Ratatouille the Ratatoosical, the Rata tat tat TikTok Musical We Need Ratatataby Randi / January 7, 2021It’s Theatre Thursday! Last weekend, King’s Cross Theatre’s 2016 production of the musical Lazarus was streamed online by Dice FM. It initially played off-Broadway in 2015, at the New York Theatre Workshop.
First things first: This was directed by Ivo van Hove. When the “Directed by…Ivo van Hove” appeared in the opening credits (livestream theatre gets opening credits!!), husbo and I simultaneously groaned ‘Iv-ughhhhhhhhh.’ We’re gonna get some live images projected onto a movie screen in this bitch! The Ivo special! No but seriously, I’ve been very open about my distaste for Ivo van Pony’s one trick and general misogynist lens through which he directs, but maybe since he was new-ish in 2015 it didn’t seem as tired. Also, out of all the shows where he showed off his filmophilia, this one made the most sense.
I obviously mean ‘made the most sense’ as in ‘for him to use his video screen schtick’, not that the actual show itself made any goddamn sense. Lazarus is for sure up there on my Top 10 List of Theatre Where WHAT THE FUCK??? IS?? HAPPENING??? But unlike so many that seemed to be confusing and weird just for the sake of being confusing and weird, Lazarus’s ambiguity wasn’t offensive to my existence. With Bowie’s music and the effective, stark staging, the vague plots and the unhinged sense of what’s real and what’s imagined all worked well together, a rare treat for a show that had us saying literally every two minutes “no but seriously what the fuck???”
Inspired by the 1963 novel The Man Who Fell to Earth by Walter Tevis, Lazarus the musical continues that story of an alien who became trapped on Earth and is desperate to get back to his planet! So sad!! (Yes, Bowie starred in the 1976 movie adaptation of the book, hence his connection to the material so it’s not as random as it seems that he made this musical.) Filled with classic Bowie songs plus more he wrote specifically for this musical, Lazarus uses that mystical aspect of Bowie’s music to heighten the otherworldly tale.
Playing the sad, now alcoholic, alien named Newton who has lost so much in addition to his homeland, Michael C. Hall continues to impress in his musical endeavors. Newton, all set with money and alcohol, stays put in his apartment, doing nothing but drinking (and speaking in a strange, unidentifiable accent (which I guess makes sense because alien)), even though it’s not quarantine for him. All he wants is to numb his pain and somehow return home. He gets a lift of hope from the trapped fairy spirit of a teenage girl, played by Sophia Anne Caruso of Beetlejuice fame, who promises him that she will help free him from his earthly shackles.
The story blends reality and imagination constantly, and it’s never clear which characters are really seeing something happen, whether/how they all could be, or whether they’re all in Newton’s head. The appearance of the serial killer Valentine, played by Michael Esper, is a real mindfork, because you’re like a) is he actually killing real people and do all the characters SEE THIS and this is awful I wasn’t prepared for a scary movie and b) can Michael C. Hall ONLY do serial killer projects??? Likewise, I find it hilarious that Michael Esper literally only does musicals with scores by rock stars (I’ve seen him in The Last Ship (Sting), American Idiot (Green Day), and now this (David Bowie)).
Esper’s Valentine is so extraordinarily creepy that I had nightmares after. Luckily, the scariness was a little lessened by all the vagueness of what was happening. I loved this one scene where he stabbed Newton’s friend and then Newton’s assistant Elly was holding the body even though she wasn’t there, right, and Newton was hugging him all bloody? And then like a dozen random actors came across doing the tango and laying on the floor and crawling around? Don’t think about it too hard too too hard.
The entire Elly plot is a total mindfork. Played by Amy Lennox, Elly starts to take on the persona of Newton’s former love, whose loss has crushed him, and he is not cool with it. Elly becomes beholden to Valentine somehow, it’s quite sad and awful but you’re like hey you had the courage to dye your hair blue, can’t you find the strength to GTFO? I would have loved to see Cristin Milioti in the NYC version, although seeing her be so underused, as Elly ultimately was, would probably make me even sadder.
