Street Lights (The SOB Overview) – American Theatre of Actors (Chernuchin Theatre), New York, New YorkHow’s this for a hot new musical?
A hip-hop show all about hope that itself is brimming with promise. That’s the effusive charm of
Joe Drymala’s
Street Lights.
Overflowing with more substantive radio-ready tunes per show than any recent musical in memory, his infectious score is beyond exciting. With a potent mix of pop, R&B, hip-hop and rap, each song is like tapping into a forbidden power source with most providing an unexpected surge of electrifying empowerment. It doesn’t matter that I can’t get the tunes out of my head -- I don’t want to.
For the sake of the
New York Musical Theatre Festival (NYMF), Drymala has clearly focused maximum energy on developing a megawatt score, and it shows. That attention comes at the expense of his book, which still needs some work in order to flow seamlessly. Nevertheless, the themes -- centering on Harlem high school students, including two gifted young siblings with the requisite faith they need to make something of their lives -- radiate enormous potential for the future life of this show.
More than realizing her potential is the self-assured
Carla Duren, delivering a heart-shattering performance as Monique Willis. As a vocal powerhouse, Duren is remarkably believable as an immensely talented young singer yearning to be the next
Alicia Keys.
Same goes for the magnetic
Kevin Curtis as her brother Rocky, a high school senior who has his eyes on becoming the next
Thurgood Marshall. His ebullient joy upon learning he’s been accepted into Georgetown is about as close as this show comes to a true show-stopping hit. Curtis’ “yes we can” enthusiasm is downright contagious.
But hope as Monique and Rocky might, their dreams risk being jeopardized by their individual associations with a charismatic drug dealer named Damon Cruz, portrayed by the mesmerizing
Miguel Jarquin-Moreland. Monique and Rocky learn just how dangerous it can be to play with fire.
Street Lights unabashedly and unapologetically wears its progressive politics transparently on its sleeve -- so much so that it often veers close to becoming overly preachy and even heavy-handed. You can chalk Drymala’s wild-eyed yet earnest passion for activism up to his experience as primary speechwriter for former Democrat National Committee Chairman
Howard Dean’s presidential campaign. That explains the few gratuitous digs at the former president. Regardless of one’s politics, there’s an admirable, if slightly naïve, call to action to overcome any obstacle, no matter how formidable.
While the
Ryan J. Davis-helmed
Street Lights has already concluded its brief NYMF run, these lights won’t dim completely. With San Diego’s
Old Globe Theatre already picking up the show for a Left Coast production, I expect to hear eventual raves on how a much further developed and tightened
Street Lights is shining brighter than ever and keeping hope alive for a return engagement in New York.
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
Labels: Carla Duren, Joe Drymala, Kevin Curtis, Miguel Jarquin-Moreland, Musical, New York City, Old Globe Theatre, Ryan J. Davis, Street Lights, The SOB Overview
Don't Quit Your Night Job (The SOB Overview) - Zipper Theatre, New York, NYSo where are all the cool kids known as Broadway Babies hanging out after hours?
Look no further than a dozen blocks or so south of the Great White Way to the illustrious
Zipper Theatre, where on a monthly basis,
Don't Quit Your Night Job keeps the midtown theatre party going with fresh and funny improv.
Like a virgin touched for the very first time, I attended my first
DQYNJ last month and was amazed at the brisk pacing coupled with big name stars of the stage -- including
Norbert Leo Butz,
Sutton Foster,
Andrea Martin,
Christopher Sieber and
George Wendt -- going toe to unstubbed toe with this new-age variety show's talented creators
Steve Rosen,
David Rossmer,
Sarah Saltzberg and music director
Dan Lipton.
Given the very nature of improv, some pieces work better than others, but you can't help but admire their spunk. My favorite bit was watching Sutton Foster and Andrea Martin compete in a hilarious obstacle race buttressed by a bloviating Broadway bent.
And to boot, all proceeds from the March performance -- a mere $20 to get in the door, although get there early in April to secure a halfway decent seat -- went to benefit
Wendy Wasserstein’s
Open Doors Initiative, a mentoring program offered through the
Theatre Development Fund (TDF) that provides small groups of high school students an in-depth introduction to live theatre and dance.
So if you want a chance to hang out where all the cool kids are, check out
Don't Quit Your Night Job.
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
Labels: Andrea Martin, Broadway, Don't Quit Your Night Job, Improvisation, New York City, Off-Broadway, Sutton Foster, The SOB Overview, Wendy Wasserstein
Margaret Cho In Concert (The SOB Overview) - Northrup Auditorium, Minneapolis, MNComedian
Margaret Cho In Concert is hilariously fierce. Giving an absolutely lucid, raunchy performance, the remarkably beautiful and rather svelte Cho is a gifted comic, whose timing has never been better.
