Julius Caesar at Shakespeare’s Globe: Bunch of Dumb Ass Bros Lose Their Shit, In High Style by Randi / October 23, 2014
The latest all-around excellent show to open on Broadway boasts a wonderful ensemble of super recognizable actors that magically mesh together, making it stand out so far this season. (See: “It’s Only A Play”. I mean don’t see it. Review forthcoming). That James Earl Jones plays the Grandpa (of an all-white family, which I love; see color-blind casting is FINE and GOOD and WORKS) is reason enough to see this show, and you’ll become fans of the wonderful theatre and H’wood actors composing the rest of the cast.
Despite how much this revival of “You Can’t Take It With You” has going for it, every single review begins the same way: The writer concedes that it’s an antiquated play, that everyone assumes it’s too old-fashioned to be relevant nowadays, but that this production’s team has done a bang-up job (which means good, contrary to how it sounds (from now on let’s agree it means bad, like banged up) (change approved)) to bring it into the 21st century. It’s actually extremely annoying. All these writers (getting paid, ffs) follow this same trite and tired formula, as if they have to apologize for the play being old. So ageist! It’s also silly. You don’t see people apologizing for Shakespeare. And you’re probably saying, but Shakespeare is still relevant today. Well so is this! No apologies!
JAMES EARL JONES IS WAVING TO ME!!! JUST TO ME!!!
“You Can’t Take It With You”, which I will refer to as YCTIWY from here on out, nevermind that is an awful acronym so I won’t, is a Kaufman & Hart work from freaking 1936, and we are still enjoying it today. Now that’s incredible. Also, if you can ever think of the great Kaufman & Hart without singing “Go ask the Gerrrrshwins or Kaufman & Hart” from “Annie” then you are stronger than I am. Hell I couldn’t even see the play “Act One” last year because I would have gone crazy singing that line over and over in my head. (It’s about Moss.)
ANYWAY. YCTWITHYOU tells the story of the jubilantly wacky Sycamore family, with its wacky playwright of a mother, its wacky firework maker of a father, its wacky wannabe prima ballerina of a daughter, her wacky husband, and the not-at-all-wacky-or-hey-maybe-she-actually-is-like-her-family other daughter who just wants to marry up, plus all the surrounding characters, including the grandfather played by James Earl Jones, who I think is written wacky but JEJ can never play wacky so he still kind of seemed regal and wise even though he was probably talking crazy. The story concerns the straight-laced office-secretary (working girl!) daughter Alice, who wants to marry her boss’s son Tony Kirby but is beyond fearful and anxious about their wildly different families – and as we see in all their insane glory, rightly so.
Obviously, the casting is vital in YTAYKAT, because the family’s wackiness can either work and make you fall in love with all of them, or it can annoy the piss out of you. Luckily, here, the producers got everything right. This hilarious band of fun crazies is led by Penny, the matriarch, played by the consistent and consistently hilarious Kristine Nielson (who was deservedly nominated for a 2013 Tony for “Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike” in a super competitive year). Penny writes various sorts of plays that never are produced or really even read, and we learn later that she fell into this ‘profession’ when a typewriter was mistakenly delivered to her house. Penny’s husband Paul makes fireworks and crackers and smoke and all sorts of things that blow up in the basement at really inopportune times. Paul is played by Mark Linn-Baker, or the non-Balki lead from “Perfect Strangers”, one of my childhood mainstays. I didn’t know that Mark was in this show, and when I moved to an empty seat in the front row (from my last row of the top balcony seat, thank you very much) I kind of gasped when I realized who it was! So fun. Anyway, yeah so he sets stuff on fire in their house, with the help of his friend Mr. De Pinna, who models for a painting in Roman garb at one point and looks exactly like Christoph Waltz in it.
The best part of this production is the characterization of the daughter Essie, played by freaking thief Annaleigh Ashford, who steals every single thing she’s in. Essie yearns to be a top ballerina, and she studies with a Russian tutor very frequently, but she’s terrible, awful, no good very bad. How do we know how bad she is? Because regardless of what is happening in the play, she is dancing. When she walks to the kitchen to make her candies that she sells, she freaking leaps. Or jetes, I don’t know I only took ballet when I was 3. When she is listening to someone talking in the living room, she is practicing her (really difficult) jumps in one spot until someone stops her. When the fancy Kirby family comes to dinner, the elegant elonge’ position she takes on the floor by Mrs. Kirby will make you cry. Her ridiculousness, which extends to her facial expressions as well as her physicality, is the best part of the play, along with her husband Ed, played with matching ridiculousness by Will Brill, with his subtle but hysterical faces constantly diverting your attention from the main action to him.
