‘The Big Bang’

Jason Parrish as Jed and Gary Marachek as Boyd, two eager producers. If you thought “Phantom of the Opera” was big, with its candle-lit lagoons and plummeting chandelier, or “Miss Saigon,” with its huge helicopter… well, you ain’t seen nothing yet.

Jed and Boyd want to produce the biggest musical extravaganza ever seen on Broadway.

How big?

BIG!

We’re talking 12 hours long, with a cast of 318 who’ll wear 1,400 wigs and 6,000 costumes. The musical, which will cost $83.5 million to produce, will tell the entire history of the world, from the creation of the universe to the present.

That’s the premise of “The Big Bang,” Florida Repertory Theatre’s last offering this season.

Written by Jed Feuer (music) and Boyd Graham (book), the two-man show stars Jason Parrish as Jed and Gary Marachek as Boyd, two eager producers. They’ve written a musical of epic proportions — also called “The Big Bang” — and are holding a backer’s audition in a posh Park Avenue apartment.

They address the audience as potential backers.

“We say we’ve written the biggest budget musical ever conceived,” says Mr. Parrish, “and we’re asking them to invest inProducing Artistic Director Bob Cacioppo, left, gives directions to Jason Parrish, right, and Gary Maracheck, middle, on the set of “The Big Bang.” it. We say we’re going to show you the highlights.”

And in a madcap 90 minutes, they then proceed to tear apart the swanky apartment, using anything and everything as props.

After popping a paper bag (to symbolize the Big Bang), they go on to portray Adam and Eve. Jed, apparently, has lost the coin toss, because he has to play Eve and wear ivy on his head.

“The original title of the play was ‘Free Food and Frontal Nudity,’” Mr. Parrish says. “That’s the title of the song Adam and Eve sing.”

“It’s silly nonsense. It’s Jerry Lewis kind of humor,” says Mr. Marachek, when asked to describe the musical. “Slapstick pie-in-the-face, but it’s cleverly written. It’s the history of man, starting with Adam and Eve, up to Hitler. We think we’ve written the best show ever written in the history of man.”

Mr. Marachek happened to see the original in New York about 10 years ago. He and a friend were walking down the street when a couple who had two extra tickets approached them. The couple’s friends were supposed to attend, but had just called to say they couldn’t make it. So they offered the tickets to Mr. Marachek and his friend.

“We laughed so hard, we were covering our mouths, because we didn’t want to miss what was coming next,” Mr. Marachek recalls. “I said, ‘I hope I get a chance to do that; it’s right up my alley.’”

He did better than that. He’s acted in three productions of the show; the Florida Rep production will be his fourth. He first portrayed Boyd at the Actors Playhouse in Coral Gables. The show was only supposed to run for three weeks, but was such a hit, the theater extended the run for another three weeks, then brought it back the following summer.

“We ran it the entire summer, for 10 or 12 weeks,” Mr. Marachek says. “June, July and August.”

Richard Hopkins, artistic director of the Florida Studio Theatre in Sarasota heard how popular the production was and drove across the state with his associate producer to check it out.

“He waited for me after the show, and said, ‘It’s the funniest thing I’ve ever seen in years!’”

And the following winter, Mr. Marachek was performing in “The Big Bang” in Sarasota for “an eight- or 10-week run.”

Why does he keep returning to this show?

“This is the most fun of any show I’ve ever done in my life, and I’ve done about 300 shows,” he says. “I grab the chance to do this show.”

When he heard that Florida Rep producing artistic director Robert Cacioppo was planning a production of “The Big Bang” and wanted to cast him, he said, “Sure, count me in.

“I kept this slot open, even turning down a few other shows, just so I could do this,” Mr. Marachek says. He was aware of Florida Rep’s reputation, and had also worked with Mr. Parrish in a show on the east coast last summer.

The show may be fun, but it’s also challenging; it’s non-stop action for 90 minutes.

“You hardly ever leave the stage, you change costumes on-stage,” he says. “I’m guessing there are 20 songs in the show, and we sing them all. There’s a little bitty scene, then another big song with a lot of choreography. Jason and I do it all.”

But just because it’s madcap and frantic, doesn’t mean every scene isn’t carefully pre-planned.

“You just can’t go helter-skelter with it. It’s all timed down to the exact second, depending upon how the audience is reacting,” Mr. Marachek says. “It’s really difficult,” Mr. Parrish says. “There are many pieces to it. Not only is there singing and dancing, but on top of that, we have to remember which parts of the apartment we’re using for our next costume. It’s highly technical.

“The process of putting it together, that no one sees, is really painful, but the payoff is just amazing. If we do it well, the audience won’t notice (all the work that went into it.)”

Doing a musical, especially a comedic one, requires a different set of skills than drama, he says.

“As an actor, you have to be very patient with yourself,” he says. “I tend to want results right away. But first you have to learn the music, then you have to add the footwork to it, then you have to start acting. It’s a matter of layering the pieces of it.

“Most of it is supposed to feel as if it’s spontaneous, especially the costumes. It’s a really fun thing. The audience will be mesmerized: Oh God, what are they going to use next?”

The props and costume designers had to work together very closely on “The Big Bang,” as the props and costumes are often one and the same.

“All the costume pieces are to be found items,” Mr. Parrish says. “The script is very specific on what you need. The props, costume and set designer have to work very closely together on this.”

And Mr. Parrish is no stranger to comedy, having performed in “Relatively Speaking” and “The Santaland Diaries” at the Florida Rep earlier this season, and in “A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum” in a previous season.

In “The Big Bang,” he plays the “straitlaced one” while Mr. Marachek’s character is more of a clown.

“You watch me fall apart through the course of it,” he says. “I think it’s more fun to play unraveling.”

Much of the humor comes from the fact that the characters believe so deeply in their ludicrous musical-on-steroids.

“They’re so desperate to get their showbiz dream realized that they’re willing to do anything to show the audience that they have what it takes,” Mr. Parrish says. “The comedy is in the earnestness of the performance.”

Among the many historical (and hysterical) characters he plays, his favorite is Mrs. Ghandi, with Eva Braun coming in a close second. (She sings a song about Hitler: “Loving Him is Where I Went Wrong.”)

“I like doing this show because it’s challenging,” Mr. Parrish says. “But at the same time, it will be so much fun to play. Once it’s up, and we have it in our bones and muscles, it’s one of those things, while I’m doing it, I’ll be thinking, ‘I’m getting paid to do this?’ It will be a joy to work on, an absolute joy to play.

“It’s very zany, very funny. It takes a lot of brain power.

“It’s just brilliantly written. That’s the fun part. It’s a great, funny, witty script that’s just a blast to play, and very funny to watch.” 

in the know

>> “The Big Bang” >> When: May 7-23, with previews May 4-6 >> Where: Florida Repertory Theatre >> Cost: $38, $42 and $10 (previews: $20 and $25) >> Information: Call 332-4488 or go to www.FloridaRep.org