Tag Archives: musical

Jekyll and Hyde and Why I’m Pathetic

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Jekyll and Hyde is a fascinating musical adaptation of the classic Robert Louis Stevenson novel featuring the schizophrenic, “chemical”-addicted Victorian doctor trying to destroy the “Duality of Man”.  I don’t remember ever reading Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, but somehow the concept has always been present in popular culture.  Anyone know why?  I mean it can’t just be The Pagemaster (featuring Leonard Nimoy as Jekyll and Hyde), can it?  Anyways.  T. Eric Hart did a fascinating job as the aforementioned Doctor, but the real star of the show is the music.  Frank Wildhorn is an incredible composer.  His music has this indelible movie-soundtrack quality that makes it so much fun to listen to.

Yesterday at my singing lesson, I briefly talked with my vocal coach about the upcoming Sweeney Todd adaptation and I voiced my opinion how in the beginning of the trailer, Johnny Depp sounds a LOT like Jack Sparrow, and how I hoped that that was just his generic English accent.  But then today I’m watching the trailer again and it hits me why I think that.  Something my coach had mentioned was that they started out with generic trailer music (before transitioning to Stephen Sondheim’s delicious treatment of Stephen Sondheim’s music), and guess what?  It’s the music from the Black Pearl trailer.  Therefore I conclude that by tying the two together, they are not only saturating our conscious mind (as if all the Pirate lovers aren’t already going to see Sweeney JUST because of Johnny), but also our sub-conscious mind with the thought that if you loved Pirates, you’ll love Sweeney Todd.  Which reminds me of how after Wicked became popular, when Rent the movie came out, all the teeny-boppers who loved Wicked became Rent-heads because of Idina Menzel, despite the fact that they had NO CLUE what being a Rent-head is about (then again, neither do I since I’ll never be a true artist working in New York…I just hit puberty while singing along to the soundtrack).  I guess I don’t mind since it’s a sound marketing strategy…maybe I’ll just have to make sure that I either catch a midnight showing of Sweeney or at a time when I won’t be surrounded by swooning girls who don’t get it or think it’s too violent.

A Weekend In The Country

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[Bonus points if you understand the title reference]

So here it is…Labor Day Weekend 2007. I spent the weekend at the King Frederick Best Western in Solvang. The whole purpose of the trip was to see PCPA’s Urinetown, but I also ended up finishing Pearl Harbor by Newt Gingrich and William Forstchen. The theatre ended up being less than a 1/10 of a mile from our hotel, and it felt really fun to walk to the theatre, see the show and then walk back to the hotel. I’ll have to make this Solvang trip more of a regular thing to see more theatre and walk back to my room. ;)

Urinetown…Not
the Place, The Musical

The Pacific Conservatory of the Performing Arts (PCPA) presents Urinetown in Santa Maria and at Solvang’s TheatreFest.

At first Officer Lockstock seemed a bit too over the top with his gay act, but after a while, I grew to enjoy it.

An Asian Bobby Strong with a white Old Man Strong? I didn’t know the people who cast Disney’s Cinderella (with Brandi) was still working!*

One of the Equity cast members who played Mr. McQueen (Mr. Cladwell’s assistant, third from the right) looked exactly like Steven Spielberg. Creepy cool!

The program for this show was actually quite informative (if not a little too commercial for my taste). It contained liner notes for all the shows for the Summer 2007 billing (makes sense – cheaper on printing and I can’t imagine the amphitheatre doing many shows during the possible rainy season). One of the most interesting things I learned from the notes highlights an old (I don’t want to call it a maxim, but I can’t think of another word for it) maxim of mine that the more times you watch something, the more you will get from it***. Robert Malthus wrote the “Essay on Population” which is referenced and even cited in the play. Hence, Officer Lockstock at the climax of the finale cries, “Hail Malthus!” While I’m talking about that maxim, I also finally decoded another line from the show that I never really comprehended (leave me alone…I have hearing problems when there are multiple sound inputs). It’s during the song “Snuff that Girl”.

