chuckro | Entries tagged with theater reviews

Originally formed as an undergrad acappella group at Indiana University in the 90s, the founding members re-formed their group in 2007 as professional performers after a video they made in 1998 went viral. Since then, they continued to rotate in new members (apparently all of whom were once in the still-extant undergrad group), and currently touring with a nine-man lineup.

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Overall: This was a fun concert, and nostalgic in more ways than one, as it was an extremely 90s acappella group doing 90s songs. College acappella has evolved (often for the better, but not always), and this felt like a time capsule in a bunch of ways.

As an anniversary adventure, Rebecca and I went to see Life and Trust, an immersive theater “experience” by the same group that did Sleep No More.

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Overall: This reminded me, more than anything, of a video game sequel: Same gameplay loop, but they made it bigger and longer and with more setpieces and more characters. But they didn’t actually consider whether these “enhancements” would hurt the total experience more than help it. Also unfortunately, tickets are $200 each, so my interest in playing it repeatedly to see everything is significantly lower than if I had it in my Steam queue.

This is based on the 1959 film that starred Tony Curtis, Jack Lemmon and Marilyn Monroe and follows basically the same plot: During prohibition, a pair of male musicians witness a mob hit, and escape by disguising themselves as women and joining an all-girl band. One of them falls in love with a girl in the band, the other attracts the attention of nutty millionaire. Hilarity ensues.

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Overall: Great show, great cast, glad I saw it.

Professor Harold Hill rolls into town, informs them that they’ve got TROUBLE in River City, and that he can start up a boy’s marching band to solve it. You know the story and you’re here for the music.

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Overall: Great production, glad I got to see it, Jackman isn’t my first choice musically but that’s my only real complaint.

Take Me Out is the fictional story of a major league baseball player coming out as gay, and the repercussions of that. It first premiered 20 years ago, and I saw that production with my mom. When a new Broadway production was announced, she got us tickets.

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Overall: Definitely a solid production of a good show (though I’d argue that the message gets muddy in the darker second half), but sad it’ still as relevant as it is. Hopefully the next revival in 20 years will feel much more like a quaint anachronism.

My ability to see actual live concerts will likely be impaired for several years, and it’s unclear whether independent music venues (or even music venues in general) are going to survive past that. So instead, we have streaming concerts.

It was an “all request” concert; and when you bought your ticket you could put in your requests with it. She took one of my requests (“St. Theresa”), called me out by name, and managed to pronounce my last name correctly! (She must have Greek friends.) That was super-cool.

This was very clearly filmed in her bedroom; they were doing work on their house. Also, they were apparently “in residence” at a club in NYC when everything closed, and all of their merch is still in a closet in said club. So they haven’t been having the best year, clearly.

I’ll admit, I haven’t really followed Joan Osborne much since the 90s, when I bought two of her albums but kind lost interest. Her voice is clearly not what it was; even on some of her own songs there are notes she apparently can’t hit any more.

She did a cover of Bob Dylan’s “Tangled Up in Blue”, and it occurred to me that, for any given Bob Dylan song, my favorite version is performed by a different artist. I like the Indigo Girls version of “Tangled Up in Blue”; Simon & Garfunkle’s "The Times They Are a-Changin'"; the Byrds "Mr. Tambourine Man"; the Persuasions’ “Quinn the Eskimo”; the Wildcats acappella cover of "Don't Think Twice, It's All Right" etc etc.

Overall: This was weaker than many other City Winery concerts I’ve been to, though I think it’s a good proof-of-concept for the setup. I actually streamed it to my tablet while we drove back from Farmingdale and never lost the signal.

Crossposts: https://chuckro.livejournal.com/616176.html

Because we all love a good jukebox musical, here’s one featuring the music of Alanis Morissette!

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Overall: It’s not even on the same level of trash fire that Bat Out of Hell was, because though the plot is patently ridiculous, the dialogue is fun, the characters are earnest, and the music makes you feel like it’s 1996 and you’re justifiably furious at a middle-aged actor/comedian.

Crossposts: https://chuckro.livejournal.com/602841.html

“On a hot summer night, would you offer your throat to the wolf with the red roses?”
“What? No. What?”
“You’re supposed to come up with a reply!”

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Overall: Honestly, if they stripped the sets, dumped the plot and just turned this into everyone talking turns wailing Meatloaf's greatest hits, they'd have a much better show that I suspect would make more money. The singers are great and Steinman is an excellent songwriter. But this show is a goddamn trash fire. (I loved it.)

