You want to do a musical comedy about corn? Are you worried about being accused of writing folksy, hokey humor and groaner puns? Here’s the answer: lean into it! Load that show with as many dad jokes and obvious double-entendres as any one production can carry. Own it, and defy anyone to sit stoney-faced through a performance of “Shucked,” now playing (but only until March 2) at the National.
From the opening number, “Corn,” about (guess what?) just the life-blood and specialty of an isolated farming (and moonshinin’) town, the tone is obvious: if anyone in the audience is allergic to puns and goofy humor, they would do well to leave sooner than later. But for those who stay, they will be treated to more laughs than any one night has any right to provide.
A pair of Storytellers (Maya Langerstam and, on opening night, Nick Raynor) promise a “farm-to-fable” story, and they deliver. There’s nothing about the plot that would surprise anyone who’s seen more than, say, one Broadway play: a romantically-involved couple, an existential problem, a quest to solve it, a reevaluation of the relationship, and a happy resolution. But the plot (except the plot of corn) is not the point.
Maizy (Danielle Wade), betrothed to Beau (Jake Odmark), is our plucky heroine determined to save her town when the corn becomes mysteriously blighted. To find a cure, she journeys to the Big City. Which turns out to be Tampa, of all places, and provides fodder for sendups of old people and gangsters. That slick schtick, involving the Storytellers and Gordy (Quinn VanAntwerp), the grifter who claims he can fix the corn, is itself worth the price of admission.
When Gordy follows Maizy (named, obviously, for….her grandmother) back to her town, he meets Lulu (Miki Abraham), who provides a value-added corn-based product for everyone’s enjoyment, which she brings home with a boffo number, “Independently Owned.” Lulu and Gordy develop a relationship reminiscent of Beatrice and Benedick, and I shouldn’t have to spell out how that ends.
And guess what? The corn problem resolves, there’s a double wedding, and everyone lives happily ever after. Okay, I added that last bit, but you will exit the theater happy and the mood should last at least until you board the Metro for home.
Shucked – Broadway at the National until March 2.