Isabelle McCalla on the Joy of Shucked and the Surprise of an Unscripted Guest

For Isabelle McCalla, starring as the spirited heroine Maizy in Shucked has been “a riot and a hoot.” She says the puntastic musical set in fictional Cob County is the funniest show she’s ever been a part of. “My gosh, it's been a dream,” she tells The Broadway Show's Charlie Cooper. “The company is wonderful. The material's fantastic.” Part of the excitement, she says, is doing a show with zero pre-existing source material. “There’s so much room to play and just let my imagination run wild based on what's on the page.”

McCalla—who will be following her time in Shucked with a starring turn in the upcoming Broadway musical Water for Elephants—took over the role of Maizy from original cast member Caroline Innerbichler in September. “She created a wonderful blueprint for me,” says McCalla. “But I've been lucky enough that [director] Jack O'Brien and the creative team have been very liberating in terms of allowing me to make my own choices with her.”

For her role in Shucked, McCalla drew on a lesson she picked up while starring in another Broadway laughfest, The Prom: take the comedy seriously. “The more you just play the truth of the situation, the given circumstances, the relationship dynamics with the genre you're in, the stakes of it all—the funnier it'll be to the audience.”

McCalla’s Shucked experience hasn’t entirely been a laughing matter, however. One recent performance featured an unscripted guest appearance. “There was a cockroach on stage. It fell from the rafters. Horrifying. Everybody was like, ‘Do you see the cockroach? Who's going to get the cockroach?’” Even the audience members in the front row noticed the insect intruder. McCalla was “ready to kick it” if it came near her.

Fortunately, for McCalla at least, it didn’t come to that. “It fell into the pit.”