Crossposts: https://chuckro.livejournal.com/595840.html

• I actually kicked things off on the Thursday before my birthday, seeing Beetlejuice: The Musical with my mom. Updates a bunch of the source material, deviates where necessary, adds a lot of wit. And it has a sandworm. Highly recommended.

• I had a birthday BBQ on Saturday. I need to remember next time make more smoked pineapple. And more smoked onions. (I wonder if they’re like homemade guacamole, where there’s no actual upper limit to how much I can make and people will consume.) The disparate kids groups all got along together (nobody cried, everyone had fun, and we only once had to dispatch the fleet of daddies), though apparently we might need nametags for the adults if we’re going to keep mixing friend circles.

• Sunday was the trip to Farmingdale: I spent a surprising amount of it doing random chores—I got my suit for Sammi’s wedding and helped her clean out boxes of stuff from her old room and also put together gift bags for the wedding. But I then ate a ton of shellfish and chocolate cake, and took a nap, and that’s most of what I wanted from the day, so it all evened out.

• Coming back on Monday was a shockingly easy drive (it was early and the weather was nice), so we ended up meeting Mithrigil for burgers for lunch, then ARR and Jethrien went to the park for a while and I dealt with a lot of random tasks. Then they came back and ARR and I defeated the Dragonlord.

• Gifts: Several bottles of exciting German wines, a few new books (that I’m already burning through), a set of personal trainer sessions, and a set of Wesley Crusher-themed Star Trek drinking glasses.

So this is 38. Not too bad, really.

Crossposts: https://chuckro.livejournal.com/591883.html

Last week, we went to Bergen PAC to see a Meatloaf concert. Or more specifically: The backing band was the Neverland Express, most of whom have been playing backup for Meatloaf himself for many years. The singer, Caleb Johnson (apparently an American Idol winner) is not Meatloaf, but he does an excellent impression. He’s got a solid voice for the music and loves running into the audience to give high-fives and climb on chairs. The big disappointment was that Meatloaf himself was supposed to be hosting the event, but he apparently fell off a stage a few days ago and fractured his collarbone. He sent the band a text for us from the hospital.

They only did songs off of two albums, Bat Out of Hell and Bat Out of Hell II. Which makes sense from a theme standpoint and also because that’s where most of Meatloaf’s big hits came from. And it occurred to me afterwards that every Meatloaf song you put in a concert setlist is a commitment. I was thinking, “Oh, they should have done ‘Objects In the Rear View Mirror’ and then I remembered that song is ten minutes long.” I’m not sure Meatloaf has ever charted with a sub-four-minute song, including radio edits! They actually did a Queen song as the encore, probably so they could get off the stage sometime this week.

All said, it was a lot of fun. I suspect this is what a concert with a younger Meatloaf 30+ years ago would have been like. I left with my ears ringing, having thoroughly enjoyed myself.

Crossposts: https://chuckro.livejournal.com/591290.html

• I’d never heard Lunesa before. They’re fun; their frontman does a good stage schtick and they do a lot of two-minute reels/jigs/standards run together into medleys.
• Hearing Merchant live is kinda like seeing George Takai in person: Recordings are good, but their voices in person are rich like molasses on your ears. It’s a delight.
• Most of my favorite artists, especially ones from my youth, dance like utter dorks. Natalie Merchant is no exception and it’s totally adorable. You know that one member of an acappella group who randomly conducts things despite the fact that no one’s watching them and they only do it about half the time? That’s her.
• Merchant’s hair is very long and totally white…except her roots, which are dark. Which makes me suspect that she’s dying it for effect. (She’s only 55, after all.)
• Symphony Space is an accessible, comfortable and reasonably-priced theater.
• They did a lot of Lunesa songs (this was their concert; Merchant was the guest) and a few of their collaboration songs. From Merchant’s older catalog came “Motherland,” “Cowboy Romance,” and surprisingly “These Are the Days.”
• I occasionally forget, as my friends now span an age range of about ten years in either direction, that some of them (notably Wavilyem) are actually the same age I am, and grew up listening to the same music. Our exposure to Merchant’s catalogue in our formative years was practically identical.
• Side note: Merchant has put me in a bit of a bind, by releasing a ten-disc set that’s all her studio releases, plus a full new album and a CD of rarities. Damnit, I own all of her studio albums already!

