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'Surf City, U.S.A.!': A love song to Huntington Beach
Shirley Weslie Orlando is sitting on the stairs in the Huntington Beach Playhouse "annex" – technically some space in an industrial park – watching a bunch of young actors rehearse her dreams last week.
And that's the Kodak moment.
The luminescent look on the face of this woman who has poured all her passion for song and joy at living in Huntington Beach and her teenage crush on surf music into this singular show.
The production is "Surf City USA," which is now in its world premiere through Aug. 20 at the playhouse and someday, just maybe, it will open on Broadway, she says.
"Just maybe. Because we are the boomers," she says. "We were there and we lived this era. I honestly feel this could be a show that does for the '60s what 'Grease' did for the '50s."
The story line is "taken from my life," says Orlando, 57, who spent her teenage years in the Beach Boys-Dick Dale Huntington Beach of the 1960s.
Which life depicted on stage is hers? Don't ask because she won't tell.
Is she Anne, the love-struck girl next door with a crush on "the guy" or is she Tammy, the spoiled, nasty girlfriend of "the guy?" Was she rescued by the mild-mannered hero or did she fall prey to the wiles of the surfer dude?
Does it matter?
"This is a strong, enjoyable show," says director Roberta Kay on opening night. "The audience will walk out humming the tunes."
She's right. Orlando has written original songs that evoke the era she's celebrating with canny familiarity.
She knows her music. She was 9 when her father moved the family of five kids from Kansas to California. She remembers crossing the state line, seeing her first palm trees and everyone in the car breaking into "California, Here I Come."
She also remembers the culture shock when she entered fourth grade in Huntington Beach:
"I was a provincial girl from Kansas. I was way too naïve for the California crowd. There were already definite pockets of hipness even in the fourth grade.
"I never did get that confidence. I never felt I fit anywhere. But I love it, the beach, the uniqueness of Orange County. It's nearly paradise."
Her tune tastes run to songs of the 1920s, '30s and '40s, the favorites of her musician father. "But when the Beach Boys came along I fell hook, line and sinker for surfer music," she says.
Orlando grew up to open Huntington Music, a guitar and sheet-music shop. She wrote songs, played instruments, became the go-to source of musical knowledge for both teachers and performers.
Five years ago, her world collapsed – divorce, family illness, the store shuttered because of discount competition.
"Everything that defined my life was gone," she says.
Then "roiling and boiling in my head" came the music and the story for "Surf City USA." Music first, she says, then lyrics "just came pouring out. I had the bones of the show in a year."
Orlando hired professional musicians to record the numbers. Then she called producers Bettie Muellenberg, Monica Bartolone and others from the playhouse to her new store, Island Bazaar, featuring tropical furniture.
"I put on a show," she says. "I described scenes and played excerpts and after two hours they said, 'Where do we sign?'"
The show is Orlando's "creative love-child," says producer Mike Bower – who also plays the beach town drunk in the production.
Directed by Kay with musical direction and arrangement by Erik Przytulski, "Surf City USA" features an energetic cast of Orange County actors, many of them high school students.
The cast includes Josh Alton, Ashleigh Arnone, Kimberly Bower, Samantha Bullat, Samantha Burbridge, Shane Cervantes, Jonathan Dean, Suzanne Geisert, Dan Gonzalez, Sarah Graham, Arroya Karian, Robert Kratti, Thomas Mastronianni, Brian Morales, Kelsy Richardson, Desiree Shay, Alex Syiek, Joanna Syiek, Bob Wardrop and Cary Watkins.
Toughest task for the producers: "Finding modest bathing suits for the girls to wear," Orlando says.