Since Cho’s weekend act was actually to benefit
District 202, a nonprofit youth center in the Twin Cities, I'll refrain from giving a regular review. However, I will say that this latter day humorist knocks practically every one of her jokes out of the ball park with biting, self-effacing wit and keen social insights.
Among the topics she tackled via hilarious riffs were airplane travel, India, Anna Nicole Smith, Britney Spears, growing up in San Francisco, growing up Korean American, President Bush and the war in Iraq. She's at her funniest when she contorts her rubber face, whether affectionately mocking her mother or describing lewd sexual acts.
Although I could have done without the protracted bathroom humor, this comedian has never been funnier than she is when engaging in thoughtful social commentary.
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
Labels: Comedy, Concert, Margaret Cho, Minneapolis/St. Paul, The SOB Overview
Come Be My Love...Love Spoken Here (The SOB Overview) - Westport Country Playhouse, Westport, CTLast evening, 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.
What could possibly be any tastier than
Come Be My Love...Love Spoken Here, last night's 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, including those not typically prone to enjoying liberal portions of the poetic verse.
Come Be My Love was no ordinary interpretation of poems and sonnets. No, what made this brilliant offering of both classic and modern odes to loves -- both requited and otherwise -- so jaw-droppingly spectacular was the way in which the seven stellar cast members 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. Alternately laughing and misty-eyed, I couldn’t help but ponder just how truly blessed I am to have found the love of my life, my own true love.
Although it’s a little heartbreaking to know that this night will never again be repeated for wider audiences, this lovely evening will long be remembered by my Valentine and me as we toast how fortunate we are, in life and in love.
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
Labels: Benefit, Come Be My Love...Love Spoken Here, The SOB Overview, Westport Country Playhouse
Anne Murray (The SOB Overview) – Historic Brady Theater, Tulsa, Oklahoma
A review of an
Anne Murray concert? I must be kidding, right? After all, this is a site devoted to live theatre,
isn’t it?!
Well, even
this SOB has a sweet, sensitive and sentimental side (and I’ve posted more about
how I ended up in Tulsa on a December Saturday evening in the first place). And I do have a soft-spot for this gifted singer.
Since the Canadian songstress was indeed performing live on a theatre stage, I’m not going to refrain from writing about her concert. But since admittedly, I’m no music critic -- and some would argue that I’m really no theatre critic, either -- I’ll refrain from calling this an all-out review. In fact, for all similar stories I post in the future, I’ll merely call them my SOB Overviews.
Suffice to say that Springhill, Nova Scotia’s favorite daughter remains a crowd-pleasing entertainer for all ages, playing particularly well in what is all too often derisively called “flyover country.” But she does strike a chord, and she also taps a nerve here and there in a surprisingly profound way.
Whether she’s dishing out hit after hit (and they’re pretty considerable) or dishing up funny fan e-mails or simply dishing on her host city and its audience, she delivers a sweetly satisfying live performance for anyone who relishes her 35+ years of hit country-pop recordings.
During her current concert tour, Murray neatly divides up her concert into two distinct acts.
First come the steady stream of visibly heartfelt hits (including some that were first popularized by others), including “Put A Little Love In Your Heart,” “Shadows In The Moonlight,” "I Just Fall In Love Again," “Danny’s Song,” “Snowbird,” “Daydream Believer,” “You Needed Me,” and “Could I Have This Dance,” among many others (although there was no trace of my own personal favorites: “A Love Song” or “You Won’t See Me”).
The second act is devoted almost entirely to the Christmas season and the hope it inspires, with some rousing renditions of everything from “Oh Holy Night” to “Winter Wonderland” to “Silent Night.” But it’s her encore of the exceedingly timely “A Little Good News” from 1983 that underscores Murray’s continued relevance on the musical landscape.
The dryly droll Murray also entertained with heaping helpings of friendly, yet smartly-sassy banter. She joked about the treacherous drive to Tulsa (which received its worst snowstorm in years just two nights earlier -- and the roads including those directly outside the theatre remained largely impassible last night), the incessant train whistle she could hear in her hotel room at 4 am and the many loopy e-mails she receives from fans (such as the “complimentary” ones critiquing her wardrobe selections and mentioning how her music was able to put some people to sleep).
Best of all, this endearing and tireless entertainer continues to give every ounce of her heart and soul. She still hits most of the high notes, even if her apparent lack of sleep coupled with the ultra-dry venue may have caused her vocal chords to strain just a bit (she sometimes sounded just a tad bit hoarse).