Crossposts: https://chuckro.livejournal.com/586784.html

This was actually a few weeks ago. I’ve been behind on writing things up. Some notes:

My dad noted that he stopped following Simon’s new work somewhere in the late 70s. I was current through the early 2000s, but it still meant that “Wristband” and “The Rewrite” were both new to me.
He performs big-band arrangements of some of the older songs. Doesn’t have all the notes any more, but he worked around it. (And brought in a “guest whistler” for “Me & Julio”.) Still a hell of a showman.
Relatively little of the Simon & Garfunkel era until the second encore. (He made a comment about “reclaiming” “Bridge Over Troubled Water” but didn’t name any names.)
I was very amused by the story behind “Rene and Georgette Magritte With Their Dog After the War,” which was named for the caption on a photo in a book of Magritte’s paintings that he happened upon in Joan Baez’s living room during a rehearsal. “That’s a great song title. But what should the song be about? Eh, the guy’s a surrealist; it can be about anything!”

Crossposts: https://chuckro.livejournal.com/576672.html

This was very much a rock concert. Alanis isn’t generally very pinned down by genre (and some of my favorite songs of hers are best performed in an acoustic, intime sort of space), but this was very much done as an electric guitars and giant speakers sort of affair.

Her drummer loves his life—he’s like Animal from the Muppet Show, except a 50-something bald guy. He also apparently needs to be kept safely behind plexiglass, and it’s unclear whether that’s a sound issue or physical protection.

Alanis is not a very good dancer; she mostly does a weird shake n’ shimmy with some head-bobbing. I figured out during the encore, though, that a bunch of her moves make perfect sense if you have long hair to swing around. Alanis is currently sporting a pixie cut.

Also of note that she sent 99% of the concert singing either to stage left or stage right. My best theory is that the spotlight (projected from far behind the audience in an outdoor stage) was so bright that she couldn’t comfortably look in that direction. I suspect she was also having problems with her monitor / earpiece, because she was clearly motioning to someone off in audience right for multiple songs. Or as Jethrien put it, “I’ve got one hand in my pocket / and the other one’s signaling the sound guy.”

All that said, it was a totally fun show. She played all the hits an a couple of the newer tracks, and threw in a few bonus lines (“Melt it down / the way a two- and seven-year-old would do”) that you hope for in a live show. The weather behaved, as we were under an awning and the temperature was pleasant. And while the summerstage isn’t a great venue, it’s a perfectly acceptable one for this sort of show.

(Also of note, my parents were watching ARR, so we got to stay over after the concert and sleep through the hotel breakfast. That was also lovely.)

Crossposts: https://chuckro.livejournal.com/574581.html

We saw 10,000 Maniacs perform at City Winery. Among other things, because I spotted these tickets early, we got really good seats—as in, three seats away from the stage and facing in the right direction.

(A bit of history for those unfamiliar: 10,000 Maniacs was formed in 1981, with Natalie Merchant as the lead singer, Robert Buck as the lead guitarist, and the two of them co-writing most of the music. Merchant’s deep and often depressing lyrics were counterbalanced by Buck’s flowery, happy music. Merchant left the group in 1993 and they brought on Mary Ramsey as the lead singer / co-writer. The albums released after 1993 were…generally not very good. They’re happy fluff about nature. Buck died in 2000, but the group has reconstituted around Ramsey and the other three founding members to tour.)

I’ve always been less than enthused by Mary Ramsey on the studio albums—in a lot of ways, she’s the poor man’s Natalie Merchant. That said, the poor man is still doing pretty well here: She’s very good in concert and she’s an amazing violinist. The concert had a slightly rough start, partially because the venue didn’t turn off the ad boards or adjust the lighting until their first song was done, partially because they didn’t really tell any stories, and partially because they back-loaded the stronger parts of their catalog. Ramsey’s impressive violin work was all in the second half. The “get up and dance” segment of the program (mostly “My Sister Rose”) was four songs from the end. “Pit Viper”, the second song they wrote and one that hasn’t been seen on an album since 1983 (for good reason) was early in the show. This is a band with a very deep, very strong catalog (even if you accept that there were maybe two really good songs in the post-Merchant era), they didn’t need to load up the show with weaker cuts.

Interesting trivia: Merchant sang the wrong lyrics to “Because the Night” in what was arguably their biggest hit and the most well-known version of that song…so those were the lyrics Ramsey sang in concert. Similarly, Ramsey was very clearly referring to a lyrics sheet for “Tension Makes a Tangle”, which Jethrien picked up on. I’m not terribly surprised about this, since that was the first song the band wrote together and the very first attempt to marry Merchant’s poetry to Buck’s music. It borders of REM-esque word salad. I’m really good at lyrics, and I can’t remember most of that one!