“Nuts, they fall close
So they say, to the tree
Looky here, here’s an a-
Corn from Cladwell I see
I say, she is the nut
and of course, we’re the squirrel!
She is what we saved for winter
So let’s snuff that girl!”

Speaking of “Snuff that Girl”, the program said that the show paid homage to West Side Story and Cabaret. I was a little puzzled by this because I had never thought about those shows as being even remotely close to anything in the show. But then not only did Officer Lockstock do the Jet jump randomly, the entire “Snuff That Girl” song is practically inspired by West Side Story’s “Cool”. Nothing familiarizes you with a show like doing it (West Side Story that is). Oh and I can’t forget the Fiddler on the Roof reference that totally topped the song “What Is Urinetown”. I mean the thing is already a classic Russian folk song, but then they went and added the bloody bottle dance to it. Love it! Oh and I can’t forget the Will Rogers’ “Favorite Son” choreography that inspired a moment in the show…I could have sworn it was during “Run Freedom Run”, but without choreography notes, I couldn’t tell you.

Another problem with outdoor amphitheatres? Bats. Several times during the show, a bat (couldn’t tell if it was the same one or another from the flock – what is a group of bats called? A gaggle?**) swooped in and out of the lights above the stage. Kind of distracting, but what can you do. Also, it’s Solvang, so all silences throughout the performance were punctuated by monster cricket chirps.

All in all, a fantastic performance. Quick! Check it out before it disappears.

Pearl Harbor

I have several issues with what I would consider print issues in the book. After a decent-sized preface that details the problems with telling a story containing Asian culture that tries to remain historically accurate, they don’t make up their minds. The biggest issue about that was they said they would call it Nanking and Peking instead of the modern Nanjing and Bangkok and then they call it both things! Frustrating. Also, despite the book being subtitled “A Novel of December 8th”, I KNOW their intention was just to approach it from the Japanese perspective: the morning of Sunday December 7th, 1941 was the morning of Monday December 8th, 1941 in Tokyo. And they totally screw that up because the little date index that appears above the section where the battle actually takes place says it’s December 8th Hawaii time and December 9th Tokyo time. But then they go and talk about how the weekend crew at Pearl Harbor is more lax than the week crew. So it’s a simple little print error, fine. So I’m obsessing, fine. I still think that a book of this quality deserves better than that.

I’ve been raving about this book for a while now, so there’s not really much more I can say. It’s a phenomenal read with characters through whom you can really feel the conflict and emotions that lead up to the attack on Pearl Harbor. And as I keep saying it’s a fascinating insight into Asian culture that I am just blown away by.

* You know, how the Prince was Asian, his father the King was white (Victor Garber) and his mother the Queen was black (Whoopi Goldberg).

** It’s actually a colony. http://www.madsci.org/posts/archives/jul99/932000898.Gb.r.html

*** The most popular example I have of this is the now-extinct Country Bear Vacation Hoedown. The three stuffed heads on the wall (Max the deer, Buff the buffalo and Melvin the moose) are arguing.

“Buff: The way you’re always hibernatin’, you must be part bear.

Melvin: Aw heck, I’m only part moose as it is!”

The Full Monty

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I have loved this musical ever since David Sidoni (of Newsies and OCHSA fame) played “Big Ass Rock” for a warm-up at Orange County Song and Dance Summer Camp many years ago. And I’ve been waiting to see it ever since I chose not to go to the national tour at OCPAC back in 2003 (long story about surgery and not sure I would be able to sit down in a chair for that long a time). It’s been gone for 4 years! I’m so grateful to Music Theatre West for producing it!

