'Mr. Burns, a Post Electric Play' is the right kind of strange

Last Thursday night the Auburn Theatre Department opened "Mr. Burns, a Post Electric Play" to a sold-out house.

Written by Anne Washburn and directed by Chase Bringardner, "Mr. Burns" tells an unusual story that takes place over three acts and in three separate periods of time.

Act 1 has a post-apocalyptic band of survivors retelling for each other the plot and punchlines from episodes of "The Simpsons."

Act 2 takes place seven years later and has that story-telling go a bit farther. Now, instead of just retelling these episodes, the survivors have now formed a traveling theatre company which performs not only "Simpsons" shows, but also adds in commercials and special effects.

After a brief intermission, Act 3 is set another 75 years later in a world bordering on completely unrecognizable. "The Simpsons" seems to have become a dominant cultural factor. All the audience sees is the climax of an episode told in a noticeably ancient Greek style, including grotesque masks of character, a narrating chorus and live music.

This show is definitely not the average kind of theatre that most audience members would expect. It has elements that seem disconnected and unnecessary and some elements that seem to be missing.

That being said, one thing definitely not missing were strong performances across the whole cast.

The six opening survivors played by London Carlisle, Noel Dudley, Lauren Vedder, Cate Rasco, Jackson Whiting and Hudson Hubbard captured attention early and transitioned nicely into other roles later in the show.

The two leads in the final act, Grant Lackey as Bart Simpson and Andy Gibson as Mr. Burns, closed the show very well and brilliantly portrayed two very iconic characters, or what remains of them anyway.

This show takes a soft look at the human fascination with story-telling. In a world where society has had to start over, the stories of today have become the myths and legends immortalized first by oral transmission and then on the stage.

My favorite reaction following the final bow was "They did a good job, whatever it was," because they did.

"Mr. Burns" is definitely a spectacle of strange storytelling and can easily leave audience members confused and discouraged.

However, hesitate before labeling this show as merely weird or perverse because the strong cast behind it here at Auburn does a good job of humanizing it.

"Mr. Burns, a Post Electric Play" runs April 12-22 at the Telfair Peet Theater here on campus.

It is free for all university students to attend and it isn't something worth missing.