Alice, the daughter embarrassed by all of her family’s shenanigans, is well cast with Rose Byrne in her Broadway debut. I saw YAKANUT in previews, and in the front row I could see a tiny bit of nervousness that seemed like hyper-awareness of what she was supposed to be doing, but overall she was fantastic. Alice really loves Tony Kirby but does not have faith in either of the families’ ability to accept and be accepted. Tony is well played by Fran Kranz, which sounds like one of the phrases Kim Jong-Il would say a lot in “Team America” but he’s really an actor who was in Joss Whedon’s magical “Much Ado About Nothing” in 2012.
Tony tries to convince Alice that they’ll be fine, that the families will get along. Of course we see things go to total shit because the Sycamores are crazy (but super fun) and the Kirbys are kind of awful and stodgy and seem like they would yell at you to sit up straighter. We are treated to seriously insane scenes when the two families do try to socialize. They actually end up in jail, naturally being arrested while the basement of fireworks is going off accidentally. It’s the kind of thing where you are sitting with your eyes bugging out not believing what is happening in front of you but also just totally loving the crap out of it.
Oh, why are they arrested? Well, Essie’s doofus of a husband fancies himself a typesetter or something, and he prints phrases that he likes on the wrappers of Essie’s candy that he delivers to customers. Turns out he likes phrases that sound like terrorist and communist propaganda so the FBI has been following the family. It doesn’t help that Grandpa Earl Jones hasn’t paid income tax in more than 20 years. Why not? Because he doesn’t trust that the government would use it well. I freaking love Grandpa. And agree. Grandpa is the voice of wisdom and gets some wonderful monologues about money and greed and of course says the title of the show in one of these so everyone in the audience drinks.
There is some surreal randomness even above the randomness of all the family members’ antics. Elizabeth Ashley appears only in Act 3 to play a former Russian royal who now works as a waitress and wants to cook the family dinner. I was like okay monster man. Very unnecessary but hey, you get to see Elizabeth Ashley onstage. Also Johanna Day plays an actress reading one of Penny’s scripts (I guess someone did read them) but she is a drunk and passes out. It’s also totally unnecessary but it’s worth it because she is still super drunk during the FBI raid, adding to that scene’s unbeatable amount of outrageousness.
YAKSCOK has a happy ending, of course, because it’s a comedy even though there are lots of snakes onstage. You kind of want to tell Alice to calm down as I’m pretty sure every single family has some Sycamore qualities, but you get why she’s anxious. Fortunately, she realizes she’s lucky to have such a loving family, despite its eccentricities. The pretty people get married and Essie keeps dancing and it’s all just a pile of smiles. The end.
ANYWAY. YCTWITHYOU tells the story of the jubilantly wacky Sycamore family, with its wacky playwright of a mother, its wacky firework maker of a father, its wacky wannabe prima ballerina of a daughter, her wacky husband, and the not-at-all-wacky-or-hey-maybe-she-actually-is-like-her-family other daughter who just wants to marry up, plus all the surrounding characters, including the grandfather played by James Earl Jones, who I think is written wacky but JEJ can never play wacky so he still kind of seemed regal and wise even though he was probably talking crazy. The story concerns the straight-laced office-secretary (working girl!) daughter Alice, who wants to marry her boss’s son Tony Kirby but is beyond fearful and anxious about their wildly different families – and as we see in all their insane glory, rightly so.
Obviously, the casting is vital in YTAYKAT, because the family’s wackiness can either work and make you fall in love with all of them, or it can annoy the piss out of you. Luckily, here, the producers got everything right. This hilarious band of fun crazies is led by Penny, the matriarch, played by the consistent and consistently hilarious Kristine Nielson (who was deservedly nominated for a 2013 Tony for “Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike” in a super competitive year). Penny writes various sorts of plays that never are produced or really even read, and we learn later that she fell into this ‘profession’ when a typewriter was mistakenly delivered to her house. Penny’s husband Paul makes fireworks and crackers and smoke and all sorts of things that blow up in the basement at really inopportune times. Paul is played by Mark Linn-Baker, or the non-Balki lead from “Perfect Strangers”, one of my childhood mainstays. I didn’t know that Mark was in this show, and when I moved to an empty seat in the front row (from my last row of the top balcony seat, thank you very much) I kind of gasped when I realized who it was! So fun. Anyway, yeah so he sets stuff on fire in their house, with the help of his friend Mr. De Pinna, who models for a painting in Roman garb at one point and looks exactly like Christoph Waltz in it.
