Outrageous and outsized musical tribute to Claes Oldenburg takes the stage in Los Angeles

Just the premise of a fringe festival musical about Claes Oldenburg is probably enough to entice any lover of Pop art to book a ticket for Enormous Things: The Musical, which true to its title includes oversized cardboard costume versions of the Swedish American artist’s most recognisable public sculptures from the giant saw (Saw, Sawing, 1996) to the really big spade (Plantoir, 1991). The brainchild of actor and writer Chris Gale (who also stars as Oldenburg) and Sarah Lew, this month’s Hollywood Fringe shows are the second go-round in Los Angeles for this 90-minute production, which imagines the artist stuck in a creative rut after his muse, a giant named Claramonde, disappears from his life.

Gale and Lew were inspired by their own experiences—Gale’s mother is a sculptor and Lew came up through film and television art departments—to make a show that both pokes fun at the art world and brings up real-life issues, from labour practices in successful artists’ studios to giving women who may have been overlooked their due.

“I have a lot of friends that have worked for galleries, interning for bigger artists,” Lew tells The Art Newspaper. She adds that the 2018 documentary The Price of Everything was “really eye-opening in terms of how the labour force has a relationship with the market world and most of the work is done by people that aren’t getting the credit”.

One person who only belatedly has received credit in Oldenburg’s oeuvre is his wife and creative partner, Coosje van Bruggen. She is nominally represented in the play by Claramonde, but Gale and Lew both feel there is a bigger story to be told about Van Bruggen.

“Part of the genesis of the show is that I grew up in Minneapolis, so [Spoonbridge and Cherry in the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden] is on every Minneapolis postcard. Everybody knew who Claes Oldenberg was [but] I don’t think Coosje was credited very often,” Gale says. “The show was already happening, writing wise, and we really realised there's this strange parallel of an uncredited person who’s collaborating with him.”

Criticism about unacknowledged artistic labour comes out loud and clear by way of the musical’s villain, Jeff Koons, played hilariously in drag by real-life balloon artist and performer Molly Balloons.

“Spending more time writing the character we actually fell a little bit more in love with him,” Lew says. “[We] still have a lot of judgments around him as an artist and a businessman, but we really feel into why this person must do the things they do because of such a desire to be loved. He is very unapologetically a salesman.” Lew adds that she wrote the role specifically for Balloons: “There’s a joke at the end of the show that’s like, ‘Oh, what am I gonna do? Give up being a successful balloon artist to do community theatre?’—which is actually her.”

After being taunted by Koons, Oldenburg goes on a Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure-style journey through art history. Along the way he meets Michelangelo, Yayoi Kusama and Alexander Calder, who have varying degrees of useful advice for him. Kusama’s ode to becoming infinite versions of yourself through her mirrors is particularly poignant.

Art history buffs will delight in the many Easter eggs peppered in throughout, including a jab at the use of “artist statement language” in how Claes speaks. The show is narrated by an embodied version of Rodin’s The Thinker (Ryan Hailey, who incredibly holds the fist-on-chin pose for most of the performance) and culminates in a cardboard congregation of Oldenburg’s most famous works.

“One thing that’s fun for me is I’m on stage almost the whole time, so I can really feel what people are laughing at, and I’ve definitely started to identify when a crowd is a little more art world-centred,” Gale says.

The pair hope Enormous Things will have a future in New York, or maybe in Gale’s hometown of Minneapolis. For now, Enormous Things has a full weekend of shows at the Hollywood Fringe, where it’s playing at the Second Place Studios on Hollywood Boulevard.

• Enormous Things: The Musical, until 28 June, Hollywood Fringe, Los Angeles