Cuckoo needed for lead role

ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO’S NEST
Naiad Productions

"I hated Nurse Ratched — she doesn't have any redeeming quality," says actor Rob Archibald of his lingering impression of Ken Kesey's book One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, which he read years ago.

However, it's not only because of his intense revulsion for the cold, iron-fisted character that has landed him the role of her nemesis, Randle McMurphy, in Naiad Productions' upcoming shows of Dale Wasserman's stage adaptation.

"Everyone in the audition wanted to be McMurphy, but there's a double side in Rob which is exactly like McMurphy's," says producer and director Lara Genovese.

"It's the mystery in him; he can be intimidating but at the same time funny. The character of McMurphy, who is apparently this bully and useless rag of the world, is not just the superficial things you see. He develops further, and people get to know the tender side of him."

Set in the 1960s and narrated from the perspective of a presumed deaf and dumb American Indian patient named Chief Bromden (Melvin James), the story follows how rape convict McMurphy, who contrives to serve a short sentence in a mental institution rather than prison, rebels against the head nurse (Candice Moore) to lead his fellow inmates out of introversion.