The best part of this production is the characterization of the daughter Essie, played by freaking thief Annaleigh Ashford, who steals every single thing she’s in. Essie yearns to be a top ballerina, and she studies with a Russian tutor very frequently, but she’s terrible, awful, no good very bad. How do we know how bad she is? Because regardless of what is happening in the play, she is dancing. When she walks to the kitchen to make her candies that she sells, she freaking leaps. Or jetes, I don’t know I only took ballet when I was 3. When she is listening to someone talking in the living room, she is practicing her (really difficult) jumps in one spot until someone stops her. When the fancy Kirby family comes to dinner, the elegant elonge’ position she takes on the floor by Mrs. Kirby will make you cry. Her ridiculousness, which extends to her facial expressions as well as her physicality, is the best part of the play, along with her husband Ed, played with matching ridiculousness by Will Brill, with his subtle but hysterical faces constantly diverting your attention from the main action to him.
Alice, the daughter embarrassed by all of her family’s shenanigans, is well cast with Rose Byrne in her Broadway debut. I saw YAKANUT in previews, and in the front row I could see a tiny bit of nervousness that seemed like hyper-awareness of what she was supposed to be doing, but overall she was fantastic. Alice really loves Tony Kirby but does not have faith in either of the families’ ability to accept and be accepted. Tony is well played by Fran Kranz, which sounds like one of the phrases Kim Jong-Il would say a lot in “Team America” but he’s really an actor who was in Joss Whedon’s magical “Much Ado About Nothing” in 2012.
Tony tries to convince Alice that they’ll be fine, that the families will get along. Of course we see things go to total shit because the Sycamores are crazy (but super fun) and the Kirbys are kind of awful and stodgy and seem like they would yell at you to sit up straighter. We are treated to seriously insane scenes when the two families do try to socialize. They actually end up in jail, naturally being arrested while the basement of fireworks is going off accidentally. It’s the kind of thing where you are sitting with your eyes bugging out not believing what is happening in front of you but also just totally loving the crap out of it.
Oh, why are they arrested? Well, Essie’s doofus of a husband fancies himself a typesetter or something, and he prints phrases that he likes on the wrappers of Essie’s candy that he delivers to customers. Turns out he likes phrases that sound like terrorist and communist propaganda so the FBI has been following the family. It doesn’t help that Grandpa Earl Jones hasn’t paid income tax in more than 20 years. Why not? Because he doesn’t trust that the government would use it well. I freaking love Grandpa. And agree. Grandpa is the voice of wisdom and gets some wonderful monologues about money and greed and of course says the title of the show in one of these so everyone in the audience drinks.
There is some surreal randomness even above the randomness of all the family members’ antics. Elizabeth Ashley appears only in Act 3 to play a former Russian royal who now works as a waitress and wants to cook the family dinner. I was like okay monster man. Very unnecessary but hey, you get to see Elizabeth Ashley onstage. Also Johanna Day plays an actress reading one of Penny’s scripts (I guess someone did read them) but she is a drunk and passes out. It’s also totally unnecessary but it’s worth it because she is still super drunk during the FBI raid, adding to that scene’s unbeatable amount of outrageousness.
YAKSCOK has a happy ending, of course, because it’s a comedy even though there are lots of snakes onstage. You kind of want to tell Alice to calm down as I’m pretty sure every single family has some Sycamore qualities, but you get why she’s anxious. Fortunately, she realizes she’s lucky to have such a loving family, despite its eccentricities. The pretty people get married and Essie keeps dancing and it’s all just a pile of smiles. The end.
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‘Bayside! The Musical’ in London: Did They Even Have ‘Saved By The Bell’ Here?
It’s Theatre Tuesday! We get an extra day to talk about theatre this week because ‘Bayside! The Musical’ opens tonight at The Other Palace in London but closes Saturday!
“Bayside is a school that’s cool and you know that it’s true! The girls are the cutest and the guys are the hippest too – oooh ooh ooh!!!” If that means anything to you – or better yet, if you heard it with Zack’s lemon juice-afflicted squeaking – then ‘Bayside! The Musical’ is the fun, silly as heck romp meant especially for you. If you have no idea what’s going on, you might enjoy seeing this new-to-London show, but not nearly as much. Unless you like truly vulgar, over-the-top raunch; then you will also like it a lot.
“Bayside is a school that’s cool and you know that it’s true! The girls are the cutest and the guys are the hippest too – oooh ooh ooh!!!” If that means anything to you – or better yet, if you heard it with Zack’s lemon juice-afflicted squeaking – then ‘Bayside! The Musical’ is the fun, silly as heck romp meant especially for you. If you have no idea what’s going on, you might enjoy seeing this new-to-London show, but not nearly as much. Unless you like truly vulgar, over-the-top raunch; then you will also like it a lot.
‘Bayside! The Musical’, presented by National Lampoon productions, sillily lampoons the American national treasure ‘Saved by the Bell’ and the goofy characters we know so well. It opens tonight after a weekend of previews, which I saw the first one of. Seeing it is like being with old friends from childhood who you just want to mock mercilessly. And hoo boy, is it merciless. Created by Bob and Tobly McSmith (no typos in there, p.s.) (I know) (Tobly) (Tobly) (I can’t stop saying it) (the word has lost all meaning), ‘Bayside!’ focuses its semi-well-meaning ridicule on the aspects of the show that made no sense and suggests new takes on the show that make so much sense – like Slater being gay and in love with Zack. Perfection!
