On stage: Daddies-to-be want some attention, too

Adrian Chamberlain / Times Colonist
February 20, 2013

On Stage

Hello Baby!

Where: Metro Studio

When: 8 p.m. Friday, Saturday

Tickets: $15, $18 at ticketrocket.org or 250-590-6291

When it comes to having babies, moms get all the attention.

Dads? Not so much.

It’s not fair, says Nelson actor/writer Lucas Myers, who brings his solo show, Hello Baby!, to Victoria this weekend. The comic piece was inspired by Myers’ experience of fathering his first child, Frances, who’s now six years old.

Hello Baby! takes the form of an instructional lecture given to about-to-be dads. Titles of songs sung and performed by Myers on guitar, ukulele and electric keyboard provide the flavour of the show. They include: What If, Nobody Warned Me about the Drool and Time Management Blues.

Myers says Hello Baby! is his theatrical response to Mom’s the Word, the hit Canadian comedy about motherhood that’s been performed more than 10,000 times in a dozen countries since 1994 (including a run on London’s West End).

“There was no male version of that, so I thought, look, here’s a niche. As far as I know, no [playwright] has picked up on the guy’s perspective of baby-making.”

Hello Baby! has yet to hit the stratosphere like Mom’s the Word (and its sequel, Mom’s the Word: 2); however, Myers has performed it often, including recent productions in Nelson, Kelowna and on Gabriola Island.

Myers, who with his wife now has two young children, says he found it stressful in the months leading up to the birth of their first child. He noticed while expectant moms get oodles of sympathy and attention, fathers are somewhat left out.

“There’s this funny thing; you’re kind of expected to be this rock, this thing of support. But you’re trying to deal with [the fact] that you’re going to be responsible for another human being,” he said.

“And once the baby arrives, you’re just in ‘go’ mode. You don’t have the time or the energy to think about all that stuff.”

A University of Victoria theatre graduate, Myers is well-known in Victoria, partly through his ongoing work with Theatre SKAM. He is co-creator of Theatre SKAM’s Smalltown: A Pickup Musical, which will have its official première in August (the show was staged in workshop form at the Victoria Fringe Festival in 2010).

In Nelson, Myers oversees his own theatre company, pilot.co.pilot. This year, he’s been designated the Kootenay city’s official cultural ambassador, representing the city when he tours.

Myers’ other solo shows include Deck, Dress, East and The Amazing and Impermeable Cromoli Brothers.

achamberlain@timescolonist.com