“Musical of the Year”
Re-Animator™ The Musical
Wins 6 LA Weekly Theater Awards
And Re-Animates Onstage
With New Hayworth Theatre Run
Opening May 3, 2012 in Los Angeles

LOS ANGELES, CA – April 17, 2012 – Earlier this month, Re-Animator™ The Musical won six LA Weekly Theater Awards including “Musical Of The Year.” It also won: “Original Music” – Mark Nutter, “Direction of a Musical” – Stuart Gordon, “Musical Ensemble” – The Cast, “Adaptation” – Dennis Paoli/William J. Norris/Stuart Gordon, and “Blood Effects” – Stuart Gordon! Now Re-Animator The Musical re-opens at a new location – The Hayworth Theatre – for a limited ten-week engagement, prior to its performance dates in New York and the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.  http://www.reanimatorthemusical.com/

In 1985, Stuart Gordon directed his first feature film and created a sensation. It was H.P. Lovecraft’s Re-Animator, a smashing popular success produced by Brian Yuzna that delivered as many laughs as it did screams, making it a cult classic among horror fans and winning a Critic’s Prize at the Cannes Film Festival. Last year, Gordon and his co-writers Dennis Paoli and William J. Norris, and composer/lyricist Mark Nutter turned Re-Animator into a musical for the stage, playing to rave reviews and standing ovations for a sold-out six month run.

Re-Animator tells the story of Herbert West, a brilliant young medical student who has created a glowing green serum that can bring the dead back to life. What should be a medical breakthrough results in hideous monstrosities and ghastly consequences. “I guess he just wasn’t fresh enough,” is West’s constant refrain as his quest for fresh subjects results in the murders of half the faculty of the medical school.

The original cast is back! George Wendt, best known as the affable Norm from Cheers plays the Dean of the Medical School who West transforms into a mindless zombie. Chris L. McKenna, the star of Gordon’s neo-noir thriller King of the Ants is Dan Cain, Herbert’s hapless roommate who finds himself drawn into the mayhem. And operatic Jesse Merlin, who played the President of the United States in the long-running The Beastly Bombing is Dr. Carl Hill who loses his head for Meg, the dean’s beautiful daughter (Rachel Avery) only to actually lose it at the hands of Herbert West. But thanks to the glowing re-agent, Dr. Hill is still able to take his curtain call with his head tucked underneath his arm. Rounding out the cast (in alphabetical order) are Mark Beltzman, Cynthia Carle, Brian Gillespie, Marlon Grace and Liesel Hanson, and featuring Graham Skipper as Herbert West.

Scene from Re-Animator The Musical with Graham Skipper, Jesse Merlin (and a headless Brian Gillespie). Photo by Thomas Hargis.

Special effects are being done by the same guys who did them for the 1985 movie: Tony Doublin, John Naulin and John Buechler, joined by Greg McDougal and Tom Devlin. And the blood will flow so freely that the first few rows will be designated as a “splash zone.” They also just won an LA Drama Critics Circle Award for their amazing work on Re-Animator The Musical.

Laura Fine Hawkes, who last designed The Lieutenant of Inishmore at the Taper, will provide the creepy sets, Joe Kucharski the moldering costumes, and Jeff Ravitz the cadaverous lighting. Stage managing the madness is the unflappable Mike Lemek.

Mark Nutter is composer and lyricist who also won a LA Drama Critics Circle Award for his cheerfully disturbing score for Re-Animator The Musical. His previous stage credits include the international hit The Bicycle Men; Christmas Smackdown (created with the equally demented Cynthia Carle); and Wild Men. He’s also known for his work on 3rd Rock From the Sun and Saturday Night Live. His recent CD, Twisted Songs for Twisted Sophisticates, has been banned from the airwaves.

Song Samples:
“I Give Life” [1:46]
“Six to Twelve Minutes” [0:40]

Stuart Gordon directs. Prior to the Re-Animator movie, he spent fifteen years as the founder and artistic director of the Organic Theater of Chicago, where he co-created and directed 37 original productions including Bleacher Bums, and the world premiere of David Mamet’s Sexual Perversity in Chicago. Gordon has also directed four more films based on Lovecraft (among them From Beyond and Dagon.) Gordon’s most recent stage credits include the still running Nevermore, An Evening with Edgar Allan Poe starring Re-Animator film star Jeffrey Combs.

You won’t want to miss the award-winning Re-Animator The Musical. You only have 10 weeks before it heads off to New York and begins its international tour.

For more about Re-Animator‘s awards, check out http://blogs.laweekly.com/arts/2012/04/theater_awards_winners.php and http://ladramacriticscircle.com/2011-awards/

For more information, to request images, or arrange interviews please contact Green Galactic’s Lynn Tejada at 213-840-1201 and lynn@greengalactic.com OR Philip Sokoloff at 626-683-9205 and showbizphil@sbcglobal.net.