Showing this week at London’s The Other Palace Theatre in the Victoria section of town, ‘Bayside!’ is downstairs in the Studio, which I never knew existed despite having been to TOP like 50 times. It’s a tiny crowded black-box style room, with a tiny stage that has barely enough room for the prop ‘table’ (it’s a piano that goes unused) let alone for sets. The actors enter and exist through the aisle between audience members. It’s open seating (first come first get the best seats) and there’s a bar like right there. So, all of this adds to the very informal vibe of ‘we’re seeing high schoolers put on this little show they worked on so hard all semester’. And of course no, this is professional, but if you pretend it’s by high schoolers it’s a lot more impressive.
Regardless of how amateur it seems (and many of the actors’ skills do reinforce that impression), it doesn’t really matter. If you just watched a few eps of ‘Saved by the Bell’ when you were young, you’ll be all in for all the inside jokes and references that remind you of how bonkers this sitcom was, especially considering it was meant for children, and you’ll have a blast. The cast includes actors for each of the main 6 – Zack, Kelly, Slater, Jessie, Lisa, Screech – plus two ‘extras’ who play all the other necessary parts (Belding, Tori, Chief Henry’s ghost) and are truly the most impressive and most hilarious of the bunch. Their improved-seeming vamps during scene changes are some of the funniest parts. Ben Campbell (a great Zack) is the only American in the bunch so there were some odd attempts at the accent but I didn’t even care I was having such fun.
This parody is indeed a musical, and while you might be expecting to hear international Grammy-winning hits by the Zack Attack, or more of those school songs like I began with, they’re all original tunes, like about how Kelly is poor or about how there’s nothing sexual about the girls’ sleepover. They’re not great songs, and the lyrics often get tired, but they’re funny and their foundations are clever. Oh there is one familiar song, of course – Hot Sunday’s “Get Down and Break a Sweat”, which even in a parody show can never be as hilarious as seeing the real thing. Although, it was a nice touch to comment that yes, this pointless music video, clearly occurring just to show the girls in their underwear, did indeed air during Saturday morning children’s programming.
The best part by far was its take on two specific characters. The first is playing AC Slater as not only gay, but super raging into Zack, always trying to get Preppy into compromising situations – like he gets when he wrestles, which is why he’s the star wrestler. Every single line out of Slater’s mouth would be something dirty directed at Preppy. Almost as genius was the roadkill-looking wig the actor was wearing to resemble the young Mario Lopez. But the best take on a character, and the best most brilliant aspect of the show by far, was their portrayal of Tori Scott. Those real fans out there will remember Tori as the new girl character introduced during the ghost season – a season with absolutely no sense of time or space as relating to the other seasons, with no regard to what had happened before or where the kids were in school by this time (hint: they had already graduated), and with no mention of what happened to Jessie or Kelly, who had left the show after their characters graduated in the previous season. You know, you think ‘high school show’, you think ‘out after graduation’, so Tiffani and Lizzie bounced, but the Tori years, my goodness, were just like they were back in a second go at junior year, with proms and everything. It was amazing, and the best part was that Tori was kind of butch and badass and honestly was the Slater that Mario Lopez, and the creators, wished he could be. So of course ‘Bayside!’ had the male extra actor play Tori – a lot – by throwing an enormous blonde curly wig on and speaking with an even deeper voice than his real one. Also, this Tori had a parole officer and a bad past, and she frequently referred to her needing to score dope (but there’s no hope with dope!). It was BRILLIANT and honestly that portrayal, by William Hazell, is my top reason why fans should go see this show. I’m cracking up just thinking about it.
Another worthy take on a character was that of Violet, the super nerdy girl that Screech falls for, or that falls for Screech really, during the chorus-focused episode (The One Where They’re All Suddenly in Chorus). Violet was played by Tori Spelling because her dad owned everyone and everything and one day she was like ‘Daddy I want to be on ‘Saved by the Bell’ all my friends watch it’ and Aaron was like ‘ugh okay but you’re so annoying that I’m going to make you a love interest for Screech’. So this Violet, played by female extra Roann McCloskey (I want to say one of the few who could carry a tune?), wasn’t referred to as Violet but as Tori Spelling, because that’s really what it was, just Tori Spelling wanting to be on TV. It was a little bit overplayed (she’s in this production A LOT for someone who I think had just one episode! (memorable though it may be)), but still pretty funny overall.
