Steve On Broadway (SOB)

All About Me (The SOB Review)

All About Me (The SOB Review) - Henry Miller's Theatre, New York City, New York

** (out of ****)

In the annals of Broadway history, there have been many truly unforgettable and dynamic duos.

Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne.

Hume Cronyn and Jessica Tandy.

Liam Neesan and Natasha Richardson.

Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick.

But Michael Feinstein and Dame Edna (Barry Humphries)?

Alas, in All About Me, they don't even come close.

Instead of like pleasurably putting your peanut butter in my chocolate, they're like throwing water on boiling oil to watch it combust. The two redoubtable entertainers are a thrill to watch individually, but this mash-up is too clever and funny by half.

Particularly annoying is that just as you start getting into the groove of one of them, they're interrupted by the other. The show is a massive collision of talent with seemingly spare direction from Casey Nicholaw.

There are enjoyable moments to be sure. I've always enjoyed Dame Edna's purposeful banter with the audience. Her rendition of "All The Single Ladies" with Gregory Butler and Jon-Paul Mateo is the funniest number in the entire show. Feinstein's tinkling of the ivories in the Great American Songbook fares well, as does the humorous vamp that opens the show.

But if you're anything like me, you'll rather see these two exceptional entertainers perform the way they should be: by themselves.

This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).

In keeping with the new Federal Trade Commission (FTC) regulations that unfairly discriminate against bloggers, who are now required by law to disclose when they have received anything of value they might write about, please note that I have received nothing of value in exchange for this post.

Labels: All About Me, Barry Humphries, Dame Edna, Michael Feinstein, Musical, Revue

posted by Steve On Broadway (SOB) @ Friday, March 19, 2010 0 comments

SOB's Best Of 2006-07: Top Ten Of The Year

Labels: A Moon For The Misbegotten, Barry Humphries, Curtains, Evita, Grey Gardens, Gypsy, SOB's Best of 2006-07, Sonia Flew, The Prime Of Miss Jean Brodie, The Real Thing, The Unmentionables

posted by Steve On Broadway (SOB) @ Monday, June 04, 2007 2 comments

SOB's Best of 2006-07: Best Special Theatrical Events

SOB's Best Of 2006-07: Best Special Theatrical Events

In addition to all the great (and not so great) musicals and plays I've seen throughout the 2006-07 Theatrical Season, there are a number of concerts, readings and individual performances that defied neatly fitting into categories. Since the Tony Awards define those types of shows as "special theatrical events," I'll do the same.

In my personal "5 Best" list of the greatest special theatrical events of the past year, you'll notice a vast and eclectic array of acclaimed talent. Here's the list:

1 - Barry Humphries & Friends: Back With A Vengeance! (Arts Centre, State Theatre, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia)

Barry Humphries made a triumphant return to his hometown of Melbourne, soundly disproving the theory that you can't go home again. His new production that stretched a quick three hours not only solidly engaged Dame Edna Everage devotees, but provided first-timers with an outstanding introduction to his most beloved character along with two who are primarily known only to Aussies: Les Patterson and Sandy Stone.

Rather than allowing his "gigastar" housewife to call the shots, Humphries was clearly in charge with plenty of biting humor involving the audience. Yet this production also featured the ribald, spitting satire of Humphries' Les Patterson skewering Aussie politicians, along with the poignant subtlety of the "deceased" Sandy Stone, whose watchful eye on his wife from above provided an insight into today's Australian psyche one never quite learns from the Great Dame -- but then, there she was in all of her glory.

Despite the nearly three hours running time, this was one must-see show that I didn't want to end thanks to the ingenious wit and wisdom from one of Australia's true treasures, Barry Humphries. And fortunately, Humphries himself took the final curtain call bow.

Click here for The SOB Review of Barry Humphries: Back With A Vengeance!


