A colorful comedy

Producers hope their colorful characters and costumes make a splash on stage in “Once Upon a Mattress,” the spring musical of the Glendale Community College theatre arts department.

It’s quite a contrast in tone from last semester’s drama “Savage in Limbo,” said director Melissa R. Randel, co-chairwoman of the department.

“It was really dark and serious and dramatic and this is like eating cotton candy and watching ‘I Love Lucy’ or cartoons,” Randel said. “It’s really light, really silly and very entertaining — a family production.”

The musical is based on Hans Christian Andersen’s “The Princess and the Pea.” An unusual princess Winnifred swims a castle moat to reach Prince Dauntless the Drab. They fall in love instantly and marriage seems imminent, if she can pass Queen Aggravain’s secret test.

Adding to the hilarity is Glendale resident Aren Soulahian, who plays King Sextimus, Randel said. The king has had a curse placed on him, and he is unable to speak, so Soulahian has to use pantomime until the end of the play.

“He has a natural ability with physical comedy,” Randel said.

Throughout the play, he chases a girl around the castle, she said.

“In one scene, he’s asking for the jester to help him find the girl and he explains how he is going to catch the girl, and it’s hysterical watching him pantomime how he’s going to set a trap to catch her.”

What makes it even funnier is Soulahian is only 19, but he plays a 60-year-old man, she added.

“He’s probably younger than the actor playing his son,” Randel said.

To prepare for his role, Soulahian watched older people walk, he said.

“I had to copy my grandpa,” he said. “At first, it was challenging, but then I started walking like an old man, and I’d imagine I had a pain in my back.”

Soulahian is always finding new things to bring to the play through his character, Randel said.

Randel has given Soulahian the freedom to do what he wants, but she pulls him back when he goes over the top, he said.

Along with the characters, Randel said the rainbow color palette should be fun on stage.

“The kingdom exists without the color green, so it’s very bright and colorful, until Princess Winnifred arrives,” she said. “She brings the color green because she’s from the swamps and she’s a different kind of girl than they have ever met.”

It’s a metaphor for the idea that it takes all kinds of people to make a kingdom or to complete the spectrum of the rainbow, Randel added.

In the initial concept discussion, Randel wanted a crayon box of colors on stage, said costume designer Royce Herron.

“I was looking for bright primary and secondary colors and it just so happened serendipitously that the male costumes, which we were pulling from our stock, fell into that pattern as well, so we have yellows, purples and pinks on stage and it’s just sort of luscious looking — like Skittles candy.”

But there was a special challenge creating costumes for the female dancers, especially for one scene where there are a lot of high kicks, Herron said.

Randel asked Herron if she could come up with costumes with pants underneath for modesty’s sake, Herron said.

“We wanted the costumes to be consistent with the Medieval time period, so we came up with a palazzo pants style,” Herron said.

So when the girls are standing still, they look like they are wearing a skirt because the legs are very wide, she added.

“There is lots of slap-stick comedy in this production that is all about movements,” Herron said.

“They are all over the stage. The choreographer has given us a whole palette of movements that go from floor into the air.”

Herron’s experience as a actress and dancer has helped her make costumes that are dancer friendly, said Jessica Young, who plays Princess Winnifred.

“The way she designed my costume was different than other costumes because I have a lot of breathing room, and it’s important because Winnifred has a lot of movement in the play,” Young said.

Especially when she’s in pajamas looking for that lump in the mattress, Young added.