One part that wasn’t overplayed and I wish they did more with it was having Lisa not know that she’s black. She never ever talks about it and no one ever mentions it on the show; it’s as whitewashed as possible while still having the actress be black. It sort of makes sense, because Lisa was originally supposed to be a JAP from Long Island (omg can I just say I am SO HAPPY that she wasn’t; can you imagine having to deal with the awful stereotypes that the shitty writers would have constantly repeated?) and so after Lark Voorhies was cast the lazy writers didn’t really change too much about the character although they were ‘supposed’ to alter her a little. So her blackness was ignored, not out of a sense of ‘oh her friends don’t see color’ but more of a ‘oh let’s just pretend she has no cultural identity of her own.’ So here, they comment on that near-erasure by having someone tell Lisa that she’s black and having her react to it. Oh my god this was hilarious and they could have done sooo much more with it. Her rap about white people things is good, and just made me want to see more as this was the one almost-sophisticated take about the whole show.
Like the jokes, the musical numbers have glimmers of brilliance but can get a little wearisome. They repeat a lot of the lyrics over and over and lose the humor that way. But the brilliant parts are what I’ll remember. The funniest song is when Kelly blithely sings about ‘Trapper Keeper Boner Hiders’, as all the boys in school have to carry their famous ‘90s binders when they see her. And my favorite rhyme in the whole show is the Act I closer, when they ask “Will Zack and Kelly be reunited? Will Jessie be…so excited?” As expected, there is a lot, maybe too much, about Jessie’s infamous caffeine pill addiction, but come on, you can’t NOT talk about that when the topic of ‘Saved by the Bell’ comes up. The most genius use of this storyline happens to be my favorite part of the whole show – but one that not many people understood, which is so sad to me as a musical theatre fanatic. So Jessie is up there on the dark stage all alone, with just a single spotlight illuminating her. The music starts to vamp, a very familiar measure of music, and Jessie quietly sings ‘Why did I do it…’ and I CACKLED. I laughed so loud and hard that people turned to look at me, people who OBVIOUSLY aren’t musical theatre fans or they would have recognized that part of Rose’s Turn from ‘Gypsy’ and joined me in recognizing how brilliant it was to use this here. SO BRILLIANT! I can’t get over it. It’s too bad the actress playing Jessie wasn’t too strong of a vocalist because I mean this is the pinnacle of musical theatre numbers and it’s kind of mean to give it to someone who is weak but still oh man this was the best ever.
Although I laughed regularly the whole time, this extra-hysterical reaction of mine was matched, almost, by one other part of the show. At the end, Screech gets struck by lightning and predicts the future. He says Jessie will do a movie that ‘shows her boobies’ and destroy her career (true), Zack will date a homeless girl (also true), and then he turns to Lisa and says ‘YOUR FACE IS GOING TO MELT OFF.’ Oh my god I died! If you have seen a picture of Lark Voorhies in the past decade you know why this is so funny and so unbelievably mean. It’s awful but I can’t stop laughing! Lisa looks concerned and says ‘my face?’ and Screech continues ‘Yes. Your face is going to melt off, it’s going to melt right off of your body.’ I couldn’t breathe.
All the fun and clever bits are sometimes overshadowed by the vulgar sex jokes, which are funny at first when you have a show this silly but it really truly goes overboard. We were the youngest people in the audience and there were all these stuffy white-haired British people sitting there and listening to really disgusting descriptions of the most crude stuff you could ever imagine and it was suuuupes aaaawk. Some of it was funny, but a good 70% of that material could be cut and the show would be better for it. There’s so much brilliance to mine in mocking this show as is; there’s no need to resort to penis jokes every other minute.
But as I shared above (oh, spoiler alert retroactively sorry), there’s plenty of hilarity going on, and fans will rejoice at an endless treasure trove of references. There’s Zack constantly stopping time with his ‘Time-outs!’, there’s Screech dressing as an old lady and having noooo one question that he is one, as happened on the show more than once. There’s shout-outs to Chief Henry (remember when Zack befriended an Indian chief?????) and Miss Bliss. There’s constant talk about how Kelly is poor, like so much. And there’s even a comment about the gang going to Hawaii, where Kelly’s grandfather lives. Remember that nonsense?? When for four or so episodes the whole gang just up and went to Hawaii for like a month? Because Kelly’s grandfather owned a hotel there? And Kelly fell for a lawyer who was trying to steal her grandfather’s business even though she was what 17 at best and the lawyer had to be at least 25 and NO ONE EVER MENTIONED how this was illegal??? Ahhhhhhhh! OMG I just found out that Kelly’s grandfather was played by Dean Jones! Dean Jones as in the original Bobby in Sondheim’s ‘Company’! Oh man writing about this show is taking me on such a roller coaster of emotions I really must stop.
‘Bayside! The Musical’ would have benefited from a good edit, but it’s overall such a funny parody of our beloved sitcom that it’s worth seeing, especially if you remember watching the show more than 20 years ago (I know) and being like, ‘wait, what?’
