The Temp: The Reviews
City Pages’ “The Lists”, the Year in Theater 1998:
# 1. The Temp, Brian Kelly and Todd Price
No Show this year contained such rampant creativity, and none provided as engrossing a theatrical experience as Kelly and Price’s musical comedy. The cast made sweet love to the gods of irony. Michael Ritchie delivered a sublime performance as a nitwit turned Phantom of the Opera, and Charle Rollings achieved the perfect marriage of actor and character in the aw-shucks role of young Scooter.
City Pages’ Best of the Twin Cities 1999:
Best Actor in a Comedy – Michael Ritchie
Our affection for the campy Bryant-Lake Bowl musical comedy ‘The Temp’ was due in no small part to the zealous performance of the rubber-faced Michael Ritchie. As Richard, the greasy, bespectacled, sniveling office reject, Ritchie brought apoplectic gonzo gusto to the task of bumbling his way out of a job. As his character turned into a cape-wearing, sneering, Michael Crawford-wannabe psychotic who calls himself the Phantom of the Storage Room, Ritchie slithered, cackled, pranced, and hissed with exuberant tongue-in-cheek melodrama. His snarf-inducing timing was ideal for a script written by and for a generation raised on the ironically non-ironic humor of The Muppet Show.
Curtain Calls: The Temp
By Carolyn Petrie
Brian Kelly and Todd Price’s The Temp, a shamelessly schlocky spoof of our ultra-modern corporate culture, simultaneously celebrates and skewers the traditional musical form. It also stands as a gloriously silly reminder that the old-song-and-dance formula still has a lot of life left in it.
Generously layered with equal parts Oklahoma! And Dilbert, The Temp is set in a nameless, faceless office that finds salvation when a swaggering, 10-gallon-hat-wearing temporary worker sweeps in, accompanied by the theme music from The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly, – and gallantly saves the day. Author and lyricist Kelly makes for a dashing mysterious stranger who files, sorts, and collates with cheeky panache; as a geeked out loser who’s hell-bent on workplace sabotage, Michael Ritchie throws himself into his role with demonic abandon.
The action moves along briskly, punctuated by hummably dorky tunes like “Casual Day” and “Love Theme from The Temp,” never missing prime opportunities to make fun of “Hang in there” kitty posters and pointless water cooler conversations along the way.
Skyway News, March 12, 1998
Words Cannot Describe
By Anne Ursu
Language is dead. When each Lethal Weapon sequel is “Hilarious!” what exactly is the point of words? How to describe art in a way that means anything when every movie with a talking dog is “Magical!”? More to the point, perhaps: What do you say when you find a piece you really believe in? After all the superlative logorrhea of Lethal Weapon, et al., what words remain to describe those theatrical gems that are actually delightful? How do we adequately convey the sheer rapture of Brian Kelly and Todd Price’s musical The Temp?
The play’s conceit is simple but ingenious. A small office is trying to sell product despite the unfortunate hiring of the disaster that is greasy, bespectacled Richard (a Tony-worthy Michael Ritchie). After a blown presentation, Richard gets his Pink Slip-but then the office is short a worker, and the boss (Tom Winner) decides to call in…a Temp.
Cue music: Clint Eastwood theme from The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly. The sound of spurs. In struts The Temp (the show’s auteur, Brian Kelly) in cowboy hat, red shirt and lots of black leather. “I understand,” he intones in a tumbleweed twang, “you’re looking for some help.”
Behold the power of cheese! The genre-iffic music, Musical! choreography, and gee-whiz acting contain the giddy, life-loving irony of the best Muppet Show numbers. Several times during this production, various audience members sprouted tears; I believe these were not caused by the ol’ “I laughed so hard I cried!” phenomenon, but because this production reaches something damn close to perfection. Indeed, in the face of the Platonic Ideal Form of Art itself, what can we do but weep? And it’s a joy we know must be transitory, causing a pain best expressed in song:
To love a Temp is like to love the starry sky…
To love a Temp is like to love the wind or rain.
Because after The Temp wins the heart of workaholic Swanson…and foils the evil plans of Richard, who has donned cape and Lon Chaney mien to become the Phantom of the Storage Room (bwa-ha-ha-ha!), it’s time for him to move on. “If I stayed,” he tells us, “I wouldn’t be a Temp.” Isn’t that the way it always goes? We come this close to finding true theatrical love and then, alas, off it saunters:
Just sign his time card
And he’ll be gone without a word
But rest assured,
That his legend lives on, yes his tale will be heard!
With a tilt of the hat, the Temp walks into the sunset, leaving behind swooning office mates and an exuberant, cheering audience. Thank you, Temp. We’ll never forget you.
