Gotta Spoof ‘Em All: ‘Balls: The Monster-Catchin’ Musical Comedy’ Parodies ‘Pokémon’ With Original Voice Actors and 40 Puppets Heading to New York Comic-Con

What do Pokémon do when they’re trapped inside of Poké Ball? Why are grass types super effective against water types? How do Escape Ropes really work? All of these questions have plagued “Pokémon” fans for 29 years, and now there’s a hilarious musical that makes fun of all these Poké-quirks — just don’t tell Nintendo.

“Balls: The Monster-Catchin’ Musical Comedy” replaces Pokémon with Collectabuddies, the esteemed Professor Oak with “The Professor” and his perpetually annoying nephew, Gary Oak, with “The Rival.” Created by Brandon Zelman and Harrison Bryan, “Balls” tells a story that every “Pokémon” fan will find familiar: An 11-year-old boy sets out to catch all 151 Collectabuddies, but “Balls” has much more soul-searching, musical numbers and DIY puppets.

More from Variety

James Carter Cathcart, ‘Pokemon’ Star Who Voiced Prof. Oak, Gary, Meowth and James, Dies at 71
Pokemon, Aardman Animation Set to Collaborate on New Mystery Project
‘Pokémon Horizons: The Series’ Season 2 Sets Netflix Premiere Date in U.S. (EXCLUSIVE)

The show started off as a Kickstarter, raising money to produce a low-budget show as a proof of concept. That resulted in three sold-out shows at Caveat NYC and an upcoming panel at New York Comic-Con hosted by Veronica Taylor, the original Ash Ketchum voice actor in the “Pokémon” anime. The NYCC event will be a nostalgic Poké-reunion as Stuart Zagnit, the original English voice of Professor Oak, stars as the Professor in “Balls.”

“We always wrote together, and we thought it would be fun to build something in someone else’s sandbox,” says Zelman, an actor and Upright Citizens Brigade alum who’s been friends with Bryan since childhood. “Take something that felt familiar and nostalgic and build something completely new out of it.”

“Whether you’re a fan of visual art, puppetry, music, improv, gaming or anime, we’re really trying to have them all speak to each other, and we’ve had such a fun, wild ride attempting to do that,” says Bryan, an actor, singer and puppeteer who plays the villainous Warlordturtle — a spoof on the Pokémon Wartortle mixed with a gun-toting extremist.

Just like the original “Pokémon” game (before the series ballooned to more than 1,000 creatures), “Balls” has 151 hilariously named Collectabuddies. There’s Warlordturtle’s right-hand tortoise Spittle (a spoof of Squirtle), the useless fish Splishy (Magikarp), sleeping oaf Grizzzlee (Snorlax), the beer-guzzling Canaconda (Ekans), and even a parody of Farfetch’d named Fat’Chance, who’s fallen in love with an onion. And you better believe there are actually 151 Collectabuddies; at the end of “Balls” the cast sings their own version of the “Pokérap” that lists every single one with crude animations onscreen.

In “Balls,” the Collectabuddies do something that Pokémon have never attempted: rise up against their human masters. It’s up to the Professor, who invented the titular, spherical, monster-catchin’ devices, and his nephew, the Rival (Teresa Attridge), to defeat the evil Collectabuddies, while also confronting their family trauma. The parody is potent during the 90-minute runtime of “Balls,” but don’t expect to hear the words “Pokémon” ever uttered onstage (the cast barely even says it during our hourlong interview).

“We sit very safely inside parody and satire law,” says Bryan. “We’re really inspired by other shows like ‘Puffs,’ which had a similar run around the ‘Harry Potter’ fandom, and ‘Stranger Sings,’ around the Netflix IP. Even if we wanted to include the Game Freak IP, we found such joy in creating our own universe and lore and bringing to life this entirely slanted, parallel universe that plays with characters that should feel familiar but also stand on their own.”

Adds Zagnit, “There’s no need to mention the source material, because everybody knows. It’s unspoken, but it’s very clear. That’s the genius. Everybody knows what they’re referring to, and they don’t have to bring it up.”

Despite creating the voice of Professor Oak in the “Pokémon” anime, Zagnit wasn’t in the original “Balls” cast. After rehearsing for months, the show suddenly lost its lead actor, so Zelman and Bryan reached out to Zagnit on a whim to see if he’d join their show. Zagnit, who’s had a career on TV, film and Broadway outside of his “Pokémon” days, shocked them by saying yes.

“This is the first time in — I have to admit, a very long career — where I’m able to combine two very significant parts of my professional life in one show. That’s unheard of,” Zagnit says. “[Zelman and Bryan] found me because of their knowledge of me and ‘Pokémon.’ Originally, I was doing little videos for them as the Professor, not connected with the show at all. We were on each other’s radar for quite a while. This really is a once-in-a-lifetime situation. Many musical theater people didn’t know I was an anime character, and the anime people had no idea I had a theater resume. Here they are melding together in one absurd, hysterical way.”

Zagnit leads the six-person cast with Attridge, who plays the self-described “piece of shit” Rival. Attridge’s breakout musical number is a rap titled, of course, “Piece of Shit,” and she and Zagnit team up for more mirthful songs, plus the occasional somber ballad. It wouldn’t be a “Pokémon” parody without a creature battle, and Zagnit, Attridge and Bryan improvise a one-on-one showdown in the show’s finale. Using audience suggestions, Zagnit and Attridge make up their Collectabuddies’ attack moves on the spot, but Bryan’s Warlordturtle opts for water gun-based attacks that soaks the front row more than Splash Mountain.

After the New York Comic-Con panel on Oct. 10, there’s one more chance to see “Balls” at Caveat NYC on Oct. 17. After starting out as a Kickstarter, the future is wide open for the musical comedy.

“We’ve got an ever-expanding universe here at ‘Balls,’” says Zelman. “We’ve got 151 original Collectabuddies. We’ve got this whole robust musical that we really want to get in front of people. I see the full, expanded universe of this world that we have only just cracked into. How do we transform this into a more permanent show? Also, a less permanent show that we could take elsewhere and pop up and perform across the globe? I’ve got a lot of hopes and dreams for the adventure ahead.”

“If we had more money, we could marry more of the video game aspect as well,” adds Attridge. “What does it look like if we have a theater with more screens? Or even screens on the floors, ceilings, TVs and animatronics. What if we have more people who can move the set? What does merch look like if it’s ever evolving? What if we had more cards? What if we had a full trading card game? What does it look like if the show gets licensed, and this gets done at colleges or high schools for kids who think their nerdy interests aren’t interesting? And then the gamer kids and the theater kids come together and form a huge monolith in which they take over town? What does that look like?”

The panel for “Balls: The Monster-Catching’ Musical Comedy” takes place on Friday, Oct. 10, at 8:30 p.m. at the Javitz Center during New York Comic-Con, with a follow-up performance at Caveat NYC on Friday, Oct. 17., at 6:30 p.m.

Best of Variety