Showing this week at London’s The Other Palace Theatre in the Victoria section of town, ‘Bayside!’ is downstairs in the Studio, which I never knew existed despite having been to TOP like 50 times. It’s a tiny crowded black-box style room, with a tiny stage that has barely enough room for the prop ‘table’ (it’s a piano that goes unused) let alone for sets. The actors enter and exist through the aisle between audience members. It’s open seating (first come first get the best seats) and there’s a bar like right there. So, all of this adds to the very informal vibe of ‘we’re seeing high schoolers put on this little show they worked on so hard all semester’. And of course no, this is professional, but if you pretend it’s by high schoolers it’s a lot more impressive.
Regardless of how amateur it seems (and many of the actors’ skills do reinforce that impression), it doesn’t really matter. If you just watched a few eps of ‘Saved by the Bell’ when you were young, you’ll be all in for all the inside jokes and references that remind you of how bonkers this sitcom was, especially considering it was meant for children, and you’ll have a blast. The cast includes actors for each of the main 6 – Zack, Kelly, Slater, Jessie, Lisa, Screech – plus two ‘extras’ who play all the other necessary parts (Belding, Tori, Chief Henry’s ghost) and are truly the most impressive and most hilarious of the bunch. Their improved-seeming vamps during scene changes are some of the funniest parts. Ben Campbell (a great Zack) is the only American in the bunch so there were some odd attempts at the accent but I didn’t even care I was having such fun.
This parody is indeed a musical, and while you might be expecting to hear international Grammy-winning hits by the Zack Attack, or more of those school songs like I began with, they’re all original tunes, like about how Kelly is poor or about how there’s nothing sexual about the girls’ sleepover. They’re not great songs, and the lyrics often get tired, but they’re funny and their foundations are clever. Oh there is one familiar song, of course – Hot Sunday’s “Get Down and Break a Sweat”, which even in a parody show can never be as hilarious as seeing the real thing. Although, it was a nice touch to comment that yes, this pointless music video, clearly occurring just to show the girls in their underwear, did indeed air during Saturday morning children’s programming.
The best part by far was its take on two specific characters. The first is playing AC Slater as not only gay, but super raging into Zack, always trying to get Preppy into compromising situations – like he gets when he wrestles, which is why he’s the star wrestler. Every single line out of Slater’s mouth would be something dirty directed at Preppy. Almost as genius was the roadkill-looking wig the actor was wearing to resemble the young Mario Lopez. But the best take on a character, and the best most brilliant aspect of the show by far, was their portrayal of Tori Scott. Those real fans out there will remember Tori as the new girl character introduced during the ghost season – a season with absolutely no sense of time or space as relating to the other seasons, with no regard to what had happened before or where the kids were in school by this time (hint: they had already graduated), and with no mention of what happened to Jessie or Kelly, who had left the show after their characters graduated in the previous season. You know, you think ‘high school show’, you think ‘out after graduation’, so Tiffani and Lizzie bounced, but the Tori years, my goodness, were just like they were back in a second go at junior year, with proms and everything. It was amazing, and the best part was that Tori was kind of butch and badass and honestly was the Slater that Mario Lopez, and the creators, wished he could be. So of course ‘Bayside!’ had the male extra actor play Tori – a lot – by throwing an enormous blonde curly wig on and speaking with an even deeper voice than his real one. Also, this Tori had a parole officer and a bad past, and she frequently referred to her needing to score dope (but there’s no hope with dope!). It was BRILLIANT and honestly that portrayal, by William Hazell, is my top reason why fans should go see this show. I’m cracking up just thinking about it.
Another worthy take on a character was that of Violet, the super nerdy girl that Screech falls for, or that falls for Screech really, during the chorus-focused episode (The One Where They’re All Suddenly in Chorus). Violet was played by Tori Spelling because her dad owned everyone and everything and one day she was like ‘Daddy I want to be on ‘Saved by the Bell’ all my friends watch it’ and Aaron was like ‘ugh okay but you’re so annoying that I’m going to make you a love interest for Screech’. So this Violet, played by female extra Roann McCloskey (I want to say one of the few who could carry a tune?), wasn’t referred to as Violet but as Tori Spelling, because that’s really what it was, just Tori Spelling wanting to be on TV. It was a little bit overplayed (she’s in this production A LOT for someone who I think had just one episode! (memorable though it may be)), but still pretty funny overall.