2 - Come Be My Love...Love Spoken Here (Westport Country Playhouse, Westport, CT)

Just before Valentine's Day, I was thrilled to be among the relative few fortunate enough to enjoy one of the loveliest, tastiest confections to come along in a long, long time. Bigger than the largest chocolate kiss, this mega-bite Valentine was served up at Connecticut's venerable Westport Country Playhouse in the form of romantic poetry written by such giants as Maya Angelou, Noël Coward, Emily Dickinson, Robert Frost, Langston Hughes, Dorothy Parker and William Shakespeare, among others.

The romantic in me wondered what could have been any tastier than Come Be My Love...Love Spoken Here, which came in a luscious seven course benefit at and for the Westport Country Playhouse. Indeed, the evening’s generous, heaping helpings of amore would have sated practically every kind of lover thanks in large part to its seven stellar cast members, who made each work come alive with humor, humility, lots of humanity and most of all, heart.

Miraculously amassed for this one-time-only event, Joanna Gleason, Charles Grodin, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Eartha Kitt, Paul Newman, Chris Sarandon and Joanne Woodward offered their own unique, individual voices on the ecstasy and agony that arguably make love life’s ultimate affection. Wow! To call this breathtaking would be a major understatement. With the megawatt cast’s refrains reverberating throughout the theatre, this audience member was left reeling as though Cupid had shot another arrow through his heart.

Click here for The SOB Overview of Come Be My Love...Love Spoken Here.

3 - An American Icon: Kitty Carlisle Hart (El Portal Theatre, North Hollywood, CA)

Eight months prior to her April death, I had one of those truly unique opportunities to see the doyenne of Broadway society for most of the 20th Century: Kitty Carlisle Hart, an astonishing film, stage and television figure whom I’d admired from the days of her long stint as a panelist on TV’s “To Tell the Truth” during my childhood.

In the sold-out An American Icon, Mrs. Moss Hart (then nearly 96 years of age) remained sharp as tack, graceful as American theatrical royalty and the epitome of class and sophistication. There she stood, poised on the stage of North Hollywood’s El Portal Theatre for more than one hour, regaling the enthusiastic audience with an erudite cross-section of her illustrious, captivating life including vivid recollections of her friendship with a veritable “Who’s Who” of the Great White Way’s Golden Age: Jerome Kern, George Gershwin, Cole Porter, Kurt Weill, Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II, Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Lowe, and of course, the great playwright and director whom she’d marry in 1946 until his death in 1961, Moss Hart -- and each fascinating vignette included a song or two.

Perhaps most touching, especially considering that this was one of her final performances, was Mrs. Hart’s rendition of the Kurt Weill/Maxwell Anderson classic “September Song.” Kitty Carlisle Hart's descriptions of her personal relationships with the legends who made Broadway such a powerful medium proved a testament to the amazing life she herself led with such style and dignity. I was honored to have one infinitely memorable opportunity to bask in her glow (and even meet her in person when I took the above photo) -- I continue to feel all the richer for the experience.

Click here for The SOB Review of An American Icon: Kitty Carlisle Hart.


4 - Pet Shop Boys (Orpheum Theatre, Minneapolis, MN)

Given the unusually high theatrical quotient in last October's amazing, entertaining concert by electronica-pop duo Pet Shop Boys -- right down to elaborate set, lighting and projection design to choreography, as well as to an intermission during a performance on a stage typically reserved for Broadway productions -- it seems entirely apropos to include their show here.

In this case, through the assistance of three outstanding back-up singers and two breathtaking dancers, their music of the last twenty years came to life. While there's more cheekiness than bite to their lyrics, the Pet Shop Boys delved into fertile political satire with fare like “I’m With Stupid,” which lampooned the unflinchingly blind support of British Prime Minister Tony Blair for the policies of U.S. President George W. Bush through an engaging video backdrop of whirling imagery including the Union Jack, Stars and Stripes and close-up shots of both leaders’ eyes and mouths.

The second act of the Pet Shops Boys’ dazzling concert included a steady stream of some of their biggest hits, including “West End Girls” and “It’s A Sin,” along with anthemic turns on such borrowed hits as “Always On My Mind,” “Where The Streets Have No Name/Can’t Take My Eyes Off Of You,” and their rousing finale, “Go West.” Each number was brilliantly staged with eye-popping choreography against a versatile backlit series of white boxes that framed movement with a visually arresting projection design. Because the set, lighting and projection design, as well as choreography, were so innovative, about my only regret with this oh-so theatrical presentation was that there was no Playbill to tell us who was responsible for each component.