At this point, I am obligated to point out that husbo gasped and said to himself “Ohh, Michael C. Hall isn’t who I thought…” Turns out he was thinking Anthony Michael Hall. Yes, I CRIED laughing.
So there’s a lot of weird stuff going on, but the music and the performances make it magical. Bowie’s songs sound just as great sung by musical theatre actors. My standout moment was when Caruso belts out “Life on Mars” in the clearest tone imaginable. I missed out on Beetlejuice last year so I never have actually heard her sing. Fork there is a reason she became a star at 14. Her voice is so strong and clean and bright (you look happy to meeeet meee). LOVES IT.
So Caruso’s spooky little girl and Newton try a lot of weird shit to get him back to his planet, like drawing a rocket on the floor and also, like, him stabbing her?? IT’S A WEIRD SHOW. Does he get home, or does he die? Or is it the same thing? Dark. It said it was suitable for ages 11 and up but honestly it was barely okay for 30. It is MURDEROUS. Seriously Michael C. Hall can only do projects that have lots of stabbing and lots of blood. Even Hedwig has lots of blood, albeit sung about only. (Yes I saw him in Hedwig and he was FANTASTIC.)
But aside from the blood and the nightmares and the fact that no, I can’t really describe what was going on without just repeating “it was weird as hell”, Lazarus was some g-d remarkable piece of theatre, thanks to Bowie’s music and I’m sure his involvement in the NYC production (he died shortly into that run). He wrote some FORKING GREAT SONGS, you know that? And this is not a jukebox musical. I haven’t worked out my full argument for why not. Maybe because the story isn’t using the songs to put forth some contrived plot but instead, the genius and glory of the music is on display, and any story happening is like our collective effort to try to make sense of how magical it is. And we can’t, so that’s why it’s WEIRD AS HELL.
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Emmy Awards 2018: What You Need to Know Before this Garbage
Like most everything in our world right now, the Emmy Awards are trash. I don’t know what the voters have been smoking, probably weed with Elon since they are also mostly rich white men who can get away with it, but their annual nonsense is upon us again. The problem with the Emmys is that voters take too long to catch up to what is actually good, and when they do, it’s too late and the thing is no longer the best but they’re too lazy and proud of themselves to change their voting habits for another four years. They get stuck in ruts, they have old-fashioned taste, and most of all they don’t actually watch everything so they JUST DON’T KNOW. Honestly make me an Emmy voter, I know what’s up, and I’m going to share with you what should be winning this worthless award that I care so much about on Monday night.
First of all, putting the nominees aside, let’s talk about the trashiness of this year’s actual ceremony. Wait there are two aspects of trash (trashspects?) about the ceremony! First of this first of all, the hosts are two regular old straight guys. Yep, in a world where Amy Poehler and Tina Fey are still alive and working and I bet happy to join forces and demolish all memory of prior award show hosting, this year’s Emmys – this year, the year of MeToo – is going with two bros. BRO, WTF? What about all the amazing female comedians in the game right now that need exposure more than the hosts of Weekend Update do? What about someone like Tiffany Haddish, who has a movie coming out right now? What about any of the women from Ghostbusters? What about any of the women Louis CK yackled in front of instead of yet another couple of dudes with viewpoints that are questionable at best and downright disgusting (like defending aforementioned yackler Louis CK) in truth? YAWN SLASH RAGE.
Second of the first of all, these forking awards are on a MONDAY this year, instead of a Sunday. To quote one of the most snubbed should-be-nominees on our list, WHAT….MAN….DID THIS. Sunday is award show day. Sunday is the day you can spend sleeping in to prepare yourself for the excitement and the stress, making theme foods (my initial plan was: (veggie) shrampies with white chocolate sauce, clam chowder, frozen yogurt (can you tell what show I’m going to be talking about the most yet?)), and getting your tweeting fingers ready. More importantly, Sunday is the day I could have watched this forking show! Readers probably know I live in London, but I’m writing this from the USA. When I booked this visit, I was looking at dates and remembered thinking, ‘oh that weekend is the Emmys! I’ll fly back to London Monday night then so I can watch them on Sunday night with my family! What an auspicious turn of events! I get to watch live for the first time in years instead of cobbling together shitty youtube videos that random people took of their own TVs!’ But NOOOOOOPE. Now instead of getting to live tweet I’m going to have to stick to day-after tweeting, which NO ONE cares about but I’m STILL going to do OBVIOUSLY because my takes are hot.
