Troy Whistman - Of Wings and Things

Suessical the Musical, St. Joseph Missouri

I took Friday the 17th and Monday the 20th off work and flew up to St. Joseph, MO to see my brother, Jon, in a production of Suessical the Musical. Jon has always wanted to be in a play, and on a whim tried out for this musical... and got two parts!

I flew in early Friday morning. Jon had to work, but my sister-in-law picked me up at the airport and we went downtown Kansas City to a very cool and large outdoor mall called The Plaza so I could get some gifts for my daughters. We had coffee at a VERY busy Starbucks... the lady working the counter said it's one of the top 10 busiest stores in the United States. I can believe it!! The line never went below 20 people the entire time we were there (about an hour).

We did forget that today was St. Pattie's Day, and there was a big parade downtown, so we had lots of detours to take getting out of town. I didn't see any of the parade, as our detour was off route, but there were lots of people sporting green hats all around, and I got this picture of balloon float. Wouldn't it be fun to be one of the rope walkers??

Only non-flash photography was allowed, so it was a challenge to get non-blurry pictures. I got to see the performance twice, once on Friday night, and these pictures are from the Sunday matinee performance. My two sisters Tammy and Heidi flew in Saturday afternoon from Washington state, and we all went to see Jon's performance together on Sunday. Here's a picture from the beginning of the performance, when the Cat in the Hat discovers Jo Jo's imagination and hurls him into the world of Suess. The story is basically a confluence of various Dr. Suess stories, centered around Horton the elephant and the world of Who's that live on a speck of dust... there is a sub-plot around Gertrude, a blue bird with only one tail feather who feels inadequate to capture Horton's attention when compared to the many-feathered birds around her.

The characters dressed in yellow are the Who's that live on the speck of dust. All the other characters are animals (for the most part). My brother is in the gold outfit, black fedora with gold stripe in the back left--he's a tiger.

This is Maisey, the red bird with great plumage (look at all the feathers!) that Gertrude envies. Maisey leaves her egg for Horton to sit on, and takes off for Palm Beach...

While Horton gets captured by hunters and auctioned off, as "an elephant with an egg in a nest in a tree" to the circus... Here's my brothers' second role... he plays the "strong man" in the circus (stage left, your right):

Horton is put on trial by the residents of the Jungle of Nool as "the biggest blame fool in the Jungle of Nool" for believing that a whole population exists on this speck of dust he's protecting on a clover...

Horton argues his case...

Out of the egg hatches the cutest little elephant-bird, played by an adorable little guy who really WAS the son of the guy who played Horton the elephant!

Horton finally recognizes Gertrude!

After the final performance, the cast went out to meet the audience on the street outside this historic theatre. It was cold and sleet was falling...

Jon gets his requisite flowers! Bravo, bro!!

Jon with his son, Joseph, and his sister, Tammy.

How about that hair? Good thing Captain James T. Kirk wasn't here to see these ladies... he probably couldn't help himself! (He always went after those multi-colored high-hair ladies).