The show is absolutely genius. I just love David Yazbek’s music and lyrics. And the story is very thoughtful as well. It deals with men not able to be men in their lives (being unemployed makes it kind of hard to bring the bread home) and finding courage to do something that not many people do…strip. It also shows people dealing with relationships and how those are built/maintained. More than anything, I absolutely loved that part of it. It’s really summed up in the song “You Rule My World (Reprise)” where Dave’s wife, Georgie (Tammi Tappan Damiano, another fabulous performer from the SoCal) and Harold’s wife, Vikki (Tracy Lore) reveal their deep love for their husbands despite the adversity (Georgie just found out that Dave is stripping and not cheating and Vikki found out that Harold’s been unemployed for 6 months and hiding it by buying expensive things).

John Bisom played Jerry Lukowski perfectly. It was especially funny to me when Dave (John Massey Jr.) called him Fabio in the song “Man” because Bisom played the Fabio character in “The Thing About Men” a couple of years ago at MTW.

John Massey Jr. is absolutely hilarious as fat b@$t@rd Dave Bukatinsky who has to deal with his obesity. And seeing the show, I never realized that while Harold (David Engel) is singing “You Rule My World” to his wife, Dave is singing it to his stomach! Kind of kills just listening to the song for me now, but that’s because I’m weird and perverted. No not like that. Jeez you guys are sick.

David Engel continues to amaze me with his versatility as an actor/performer. He’s literally the greatest thing to come out of Southern California since…I don’t know, happy cows.

So it’s not like you can see it now (I saw the last show), but I highly recommend seeing this show if you get the chance. I give an R-rating strictly for the foul language (more than 1 F-bomb means R) because the nudity isn’t really that bad. You see lots of butt and guys strutting around in thong’s, but beyond that at the very end of the show (where they go all the way) there’s really bright lights behind them eclipsing anything revealing, so unless you truly mind seeing a guy’s butt, this show is for anyone who’s ever had trouble with a relationship.

Assassins

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This was my first time seeing the show, but I was far from unfamiliar with the material…I’d been listening to the soundtrack for at least 8 years if not longer and absolutely love the show. This production was a well put-together performance that was wonderful to watch. The director decided to put the assassins in a hotel lobby/bar reminiscent of the Hollywood Hotel (of Twilight Zone fame), which makes the fairway references in the opening number a little vague, but none-the-less works really well as the entire cast is onstage all the time, watching the different vignettes occurring with various reactions. My favorite character before seeing the show was Guiteau (whom I now love twice as much thanks to the actor’s fantastic performance), but now my allegiance is divided between him and Sam Bicke, who is dressed in a Santa suit and has two fantastic 5-min monologues where he records tapes for famous people complaining or complimenting on their work. Of course, watching this, I couldn’t help thinking about the Sean Penn movie about Sam Bicke which has to be straight dramatics, because Sean Penn would not degrade himself enough to be in a Santa suit for an hour and a half and be insane…he’d have to make it be all weepy and dramatic and crap and that just doesn’t interest me.

But anyways, back to the cool stuff. Because I don’t want to be a bitch and spoil what I thought was an awesome twist, I’ll put it in spoiler tags.

Spoiler Alert! (place and hold your mouse over the bar to see)

The first person to come on-stage and sign the guest book of the hotel gets drafted to be the Balladeer, the primary narrator, but is later revealed to be Lee Harvey Oswald, which I thought was a fantastic twist.

Ok, now that I’ve got that awesomeness off my chest, there’s the tiny issue of John Wilkes Booth. The actor playing him looked very much the part, but he was huge! Also, he took the final scene with Lee Harvey Oswald rather slowly. Post mortem, the joke is that he was downloading his lines over a modem connection and everybody else was on DSL. Beyond that, he was trying very hard to act well, and while doing a very nice job, was just a little over the top for me. God what I would have given to see Victor Garber do this.

Also can’t talk about the production without crying about the orchestration. Don’t get me wrong they did a fantastic job for what they had…but it was synthesizer and drums! How I Saved Roosevelt was incredibly lacking (it’s a huge John Phillip Sousa march with horns and everything). I was practically depressed! Just kidding…but not too much.