(gentle music) - Salt Lake Acting Company brings holiday fun with Mo Williams, Naked Mole Rat Gets Dressed, the Rock Experience.

And here to tell us more is the star of the show and director of communications, Joseph Paul Branka.

Hello Joseph.

- Hello.

Thank you so much for having me.

- You get to play the Rat Mole.

- I surely do, I surely do.

A little naked mole rat on stage.

Probably some of my, not just my favorite title, but one of my favorite costumes too.

I can't wait for people to see our interpretation of a naked mole rat for musical theater.

- Alright, and it's a children's holiday show we should tell people.

- Exactly.

It may seem a bit misleading with that title, but No, it's, it's very appropriate and well-dressed naked mole rat.

(laughing) - For the whole family.

Okay, so I'm very curious about this show.

What's it about?

- Oh, it's wonderful.

So I play Wilbur J. Mole Rat Jr., who is a little bit wistful about the life that he's living in the tunnel with all of his mole rat friends and family.

And naturally they're naked as naked mole rats tend to be.

But Wilbur happens upon a magical hole from the sky that starts dropping clothes into the tunnel.

And he finds that it's an, his new and favorite way of expressing himself are all of these wonderful, beautiful, bright pieces of clothing that he comes to find.

And the story is of the difficulty he runs into with the rest of the community who have never tried clothes, suddenly seeing a naked mole rat dressed for the first time.

And that throws things into a bit of disarray.

- Great.

And I know it's music.

You love the music.

- Oh my goodness, it's wonderful.

It's some of my favorite compositions from Mo Willems and Deborah Wicks La Puma.

The music is bright and fun and exciting and there's some really heart wrenching ballads.

We give you a little bit of everything with the children's theater at SLAC.

- Oh, that's so great.

And how, okay, how big's the rest of the cast?

- There are six of us total.

So we've got our creative team, our stage management team, and then the six of us in the cast all playing various forms of naked mole rats for the show.

- Alright.

And you get the clothes.

- I sure do get those clothes.

Yes I do.

- Alright, Joseph, thanks so much for being here.

- Of course.

Thank you so much for having me.

- And if you'd like to know more about that upcoming children's holiday show at Salt Lake Acting Company, Naked Mole Rat Gets Dressed, the Rock Experience, it's playing now through December 30th.

Just go to SaltLakeActingCompany.org.

SaltLakeActingCompany.org.

I'm Mary Dixon.

Thanks for watching Contact.

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