Little Lucy has an imaginary friend, the likes of which you’ve never seen before.
The four-year-old’s companion, Mr. Marmalade, is a frequently abusive cocaine addict with a personal assistant.
“He’s kind of a collage of the sort of dream man and alpha male in all his good and bad qualities,” said Christine Quintana, who plays Lucy in Latchkey Co-op’s upcoming production Mr. Marmalade. “He’s like Romeo and [Mad Men’s] Don Draper and all kinds of bad people…
Depending on how Lucy’s feeling he changes. Sometimes he’s charming, sometimes he’s dangerous.”
Quintana, co-artistic producer of Delinquent Theatre, and Chelsea Haberlin, Mr. Marmalade’s director and co-artistic director of ITSAZOO Productions, formed the Latchkey Co-op specifically to present Mr. Marmalade at Little Mountain Gallery, Aug. 20 to 30.
“It’s such a pleasure to have a dark, dark comedy that really has something to say,” Quintana said.
Written by Detroit-based playwright Noah Haidle a decade ago, Mr. Marmalade focuses on Lucy who has a wild imagination and is often left alone.
“Like a lot of kids, her imagination is fed by the things she sees in real life, but unfortunately, not all of the things that she’s seen in her real life are things that a four-year-old should have to see,” Quintana said. “Her imagination is a crazy mix of kids’ TV and adult TV and real life as a kid and real life as an adult.”
Lucy and Mr. Marmalade play out relationship tropes such as the abusive partner, the enabling partner and the ideal housewife.
“When you put them on a four-year-old child it seems bizarre and really grotesque and upsetting and makes you kind of realize how saturated we are with some really perverse gender roles and just roles in general,” Quintana said.
“I was just in a Toys‘R’Us… there’s still a pink section and a blue section. There’s guns and armour for the boys and tea sets and purses and fake makeup for girls,” she continued. “So you wonder where does it start and how early do these impressions get made, especially in a culture now where when you gave a kid a book, you knew what book they had. When you give a kid an iPad, you don’t know what they’re seeing out there.”
Mr. Marmalade highlights how children form impressions of the world through watching adults interact, pop music and TV.
“Their brains are little sponges. They take in everything that surrounds them. And when you consider you take a growing mind like that and you put it in a toxic environment what that can create,” Quintana said. “All of us can list some formative experiences that were maybe unremarkable to our parents or our caregivers, but to us they leave a big stamp on you and it shapes who you become… so a lot of it is how to let go of those things and go back to the real you, or finding the real you.”
But Quintana doesn’t want the darkness to deter theatregoers from seeing what she says is a hilarious comedy.
“It’s a lot of fun going into the imagination of a four-year-old because we’re not talking always about realistic drama here,” Quintana said. “We’ve got some wild props, some music numbers are hilarious. There’s a couple of other invisible friends that come in that have costumes that we only just recently managed to be able to look at without laughing.”
Jay Clift (Bug, Cool Beans, Someone Who’ll Watch Over Me), who won the Sam Payne Award for the most promising newcomer this year at the Jessie Awards, plays Mr. Marmalade. Cast members include Amitai Marmorstein (Of Mice and Men, Trespassers, Nelly Boy); Kayla Dunbar (Avenue Q, Busytown); Brett Harris (Mojo), Sebastien Archibald (Killer Joe, Clybourne Park); and new University of B.C. bachelor of fine arts acting graduate Sarah Canero.
“Just a really amazing group of emerging artists,” Quintana said. “This is kind of like our summer camp as we’re all working to try to get gigs for the year to come, our summer camp to stay sharp and have some fun doing what we love together.”
Mr. Marmalade starts at 7 p.m. at 195 East 26th Ave., just off Main Street. Tickets are $10 for the preview on Aug. 20, $15 at brownpapertickets.com or phone 1-800-838-3006, or $18 at the door, cash only.
