Hello, Dolly!

We were excited to see Hello, Dolly for two reasons. 1. Pat Cashman (that high fiven' white guy!) 2. WALL-E.

Costumes: 5 stars

Actors/Actresses: 5 stars (we especially were impressed with Suzanne Bouchard)

Sets: 5 stars

Dancing: 5+ stars!

Music: 5 stars

Why didn't we like it more? The plot! It was pretty meh...neither of us felt that Dolly and Horace should end up getting hitched. But It Only Takes a Moment between the widowed hat maker and the feed clerk did. But they at least spent all day together! Which is more than Dolly ever did with her new husband to be! 

Verdict, I think snuggling up with the Michael Crawford movie version would serve just as well. Plus you can turn it off if the plot isn't doing it for you either.

Through the Looking Glass: The Burlesque Alice in Wonderland

The awesome friends that invited us to Moisturefest also invited us to the Triple Door to see Through the Looking Glass: The Burlesque Alice in Wonderland for Jenn's birthday. It was amazing! We had mirror Aliceses (one blond, one black haired) with opposite black and white costumes. Once both Aliceses are through the looking glass they end up at the White Rabbit's club where we are entertained. By the end when we pretty much saw everything and it was surprising just how identical the two artists were! 

We felt like we were at the Sands in the 50s or 60s which was loads of fun. Not all the acts took it all off, and those were just as mesmerizing. Our favorites were:

• The Caterpillar had the TriBellas underneath who also had these amazing mushroom costumes. 
  
• The Cheshire Cat who started out in a buff man thong and slowly got dressed
  
• The Red and White Queens battling
  
• The waitress EatMe who sounded like Dr. Girlfriend 
• The Flamingos (the TriBellas again)
• The Tigerlily (who made her pasties go in opposite directions at the same time!)

The Seafarer

The Seafarer was dark, depressing and drunk. Very Irish. The main characher was very hard to like once we found out he beat someone to death.

But he beat the Devil in a game of cards on Christmas Eve and was conveniently let out of jail scott free. 20 years have passed and the Devil is back to collect his soul.

Lots of drinking, arguing and cards are played and in the end the Devil slinks off. But it was a heck of a ride getting there. 

The husband enjoyed this far more than I did, (a little to dark and drunk for the Disney Princess loving gal that I am) but I will admit the the set was great. The artistic director managed to create a house, yard and street for all the action to take place on. 

Birthday's and Burlesque

Fiyero had his first birthday on March 10th. So, of course we had to have a party to celebrate! We invited our friends and their puppy dogs over for a fun day of BBQ and watching the doggies play. On Sunday, we celebrate our friend's 29th birthday by watching Gremlin's at the Cinerama. 

To make the weekend even more fun, we went to the Moisturefest Burlesque shows on Friday and Saturday night with friends.

Friday Night:
Host: Rob Williams
Show band: Zebra Kings
Aerialistas, Belle Cozette, Bellini Twins, Ben DeLaCreme, Fuchsia Foxxx, Heavenly Spies, Inga Ingenue, Nanda, The Shanghai Pearl, Sydni Deveraux, Trixie Little and the Evil Hate Monkey, Buxom

Saturday Night:
Host: Madame X
Show band: Zebra Kings
Belle Cozette, Ben DeLaCreme, Jonathan Rose, Nanda, Rob Williams, Shanghai Pearl, Swedish Housewife, Tamara the Trapeze Lady, TriBellas Belly Dance, The Von Foxies, Buxom, Trixie Little and the Evil Hate Monkey

Our favorites were the Aerialistas, the Bellini Twins (where was the bowling ball hiding?), Bed DeLa Creme (Eve and the snake in the Garden of Eden), Fuchsia Foxx (great belly dancing), Nanda (action fantasy), the Shanghai Pearl (she starts out in a pink monkey costume), Sydni Deveraux (I will never look at a photo of Barack Obama the same way again), Trixie and the Evil Hate Monkey, Buxom (bawdy songs!)

Rob Williams made a sandwich with his feel which was both compelling and disgusting. Burlesque was lots of fun!

Bluebeard's Castle & Erwartung

The husband and I have been debating the pros and cons of attending Opera previews. We went to the Elektra preview together and he felt that it ruined the surprise of the experience. I liked the extra information so I went to the preview for Bluebeard & Erwartung alone. I have to admit that he was right...

I think it might be a generational thing, because the opera guy told us that we should resist the urge to leave Erwartung because the atonal composition was so grating- but Ryan and I both loved it!

The staging for both one act operas was amazing as the stage itself became a character. Bluebeard was first, and there was a band of water and the front of the stage. At first you couldn't even see it, it only became visible as Judith opened the doors to the horrors of Bluebeard's castle. At first I thought, oh, that's neat, it's probably a few inches deep. But at the climatic moment I nearly jumped out of my chair when Bluebeard's previous three wives slowly emerged from the lake! They were going so slowly that I don't know how they held their breath that long.

After the intermission it was Erwartung. Now, the preview guy was correct, this piece is atonal, but it's grabbing. There is only one singer, the woman whose psycocis we're watching. According to the preview guy the opera is set in the woods, but it makes more sense the way we saw it staged in a mental institution. I jumped out of my seat again, when the body of the man she was in love with rolled down the stage, into the lake face down and was ripped off stage.

Lion King and Lucy

This was the second time seeing the Lion King for us, and we had a nice group of 8 attending the show. Overall it was an amazing show, I think everyone should see the Lion King at least once in their lifetime.

I was sad to see that there had been some tinkering done since the last time it was in town and not for the better. There were some new ballet moments and what my friends and I jokingly referred to as the "naked butt cheek". Really, that didn't need to be there! The aerial ballet was lovely and had it been in another show would have been completely appropriate. My last complaint is that they added the ensemble to a few songs in African inspired outfits...ummm...hello! The show is about ANIMALS, it completely broke the mood have people. They worked so hard on the costumes that this just doesn't make any sense.

The following day we headed off to the Science Center to see the Lucy exhibit. The place was crazy and there were lines going out to Wazu. We got snapped at twice trying to figure out which line was for the ticket booth and which for the kiosks. So we went to the other side and used the completely empty kiosk. People seriously need to embrace kiosks! And be nicer. We killed some time before our entry time at the Laser Dome watching the 80s Show which was loads of fun!

As to the Lucy exhibit, we were glad that we saw the bones but we both felt that it had been mis-marketed. It should have been called Ethiopia, with Lucy. The majority was on the history, culture and religion of Ethiopia which was very interesting and I would have gone to see regardless. But by putting the focus on Lucy we were expecting a paleontology based exhibit. But it was only the last bit.