The World Premiere of Guys And Does

The American Folklore Theatre has established quite a reputation for itself over the years. The rather narrow genre of Wisconsin-based musical comedy is now approaching its 40th year in existence. The theatre company that brought the world Guys On Ice, Lumberjacks In Love and Cheeseheads The Musical opens another Wisconsin-themed musical next week as it presents the world premiere of Guys And Does.

The new musical opens Friday September 4th and closes well in advance of the 2009 deer hunting season. It tells the story of a couple of hunters in Northern Wisconsin who run into a talking doe. I distinctly remember local sketch comedy group The Show  having done a much shorter comedy bit with a very similar premise for a few years now, but to be fair, the idea of anthropomorphizing hunted animals and having them interact with those hunting them has a long and distinguished history that includes The Fisherman And His Wife, Elmer Fudd and Bugs Bunny and of course the ever popular Deer Avenger series of computer games. 

Guys And Does focuses on a pair of guys . . . an old paper mill worker who is going hunting with a man dating his daughter. It sounds like an interesting dynamic that could play out well when a talking doe enters the picture. The musical was written by Frederick Heide and Lee Becker with music by Paul Libman, the same team responsible for Cabin With A View and Muskie Love.

The show runs September 4th – October 24th at the Historic Ephraim Village Hall in Ephraim, Wisconsin.