By Kaylon Coleman

Over the weekend, I attended the last show for Bat Boy: The Musical hosted by the Cal Poly Humboldt Department of Dance, Music and Theatre. To fully immerse myself in the experience, I decided to channel my inner bat and walk in blind. I know it’s in the name, but it wasn’t until I was smack-dab in front of the Van Duzer that I realized I was attending a musical. 

Now, it’s been a minute since I’ve basked in the theater arts, ironically six or seven years probably — but I believe this is the first time I’ve ever witnessed a musical live. The play itself lasted about two-and-a-half hours, with an intermission included. For those unaware, Bat Boy is about… well, a bat-boy. Bat Boy, later dubbed Edgar, is stumbled upon by some cave explorers while spelunking. After getting captured and brought to the surface, Edgar is caged as the townspeople decide whether to string him up as entertainment or to put him down via the town doctor, Dr. Parker.

The first act of the musical consisted of Edgar getting accustomed to human life, learning how to walk the walk, talk the talk, so on and so forth. This presented itself through 13 different songs sprinkled throughout the first act. I know musicals get a bad wrap a lot of the time, but I think the fact that I was watching this live immersed me more than a traditional movie-musical. I need to give props to Rylan McClain, a.k.a Dr. Parker. Everybody who sang did a great job, but McClain’s vocals stuck with me. He was belting up there like his rent was due. 

The play, while more serious leaning, did indulge in some bouts of comedy. One moment that made me laugh was when Edgar was showing off his progression as a civilized individual, and replied to someone with the term, “indubitably.”

  It took me some getting used to, but by the end of act one, I was fairly brought on board the Bat Boy train. All this changed during act two however. After a brief intermission, the play resumed with Edgar attending the revival service they chose to hard launch his progression at. After some snafu’s, Edgar flees into the wilderness, with the townsfolk hot on his tail. This is where the play started to lose me, to no fault of the performers. It just seemed as though the story completely flipped from where I thought it was going. There was a plot twist that I assumed would be the case, but did not end how I thought it would. 

Bat Boy: The Musical is one of few productions I’ve seen that have left me speechless for the most part, which might just be a symptom of live theater, who knows. I applaud the performances of each cast member, and extend my applause to the band as well, which did an amazing job of immersing the audience. Keep live theater alive!

Kaylon Coleman is a senior journalism major with a concentration in news and a minor in communications. He is the Life & Arts editor for LJ, Marketing and Communications lead for the Umoja Center and  and a part-time radio DJ and merch manager for KRFH. If you have a topic you want him to discuss, email him at kc403@humboldt.edu.