One part that wasn’t overplayed and I wish they did more with it was having Lisa not know that she’s black. She never ever talks about it and no one ever mentions it on the show; it’s as whitewashed as possible while still having the actress be black. It sort of makes sense, because Lisa was originally supposed to be a JAP from Long Island (omg can I just say I am SO HAPPY that she wasn’t; can you imagine having to deal with the awful stereotypes that the shitty writers would have constantly repeated?) and so after Lark Voorhies was cast the lazy writers didn’t really change too much about the character although they were ‘supposed’ to alter her a little. So her blackness was ignored, not out of a sense of ‘oh her friends don’t see color’ but more of a ‘oh let’s just pretend she has no cultural identity of her own.’ So here, they comment on that near-erasure by having someone tell Lisa that she’s black and having her react to it. Oh my god this was hilarious and they could have done sooo much more with it. Her rap about white people things is good, and just made me want to see more as this was the one almost-sophisticated take about the whole show.
Like the jokes, the musical numbers have glimmers of brilliance but can get a little wearisome. They repeat a lot of the lyrics over and over and lose the humor that way. But the brilliant parts are what I’ll remember. The funniest song is when Kelly blithely sings about ‘Trapper Keeper Boner Hiders’, as all the boys in school have to carry their famous ‘90s binders when they see her. And my favorite rhyme in the whole show is the Act I closer, when they ask “Will Zack and Kelly be reunited? Will Jessie be…so excited?” As expected, there is a lot, maybe too much, about Jessie’s infamous caffeine pill addiction, but come on, you can’t NOT talk about that when the topic of ‘Saved by the Bell’ comes up. The most genius use of this storyline happens to be my favorite part of the whole show – but one that not many people understood, which is so sad to me as a musical theatre fanatic. So Jessie is up there on the dark stage all alone, with just a single spotlight illuminating her. The music starts to vamp, a very familiar measure of music, and Jessie quietly sings ‘Why did I do it…’ and I CACKLED. I laughed so loud and hard that people turned to look at me, people who OBVIOUSLY aren’t musical theatre fans or they would have recognized that part of Rose’s Turn from ‘Gypsy’ and joined me in recognizing how brilliant it was to use this here. SO BRILLIANT! I can’t get over it. It’s too bad the actress playing Jessie wasn’t too strong of a vocalist because I mean this is the pinnacle of musical theatre numbers and it’s kind of mean to give it to someone who is weak but still oh man this was the best ever.
Although I laughed regularly the whole time, this extra-hysterical reaction of mine was matched, almost, by one other part of the show. At the end, Screech gets struck by lightning and predicts the future. He says Jessie will do a movie that ‘shows her boobies’ and destroy her career (true), Zack will date a homeless girl (also true), and then he turns to Lisa and says ‘YOUR FACE IS GOING TO MELT OFF.’ Oh my god I died! If you have seen a picture of Lark Voorhies in the past decade you know why this is so funny and so unbelievably mean. It’s awful but I can’t stop laughing! Lisa looks concerned and says ‘my face?’ and Screech continues ‘Yes. Your face is going to melt off, it’s going to melt right off of your body.’ I couldn’t breathe.
All the fun and clever bits are sometimes overshadowed by the vulgar sex jokes, which are funny at first when you have a show this silly but it really truly goes overboard. We were the youngest people in the audience and there were all these stuffy white-haired British people sitting there and listening to really disgusting descriptions of the most crude stuff you could ever imagine and it was suuuupes aaaawk. Some of it was funny, but a good 70% of that material could be cut and the show would be better for it. There’s so much brilliance to mine in mocking this show as is; there’s no need to resort to penis jokes every other minute.
But as I shared above (oh, spoiler alert retroactively sorry), there’s plenty of hilarity going on, and fans will rejoice at an endless treasure trove of references. There’s Zack constantly stopping time with his ‘Time-outs!’, there’s Screech dressing as an old lady and having noooo one question that he is one, as happened on the show more than once. There’s shout-outs to Chief Henry (remember when Zack befriended an Indian chief?????) and Miss Bliss. There’s constant talk about how Kelly is poor, like so much. And there’s even a comment about the gang going to Hawaii, where Kelly’s grandfather lives. Remember that nonsense?? When for four or so episodes the whole gang just up and went to Hawaii for like a month? Because Kelly’s grandfather owned a hotel there? And Kelly fell for a lawyer who was trying to steal her grandfather’s business even though she was what 17 at best and the lawyer had to be at least 25 and NO ONE EVER MENTIONED how this was illegal??? Ahhhhhhhh! OMG I just found out that Kelly’s grandfather was played by Dean Jones! Dean Jones as in the original Bobby in Sondheim’s ‘Company’! Oh man writing about this show is taking me on such a roller coaster of emotions I really must stop.
‘Bayside! The Musical’ would have benefited from a good edit, but it’s overall such a funny parody of our beloved sitcom that it’s worth seeing, especially if you remember watching the show more than 20 years ago (I know) and being like, ‘wait, what?’
All the Best Things about Pride & Prejudice* (*sort of)
There are no excellent boiled potatoes, but the Ferrero Rocher tower will have to do.