But backed by an impeccably gifted, tight (and very loyal) band and soaring orchestra, Anne Murray gave her fans a solid performance that they eagerly ate up -- and even the most jaded of musical tastes would be hard-pressed to quibble with her nuanced encore song dealing with today’s distressing headlines.
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
Click here for concert tour ticket information.Labels: Anne Murray, Concert, The SOB Overview, Tulsa
Another High School MusicalMuch has been written (elsewhere) about Disney's latest movie turned stage production
High School Musical. But Thursday evening, I traveled to the smallish college town of River Falls, Wisconsin to take in the real deal: an honest to goodness high school musical production. There I discovered two very different arcs coming together.
River Falls High School is currently presenting
Rodgers and
Hammerstein's
State Fair, which like the aforementioned
High School Musical originated
off the stage (the
High School Musical film premiered on television, while
State Fair as musical was first presented in two versions on the silver screen).
One of the arcs that made this production especially noteworthy was that its director, teacher Emily Lyon, is the great niece of
Phil Stong, who wrote the source novel on which the show was based. Lyon certainly knows her way around the
Iowa State Fair where the musical is set. Her family is well-known throughout the Hawkeye State for their contributions to its premiere annual event: her father Joe Lyon for his award-winning Jerseys and her mother Norma "Duffy" Lyon for her 45 year tenure as the beloved "
Butter Cow Lady."
In her director's notes, Lyon states:
State Fair is about the glass being half empty or half full. Phil Stong, my great uncle, wrote this one-hit-wonder novel in the 30s. At the end of the book, the glass was half empty -- the story did not have a happy ending.
The novel was made into a Hollywood movie starring Will Rogers. (My mother remembers attending a gala opening, but was so young that only the details she
imparted to the family were that her mother scolded her in the women's restroom for some transgression and that she collected actors' autographs.)
In the 40s, Rodgers and Hammerstein contracted the rights and made it into a feel-good WWII-antidote. This time the glass was half full. In the 60s, Hollywood did a remake "blockbuster" starring Pat Boone and Ann-Margret at the Texas State Fair. This time the glass was half full...of sour milk.
Someone adapted the novel into a stage play, but no stage musical. With only four or five wonderful tunes ("It Might As Well Be Spring" had won an Academy Award), the musical languished.
Finally, Hammerstein's son collaborated with others, adding music from the R&H trunk to make a stage musical. It premiered Des Moines, Iowa in August of 1995. My daughter and I attended a special performance with my mother and father. (No scoldings in the restroom this time.) When the company did "Ioway," the Iowa house "rocked" of course. This production toured before it went to Broadway. It fell far short of a Broadway success, but the glass was half full again. I've waited a long time to direct this great slice of Iowa pie.
My mother's great-grandfather was on an early Iowa State Fair Board, my mother was the Iowa State Fair Butter Cow Lady for over 40 years, my father has shown champion Jersey cows (not swine) at 58 Iowa State Fairs. The "Blue Boy trophy" sat on a shelf on our porch for decades. Our family's interpretation of the fates' intervention was expressed in Grandma's terse, "It will all come out in the wash."
This musical is not an Iowa tribute, Iowa being the butt of many jokes. Instead, it is a musical that celebrates the values of America's heartland...fragile romantic optimism, hope and pride balanced by the harsh realities of hard work and inevitable disappointments. However, sometimes the Dave Millers of the world lose, and we win.
By the way, Phil Stong's mother's cupboard is the one we are using on our set. Sometimes it's half empty, sometimes it's half full.
I hope you will enjoy this company's performance.
Emily Lyon
So it was with lots of loving care that Lyon put together this paean to her original home state and its people (and yes, Em, I do think that ultimately
State Fair treats Iowans with respect). Through the assistance of her daughter Abigail Testa's intricate lighting design and David Markson's impeccable set design, the show had a beautiful look. And of course, it's always a treat to see the talent of teenagers singing, dancing and acting their hearts out, with standout performances by Bethany Tunheim as Margy Frake and Seth Stratton as Abel Frake.
Earlier, I mentioned two arcs coming together. The second, unexpected arc came in learning that one of the principal actors was the young Mike Marita as Pat. The last name sounded very familiar. Much to my pleasant surprise, I learned that Mike is the son of Jim Marita, one of
my own high school classmates from
Homestead High in Mequon, a suburb of Milwaukee -- some 320 miles away from River Falls. What made it all the more ironic was that the elder Marita took on the role of Tevya in my high school's production of
Fiddler On The Roof (and I can still vividly recall his wonderful performance).
