Rhoda Penmark is an eight-year-old who is willing to do anything to get what she wants, including murder.
For its second production this semester, The Lost Flamingo Company will perform The Bad Seed on Friday and Saturday in Ryors Rec. The play is set in the 1950s and follows Rhoda’s mother, Christine, and her struggle to come to terms with the fact that her “sweet, innocent” daughter is possibly a serial killer.
When Schuyler Fastenau, the director of the show, read the play, he said he really enjoyed the shock and twists in the story.
“It wasn’t at all what I was expecting it to be,” said Fastenau, a sophomore studying journalism. “I thought it would be innocent and cliché, but it’s not that at all. … I was really affected by it and really wanted others to see it.”
Fastenau isn’t the only one affected. He said when the company’s script reading committee read the play, everyone was taken aback and simply said “wow.”
The unusualness of the main character is exactly what intrigued Bri McCabe, who plays Rhoda. She said she is interested in the arc of her character, which has been challenging at times to play.
“I’m not eight, so I have to become eight. Then I have to be a serial killer eight-year-old and then mask that with the sweetness of a regular eight-year-old,” said McCabe, a freshman studying theater performance. “Then I have to find a way to break that whole thing down again. It’s fun. It’s thrilling, but it’s challenging.”
But it’s not all dark. Mira Cooper, as the nosy neighbor Monica, is there to lighten the mood from time to time.
“There are times you get a lot of information thrown at you at once, and (Monica and her sister are) there to give you a bit of relief,” said Cooper, a freshman studying civil engineering. “I get to overact; be very dramatic and intense.”
Although the main plot centers around Rhoda as an 8-year-old serial killer, Cooper said there are several other twists you won’t expect. She said even now — after all of the rehearsals — she still sees things that shock her.
“It’s very unnerving,” she said. “It’s such a dark twist on something that could be innocent. … Be prepared because you’re not going to expect what’s about to happen.”
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