Click here for The SOB Review of Pet Shop Boys.


5 - Sandra Bernhard IS Plan B From Outer Space (Rossi's Blue Star Room, Minneapolis, MN)

In Sandra Bernhard IS Plan B From Outer Space, it wasn't so much not knowing where the Flint, Michigan native was coming from, but it was wondering where she was taking you. Just when you thought she'd whirled you out of orbit, she suddenly came back to the original point with style and finesse. It was quite a ride.

Her voice has certainly come a long, long way from its rather raw beginnings. Most of her music, accompanied by a tight three piece band, served to bookend her nearly non-stop two hour performance, starting with playful R&B takes on a memorable Jennifer Holliday tune -- along with Monica and Brandy's "The Boy Is Mine" and a poignant tribute to Nina Simone -- and concluding with her rocking out to Guns N' Roses ("Welcome To The Jungle"), Led Zeppelin ("Whole Lotta Love") and Prince ("Little Red Corvette").

Along the way, Bernhard easily swayed from the irreverent to the reverential. With riffs on everyone -- from Madonna and Malawi babies to Angelina Jolie's adoption addiction to the Britney Spears/Paris Hilton/Lindsay Lohan/Nicole Richie capers to designer Tom Ford's new ad campaign to, of course, President George W. Bush -- and everything, including her own study of kabbalah, her Manolo Blahnik shoes and Larry King's 50th anniversary party, Bernhard packed it all in with her biting trademark humor. While the title of her act may suggest she's from another planet, Ms. Bernhard thankfully came back down to earth to entertain us once again.

Click here for The SOB Review of Sandra Bernhard: Plan B From Outer Space.

What were the best special theatrical events you saw over the past year? I invite you to join the conversation by sharing your theatre experiences with me.

Labels: An American Icon, Barry Humphries, Come Be My Love...Love Spoken Here, Kitty Carlisle Hart, Pet Shop Boys, Sandra Bernhard IS Plan B From Outer Space, SOB's Best of 2006-07

posted by Steve On Broadway (SOB) @ Wednesday, May 23, 2007 0 comments

SOB's 6 Singular Sensations Of '06 - #4: Barry Humphries

SOB's 6 Singular Sensations Of '06 - #4: Barry Humphries

Introduction: Throughout the course of 2006, I've had many incredible opportunities to see some of the best actors, singers and dancers of our time perform live on the stage. Rather than recap the best shows of the year (which I'll do at the close of the 2006-07 Theatrical Season), I'm devoting the last six days of the calendar year to those live performances that have stayed with me throughout the year.

If the last week has seemed a bit like a lovefest for the genius of Barry Humphries, it's because I revere his breathtakingly quick wit. But it's also because I was in a very privileged audience for his latest show, which is currently running in his own hometown of Melbourne. There, he is demonstrating a range of characters unlike anything previously presented on American soil.

As I noted in my review of his latest show:

Barry Humphries...seems to be calling the shots rather than his "gigastar" housewife. Yes, there's plenty of the biting humor involving the audience, but this production also features the ribald, spitting satire of Humphries' Les Patterson skewering Aussie politicians and the poignant subtlety of the deceased Sandy Stone, whose watchful eye on his wife from above provides an insight into today's Australian psyche one never quite learns from the Great Dame.

But then there's Dame Edna herself, in all of her glory....Despite the nearly three hours running time, this was one show that I didn't want to end thanks to the ingenious wit and wisdom from one of Austalia's true treasures, Barry Humphries. And fortunately, Humphries himself takes the final curtain call bow.

Here's toasting you, Barry Humphries, along with each of your glorious creations!

This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).