City Pages, July 15, 1998
‘Temp’ returns to comic office life
By Kelly L. Carter
Think of it as another typical workday: water-cooler gossip, overtime and interoffice love affairs. Add song and dance, non-stop comedy and an off-the-wall flamenco routine and you get “The Temp”, an entertaining slice of life on the job.
“The Temp” is a farce chronicling how a temporary employee saves the day at a dysfunctional work site: an office in absolute chaos where a disgruntled ex-employee seeks vengeance on the people who caused him grief.
The Production makes several jabs at popular culture, including the lovesick scenes in “Titanic” and the comic strip “Cathy”.
Michael Ritchie, one of the notable actors in this word-of-mouth success, takes on the role of the frighteningly hilarious ex-employee Richard. Whether it’s with evil guffawing or the sinister way he swirls his “Phantom of the Opera”-type cape, his discontented character’s ghastly presence fills the theater.
Laureen Vignovich as Swanson, the Temp’s love interest, has an exceptional singing and dramatic voice. Her character’s dilemma, that of a workhorse career woman without any time for personal relationships, contributes to the true-to-life nature of the show.
Though the choreography is amateurish, it is animated. Several characters use the length of the theater with bold windmill-type arm movements and sometimes exit the stage via the main aisle. An effective dance comedy by gossip hounds Judy and Trudy (aka the Lovely Swans), plays on the ballet “Swan Lake.”
Besides Ritchie’s standout performance, the best aspect of ‘The Temp” is the lyrics. Writer, director and headliner Brian Kelly uses familiar office themes including ‘casual day’ and Monday morning presentations to create poetic comedy. Kelly puns on customary office traditions and uses the flamenco-complete with pink ruffles and sharp toe movements-to represent the task of pink slipping an incompetent employee.
What makes this production work well is its high-spirited comedy about commonplace work situations. To quote what becomes the pinnacle line in the show “It’s funny because it’s true!”
Minneapolis Star Tribune, July 17, 1998
‘The Temp’
By Rudy Renaud
Enough can’t be said about The Temp these days. The Bryant-Lake-Bowl has found its Tony & Tina’s Wedding. On its third run, The Temp is a show that people just can’t get enough of, and for good reason. Todd Price and Brian Kelly have created a masterpiece that gets better with every run (I’ve seen it four times)
If you have ever been a temp, or know one, or don’t, or even if you have no idea what a temp is, you need to see this play. 9-5 was never so much fun, even when Lily Tomlin had something to do with it. The gist of it: the office needs help, the temp comes in and saves the day, the jilted ex-employee gets revenge by occupying the storage room, love abounds, and somebody rides off into the sunset, but I won’t say who.
Lavender, August 14, 1998
‘The Temp’ does a great job
By Tammy Schulman
Few musical comedies could be described as high art, but with its long standing tradition of sudden songs, simplified story lines and fancy footwork, the genre is as endearing as it is cheesy. Because of this, only those with a real passion for it should attempt to make fun of it. Stand back- the creators of The Temp are professionals, bringing giggling drama to the workplace.
The action opens in a bustling office where nerdy Richard (Michael Ritchie) just doesn’t fit in. He’s out of sync, ineffective, and his affections are not returned by the lovely Swanson (Laureen Vignovich). Not surprisingly, he is summarily fired by the John Goodman-esque Mr. Rooney (Tom Winner), who handles the dismissal in a hilarious pink-slip flamenco number. Richard, embittered and unemployed, remains to exact his own brand of vengeance as “The Phantom of the Storage Room”.
Meanwhile, the office is thrown into utter disarray. Nothing is getting done, everyone is irritable, and to make things worse, strange things keep happening. People are desperate until, walking tall and looking like a Baldwin brother, The Temp strides in to save the day. The staff is right to put their faith in this stranger, and The Temp is as good as his legend. Mountains of paperwork disappear like yesterday’s voice-mail messages, enormous packages are shipped and files filed. He’s the consummate hero, even overcoming an arsenal of seemingly innocuous office equipment to prevail in the final battle between good and evil.
There are a hundred tiny jokes, enough to make you want to see it twice to make sure you didn’t miss any. By the time its over, you have been jabbed in the ribs so many times you consider calling in sick to work.
‘The Temp’ –The A-List
This Week Bryant-Lake Bowl begins its second run of The Temp, which sold out all its productions in March and inspired eye-rolling, tongue-lolling devotion in those who scored tickets. This musical (featuring “Casual Day!” and “Love Theme From The Temp”) is the story of an office in chaos and the steely-eyed, iron-jawed employee who comes in to save the day. The Temp wins the heart of the lovely, lonely Swanson, but alas, their love, like a temp worker’s assignment, must be fleeting. Who was that masked man?
City Pages, July 8, 1998