NYC Happenings- the Cliff’s Notes ® Version

So, two weekends ago, I went up to New York along with The Gay Dads^® (but I didn’t drive with them because T’s ex-wife was joining them) and I stayed up on W. 95th Street. Here’s what I saw:


Friday night, I saw Forbidden Broadway: SVU. Just Shows to Go You & I got together to see this long-running revue, as I’d never seen it before. Some of it went on too long, but there were enough recent (“Jersey Boys” & “Sweeney Todd”) and classic (“Les Mis” & “Chicago”) show parodies that tickled the funny bone to make it a very enjoyable night. Grade: B-



Saturday afternoon, I caught Jersey Boys, which I had no real interest in seeing it until the reviews came out and JSTGY said he loved it and, of course, by that time tickets were hard to come by so I actually paid full price about 5 months ago to see this. And it was a really well done production. The four leads (of which I saw one understudy) were tremendously talented and the back-story of Frankie Valli & The Four Seasons is fascinating, but it amounts to no more than a VH1 Behind The Music episode. The book was well-written, the songs infectious and joyous and the direction seamless and cinematic; although there were a couple of odd-bordering-on-the-ridiculous staging moments, but thankfully they didn’t last long and the show continued to be entertaining and. If I hadn’t had “Dreamgirls” on my mind, I think I would have been more amazed, but I honestly did enjoy myself in spite of it’s faults. Plus, it seemed like they bussed in all of north Jersey for the matinee. Grade: B+

Saturday evening, I went down to the West Village to catch Duncan Sheik’s musical version of Weidekind’s “Spring Awakening,” a show I had been looking forward to since the first time I heard of it last year. Chronicling the passions and frustrations of adolescence in late 19th century Germany and using rock music to signify their confusion and rage, I found this to be very stimulating, akin to watching “Hedwig and the Angry Inch” to first time. Again, it’s not without its faults but the choreography and music simply mesmerized me and I was swept by the piece. The Atlantic Theatre is very akin to The Theatre in size (about 160 seats) and it seems that their mission is similar to ours as well. Grade:A-

Sunday turned out to be Gay Pride Day in Manhattan, much to my chagrin, but I met up with my friend Jamie (not Ellen’s son, but a full-fledged adult) at Foodbar for brunch. I figured I might as well do something gay that’s not theatre-related, but afterwards, I went to see “The Wedding Singer.”

I realized halfway through the show that I don’t think I’ve ever seen the entire movie, only the last 30 minutes over and over, so the story was fairly unfamiliar (even though the ending was spoiled). Since the show’s composer and lyricist worked at The Theatre on a show that I quite enjoyed years ago, I was happy to attend their Broadway debut. And, while it’s a romp through the 80s with fun pop songs, it’s also quite bloated by at least half an hour. Laura Benanti plays the Drew Barrymore character and she has no chemistry with Wedding Singer Stephen Lynch (who is so cute and charismatic) and I don’t think she’s right for that part. She’s got a lovely soprano but her voice and lack of humour just don’t mesh with the piece. Other than that, it was a cute. Grade:C+

And then it took me six hours to get home. I blame the gays. Simply because it took one hour of waiting to get to the Holland Tunnel because they had to cross the street to get to the piers for whatever circuit party was going on that night. I then encountered construction on the Turnpike and it started pouring rain once I got into Maryland, which slowed down traffic. Luckily, our new offices got flooded and we didn’t have to go to work the next day.