HOUGHTON - With games as the common theme of the evening, student organizations at Michigan Technological University incorporated everything from Miley Cyrus songs to suggestive humor in their Stage Revue skits Thursday with most ending in chaotic or well-rehearsed musical numbers.
Stage Revue, a skit show meant to poke fun at students and the Copper Country, is held every year during Winter Carnival and featured eight different student organizations willing to bare their chests, cross-dress and literally wig out with big blonde wigs in stereotypical roles. The show was held twice at the Rozsa Center for the Performing Arts with one show at 10 p.m. and the more family-friendly show at 6 p.m.
But that didn't stop comedian Rachel Feinstein, who hosted the show with raunchy humor and talked about love, life and the pursuit of a man.
"This room is mostly guys," she said peering around the room. "There are, like, two chicks in here."
Feinstein even picked a couple of students out of the crowd, many of whom admitted they brought their mothers, and heckled them during parts of the show.
"That is a sassy tuxedo shirt you're wearing," she said to one student who told her he only wears the shirt on Fridays, only it was Thursday. "You wear it two days in a row every week? That's gross."
The Air Force ROTC in "A Video Game Carol" were the first to take the stage. The skit followed a student who quit playing video games and was visited by three video game characters throughout the night. The skit made fun of Brett Favre and business majors before Phi Delta Chi in "A Nightmare Before Winter Carnival" was presented.
The skit centered around Ditzy Alyssa who decided she would rather spend time inside watching TV rather than enjoy Winter Carnival. Incorporating TV game shows, such as "Jeopardy" and "Cash Cab," Alyssa was thrust into her dream and discovers the real meaning of Winter Carnival.
Alpha Gamma Delta captured a group of very diverse students, from the campus jock to the smartest nerd, who are snowed in and forced to play Monopoly together in the Memorial Union Building. The group ended their skit with a dance number to Michael Jackson's "Beat It."
This is the third straight year Tara Mikkelson has played a male character on stage, a role she's become accustomed to doing. This year, she took the stage as Butch the football player.
"I get used to it," Mikkelson said after the show. "I'm really outgoing and it doesn't scare me. They were writing the skit and they said, 'We have a perfect part for you.' They just said, 'Act dumb,' so I did."
In Sigma Phi Epsilon's "The Game of Life: MTU Edition," three young men are given the chance to play the game of life and are thrown onto the campus scene where they meet Michigan Tech female students - men with mustaches dressed as women - and even graduate. The group is also one of two groups of the evening to take a crack at Northern Michigan University female students, drawing big laughs from the audience.
At the end of their skit, a crowd of men from the organization hopped onstage and ripped off their shirts to reveal bare chests and bow ties as they danced to "It's Raining Men," a poke at Tech's men to women ratio.
West McNair was the only student residence hall to participate in Stage Revue when Mario and Luigi in "Level 9" must save Princess Peach from Bowser. The skit called for plenty of fog that blanketed the crowd and drew lots of laughs.
The Army ROTC presented "Mystery Science Theater 2000" and featured three good friends watching TV on a couch and incorporated a Mario rap. Delta Zeta in "The Monopoly Anomaly" followed four stereotypical "Mrs. Degree" girls as they tried to recover missing pieces from their Monopoly board game. Halfway through the skit, another skit member from Delta Zeta jumped on stage dressed as Kanye West.
"I'm a let you finish, but ..." the character said in the line made famous by West.
The women closed with an energetic, well-rehearsed dance number.
"We worked really, really hard on it," Emily Schmidt said after the show. "The dance we spent a ton of time on. We were fortunate enough to have a lot of girls who know dance and were able to teach us stuff. It was worth it and we were nervous."
Delta Sigma Phi, in the final skit of the evening "Operation: Primetime Catastrophe," channeled TV shows such as "M*A*S*H," "Scrubs" and "House, M.D." for their skit as they removed pieces from a skit member like the game operation. When the "patient" hopped up and began singing a rewrite to "Bohemian Rhapsody," the crowd roared with laughter.
Stacey Kukkonen can be reached at skukkonen@mininggazette.com.