Related Stories:
Melbourne's Magnificent Maestro: Barry Humphries (December 25, 2006)
This Dame's The Deal Down Under (December 24, 2006)
Barry Humphries & Friends: Back With A Vengeance! (The SOB Review) - Arts Centre, State Theatre, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia (December 21, 2006)

Labels: Australia, Barry Humphries, Musical, Play, SOB's 6 Singular Sensations Of '06

posted by Steve On Broadway (SOB) @ Thursday, December 28, 2006 0 comments

Melbourne's Magnificent Maestro: Barry Humphries

Melbourne’s Magnificent Maestro: Barry Humphries

As noted both in my review of Barry Humphries & Friends: Back With A Vengeance and my synopsis of the "career" of Dame Edna, the 50 years of entertainment by Humphries is currently being roundly celebrated in his hometown of Melbourne, Australia.

In addition to his current run at The Arts Centre’s State Theatre in Melbourne, it’s worth noting that this incredibly brilliant and wickedly funny performer is also the patron of the theatre’s Performing Arts Collection, part of which I had an opportunity to view.

In The Arts Centre’s official publication, Cultural Collections, Humphries writes:

The Performing Arts Collection is a treasure trove of the Australian performing arts. Not some boring, dry museum, but a living growing entertainment for the whole family.

Beautifully preserved and maintained, among the splendid donations by Dame Nellie Melba’s family, Mr. Kenn Brodziak and The Australian Ballet, to name a few, is a collection of my own costumes, bejeweled spectacles, paintings, photographs, posters, programs and personal memorabilia that I had assumed lost, or “mislaid” by negligent producers. Dame Edna’s collection has now of course been rivaled by the donation of her cultural successor, Kylie Minogue.

The Performing Arts Collection has come into its own as a major cultural anthology. It holds many items: wonderful stage models, paintings and drawings by our finest stage and costume designers, puppets, unique posters and original works of art. These record the history of the Australian stage – which is unique in the world – and have been rescued from oblivion by dedicated curators with a passionate love for our theatrical heritage.

One visit to this amazing collection will convince you that it is a great asset to the
community, and indeed, to the world of Australian entertainment. I hope it surprises and amuses you as much as it did me when I first saw what a treasure house of material we has here in Melbourne. This collection deserves your donations of theatrical memorabilia as well as your patronage. That does not just mean your attendance at its ever-changing exhibitions, but your financial support as well.

If you care for Australian’s living theatre and its traditions, I urge you to please get involved with the cultural collections. Long may they flourish.

According to the same document, the Barry Humphries Collection encompasses “70 costumes, works of art, scripts and memorabilia donated to the Performing Arts Collection since 1981. The collection continues to grow through the generous patronage of Barry Humphries.”

Ironically, as recently as 1985, this great patron of the Australian arts was derided by Mr. Colin Hollis ALP of the Hansard House of Representatives, who said, “People such as Barry Humphries, in his character Les Patterson, from which he has made a lot of money by knocking Australia and the arts, have done great damage to the Australian arts.”

An outstanding, fascinating biography of Melbourne’s favorite son is included in the official program for his current theatrical production there:

Barry Humphries is not only a successful character actor in Europe and Australia, but one of Australia’s best-loved landscape painters. His pictures are in private and public collections, both in his homeland and abroad.

He was educated at the University of Melbourne where he studied law, philosophy and fine arts. It was at the University of Melbourne where he held his first Dada exhibition – exhibitions in anarchy and visual satire. These have become part of Australian folklore. After writing and performing songs and sketches in University revues, Humphries joined the newly formed Melbourne Theatre Company.

In 1955, he created Mrs. Norm Everage, a Melbourne housewife who has subsequently become internationally celebrated and has evolved into the hugely popular and universally adored Dame Edna. In Sydney, in the late 50s, Humphries joined the Phillip Street Revue Theatre, Australia’s first home for intimate revue and satirical comedy. After a long season in which he developed his newly invented characters, Humphries appeared as Estragon in Waiting For Godot. This production marked Australia’s first ever production of a Samuel Beckett play.

