The Jenny Revue

BugJuice: A Beetlejuice Parody By Meraki Theatre	Meraki Theatre - Winnipeg, MB merakitheatre.com	V.19 - CCFM - Antoine Gaborieau Hall
	BugJuice, BugJuice, BugJuice! Join Meraki Theatre's all-teenage cast in this musical parody of Beetlejuice, with a few extra legs and a whole lot of fun. Packed with laughs, larger- than-life characters and toe-tapping tunes, it's a ghostly good time for the living and the not-so-living. From the team that brought you the completely sold-out run of Midnight (2023) and Barbie: A Parody (2024) comes a delightful journey through the land of the living, the dead, and everything in between.	Show Info: 45 minutes Genre: Musical Audience: General	Wed July 16 7:45 PM Thu July 17 9:30 PM Fri July 18 6:00 PM Sat July 19 7:45 PM Sun July 20 6:00 PM Tue July 22 9:30 PM Wed July 23 7:45 PM Thu July 24 9:30 PM Fri July 25 6:00 PM Sat July 26 7:45 PM Sun July 27 8:30 PM

BugJuice: A Beetlejuice Parody

Meraki Theatre—CCFM – Antoine Gaborieau Hall

The write-up says the show is a parody, but I wonder if it creeps closer to a spoof. Either way, it helps you considerably if you know the original movie Beetlejuice. It mostly makes sense even if you know nothing about the movie, but film familiarity gives it a lot more context.

The lead character, BugJuice, nails Michael Keaton’s voice and many of his mannerisms, and the feature ghosts look like they could be younger versions of Geena Davis and Alec Baldwin. As for the other characters? Let’s just say that they didn’t try to imitate the originals.

Why did I say that it feels more like a spoof at the beginning? From the opening number, the song vocals—errrr—I’ll be kind and say that they weren’t great. There were snippets where I could tell the actors CAN sing, but did they choose to sing off to spoof the movie? It wasn’t just one person; most of the singers would leave the Idol judges cringing.

Curiously, they mentioned several times that they only have 45 minutes to run this show.

Warning: the show runs a bit long. After the schlepping of the merch, the clocked ticked in at 53 minutes total running time.

Because of time limitations, they skipped key parts from the movie. Then why not make it a longer show? You ran over anyway!

There were some fun and some giggly moments. A lot of bodies stood to applaud after the run but I suspect there were a lot of friends and family, including a very rude family member beside who shot video with her phone, WITH THE FLASH ON. Just don’t.

Ray Yuen