Little Shop Of Horrors

I'd like to talk to you all about one of my favourite musicals, the Little Shop Of Horrors. The original 1960's version boasted the first appearance by a young Jack Nicholson. It's the 1986 version I love best. Everything about it is wonderful, the songs are great, the cast is amazing, the story is fantastic and the Audrey II puppet was the coolest thing ever. Steve Martin was wonderful as the sadistic dentist as was Bill Murray as his masosistic patient. I love John Candy's cameo as the dj Weird Wink Wilkinson. I like the different stages of growth the plant went through - from being really itsy bitsy like a common potplant to being almost as big as godzilla. Howard Ashman's music and lyrics were fantastic mind you, and the man later went on to work on the music and lyrics for Disney's Beauty And The Beast - the songs in that film were excellent also (I still have the Gaston song stuck in my head along with the Dentist song from this movie).

I played the dentist in our company production of Little Shop Of Horrors and I can honestly say that it was a lot of fun. It seems that playing a villain is a lot of fun, I had a blast playing Gaston in Beauty And The Beast .

Another thing I like about Little Shop Of Horrors is the plant itself, Audrey II. It is quite a marvelous bloodsucking plant. I have a homemade Audrey II plush as well as an electronic Audrey II toy that my brother and I made - it says "Feed me" when you press one of his leaves - there's also an electronic Brain Eating Rock - the brain eating rock is from the billy and mandy episode that parodied Little Shop Of Horrors. Those two got sadly recalled. There's also a Grow Your Own Audrey II kit - which also sadly got recalled but you can still get them at yard sales. There's also an Audrey II plant of our very own, we call her Andria II. She is a sibling to Audrey II but she doesn't drink blood like her evil sibling does, she likes alcholic beverages. We also have a plushie of her.

Our friend Tyrone The Terrible has a giant Audrey II plant in his backyard.

Every year we have an Audrey II contest in the neighbourhood where people grow and customise their own Audrey II plants and enter them in the contest. The winner gets a special edition grow your audrey II kit signed by my brother and I, and the runners up get all sorts of wonderful prizes as well. Terry McCoy was this year's winner. His audrey II plant was very unique and colourful - it also was wearing shades which my brother thought looked really cool.