In 1959, he sailed to Venice. During the 60s in London, Barry Humphries appeared in numerous West End productions. Most notable were the musicals Oliver! and Maggie May by Lionel Bart, and stage/radio productions by his friend, Spike Milligan, in particular "The Bed Sitting Room." He also worked in productions with Joan Littlewood at Stratford East, and played Long John Silver at the Mermaid Theatre.

In 1967 he starred as Fagin in the Piccadilly Theatre’s revival of Oliver! (SOB: This is the current home to the West End revival of Guys And Dolls.) Phil Collins played the Artful Dodger in this production. Between West End engagements, he regularly returned to Australia with a new one-man offering, presenting a wide range of characters including Edna, whose popularity was fast developing.

In the early 1970s, with his friend, Bruce Beresford ("Breaker Morant," "Driving Miss Daisy"), Humphries brought to the cinema the character of Barry Mackenzie, a personage he had invented in the Sixties in a cult comic strip he wrote for Peter Cook’s satirical magazine Private Eye. By the mid-70s Humphries was not only playing character roles in British films, plays and television shows, but starring in his own one-man show at the Apollo Theatre in London (SOB: this was where I saw my very first Broadway show in 1979 in the West End version of Annie).

Housewife Superstar! Took London by storm, dominated by Dame Edna and
Les Patterson, and his favorite theatrical invention, the suburban ghost Alexander (Sandy) Stone. He has been presenting his own shows in the West End ever since, culminating in Edna, The Spectacle at the historic Theatre Royal Haymarket. In 1979, Humphries won the Society of West End Theatres Award for A Night With Dame Edna! at the Piccadilly Theatre.

Since then, he has collected innumerable honours for stage and television work, including the Rose d’Or de Montreux in 1991 for his television show, “A Night On Mount Edna,” and a Sir Peter Ustinov Endowment, for his life work as an entertainer, at the Banff Television Festival in 1997. In 2000, he won a Special Tony Award for his Broadway show and a Special Achievement Award from the Outer Critics’ Circle and his last Broadway offering Back With A Vengeance (2005) won a Tony Nomination.

Humphries has toured in Germany, Scandinavia, the Netherlands and in the Far and Middle East, and extensively in the United State (sic). He has recorded Dame Edna television specials for the BBC, London Weekend TV, NBC and Fox networks. Dr. Humphries is the author of innumerable novels, autobiographies, poetry and one-man plays.

His autobiography My Gorgeous Life won the J.R. Ackerley prize for biography in 1993, and he is the subject of two critical and biographical studies: The Real Barry Humphries by Peter Coleman, and Dame Edna Everage And The Rise Of Western Civilisation by John Lahr.

His second volume of autobiography My Life As Me won popular and critical acclaim in Australia and the UK.

He was given the popular Order of Australia in 1982 and was endowed with an Honorary Doctorate of Griffith University (Australia) in 1994 and a Doctorate of Law at his Alma Mater, Melbourne University in 2003.

He is married to Lizzie Spender, the daughter of British poet Sir Stephen Spender, and has two sons and two daughters.

Taking in Thursday evening’s performance in Melbourne was my sixth time seeing Dame Edna (including both Broadway shows, two times in Minneapolis and once in Cleveland), but was uniquely my first experience with the inimitable Barry Humphries and his other characters.

Once again, I was thrilled to be within spitting distance of this amazingly sharp performer in the first couple of rows. Not only was I able to catch another of the Great Dame’s gladiolas, but I found myself both relieved and mildly disappointed at the same time when not being singled out for Dame Edna’s trademark ridicule and bromides, although as in past performances, her gaze lingered uncomfortably upon my eyes for several seconds at a time.

In addition to being introduced to Humphries other far-ranging characters of the aforementioned Les Patterson and Sandy Stone, what made this a uniquely moving experience was being able to stand-up and cheer Melbourne’s magnificent maestro himself at the conclusion of his show as he celebrated his 50th year on the stage in his own hometown. This is a memory I won’t soon forget.

This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).