But like a number of concerts of artists I’ve liked since I was a teenager, this stirred up a lot of good emotions and reminded me of a lot of songs that mean a lot to me. If you don’t know their catalogue at all, then I’ll just leave you with Trouble Me.

Crossposts: https://chuckro.livejournal.com/566519.html

- We have officially eaten at a Michelin-starred restaurant, Aureole. (I suspect we have before, but this was the first time I was conscious of it. It was a glorious meal.) I have never had venison this tender and mild. I have also never known gorgonzola cheese to blend so well into a dish (specifically a spatzel dish). Seriously, it was marvelous.

- If you told 6-year-old me that one day I would be savoring beets, I would have thought you mad. Yet here we are.

- Goat cheese risotto can be a thing. Did you know that? We never thought of that. But it can be a delicious thing.

- We then saw The Play That Goes Wrong. It's not Noises Off, but that's damning it with an impossible comparison. It's still hilarious, and it takes avenues of humor (collapsing sets, technical problems) that aren't used in Noises Off, so it doesn't feel like a retread.

- Though as much as I liked the physical humor, the bit that keeps getting me is the discussion of their previous plays, which were done with a much smaller cast and budget. So they did Anton Chekhov's “Two Sisters,” “Snow White and the Tall, Broad Gentlemen,” and the hit musical “Cat”. They also did a production of Roald Dahl's “James and the...Peach” which, when the fruit went rotten, was quickly changed into, “James...Where's Your Peach?”

Crossposts: https://chuckro.livejournal.com/554564.html

Thor: Ragnarok - Yet another solid, very fun Marvel movie, that manages to stand alone nicely despite being in the middle of other events. I miss Jane and the Earth-based supporting cast, but acknowledge they would have basically nothing to do here. I'm going to guess Lady Sif doesn't appear so they can pull her in later, rather than having her get killed with the Warriors Three. Given the continued characterization of Loki, I suspect they're eventually going to make explicit that he was being influenced by Thanos / the Mind Gem in the first Avengers movie. (Also, Loki totally pocketed the Space Gem from Odin's hall, right? We all know that happened.) And I'm amused by the continued portrayal of Heimdall as the only responsible adult on Asgard.

The Impossible Burger - I recently made it to a Bareburger and tried the Impossible Burger, an all-veggie patty that is supposed to better approximate meat than any other. And yes, it does—if you presented it to me as a cheap frozen beef patty, I'd believe it. It's not as good as a Bareburger beef patty (which are very good), but we're really getting there with the fake meat offerings.

Brigadoon (Encores production at City Center) - I was a bit surprised at how much of this show I'd forgotten until I realized that I performed it with the St. Killian Players 20 years ago. It was a delightful production with fantastic dancing and a cast that was clearly just having a good time.

We were able to take ARR to The Brownstone Diner for the first time in three years, because his ability to eat baked milk means that he can have their pancakes without throwing up, and the pancakes are the reason to go there. They are still very, very good.

Crossposts: https://chuckro.livejournal.com/548012.html

This was sorta-kinda a Blues Traveler concert, in that they did Blues Traveler songs, but it was more of a “chamber piece” setlist and featured only Popper and keyboardist Ben Wilson.

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Overall: I rather love the intime concert style City Winery offers. They're three for three for concerts I've seen there.

Crossposts: https://chuckro.livejournal.com/543406.html

Jethrien and I saw BNL in concert at BergenPAC in Englewood last Friday. It occurred to me that they've been performing for over 25 years at this point, and their special guests noted that they'd been performing for 55 years.

The oldest member of the Persuasions, incidentally, is 91 years old. And he's still got hella charm. When the lead singer started talking about whether their style of music was doo wop, or gospel, or motown, the older guy piped up, “We're folk musicians. We sing music for folks!” They did a lovely opening act of their own stuff, then came back for a bunch of sets with BNL—they apparently cut an album together, which I'm likely to buy.

Back to BNL, I think the group lacks some of the energy they had when I saw them 15 years ago, but that's logical given both time and the fact that Steven Page stopped touring with them some years ago. They dropped a bunch of the stage banter and goofiness I remember from that earlier show and their published live tracks. Ed took over some of Steve's classic vocals, and members of the Persuasions covered some of them. They did a nice mix of new and old material, and hit all of the classic hits. I think they realize that much of their audience is only middling on their latest albums and still want to hear “If I Had $1000000.”

As an aside: Jim Creeggan is the single ganglyest individual I think I've ever seen. I think he's only gotten ganglier with age.

