“That’s not right!”
Matilda Wormwood’s father is an unscrupulous used car salesman. Mom’s obsessed with wealth, looks and her dance instructor, Rudolpho. But Matilda has a highly refined moral compass. She developed her sense of right and wrong from reading the classics. Sixth grader Kylie Hill, who plays Matilda, says this has also given her character an even greater gift.
“Matilda … shows how women can be brave, and they can stand up for themselves and they don't have to be scared of what they can do.”
Matilda stands up to her father.
She stands up to her school’s tyrannical headmistress, Agatha Trunchbull, using another hidden power. Matilda Wormwood can move objects with her mind.
In the musical’s most memorable scene, Matilda causes chalk to write an indictment on the blackboard. The message causes Trunchbull to flee in terror and her classmates to break out in song.
We are revolting children
Living in revolting times
We sing revolting songs
Using revolting rhymes
We'll be revolting children
'Til our revolting's done
And we'll have the Trunchbull vaulting
We're revolting
Hill’s a virtuoso, and her performance as the plucky British schoolgirl will have audiences asking themselves whether they will stand up the next time they see abuse and echo Matilda in saying, “That’s not right!”
“Matilda the Musical” is onstage Sept.19 to 28.
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“Matilda” is the story of an extraordinary little girl with extraordinary powers. The daughter of abusive parents, Matilda finds refuge in library books and in creating her own stories. Things are no better at school, where Matilda faces a tyrannical and cruel headmistress, Miss Trunchbull, who believes in Crunchem Hall’s motto: “Bambinatum est Magitum,” or “Children are Maggots.”
Matilda finds companionship in her well-intentioned teacher, Miss Honey, who is shy and fragile. Brave little Matilda knows she has to stand up against the adults in her world, and in doing so, discovers her own remarkable powers. Matilda’s bravery teaches Miss Honey and her classmates an important lesson -- that even though life can be hard, “nobody but me is gonna change my story” so “sometimes you have to be a little bit naughty.”
Kylie Hill is extraordinary in the role. The sixth grader leads a cast of children and adults in Cultural Park Theatre’s production of the musical.
Hill says she’s always had a passion for performing.
“I was 5 years old when I started,” she said.
Past credits include “Music Man,” “Matilda” once before, “The Sound of Music” and “Elf the Musical.”
In “Matilda,” Hill is onstage throughout the entire show. She has a heavy line load, which she not only delivers with heartfelt emotion, but also in a thick British accent, which she learned the last time she appeared in the musical.
“It was a lot of listening to the movie, a lot of listening to the Broadway videos, and just listening and redoing it,” said Hill, explaining how she perfected her British accent.
Hill is also impeccable in her musical numbers in the show.
Based on Roald Dahl’s 1988 children’s classic, the show features music and lyrics by comedian, actor, musician, and songwriter Tim Minchin (“Groundhog Day”).
Audiences get their first glimpse of Matilda’s plucky personality in “Naughty,” when Hill sings, “Just because you find that life's not fair, it doesn't mean that you just have to grin and bear it / If you always take it on the chin and wear it / Nothing will change.”
To underscore the conclusion that sometimes you have to get into good trouble, she adds peroxide to her father’s hair dye, giving him green hair on the eve of a big sales meeting.
Of all the numbers, “Quiet” is Hill’s favorite. It’s the song in which the audience discovers that Matilda has both psychic and telekinetic powers.
“These answers that come into my mind unbidden / These stories delivered to me fully written / And when everyone shouts, they seem to like shouting / The noise in my head is incredibly loud.”
At the other end of the musical spectrum is “Revolting Children,” which she likes almost as much as “Quiet.”
It’s a disco-rock ensemble number that’s sung by Matilda and her classmates at Crunchem Hall. Newly liberated from Trunchbull’s reign of terror, the children appropriate the label Trunchbull hung on them, turning it into a battle cry. Trunchbull equated revolting with disgusting, but Matilda and her classmates equate revolting with revolutionary in this barn-storming number.
“’Revolting Children’ has a ton of energy in it,” Hill said. “It's just really powerful.”
A true pre-professional, Hill gives kudos to her fellow castmates for the success she enjoys in the show.
“There is an amazing cast, and there are great people in it. It's amazing. Come and watch it.”
Madison Mitchell is terrifying in the role of the former hammer-throwing champion, Agatha Trunchbull. Discipline is what has made her what she is. If the children under her charge want to have the same kind of success, “You don't need happiness or self-esteem / You just need to keep your feet inside the line.” Trunchbull doesn’t really have the children’s best interests at heart. She despises them, as evidenced by the motto she’s installed at Crunchem Hall: “Bambinatum est Magitum,” or “Children are Maggots.”
Audiences are sure to hate Mitchell in the role but will be forced to admire and applaud her vocal numbers, which include “The Hammer” and “The Smell of Rebellion.” Mitchell is in fine voice, even if she’s a dastardly, despicable and deplorable human being.
Joining Trunchbull under the heading of abusive people are Matilda’s parents, played with panache by Brian Blanks and Maegan Levesque. Blanks has an especially nice moment in the show in the number “Telly,” a dated country-inspired number in which Mr. Wormwood boasts that everything he’s ever learned, he’s learned from telly (“the bigger the telly the smarter the man”). Why bother with books? If the show is ever updated, the number would have to be renamed “Social Media” ….
Miss Honey is played by Christina Placke. She perfectly portrays the browbeaten teacher with low self esteem and a heart of gold. Placke also warbles like a songbird in her numbers, which include the tear-jerking song, “Pathetic,” and “This Little Girl.”
Tyler Connelly and Siana Poteet steal the show with their dance sequences in the scenes illustrating Matilda’s story about The Acrobat and The Escapologist. Their gymnastic-inspired choreography adds an elegant counterpoint to the scenes conjuring the poverty that typifies the existence of Miss Honey and her students.
The rest of the cast includes Constantine Belis as Matilda’s TV-addled brother, Michael; Robin Mu as Mrs. Phelps; Penelope Robersberger as Bruce (whom Mrs. Trunchbull forces to eat an entire chocolate cake after she catches him stealing a piece earlier that day); Grace Wykes as Matilda’s bestie, Lavender; Isabella Eggers at Henchman 1; Dylan Frink as Henchman 2 and the Children’s Entertainer; Robert Gosling as Henchman 3; David Hernandez as the doctor and the Russian mafia boss Sergie; Penelope Hull as Amanda; Grant Wylie as Nigel; Gavin Wylie as Eric; Julianna Metcalf as Alice; Nixyn Fridh as Hortensia; and Reid Wylie as Tommy.
The Big Kids at Crunchem Hall are Logan King, Dylan Frink, Robert Gosling, Joshua Pickering, Khalessi Denslow, Abigail Colbert, Makeila Marston, Carly Jackson, Isabella Eggers, Eloise Hull and Juniper Neff.
The Little Kids are Parker Henry, Mia Gregware, Sophie Hull, Claire Hull, Alexis Calandra, Camdyn Sampson, Audrey Hage, Gypsy Pollock and Sofia Francioni.
Next up for Hill is “A Christmas Story” at Broadway Palm Dinner Theatre (Nov. 21-Dec. 28).
The Oasis Middle School student has her eyes set on North Fort Myers High School, where Theatre Director Janelle Laux regularly turns out powerhouse musical theater performers.
Support for WGCU’s arts & culture reporting comes from the Estate of Myra Janco Daniels, the Charles M. and Joan R. Taylor Foundation, and Naomi Bloom in loving memory of her husband, Ron Wallace.