With the deep connection between Charles Schulz and Sonoma County, one might expect You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown to run perpetually. Rohnert Park’s Spreckels Theatre Company is hosting the Peanuts gang with a production running through September 15.
The show began its life as a series of songs by Clark Gesner. After receiving permission from Schulz, Gesner produced a concept album and then a stage adaptation. It opened off-Broadway in 1967 and enjoyed a four-year run.
The late nineties brought revisions and a revival, noted by the addition of new music and songs by Andrew Lippa.
There’s no plot per se, just a series of vignettes featuring Charlie Brown (Anderson Templeton), Lucy (Kaela Mariano), Linus (Tyler Ono), Sally (Nicole Stanley), Schroeder (Chase Thompson), and, of course, Snoopy (Brady Voss).
The sense of the comic strip coming alive was supported with a three-panel comic strip backdrop and simple, colorful set pieces by Eddy Hansen and spot-on recreations of the expected character clothing by Donnie Frank.
The vignettes were of familiar Peanuts moments: Charlie Brown pining for the Little Red-Headed Girl, Lucy pining for Schroeder, Schroeder pining for Beethoven, Linus pining for his blanket, Sally pining for better grades, and Snoopy pining for his dinner. The kite-eating tree, psychiatrist booth, baseball game, and Sopwith Camel also appear.
The challenge of mounting a production of You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown, is that it’s not really a children’s show, but you must do something to keep the tykes in attendance attentive.
Director Elly Lichenstein appears to have sought a solution to this dilemma through casting. It’s a mixture of teens and adults, and while it’s nice to see some of the area’s talented young performers get a shot at larger roles, they lack gravitas. Ono’s Linus has a wonderful bit with “Me and My Blanket” but his more philosophical moments came off as too juvenile. Thompson captures Schroeder’s love and passion for music, but his frequent expressions of anger were out of step and over the top.
The girls come off best, with Stanley perfectly capturing Sally’s neediness and scapegoating while Mariano fully embodied Lucy’s alpha femaleness (and crabbiness).
Voss played Snoopy for the kids which, based on the reactions from the young folks, worked well, but I missed a sense of the character’s intelligence. Silliness reigned supreme here.
Templeton exuded Charlie Brown’s lack of self-confidence, but that anxiety seemed very real when singing. He was clearly struggling with some of the songs, and his already thin voice disappeared occasionally, as was the case with several other cast members.
The curious decision to not use mics while having a four-piece band onstage did not serve this production well. The band, under the direction of Janis Dunson Wilson, did not overpower the singing and handled the music quite well. The cast simply did not receive the amplification support they should have.
You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown is the theatrical equivalent of opening up a dog-eared copy of a Peanuts compendium and paging your way through a trip down memory lane.
‘You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown’ runs through Sept 15 in the Condiotti Experimental Theater at the Spreckels Performing Arts Center, 5409 Snyder Lane, Rohnert Park. Fri-Sat, 7:30 pm; Sun, 2 pm. $16 – $42. 707.588.3400. spreckelsonline.com
