanishes; what remains are his rebobs, set loose to haunt the hillsides, and lovers in particular.
Fast forward to Oct. 30, 1982, a time when little Napa Valley was being discovered by the world. As Napa locals do a ritual unwelcome dance aimed at “outsiders,” a stranger comes to town. Randy Candeaux (Jeremy Kreamer) (pronounced “Can-do”) is a researcher of cryptids, creatures, according to Google AI, “whose existence is reported but unproven by science, known through folklore, eyewitness accounts or indirect evidence like footprints.” Examples include Bigfoot, the Loch Ness Monster and Rebobs.
After debunking other mythical accounts (he is a contributor to a publication for disbelievers) Randy has decided to examine the legend of the Rebobs. “I just want reality,” he explains as he ventures into the wood. “I just want the truth.”
He gets much more than he bargained for when he encounters Candy Mandrew (Taylor Bartolucci), a child of nature (and two hippies) given to wandering in the woods, looking for “the place where the weird and the world align.”
Kreamer delivers a disarming performance as the earnest investigator who comes to believe in something he can’t see or define (and it’s not Rebobs), and Bartolucci who has shined in her sleazier roles at Lucky Penny, (Real Housewives, Trailer Park Musical) demonstrates the versatility of her talent as the dreamy, dewy dryad of Mt. Veeder. Andrea Davis takes on the role for two shows, and those who saw her performance on Oct. 19 report that hers was a winning performance, or as one man put it, “I could believe that the guy could fall for her, just like that.”
But Candy is not all that Randy discovers on the mountain: There’s also a hilarious trio of Goths (Sarah Lundstrom, Emma Sutherland and Pilar Gonsales), who could give Macbeth’s three witches a run for their money. (Are Rebobs their kind of guys?)
And he also encounters Scott the Jock (Skyler King) and his long-suffering girlfriend Janet (Jenny Veilleux) who have been making the pilgrimage to Partrick Road for more than a decade. Scott, wearing his letterman jacket, lugging a supply of beer, is excited about the upcoming Turnabout Dance. “It’s my favorite dance of the year,” he chides Janet when she is less that enthusiastic. “But Scott,” she points out, “You’re 31.”
Veilleux gives depth to a character trapped in her relationship with an aging guy trapped in high school glory, while she is caught, as well, in the changing world of expectations for women. This lands her for a night at Napa State Hospital, leading to one of the funniest song and dance scenes, the raucous and unapologetically politically incorrect, “Halloween at the N.S.H.”
As for King, he is glorious everywhere, whether he is the goofy jock leading “The Rebob Dance,” or the king of the Rebobs, expounding the role of “Deus ex Machina.”
He, however, is almost outdone, at least momentarily, by the PG&E duo of Brad Fisher and Arthur Mautner, who dance a minuet, an ode to their employers, as they scout out the mountain for potential development.
When death comes to the mountain, the Rebobs are suspects. But what role does the mysterious, grouchy, weird Old Man Who Lives on the Hill (Sean O’Brien) play in these calamities? Who is he and what really happened to his wife?
The cast is rounded out by Marjory Haper, who, like the rest of this superbly talented team, slip in and out of multiple roles; as always with Lucky Penny, the production standards are stellar.
When the Rebobs finally do appear, they are almost anti-climactic.
Broadhurst’s music is riveting and polished, a “New Wave soundtrack,” as he describes it. Combined with Martin’s zany plot and wackadoodle characters, “The Revenge of the Rebobs” is a weird, wild, wacky romp, an evening of pure (well, not always quite so pure) fun.
But just as Rodgers and Hammerstein’s musicals contain an undercurrent of reality, grounded in the world in which the work is set (racism in “South Pacific,” Nazis in “The Sound of Music”), “The Revenge of the Rebobs” is not purely a farce.
1982 is a strategic choice, and not only because, as Martin pointed it, it frees him from the omnipresent mobile phones. Insider references, such as a sale at Allen & Benedict (a long-closed furniture store) in the news from KVON harken back to another Napa, baffled, bemused and heading into momentous change. 1982, after all, was two years into the first Reagan administration, a time of conflict and confusion, especially over who is telling the truth. When one character comments, “I can’t imagine things would ever be worse than they are now,” there was laughter in the audience, but it was distinctly of the suffering sort.
What is the revenge of the Rebobs? Maybe it’s just the fact that, in this world, they do exist, and monsters though they may be, they are the creation of humans, alone.
“The Revenge of the Rebobs,” directed by Barry Martin, with musical direction by Rob Broadhurst, continues through Nov. 2 at the Lucky Penny Community Arts Center in Napa. For tickets and more information, visit luckypennynapa.com.
