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Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson
In my brief interim between late-summer intensives and fall classes, I went to see a show with my mother. I really haven't paid any attention to what's on Broadway recently because I don't usually have time to see anything, anyway. Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson got good reviews, so we went to see that.
So, imagine that US President Andrew Jackson was an emoboy rock star who wore really tight black jeans and cursed a lot. And cut himself when he was depressed. Now take the actual history--which, to the title's credit, does involve Jackson killing a shitload of Brits, Spaniards and American Indians--and put it all through this lens.
The presentation is pretty standard refuge in audacity. The cast, and Jackson in particular, swear like sailors. The narrator is introduced early on as a homely middle-aged librarian wearing a teddy-bear sweater and riding a scooter with a flag on the back. Jackson shoots her in the neck in her second scene. The powers in Washington before Jackson is elected (Monroe, Van Buren, Adams) are presented as incompetant, flamboyantly gay fops; John Quincy Adams gets the worst of it, being presented as an obviously retarded flamboyantly gay fop.
As political commentary, it's all over the place and doesn't really seem to know what parallels it's trying to draw. My mother seemed to think it was a straightforward anti-tea party message, as Jackson's "Populism YEAH YEAH" platform gets him into office with no idea what to actually do, causing him to alienate his constituency and force the Trail of Tears. Thing is, depending on the scene, Jackson is a parallel to Dubya ("candidate we'd like to have a beer with", he's the decider!), Gore (his first election was stolen from him by a backroom-dealing idiot son of a former president!), Obama (hope and change!...now what do I do when Washington remains full of obstinate jackasses?), and Palin (frontier gun-nut who hates latte-swilling elites). Oh, and he's a horrible racist who kills a lot of people, but he's big on equality for everyone who counts as a person (i.e. not slaves, Indians or women). If there was a message, I found it to be rather confused at best.
The music was fun, and funny at points, but nothing jumped out the way Avenue Q or Evil Dead: The Musical did. It was a collection of book numbers and no breakaway pop hits.
Overall, it was fun, but I'm not rushing out to recommend it.
On an unrelated note, we had dinner at Balkanika beforehand, and I'd heartily recommend that. Get the mezes combo platter.
So, imagine that US President Andrew Jackson was an emoboy rock star who wore really tight black jeans and cursed a lot. And cut himself when he was depressed. Now take the actual history--which, to the title's credit, does involve Jackson killing a shitload of Brits, Spaniards and American Indians--and put it all through this lens.
The presentation is pretty standard refuge in audacity. The cast, and Jackson in particular, swear like sailors. The narrator is introduced early on as a homely middle-aged librarian wearing a teddy-bear sweater and riding a scooter with a flag on the back. Jackson shoots her in the neck in her second scene. The powers in Washington before Jackson is elected (Monroe, Van Buren, Adams) are presented as incompetant, flamboyantly gay fops; John Quincy Adams gets the worst of it, being presented as an obviously retarded flamboyantly gay fop.
As political commentary, it's all over the place and doesn't really seem to know what parallels it's trying to draw. My mother seemed to think it was a straightforward anti-tea party message, as Jackson's "Populism YEAH YEAH" platform gets him into office with no idea what to actually do, causing him to alienate his constituency and force the Trail of Tears. Thing is, depending on the scene, Jackson is a parallel to Dubya ("candidate we'd like to have a beer with", he's the decider!), Gore (his first election was stolen from him by a backroom-dealing idiot son of a former president!), Obama (hope and change!...now what do I do when Washington remains full of obstinate jackasses?), and Palin (frontier gun-nut who hates latte-swilling elites). Oh, and he's a horrible racist who kills a lot of people, but he's big on equality for everyone who counts as a person (i.e. not slaves, Indians or women). If there was a message, I found it to be rather confused at best.
The music was fun, and funny at points, but nothing jumped out the way Avenue Q or Evil Dead: The Musical did. It was a collection of book numbers and no breakaway pop hits.
Overall, it was fun, but I'm not rushing out to recommend it.
On an unrelated note, we had dinner at Balkanika beforehand, and I'd heartily recommend that. Get the mezes combo platter.
no subject
I assume that anything on Broadway that's "political", and is intentionally outrageous (outrageous here meaning "outrageous to people not in the NYC bubble", not, say, "critical of the American left"), gets free boosted reviews for it. When even Avenue Q, Billy Elliott, and The Putnam County Spelling Bee have to throw in political sucker punches, the openly political musicals have to be distasteful.
no subject
bbaj
(Anonymous) 2010-09-23 01:47 pm (UTC)(link)Re: bbaj
The musical is not trying to comment on current politics.
Then maybe it shouldn't directly reference them by using lines like the "decider" thing, or the "hope and change" thing, which are unmistakeably parallels to modern politics. (There were a number of them, but I wasn't keeping a tally.)
It transcends time.
That's amazingly pretentious for an emo-rock show. Also, I read the eHow page on transcending time (http://www.ehow.com/how_4420938_transcend-time-space.html) and it totally doesn't do any of those things.
Plus it's incredibly entertaining. This is going to be big.
I was amused, but glad I didn't pay full price for it and wouldn't particularly recommend it. Also, it's rather late to the party, given that emo doesn't really seem to be a "thing" nowadays. But hey, Twilight is unreadable crap and it's huge, so I could be totally wrong.