‘The Loveland Frog’ returns, updated and finally embraced by its home town

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For more than a decade, Joshua Steele and Michael Hall – known as Hugo West Theatricals – have ruled the zany fringe of Cincinnati theater. They’ve done it with shows like “A Klingon Christmas Carol,” “Zombie-Logue,” “The Letters of Vincent van Gogh: a Live Performance” and “Sumatran Rhino.”

Sometimes the shows are quirky and a tad outlandish. Other times, they feel slightly unhinged. The one thing they all have in common, though, is they’re hilarious. 

Steele and Hall have been around long enough now to stage a 10th anniversary revival of one of their early hits – “Hot Damn! It’s The Loveland Frog! – A Bluegrass Musical.” It’s an unwieldy title, but the show itself has proven to have a lasting appeal.

Like nearly all of the duo’s shows, the tale has its roots in a true story. On second thought, “true” may be a bit of a stretch. Perhaps Steele and Hall describe it better as “based on real accounts.”

“We take a few liberties,” said Steele. He’s the dry-witted, understated one of the pair. 

The last time Cincinnati saw this show, it was one of the hits of the 2014 Cincinnati Fringe Festival. It was appropriately oddball, a musical that examined a 75-year-old urban folk tale about a human-sized amphibian.

Steele and Hall describe their spin on the tale:

“Join Luke Honeywell and a smokin’ bluegrass band on a wild river adventure with maniacal moonshiners, a peculiar professor and crooked cops as they rescue Peepaw from the wondrous and elusive Loveland Frog.”

Some places have fish stories. Loveland has frog stories.

There was a time when this tale was a source of embarrassment to many Lovelanders. And the more you know about the story, the more understandable that was. This was a respectable suburb, after all. Odd happenings like this just don’t take place there. But time has a way of blunting the impact of things. And social mores have changed a great deal since the Loveland Frog first appeared nearly 70 years ago.

The legend of the Loveland Frog comes in many variations. Each of us gets to pick the versions we like most. That’s why it’s a legend, not a factual story. It seems that one night in 1955, a driver saw three frog-like critters standing on their hind legs on the side of the road. They were between 3 and 4 feet tall. They had scaly skin, no hair and had heads shaped like a frog’s. In one version of the story – as reported on skeptoid.com – the driver stopped his car and watched the creatures for several minutes until one of them waved a wand-like stick that “fired a spray of sparks,” prompting the driver to flee.

Weird enough for you?

There have been several other sightings, as well, including one in 1972 where a Loveland cop shot and killed the creature and tossed it into the trunk of his car. So what was it? Well, that’s where the story conveniently withers away.

Though Hall grew up in Loveland, he had never heard of the Loveland Frog.

“I was trading stories with a friend of mine who also grew up in Loveland,” recounts Hall, who now lives in Los Angeles. “He said something like ‘you know about the frog.’ I had no clue what he was talking about. When he started telling me, I stood there gob-smacked for about 15 minutes.”

But gob-smacked has proven to be fruitful territory for Hall and Steele. The more outlandish, the better. Or so it seems. Remember, these two turned a real-life story about a plane crash involving a notorious embezzler and a handful of FBI agents into a popular Fringe show.

Long live the Loveland Frog

Over time, Loveland has come to embrace the Frog. Last year, the city adopted the Loveland Frog as its official mascot.

So this time, the production will occupy a place of honor in the community. And it’ll take place in Loveland – at the Loveland Stage Company. It’ll be a centerpiece of a weekend that includes the Loveland Frogman Race – it’s a mini-triathlon – and the seventh annual Loveland Art Festival.

Though this production is largely the same as the original, the passage of time has necessitated some changes, said Steele.

“There’s such a thing as the pendulum of good taste, you know,” he said. “It’s only been 10 years. But when we went through the script, there were some jokes that made us cringe. And we’re not just talking about snowflake sensibilities. In my gut, I knew some of these jokes just weren’t funny anymore.”

The sleepy little Loveland of 2014 has become a destination, filled with upscale shopping and dining. So what seemed worth a giggle in 2014 – “It ain’t a big hassle, heck we even got a castle | and a Frisch’s and a Walgreens too” – was off-mark now. It and several other lines were given a hefty tweak.

They’ve reworked the ending of the show, too.

“In 2014, we were deeply devoted to the specifics of the 1955 and 1972 Loveland Frog sightings,” said Steele. “We developed a theory that there existed not one Loveland Frog, but two. The original Loveland Frog was perhaps a demigod or outer space creature who created the second Loveland Frog from a human teenager hundreds of years ago. Then we tried to squeeze all of this into the ending of the play.”

The result bewildered nearly everyone who saw the show.

“We’d like to think our 2024 ending is a little less complicated.”

Tongues planted firmly in cheek

There’s something mightily laudable about these guys’ productions. They re-examine local history. Or some oddball variation of that history, at least. They employ local actors and creative staff. And since they’re extremely well-connected within the theater community, they’re able to attract top talent. This production, for instance, is directed by Kevin Crowley and has musical direction by Steve Goers, the man behind the music of a huge majority of the area’s credible musical shows.

At the same time, there is something deliciously hucksterish about Hugo West Theatricals. Look deeply enough and you might just discover that Hall and Steele share a gene or two with P.T. Barnum.

Like Barnum, they understand that even the most outrageous theatrical premises can work if you wrap them up in an enjoyable enough package. Even when you roll your eyes at the rampant silliness that occasionally unfolds on the stage, there’s something so good-natured about it that you happily go along with it all.

The creative partners are as different as can be. Steele is a dapper dresser, slender and striking with his bald head – he could be a model if he wanted to. By day, he’s the senior manager of Memorial Hall. He’s the careful, cautious one. Hall is cut from rougher cloth. With his unruly beard and booming voice, he would be a natural to play the title role in “Falstaff.” When he’s onstage, you never quite know what is going to happen. He’s quick. And smart. And delightfully unpredictable. He had a memorable role in director Emilio Estevez’s 2018 movie “The Public.”

For all their differences, they share a love of theater that tiptoes along that line between absurd and slapstickish. Most of their shows – “Loveland Frog” included – have a tongue planted firmly in the cheek. Sitting through one of their productions is a little like listening to a cheeky storyteller. You’re never really sure what’s real and what’s not. But it’s so damned entertaining, you don’t really care.

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“Hot Damn! It’s The Loveland Frog! – A Bluegrass Musical”
Sept. 5-7
The Loveland Stage Company
111 S. Second St., Loveland
www.lovelandstagecompany.org