Ride The Cyclone

Ride the Cyclone is a Canadian musical written by Jacob Richmond and Brooke Maxwell.^[1] It is the the second piece of media in the Uranium Teen Scream Trilogy. It follows the stories of the spirits of six teenagers who were in the St. Cassian High School chamber choir that are summoned after perishing on a roller coaster accident. The six teenagers are informed that one of them will be resurrected, and they have to plead their case as to why they deserve it the most.

Plot

When the Saint Cassian Choir travels to the Wonder Ville Traveling Fair to compete in the Kiwanis International Singing Competition, they all meet their deaths when they ride the Cyclone, as explained by Karnak in The Uranium Suite. When they die, they enter limbo. There they are greeted by Karnak, who tells them that he will give one of them a chance to return to life. He also gives them a prophecy: "The one who wants to win it the most shall redeem the loser in order to complete the whole."

Ocean O'Connell Rosenberg starts to explain to Karnak that she is the best choice for resurrection, and sings What the World Needs, telling him that she is the best of the group and why the others don't deserve it. After her song, Karnak informs her that the choice would be made through a unanimous vote from the choir. She tries to remedy her previous insults by singing I Love you Guys, but she is interrupted by Noel Gruber.

Karnak introduces Noel next. He offers a mariachi band to back up Noel's song, which he suggests should be about affordable Mexican cuisine due to his job at Taco Bell. Noel refuses this, and sings about his desires to be a sex worker in post-war France in Noel's Lament.

Mischa then sings two songs, the first being This Song is Awesome, where he raps about how awesome his life is. In his second number, Talia, he sings about his online fiancée, and how he wishes to become a man worthy of marrying her.

Ricky sings about a story he imagined in Space Age Bachelor Man. Here he says that he is the savior of the planet Zolar, populated by catlike aliens. He received a message from some of the alien men, asking him to make love to the alien women. After he does what they ask, he is then told that the army from K-9 is attacking. He panics and states that he is only a lover, not a fighter. Peace is restored in the galaxy, and Ricky concedes after the song.

Jane sings about not knowing her identity in The Ballad of Jane Doe. This makes all the choir members sympathize with her, resulting in them throwing her a birthday party. After they realize that the birthday song includes naming the person being celebrated, Ocean creates a new one, The New Birthday Song.

Finally, Constance sings the song Sugar Cloud. This song is about her realising that she loved the world she lived in, and that she now enjoys the life she left behind, and she regrets loathing it all along.

Karnak states that the vote is no longer unanimous, and that the person who will be resurrected will be decided by the person with the highest GPA, which is Ocean. Ocean finds out the meaning of the prophecy and chooses for Jane to be resurrected as Penny Lamb. The other children watch Jane grow up and live her life with her new identity. Karnak tries to make one last prophecy, but he is interrupted by Virgil chewing through his power cord, killing both of them. This leaves the rest of the group to pass on to the afterlife, and they go out singing It's Not a Game/It's Just a Ride.

Characters

The Amazing Karnak

An omniscient fortune-telling machine that can accurately predict the time, place and cause of someone's death but is unable to tell them in the human world, possibly due to his 'Family Fun Novelty Mode'. It is said that he knew of the teens' demises prior to the freak accident. Karnak reads each of the characters' lives using their birthdays and full names.

Virgil The Rat

A rat, made to play the bass by Karnak, that has been slowly chewing through Karnak's power cable for the past two years, causing both of them to die at the end of the show.

Ocean O'Connell Rosenberg

"The Most Successful Girl in Town"

Overachiever, straight-A student and choir captain with a superiority complex, Ocean is a self proclaimed social Darwinist, Buddhist, Christian and Jew who believes the other members of the choir will never amount to anything in life

Noel Gruber

"The Most Romantic Boy in Town"

The only gay boy in their small conservative town, Noel is obsessed with tragedy and New Wave French cinema and secretly fantasizes of being a sex worker named Monique Gibeau in Post-War France, but instead works a job he hates at the Taco Bell in their local megamall.