Click here for tickets.
Related Stories:
This Dame's The Deal Down Under (December 24, 2006)
Barry Humphries & Friends: Back With A Vengeance! (The SOB Review) - Arts Centre, State Theatre, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia (December 21, 2006)

Labels: Australia, Barry Humphries, Musical, Play

posted by Steve On Broadway (SOB) @ Tuesday, December 26, 2006 2 comments

This Dame's The Deal Down Under

This Dame’s The Deal Down Under

Possums, traveling all the way to Australia for the Holidays, it’s hard to move about the island continent/country without seeing just how iconic Barry Humphries’ most renowned character creations actually is.

Whether it’s flying on Qantas -- “proud supporter” of Barry Humphries’ & Friends: Back With A Vengeance -- or seeing billboards and bus or tram signage with the Great Dame adorning them, Dame Edna Everage is everywhere.

If you’re traveling to Australia over the next couple months and particularly interested in seeing why this character is so particularly revered, then you should make every effort to get to Melbourne. Not only can you take in a performance of the show itself, but you can enjoy many displays within a relatively compact area along the beautiful Yarra River. To understand Dame Edna Everage is to gain an amazing insight into Melbourne and indeed Australia itself.

According to the program notes, Dame Edna is:

Probably the most popular and gifted woman in the world today. Housewife, investigative journalist, social anthropologist, talk show host, swami, children’s book illustrator, megastar, celebrity spin doctor and icon.

With Olivia Newton-John, Kylie Minogue, Nicole Kidman and Dame Joan Sutherland, she is the most prominent of a remarkable succession of female stars to emerge from Australia.

During the 1970s, Dame Edna’s success in her homeland was repeated in Britain with London stage shows including Housewife Superstar! and A Night With Dame Edna. Subsequently, she has performed at London’s Royal Albert Hall and at the prestigious Theatre Royal Drury Lane and the Theatre Royal Haymarket.

Television triumphs include two critically acclaimed UK specials, “An Audience With Dame Edna” and “Another Audience With Dame Edna.” She also hosted two series of her own innovative chat show, “The Dame Edna Experience,” where her past guests have included Jane Fonda, Charlton Heston, Liza Minnelli, Sean Connery, and Mel
Gibson.

Most recently, on Broadway, her sensational vehicle, Dame Edna: The Royal Tour received a Special Tony Award for Live Theatrical Event. The Outer Critics’ Circle has also bestowed upon her a Special Achievement Award. Dame Edna has recorded numerous TV specials, the last of which, “A Night On Mount Edna,” won the foremost European Entertainment Award, the Golden Rose of Montreux in 1991. Edna’s other notable awards include first prize in the San Francisco International Film Festival, a Gold Award at the New York Film and TV Festival, and a British Academy Award Nomination for “The Dame Edna Experience.”

Her books include Dame Edna’s Coffee Table Book, Dame Edna’s Bedside Companion and her seminal autobiography, My Gorgeous Life, which is translated into many languages and which has, on government orders, been placed in hotel bedrooms throughout Britain and Australia.

Possibly Jewish, Dame Edna is a widow, with three grown children. She spends her time visiting World leaders and jet-setting between homes in Malibu, Melbourne,
Montreux and Martha’s Vineyard. She is the Founder and Governor of “Friends of
Prostrate” and the creator of the World Prostrate Olympics. Currently, she has
turned her attention to the deviated septum.

She was featured in David E. Kelley’s cutting edge TV series "Ally McBeal," where her abilities as a distinguished actress were at least recognized.

Dame Edna has appeared regularly on the “Tonight Show With Jay Leno” and did the Millennium countdown in Times Square on New Year’s Eve. She starred at the concluding Commonwealth Games Ceremony in her home town and more recently, she triumphed at the Queen’s Jubilee Celebrations at Buckingham Palace where she appeared by Royal Invitation.

In 2005 Edna returned to her beloved Broadway where her show Back With A Vengeance won, amongst other awards, a distinguished Tony Nomination, followed by a successful tour of the United States.

She is at present celebrating her 50 years on the stage with “her best show ever” and is preparing for a new series on British television “The Edna Treatment.”

