Fairy tale creatures come to life with 'Shrek the Musical'

In an uncertain time, cast members with “Shrek the Musical” at Center Stage found an escape in a world of fairy tales, singing dragons and love between a princess and an ogre.

“At the beginning, we were really hopeful,” Emilia Morton, Princess Fiona, said. “What I love about this kind of stuff and this show is that when we come here, we know what’s going on in the world, and we protect ourselves, but we also almost forget.

“We come here, and it’s just like the world disappears, but this show.”

Shrek, played by Pride Wilder, contemplates his place in the world.Photo provided

Her co-star Pride Wilder, who plays Shrek, agreed with that assessment and added, “COVID doesn’t bother the theater here.

“We’re all responsible outside, and then, we come here, and I know there’s nothing to worry about because I know that Emilia is going to make me laugh on stage.”

The story of “Shrek” follows an ogre on an adventure to get his swamp back and be left alone after Lord Farquaad used it as a holding camp for fairy tale creatures.

Princess Fiona, played by Emilia Morton, performs I Know It's Today.Photo provided

Along the way, he travels with a talking donkey and Princess Fiona, who spent 20 years isolated in a tower before Shrek came along to rescue her.

The Broadway musical is based on a film by DreamWorks Animation that came out in 2001.

The production has some differences from the filmed stage production available on Netflix.

Donkey, played by Cheyanne Pietrofere, and Shrek, played by Pride Wilder, petition Lord Farquaad, played by Derek Slayton, for Shrek's swamp back.Photo provided

Both Wilder and Morton said the production came together quickly and easily, with everybody learning their lines and getting the choreography weeks sooner than normal.

“We were like done within the first month, and we ended up just rehearsing the show over and over and over again for a longer period,” Morton said. “It’s really prepared, and there’s so much organization that went into it.”

Morton performed this time last year as Belle in “Beauty and the Beast.”

She said she was unsure about auditioning for Fiona at first because she’s not very familiar with the story of “Shrek,” but watched the Broadway production and felt a connection.

“It was like a different side of my personality,” she said. “I feel like I really fell in love with the character because she’s so goofy. She’s very different from Belle. I feel like Belle’s one side of my personality, and Fiona is the other side. It’s just the two melded together is me.

“I’m absolutely wacko crazy, and I love every minute of it.”

Director Suzanne Cowan also directed “Beauty and the Beast” last year, and, Morton said, she wanted to work with Cowan again.

Wilder performed in the band for other recent Center Stage productions, but hasn’t acted in a while, he said. He’s friends with stagehand Megan Legron, and she mentioned the show to him.

“Ever since I saw the musical, the Broadway version, I was like ‘I want to do this if anything ever comes around,’” Wilder said. “I was torn. I didn’t know if I wanted to be Shrek or I kind of wanted to be a pig, but I went for Shrek.”

Morton said when she first heard about “Shrek the Musical” she was a little judgmental of it.

Now, after watching it and working on the production, she said, it’s underrated and seen as silly when in reality there’s lessons to learn from it.

“It is laugh out loud funny,” she said. “We’ve cried, we were laughing so hard, but there’s so many serious things with it too that are so important, I think, especially today.

“It just blew me away. This is so much more profound than I first judged it.”

Wilder agreed with her assessment and added there’s something for everyone in the show.

While younger audience members would get the humor, older ones would understand the “serious undertones” and message the story has.

“You wouldn’t expect it from Shrek,” he said.

Both stars said their favorite scene is while singing the song “I Think I’ve Got You Beat” in the second act, which features Shrek and Fiona explaining the hardships of their respective childhoods.

Wilder said it’s the first scene where Shrek is realizing that he could have feelings for Fiona, and they start bonding with the line “my dad and mom sent me away.”

The song ends with the two exchanging a series of farts and burps.

“That was the hardest thing we had to do was get the fart timing right, which sounds so silly,” Morton said. “Then once we got it, it was really good.”

Along with the actors on stage, there’s several scenes with Dragon. While she’s played by Cynthia Gonzalez, Dragon also includes a 20-foot puppet built for the show and takes four people to operate.

Lauren Robertson, who has worked backstage on Center Stage productions before, took the lead on building the puppet after realizing how expensive rentals for a Dragon puppet could be.

“So, I was thinking it wouldn’t be that difficult (to build),” she said.

Robertson is friends with props manager Elaine Woodruff, who saw some of the sketches she’d done trying to figure out the Dragon puppet. She said a few days later Cowan called and asked her to build it.

Robertson built most of the puppet in her basement out of PVC piping, rings, foam and fabric. It is an operational puppet, with puppeteers controlling her mouth and eyelids, wings and tail.

Robertson operates the head with Nick McDaniel, Tyler Christian and Molly Adams taking other parts of it.

“They have totally brought it to life,” Robertson said. “I’m just the head. They have taken every correction, any direction I’ve given them and just took it to the next level. I’m so amazed by them. We’re really excited for, we all think, a showstopper.”

“Shrek the Musical” starts Friday night with a 7 p.m. show, Saturday at 2 p.m. and 7 p.m. and Sunday at 2 p.m. There also are shows at the same times next weekend. Tickets cost $10 and can be bought at the Tinnin Fine Arts Center or online at tinnin.ticketleap.com.