ABBA Mia
Here we go again – my, my how can we resist it!
By Joseph Kokenge
The Orpheum Theatre
409 S. 16th St • 345-0606

“spectacular,” “a phenomenon,” “best-ever,” “awesome,” “dancing-in-the-aisle’s fun,” “like a roomful of screaming, orgasmic muppets.”

At some point, except for the comment about the muppets, it’s all been said about “Mamma Mia.”

The smash-hit musical based on the music of the Swedish pop group ABBA is coming to the Orpheum Theater once again from March 28 to April 2 with various show times and ticket prices, ranging from $28 to $63.  Note well, however, that the show has been selling out for years now.

Laurie Wells, who plays Donna Sheridan, has laid down a challenge to everyone who has ever said, “I don’t like musicals.”

“I would dare people to come and not like it,”  Wells said.  “I really would. I would dare them.”

A veteran of productions in both Los Angeles and New York, including “Swing!,” Wells as Donna is the mother of Sophie Sheridan (Carrie Manolakos), a snooping young women who will soon be married on a romantic Greek island.

Sophie has read her mother’s diary and discovered that there are three men: Harry, Bill and Sam – a banker, a stereotypical Australian and an architect respectively, who all might be her father.

Unbeknownst to her mother, Sophie has taken it upon herself to invite all three men to her impending wedding. She wants her father to give her away.

Donna hasn’t seen any of these men in 20 years and she’s more than a bit surprised at their arrival.

“The whole time I’m trying to figure out ‘Why are they here?,’ and ‘What are they all doing here?’ and then they’re trying to talk to Sophie and I’m trying to keep them away from Sophie because I think it’s going to ruin our relationship.”

Donna is just trying to get the wedding off before the, as Wells puts it, “craziness unfolds.”

Craziness does, nevertheless, unfold.  After all, it wouldn’t be much of a musical without it.

And, although not knowing her only daughter’s father and having three possible choices might qualify Donna Sheridan as a cheap island floozy, Wells defends her.

“She’s not a whore, she’s a child of the ’70s,” said Wells. “She went to college, she’s very kind of free love ... even that her daughter is getting married is shocking to her.”

“She’s a single mother at 40 years old who had to raise a daughter all on her own and never really needed a man, so she’s kind of horrified by the whole wedding idea anyway.”

The score of “Mamma Mia!” not surprisingly reads like a list of ABBA’s greatest hits: “Dancing Queen,” “S.O.S,” “Knowing Me, Knowing You,” “Take a Chance on Me,” “Mamma Mia,” and “Money, Money, Money,” among others.

The story, written by British playwright Catherine Johnson, links with impressive seamlessness previously wholly unrelated songs, which earned Johnson a Tony Award nomination in 2002 for Best Musical Book.

“It’s a really fun story and it’s funny,” Wells said. “The whole show is so funny.  It’s flashy.  It’s sort of everything you want a musical to be,” Wells said. 

She even upped the dare.

“I double dog dare them,” Wells said.