Her hobbies are caring, sharing and downsizing.

Edna is now on a coin, a stamp and has a street named after her.

In addition to that, Dame Edna’s “historic home” is on display on the upper level of the very same The Arts Centre where Barry Humphries is currently performing to sold-out audiences.

According to Dame Edna herself, Ednaville represents a:

…caring reconstruction (that) captures the very essence of the dwelling where I spent my early married life, where my kiddies grew up, where my bewildered mother came to live, and where my husband Norm had the first of his many urological incidents.

When my career took off, I kept most of my beautiful things in storage for years, but my negligent manager Barry Humphries “misplaced” my most treasured home furnishings and appliances. I would like to personally thank all those wonderful and honest little folk of Victoria who have helped restore my home to its former glory, with its sophisticated 1956 interiors and appointments, by returning my precious artifacts and knick-knacks. You have enriched the lives of innumerable Australians.

This is one Yank who feels especially enriched by having had a fabulously overwhelming opportunity to earn an even greater appreciation for this icon from Melbourne’s 36 Humoresque Street at Moonee Ponds, a “War Savings Street.” To have a taste of Dame Edna is to whet the appetite for all things Australian.

Here’s to many more wonderful, entertaining years for Barry Humphries -- may Dame Edna continue to captivate generations to come.

This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).

Click here for tickets.

Related Stories:

Barry Humphries & Friends: Back With A Vengeance! (The SOB Review) - Arts Centre, State Theatre, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia (December 21, 2006)

Labels: Australia, Barry Humphries, Musical, Play

posted by Steve On Broadway (SOB) @ Sunday, December 24, 2006 0 comments

Barry Humphries & Friends: Back With A Vengeance! (The SOB Review) - Arts Centre, State Theatre, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia

Barry Humphries & Friends: Back With A Vengeance! (The SOB Review) - Arts Centre, State Theatre, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia

***1/2 (out of ****)

Soundly disproving the theory that you can't go home again, Barry Humphries has made a triumphant return to his hometown of Melbourne through Barry Humphries & Friends -- Back With A Vengeance!

His new production that stretches a quick three hours not only solidly engages Dame Edna Everage devotees, but provides first-timers with an outstanding introduction to his most beloved character along with two who are primarily known only to Aussies: Les Patterson and Sandy Stone.

For anyone who saw the Broadway production of Dame Edna: Back With A Vengeance, they'd likely be pleasantly surprised that this show is dramatically different from that incarnation than Dame Edna: The Royal Tour from 2000. That's because it's Barry Humphries who seems to be calling the shots rather than his "gigastar" housewife.

Yes, there's plenty of the biting humor involving the audience, but this production also features the ribald, spitting satire of Humphries' Les Patterson skewering Aussie politicians and the poignant subtlety of the deceased Sandy Stone, whose watchful eye on his wife from above provides an insight into today's Australian psyche one never quite learns from the Great Dame.

But then there's Dame Edna herself, in all of her glory. Indeed, 2006 marks Melbourne's "Celebration of 50 Golden Years of Dame Edna" as part of the city's Ednafest, that includes everything from a mock-up of Dame Edna's home in a museum-like display called Ednaville to a wonderful montage of Edna clips in "Virtual Edna" at the Australian Centre for the Moving Image -- all in Melbourne.

True to form, Dame Edna sings, "I'm fifty. Fifty years up on the boards, fifty million compliments, plaudits and awards, and although of course it's tasteless to ask a woman's age, I'm proud to say, I'm fifty on the stage."

Despite the nearly three hours running time, this was one show that I didn't want to end thanks to the ingenious wit and wisdom from one of Austalia's true treasures, Barry Humphries. And fortunately, Humphries himself takes the final curtain call bow.

The current production is slated to run through February 11, 2007. A must-see for anyone traveling -- or living -- Down Under!

This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).

Click here for tickets.

Labels: Australia, Barry Humphries, International, Musical, Play, The SOB Review

posted by Steve On Broadway (SOB) @ Thursday, December 21, 2006 0 comments