It’s Theatre Thursday! (Well it was supposed to be but I forgot to publish so let’s just go with it!) Today’s show is the phenomenally fun Pride & Prejudice* (*sort of) playing at the Criterion Theatre in Piccadilly Circus. As of publication it is one of the West End shows not closed due to Covid cases so go see it and have a laugh!
As a passionate devotee of Pride & Prejudice by way of the Colin Firth miniseries that gave way to the superior (will fight to defend) Keira/Macfadyen movie and all its subsequent instagram meme content, I am undoubtedly the target audience for this hilarious and goofy take on the classic, and yet I still was not prepared for how much fun I would have. I could spend 1000 words just saying “lol x was so funny….lol y was so funny…lol z was so funny” so to do that but in a less annoying way, I’ve made a list, I’m checking it twice*, gonna find out who’s naughty or nice,** Santa Claus he doesn’tttt exiiiiist.
*lolz like I ever edit this blog
**nice people wear masks, naughty people who don’t wear masks should be getting a lump of coal shoved up their bums next week heyooo.
The Best Parts of Pride & Prejudice* (*sort of) (besides everything)
– The pre-show bits
Starting even from the pre-show bits as people were still going to the bar and finding their seats, I was cracking up. The cast desperately tried to get a cleaning glove down from the chandelier in wildly entertaining hijinks, all performed while they kept telling the audience “no we HAVE NOT started yet!” It made me giddy with hysterics. I was all in from the start.
– The use of modern music
At opportune moments throughout the play, the characters grabbed microphones and sang relevant, fun, and/or scathing overviews of the current situations. My favorite was probably Elizabeth grabbing the mic and singing “You’re So Vain” to Darcy at the Bingley Ball, a perfect theatrical moment. Does it count as a jukebox musical? Don’t worry about it.
– Literally everything Hannah Jarrett-Scott did
As Charles Bingley, Caroline Bingley, Charlotte Lucas, and other characters, HJS had me sobbing with laughter. She managed to embody a believable version of Bingley without being actually like him, instead choosing a kind of doltish pomposity by way of merely a jacket. Her Sister Bingley was my favorite, that bitch. And playing poor Charlotte as in love with Lizzie was clever and meaningful without being overly sad. The audience was in stitches whenever Hannah appeared, in whichever character’s hat. She was the gem of the show for me.
– Isobel McArthur’s Mrs. Bennet
Usually portrayed to infuriating you (well, me), Mrs. Bennet here was understandable and more agreeable if only because she was so damn funny. The only reason I didn’t love Isobel’s Darcy as much is merely because it wasn’t Matthew Macfadyen melting the screen. It was still a riot. I didn’t realize until after that this actress was Isobel McArthur as in the writer of this adaptation and co-director. People shouldn’t be so talented it’s just not right.
– Mary’s glasses
Poor fucking Mary.
– The lack of Kitty
Not having anyone even briefly don a cap as Kitty made me continuously cackle. She lifts right out!
– Every time Lydia appeared onstage
Tori Burgess’s portrayal of Lydia as an out of control twit of a party girl was too on the nose. Of course she’s be the one getting drunk first. She was played exactly like so many girls I see out and about in the city on the weekends and it was glorious.
– The props
The Ferrero Rocher tower. The chandelier. The horse (below). Everything was so funny. Darn I said I wouldn’t just keep saying it over and over but really what else can I say; also it’s been a few weeks and I forgot to take notes, so.
– Mr. Bennet
Absolute genius to have him ‘portrayed’ like that, and also a scathing critique of a character that usually gets a pass simply because he isn’t annoying like his loudmouth wife. At least the mother has a purpose to her behaviour, trying to get FIVE DAUGHTERS MARRIED. Can you imagine.
– The de Bourgh family values
Every time Christina Gordon’s Lady Catherine de Bourgh appeared in her insane and elaborate getup, it was a riot, but the best was the stupid/clever joke about the song “Lady in Red” by her relative, you know, Chris de Burgh. I love when I get stupid jokes and this was no exception. Ridiculous.
– Jane on the gd horse.
As Jane traveled on horseback to the Netherfield at her mother’s urging (you know the part, when it rains and she has to stay there for a few days because rain was a death sentence back then), Christina Gordon kicking her heels in time as she sang “At Last” atop that giant fake horse was one of the funniest bits of physical comedy on stage in years. I am cracking up here just thinking about it.
Do yourself a favor and go see this if you haven’t yet. It’s at the Criterion, the one right in the center of Piccadilly Circus. Sit house right (stage left) in the orchestra and you’ll be closest to the bathrooms by the bar. It’s a bit of a cave, this theatre, with all levels underground, and you can sometimes hear the tube, but this show is so much fun you (I) will (did) forget that you’re (I’m) claustrophobic.