Mischa Bachinski

"The Angriest Boy in Town"

A Ukrainian adoptee with a drinking problem who was brought to Canada after his mother (who was dying from uranium poisoning) lied about his age on his birth certificate. His adoptive parents, expecting a toddler and instead getting a fully grown teenager, put him in the basement and left him to his own devices, making him turn to "the last bastion of pure strength and masculinity in society", commercialized, autotuned hip-hop. On his YouTube channel, where he posted his music, he met a fellow Ukrainian named Natalia, who eventually became his full-time online fianceé.

Ricky Potts

"The Most Imaginative Boy in Town"

Born with an unnamed disease that left him unable to walk or talk, Ricky was ignored by his peers most of his life, causing his overactive imagination to create a fictional cat planet named Zolar, that he, as the character "Space Age Bachelor Man", rescues.

"Jane Doe"

"The Most Forgettable Girl in Town"

The one unidentified body of the Cyclone Accident was decapitated when the roller coaster derailed and her head was never found, which led to her replacing her missing head with that of a doll, which she then proceeds to carry around the headless doll body. The choir director, having died a couple hours after the accident, was unidentified, buried as a 'Jane Doe'. This caused her to forget her own life during the events of Ride the Cyclone.

Constance Blackwood

"The Nicest Girl in Town"

A seemingly innocent and sweet girl with a secret, dark, self-loathing and dirty side, she reveals she lost her virginity to a ~32-year-old carnie in a porta-potty just hours before the accident. She describes how she secretly began to hate both herself and her family for having pride in their small town after she got to high school and how guilty she felt about it.

Characters who were cut in the early Canadian run of the show include: Astrid: Ocean's older cousin, who is believed to be from a Nordic country, Hank: Astrid's boyfriend who used mobility aids, Corey Ross: an early version of Mischa, and Trishna: a shy girl was interested in entomology.

Songs

Cut Songs

Cast

Characters	Toronto (2011)	Canadian Tour (2013)	Chicago (2015)	Off Broadway (2016)	Seattle (2018)	Atlanta (2019)	Jungle Theatre (2019)	Blue Bridge Theatre (2022)	McCarter Theatre (2022)	Arena Stage (2023)
The Amazing Karnak	Alex Walensko	Carey Wass	Karl Hamilton				Jim Lichtsheidl	Treena Stubel (Voiced by Jacob Richmond)	Jeffrey Binder	Marc Geller
Ocean O'Connell Rosenberg	Rielle Braid		Tiffany Tatreau				Shinah Hey	Madeline Humeny	Katerina McCrimmon	Shinah Hey
Noel Gruber	Kholby Wardell						Josh Zwick	Carter Gulseth	Nick Martinez	Nick Martinez
Mischa Bachinski	Matthew Coulson	Jameson Matthew Parker	Russell Mernagh	Gus Halper	Adam Standley	Chaz Duffy	Michael Hanna	Matt Coulson	Eli Mayer	Eli Mayer
Ricky Potts	Elliot Loran		Jackson Evans	Alex Wyse	Connor Russell	Scott Redmond	Jordan M. Leggett	Keith MacMillan	Yannick-robin Eike	Matthew Boyd Snyder
Jane Doe	Sarah Jane Pelzer		Emily Rohm				Becca Hart	Anna Van Der Hooft	Ashlyn Maddox	Ashyln Maddox/ Katie Mariko Murray
Constance Blackwood	Kelly Hudson		Lillian Castillo				Gabrielle Dominique	Yasmin Doshun	Princess Sasha Victome	Gabrielle Dominique

↑ https://www.playbill.com/article/new-musical-ride-the-cyclone-opens-tonight

[1] ttps://www.playbill.com/article/new-musical-ride-the-cyclone-opens-tonight

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