‘Little Shop of Horrors’ opens July 25

Which is probably why it’s a classic hit.

Signature Productions announces its next performance, “Little Shop of Horrors,” for Monday through Aug. 27 at the Summerlin Library Performing Arts Center, 1771 Inner Circle Drive.

Tickets can be purchased at signatureproductions.net or by calling 878-7529 from 1 to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday.

Many people remember “Little Shop of Horrors” when it burst from theater screens in 1986. The Oscar-nominated film has gained a cult following since then.

The movie starred Rick Moranis and Ellen Greene. It follows a nerdish florist who finds romance with the help of a man-eating plant that demands to be fed.

The stage show features an intimate cast of fewer than two dozen characters — an easy one to cast, o r maybe not.

Director Erik Ball said people came to the audition “in droves. We had to break it up over multiple days.”

The result: Signature had its choice of actors.

The female lead went to Aly Thomas. She plays Audrey, the Greene part.

Nerves ran high at the auditions, Thomas said, and even higher as the girls awaited word on who would be called back. Hers was one of the nine names called. After that, it was cut to two.

She got Ball’s phone call while at school.

“I think he spent two minutes convincing me that I actually had the part,” she said.

A product of the Las Vegas Academy, Thomas, 18, already was familiar with putting on the show, as s he’d done it in middle school. Back then, her role was much less prominent. She sat on stage as a plant operator.

Thomas said she was excited to do the play.

“I grew up on the movie,” she said. “I was kind of a morbid child, so, yeah, a man-eating flower was right up there.”

Thomas said she’ll perform the character with less of a lisp than Greene so she’s easier to understand. She said she felt no pressure doing a show with a cult following that knows every line.

“The mechanics of it doesn’t matter,” she said. “The audience is just excited to be there.”

Michael Vojvodich won the role of Seymour, which Moranis played in the film . Vojvodich is the director of Broadway Bound, the musical theater program at Summerlin Dance Academy.

He recalled being at the Nevada Ballet Theatre for auditions. Dozens of actors were in the hallways, singing random lyrics and practicing their monologues as they waited to be called into the audition room.

“I had to separate myself and focus so I could ramp up my nerdy-ness,” he said.

His nerdy-ness must have impressed the casting crew, because he got the job.

The triple threat said, “It’s hard not to watch the movie and copy it … I purposely told myself when I got the role that I would not be watching the movie. I didn’t want to copy it word for word, moment by moment.”

Vojvodich said the cast used rehearsals to tweak their roles.

“It’s solidified (about the time) you get on stage for the technical rehearsals,” he said.

Even though many people know the script by heart, he said, they may be in for a surprise.

“The way the movie ends is not the way the stage play ends,” Vojvodich said.

Contact Summerlin and Summerlin South View reporter Jan Hogan at jhogan@viewnews.com or 387-2949.