Triangle sets sail for “Tropic Blunder”: Q&A with Tori Rinker ’16

This weekend, the Princeton Triangle Club will present its 125th musical comedy, “Tropic Blunder.” The show concerns the recipients of an all-expenses-paid island vacation, who have just so happened to win a soda company’s contest. When the island turns out to be cursed, Triangle’s particular brand of musical comedy ensues. To talk about the nautical-themed adventure, Street sat down with Tori Rinker ’16, the president of Triangle. “Tropic Blunder” will run Friday and Saturday at 8 p.m. and Sunday at 2 p.m. in McCarter Theatre.

Daily Princetonian: How does Triangle choose the theme of the show?

Tori Rinker ’16: Our writers work under the supervision of two writing professionals, Pete Mills and Jeremy Desmon. The writers workshop and brainstorm and come up with different ideas for what the show could be this year. And once they decide, they write material for the show and they’ll pitch it and sort of do a read-through of a draft of the script at Reunions of every year. Everyone in the club who’s there, plus the trustees, will get feedback, saying this worked, this didn’t work, and then they’ll take the summer to revise it and go from there.

DP: What was challenging about this particular production?

TR: I think what was different and exciting for us this year was that it was a book show, in that in the past it has been a musical upon a revue, where it’s sort of like [Saturday Night Live] — there are sketches here, songs here, sketches here. In this one, the writers did a really wonderful job of having an entire plot the entire show, every single step. It was a little different from a plot, because it means we’re playing actual characters, we’re not sort of just copping characters from scene to scene, which just means you just get to know your character a little more.

DP: What is the difference between the fall and spring shows?

TR: The spring show is also a musical, it’s just the audience is more college-centered as opposed to everyone — family, friends, uncles, cousins — and just the way the schedule is. The fall show is a little more fun because it is a different audience which means we can get away with a little raunchier stuff [in the spring show]. We do our staff transition at the end of January. So it’s kind of nice that everyone gets a show underneath their belt.

DP: Are there any scenes we should look out for?

TR: I love that there is a love story in this show. We haven’t had a love story in a couple years. I’m really excited, there’s this pop star character that was kind of based off Miley Cyrus. We just rehearsed that number, and the costumes, the dancing, the music — that’s the most fun for me because I'm also in it but I think it’s going to come together pretty well. Also the kick-line is scheduled as well. It’s also very colorful, the kick-line is.

DP: [The kick-line is] pretty essential.

TR: Yeah. It’s what we do.

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Correction: Due to reporting errors, there were several transcription errors in this Q&A, including incorrectly spelling Jeremy Desmon's name, misspelling the word "revue" and misidentifying the spring show and the fall show in the answer for the third question. The 'Prince' regrets the errors.