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Pull-Out Edition Special 2017 Readers Choice Pull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out EditionPull-Out Edition 2017 www.waterlooreaderschoice.ca THURSDAY, JUNE 1, 2017 • WATERLOO CHRONICLE • 15 Step by step Dratyon Entertainment's � e 39 Steps brings humourous takes to Hitchcock � lm classic By Bob Vrbanac Chronicle Sta� Kevin Bigger has worked with a lot of pro-ducers and production houses in his time on and o� Broadway, but he's never worked with one that gave him exactly what he needed, like Drayton Entertainment. "Producers don't know how to react to me when I tell them if they hire me to do this show I have to have a sound system with the entire sound plot of the show, which is 350 sound cues, in rehearsal from day one," said Bigger. "Drayton has been so beyond exceptional for me to work with, I'm used to New York produc- tion companies that � ght you every step of the way. "Everything I need they say absolutely of course, of course. � ey're con� rming my deep- ly held American belief that Canadians are much more polite than we are." � at's important because the director had a quick turnaround to get the latest show open- ing at the St. Jacobs County Playhouse, � e 39 Steps, o� the ground. � e show opens June 1 and plays until June 17. Luckily, he brings expe- rience to the production. "I'm bringing the original New York produc- tion that I've been working on a good part of the past nine years with me," said Bigger. "I was the assistant director and the associate director of the original production, so I have the graces of the original director to be doing her version of the show here." Based on the classic 1935 Alfred Hitchcock movie, The 39 Steps takes the original film's deadly tale of espionage and intrigue and spins it on its head, playing up the spy movie tropes for laughs. � ink Monty Python meets Hum- phrey Bogart. Something that a lot of people don't realize is that Hitchcock had a wry sense of humour and liked dark comedy in his works, so � e 39 Steps just slightly exaggerates those cues for comedy. "I'm the only one who knows what's going on," said Bigger, displaying his own dry sense of humour. "One of the actors has done it with me before in the past, so everybody else is play- ing catch-up, so to speak." But they've assembled a talented cast including Patrick Brown, who plays Richard Hannay on the run for murder. He runs into a number of femme fatales who prove to be his weakness, all played by Drayton favourite Jayme Armstrong. The four-person cast is rounded out by Eddie Glen and Cli� Saunders who deliver the physical humour and their take on the oddballs and low-lifes that populate the rest of the piece. In fact, the cast of four takes on more than 139 di� erent roles in what is described as a come- dic tour-de-force. "We need one man to play the roman- tic lead, one woman to play all three of his love interests, and two others who we call the clowns to play all the other parts," said Bigger. � ey accomplish that by delivering a mul- titude of ridiculous accents, physical pratfalls and clever comedic diversions to create a stag- gering number of fantastically funny, over-the- top characters. "� ey go full throttle as best as they can to do the entire movie that takes place in London, then on a train up to Scotland across the high- lands and back to London," said Bigger. "The concept is that they've sort of rehearsed it, but maybe not as much as they should have and they are desperately trying to tell the whole story of this movie in the best way they can. "Sometimes things go a little bit wrong, which is where the humour comes in, when something happens when it really isn't sup- posed to happen and the actors have to keep going with it." The conceit is that the audience is on the joke and knows there are only four people try- ing to cover o� a cast of hundreds. � e fourth wall between the stage and the audience is often broken down with a wink to the sheer madness of trying to portray every- thing from the bad guy to an inanimate object. It's up to the audience to decide which is which. "It's one of those plays on paper that when you read it you go, 'Oh yeah, that's funny,'" said Bigger. "But when you put it up on its feet you have to � gure out how do I do this. "� ere is something so annoyingly speci� c about comedy. Is it say the line then the look, or is it the look and then say the line? "� ose annoyingly speci� c details are really what helps a joke pop or sort of completely fall � at." Helping set the table is work of the origi- nal New York creative team: including set and costume design by Peter Mckintosh, lighting design by Kevin Adams, sound design by Mic Pool and movement by Christopher Baynes. The sound and lighting design won Tony awards when The 39 Steps played on Broad- way, and are actually another character in the play, according to Bigger. "� e sound is the show in a certain sense," said Bigger. "The actors need to understand from the very beginning that the sound is another character in the show. Without it, it would be a very di� erent play." It's all about capturing those moments like intense close ups that you have in movies and trying to translate it to the stage with hilarious results. And it all comes back to the inherent humour in a Hitchcock movie, said Bigger. "There are more jokes than you might expect in the movie itself," he said. "Some of the funniest lines in the play are lifted directly from the movie -- we didn't do anything to it. "� is is what Hitchcock had and this is what we're doing. � ere are little tiny moments from the movie that we've grown to love that we try to � gure out how to play." For more information visit www.draytonen- tertainment.com. ARTS FOCUS WATERLOO CHRONICLEWATERLOO CHRONICLE Director Kevin Bigger, from right, works with the cast of The 39 Steps, Cliff Saunders, Jayme Armstrong, Patrick R. Brown and Eddie Glen in re- hearsal at the St. Jacobs Country Playhouse. The show plays June 1 to June 17. SUBMITTED PHOTO