The Addams family isn’t your typical family with two parents, two children, and a white picket fence to go with their typical suburban house, not by a long shot. We were first introduced to the abnormally morbid family in 1964 with the debut of the classic TV show. While the show’s last episode aired in 1966, the Addams Family has survived throughout the years in many different formats, whether it be on film or, more recently, on stage.
The Addams Family musical opened on Broadway April of 2010, after a brief stint in Chicago the year before. The adaption tells a story of change and acceptance, as eighteen year old Wednesday Addams’s boyfriend, Lucas Beineke, and his parents come over to have dinner with the Addams family. This opens a whole can of worms, as Wednesday’s parents, Gomez and Morticia, struggle with the idea that their daughter is growing up. Pugsley, Wednesday’s brother, then begins to fear that Wednesday’s new relationship will cause her to start ignoring him in favor of Lucas.
Over the years, The Addams Family has become a highly acclaimed musical, which creates quite a bit of pressure for the cast. “People have expectations, and we want to live up to their expectations and exceed them,” Linnaea Rusaw, who will be playing Wednesday Addams, told me. But she’s not concerned much about this. Practices are going “very, very well. We’ve already started on choreography, which is already a quicker pace than last year, so we’re going to be super prepared.” All in all, it’s shaping up to be a great performance.
The musical will open November 2nd, at 7:30 pm, and following performances on November 3rd, 4th, 9th, 10th, and 11th, all at 7:30 pm.