A *utopia That Sells For Less

Wal-Mart is the big-box retailer that everyone loves to hate. Sure it's got the lowest prices, and it's fun to stock up on great quantities of things you don't really need at Sam's Club. But the mega-store has a list of detractors a mile long, including small businesses, environmentalists, workers' advocates and 1.6 million women who are currently involved in the world's largest lawsuit for sexual discrimination. Add to the list Catherine Capellaro and Andrew Rohn, authors and composers of Walmartopia, an original musical produced by Mercury Players Theatre.

Walmartopia is an agit-prop piece that's part Wizard of Oz, part Michael Moore film, part after-school special.

Walmartopia introduces us to model Wal-Mart employee Vicki Latrell (Anna Jayne Marquardt). Vicki has been working hard – doing the Wal-Mart morning cheer, working long hours and holidays at the expense of her family, and discouraging her coworkers from forming a union. But she still lives in a motel with her daughter and can't afford health insurance. Her chauvinist boss won't promote her; instead he nominates her to be a cute and perky poster-girl for the company's new PR campaign – "a woman's place is at Wal-Mart." On a trip to company headquarters in Bentonville, Ark., Vicki has the misfortune to discover a mad scientist in the boardroom, who thrusts her 30 years in the future, into a world where Wal-Mart is more than a ruthless mega-retailer, it rules all of metropolis, controlling not just commerce, but the schools, the government and the arts, as well.

Walmartopia is an agit-prop piece that's part Wizard of Oz, part Michael Moore film, part after-school special. It's got a lot of heart, and its large cast gives everything they've got, with over a dozen rousing musical numbers that range from a stage full of blue-vested employees holding smiley-face signs and complaining about their jobs, to a hilarious send-up of Wal-Mart's CEO being, in his own words, "nibbled to death by guppies," to the horrifying futuristic propaganda piece "Bullets are Freedom."

Several members of the two-dozen plus ensemble give remarkable performances that keep the audience rooting for the good guys and against the most sinister of capitalists. Anna Jayne Marquardt is the center of almost every scene, and leads the show with aplomb. Her strong singing voice, natural stage presence and wholesome look make her very easy to cheer for. Mikhael A. Farah also stands out as the disgruntled Wal-Mart employee Miguel, and later as the radical non-conformist, Zeb. Christopher Babiarz as evil time traveler Dr. Normal is a convincing partner-in-crime to the maniacal Wal-Mart executive Scott Lee (Frank Furillo). As the resurrected Sam Walton, Douglas Holz practically steals the show.

In researching Walmartopia, Capellaro and Rohn drew on Liza Featherstone's book, Selling Women Short: The Landmark Battle for Workers' Rights at Wal-Mart, Barbara Ehrenreich's Nickel and Dimed: On Not Getting By in America, and other news reports that indict Wal-Mart for a variety of crimes against humanity. Their well-documented rant, however, is little more than a funny summary of what we already know – Wal-Mart is an easy target.