By Bill Hirschman, FloridaTheaterOnStage.com, for SouthFloridaReporter.com, Oct. 19, 2015- Somewhere under the green slime encrusted set of The Toxic Avenger at Actors Playhouse, a nuclear plant must be melting down all China Syndrome like. That might explain the raw power emanating from this hilarious hoot of a rock musical.
The daffy goofball satire from 2008 revels in, honors and mercilessly teases that comic-book, B-movie, sci-fi, dystopian, horror movie vibe that has grown exponentially over the past half-century-plus (can it be that long?) like something out of TheAndromeda Strain.
This genre in musical theater has proliferated over the past two decades from its roots in 1973’s The Rocky Horror Show, 1982’sLittle Shop of Horrors and 2001’s Urinetown the Musical and moving into such titles as Return of the Living Dead and Evil Dead: The Musical, not to mention the real horror of Spiderman: Turn Off The Dark. But many of the more recent crop have been amateurish, not just in style but execution.