I had a chance to briefly catch up with Jim after not having seen him in at least 20 years. He told me that it was our high school's production of
South Pacific the year prior to
Fiddler that inspired him to try out for Tevye (incidentally,
South Pacific provided me with my only stage role
ever as Lieutenant Joseph Cable). Jim went on to become a theatre major in college, although his career path has since swung to a corporate position, although his fondness for theatre undoubtedly helped pave the way for his scion.
Having these two arcs intertwine provided me with a very unique theatre experience that I won't soon forget. And it just goes to show you that attending a high school musical can still delight!
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
Click here:Will It Play in Peoria? How About Iowa? (July 24, 2006)
Labels: Musical, Revival, State Fair, The SOB Overview
Cruise ControlEarly this morning, I disembarked from a sold-out cruise aboard the
Jewel of the Seas, one of
Royal Caribbean’s myriad cruise options. As indicated earlier, I looked forward to putting the cruise line’s claim of having Broadway-style entertainment to the test.
Only one night of my five-night cruise included any entertainment that came close to a Broadway show with the opening of
Tango Buenos Aires (I’ll post a review later), although, truth be told, I did miss most of last night’s closing entertainment because the cruise line graciously helped me toast my dear grandfather’s 95th birthday with a special celebration all our own.
Although I anticipated more in terms of large-scale productions, I thoroughly enjoyed
Tango Buenos Aires, as well as the two nights of comedians – the amusing
Jeff Harms on Saturday and the hysterically funny
Troy Thirdgill (pictured) on Monday -- and a night of the reconstituted 50s group, (
Herb Reed and) The Platters, on Sunday.
If cruise line’s goal was to build upon each night with successively better evenings of entertainment, then they succeeded. As
I’ve reported earlier, Harms was funny, but there was no denying the magic that The Platters infuse into their 45-minute set for the packed-house where I dare say the average age was roughly 40. Although all but one of the original members has been replaced, their music with familiar stylings -- including hits like “Only You,” “Harbor Lights,” “Smoke Gets In Your Eyes,” and “The Great Pretender” -- struck the right chord for this nostalgic audience.
Even more entertaining was the comedic talent of Portland (OR)-born Thirdgill, whose politically incorrect take on everything from the way he’s inaccurately viewed because of his race to young white kids trying to act black to tattoos and body piercings had me doubled over in laughter. Not since seeing
Robin Williams live back a half dozen years ago have I convulsed with laughter to the degree I did with this amazing near-genius. I had never heard of Thirdgill before, but you can bet I won’t soon forget how much he entertained, and I look forward to seeing much more of him in the future.
In summary, I have to admit that I found my jaded self to be a bit surprised that all of Royal Caribbean’s onboard entertainment was first-rate. However, far from first-rate was the exasperatingly slow -- and as a result, excessively expensive -- Internet functionality on the ship. At $.33 per minute, I was only able to post a few items from sea due to the sluggish online connection. It was akin to riding in the worst non-moving taxi only to see the meter running and not being able to get out.
But if you can overlook that potentially inconsequential detail, all but the most jaded of cruise audiences will find the entertainment experience aboard the
Jewel of the Seas a delight.
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
Related Stories:
Harm-lessly Funny (October 22, 2006)
Going To Sea Theatre (October 21, 2006)
Labels: Cruise Entertainment, Tango Buenos Aires, The SOB Overview
Harm-lessly FunnyAs promised, I just wanted to update you on the entertainment to date on the
Royal Caribbean Jewel of the Seas. We're docked today in beautiful Portland, Maine after sailing from Boston last evening.
Instead of the full-blown entertainment treatment promised on the cruise lines' Web site (that apparently is coming later in the cruise), last evening's on-stage performance came in the form of Florida-based comedian
Jeff Harms. To be honest, I had never heard of him before, but this white-haired version of Alec Baldwin provided a half hour of pretty decent humor.
Now, I'm no connoisseur of stand-up comedy, but I've always thought that it took a great deal more talent to make an audience laugh with thoughtful observations from life than going for the easy laugh by catering to the lowest common denominator with raunchy, vulgar humor. That doesn't mean I don't appreciate occasionally going in the gutter, but it does take a greater imagination to come up with something truly fresh. Harms certainly accomplished just that, even in the way he dealt with a near heckler situation early on. Much of his humor was based on observations he made on everyday life (like his riff on junk drawers in the kitchen) to how kids today are much the same as they ever were.
Since this wasn't a full-blown production along the scales that I had anticipated, I'm not providing my typical full-scale review. But I will say that I found Jeff Harms' act to be harmlessly funny, and that's a nice start for this voyage.
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
Related Stories:Going To Sea Theatre (October 21, 2006)
Labels: Cruise Entertainment, The SOB Overview