Overall: Not the best concert we've seen, but we've also seen some really fantastic concerts in the past few years, so the competition there was fierce. Still a lot of fun.

Crossposts: http://chuckro.livejournal.com/528420.html

Garfunkel and Oats - I found this short TV series reminiscent of The Monkees, with loosely-connected goofy slice-of-life plots and musical breaks interspersed. They got an impressive collection of guest stars crammed into the eight episodes. It’s fun, but I’m not surprised it didn’t find an audience—their style is really better suited to Youtube shorts than a full 22-minute episode.

Justice League: The Flashpoint Paradox - The Flash deals with a totally broken timeline in which Aquaman and Wonder Woman are poised to destroy the world. If you haven’t read the original comics and have a good enough knowledge of DC characters to recognize everybody, you’re going to be seriously confused.

Star Trek Beyond - This was a lot of fun, and better than Into Darkness mostly in that it didn't have many of the problems, not that it was a notably better movie on its merits. There wasn't much we hadn't seen before, there were some nice plotholes (though not nearly as huge as the previous two movies); but the dialogue and character interactions were snappy and the whole ensemble cast got to show off. Arguably the best of the three new Trek movies.

Sunday in the Park with George - On one hand, this was a very well-presented show with an excellent score and very talented performers. On the other hand, the material is so much “artistic” wanking it’s not even funny. Look at all the amazing references to art history I’ve made here! Share my ANGST about ART! (Also, I didn’t realize that a song from tick, tick…BOOM! was a direct parody of a song from this show.)

tick, tick…BOOM! - I realized shortly after she walked on stage that Hawkgirl was playing Susan. What I didn’t realize until reading the Playbill was that I’d also probably seen her as the leading player in the recent revival of Pippin (the one with Terrence Mann as Charles). Which makes it a super-shame that there’s basically no dancing in this show, because she was amazing in that. I was underwhelmed by Johnny because he either sang with an insanely nasal voice (which grated on me) or a Ben Folds-esque rock voice (which would have worked as a stylistic choice if he’d actually been consistent with it). Michael didn’t match my personal vision of the character, but the actor did a nice job anyway. And despite its resonance with me dying down after I turned 30, finished my MBA, bought a house, and had a kid, I still do really like this show.

Pentatonix – 2016 World Tour - Much more of a classic arena “rock concert” than pretty much every other concert we’ve been to recently, which was a nice change of place, though I’ll admit the more “intime” venues are more my style. They got a bunch of audience members up on stage for one song, which made this the Best Birthday Ever for one 14-year-old fan. Also, we got $7 ice creams, because the Prudential Center wants to grow up to be Madison Square Garden.

Crossposts: http://chuckro.livejournal.com/510027.html

The theater company formerly known as the Attic Ensemble (mostly defunct at this point) does an annual murder mystery fundraiser at a local church. This is my fifth performance with them, which included two shows where I died, one show where Puel died, and one show where I murdered Jethrien. Shockingly, I both survived this one and wasn’t the murderer (much to the chagrin of half the audience—I got a lot of votes).

I played Ricky the Revealer, a wannabe blogger who showed up at this high school reunion/homecoming because he lost a bet to a reader. Notable accomplishments include taking a selfie with the corpse:
photo 20161015_145759_zpsm83oh2pp.jpg

And carrying around my laptop with my blog on it as a prop. If you’d like to read the blog, I uploaded a pdf.

The Attic folks are already requesting that Mary write parts for Jethrien and ARR into the next show.

Crossposts: http://chuckro.livejournal.com/506175.html

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The World of Insufficient Light

Entries tagged with theater reviews

Straight No Chaser (Summer 90s Concert)

Life and Trust (Sleep No More 2: Sleep Even Less)

Some Like it Hot (Broadway)

The Music Man (2022 Broadway Revival)

Take Me Out

Joan Osborne All-Request Streaming Concert (via City Winery)

Jagged Little Pill: The Musical

Bat Out of Hell: The Musical

Birthday Weekend!

BAT - The Music of Meatloaf

Lunesa with Natalie Merchant

Paul Simon’s “Homeward Bound” Concert at Madison Square Garden

Alanis Morrisette at Mt. Airy Lodge Summerstage

Birthday Long Weekend Day 1: 10,000 Maniacs Concert

Jethrien's Birthday Fauxtweets

Other Very Random Reviews

John Popper (of Blues Traveler) at City Winery

Barenaked Ladies, with special guests The Persuasions

Other Things I’ve Watched: Movies and Theater

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