The show I’m going to be talking most about
Speaking of schedule changes that I did not approve of, the Creative Arts Emmys, which are usually the Saturday night before the Sunday telecast, were LAST WEEK. You’re killing me Smalls!! As you may know, the Creative Arts Emmys are the ones that most of the public don’t care about, sadly: the technical awards (lighting, cinematography, makeup, editing, sound), the reality TV ones (RuPaul all day), and artsy ones (choreography, music), and whatever else isn’t Best Comedy, Drama, Actor, and Actress, pretty much. There are two things I want to complain heavily about from the Creatives, and it’s not about who won – it’s about who wasn’t nominated. (That’s what all of this is really going to be about, naturally.)
First: The most infuriating abomination of a category this year is Outstanding Original Music and Lyrics, which means Best Song. And not to belittle any of the nominees, but they’re bullshit compared to literally any song from ‘Crazy Ex-Girlfriend’, the CW’s musical dramedy about mental illness. It is one of the greatest shows ever to exist, and 80% of that is because of the songs. Each episode has 2-3 original songs that brilliantly evoke musical theatre standards, pop genres, and/or famous bands. The songs are written by Adam Schlesinger, who you may know either as the guy from Fountains of Wayne or as the guy who wrote the one-hit-wonder’s hit song from ‘That Thing You Do!’ If you have any doubt in my opinion that his Crazy Ex songs should be the pictures next to the dictionary definition of Emmy-winning songs if audio could be captured as pictures, then just think for a second about how movie producers were like ‘hey we are making a movie that ENTIRELY REVOLVES around a song being so great that it catapults all the action forward and we need you to just like, go write that song and have it all be believable’ AND HE DID.
Here are the nominees:
- (WINNER) SNL: “Come Back Barack” – a very funny song and great moment on the show but not better than the actual best topical song of the year, “Let’s Generalize About Men“. I dare you to watch this and not squeal with glee at every moment.
- Big Mouth: “Am I Gay?” Again, fun song on an absolutely incredible show, but not better than the HILARIOUS and perfect ABBA-inspired “The First Penis I Saw“!
- A Christmas Story Live: “In the Market for a Miracle” Haven’t Pasek & Paul won enough in literally like a 15 month span?? CHILL BOYS. Also, if we’re talking Christmas miracles, what about “Maybe She’s Not Such a Heinous Bitch After All”?? I mean hello, talk about perfectly capturing an era of music.
- The Good Fight: “High Crimes and Misdemeanors” I’m not even going to talk about how RUDE it is to nominate a song from the drama about lawyers and not the MUSICAL COMEDY about lawyers, but I’ll say what about the Fosse-inspired “Strip Away My Conscience”?? I mean, you wanna talk clever writing, talk about what they rhymed with ‘luridness’ and still got approval from the censors. Man alive.
- Steve Martin & Martin Short’s special: “The Buddy Song” JFC. I love these guys so much but puh lease. How about the Gene Kelly-evoking “Head in the Clouds”? This song is considered one of the WEAKEST of the season and listen to how great it is.
- If You’re Not in the Obit, Eat Breakfast: “Just Getting Started” I don’t know what this documentary?? is, but how about the amazing song “End of the Movie”? They actually got JOSH GROBAN to sing a song! And it was incredible! Man alive if this category were a table full of glasses I would knock it over.
Also, I was a little sad that Kelli O’Hara, my queen, lost for Actress in a Web Series (even though I didn’t watch it, she wasn’t singing right?), as did her co-nominee Megan Amram, who is becoming another one of my queens for her work on my favorite show (The Good Place). But they lost to Christina Pickles! Who is amazing! I’m just going to pretend she won for her work as Judy Gellar, especially when she tells Monica and Ross that “that was a lot of information to receive in 30 seconds” and then tells Rachel “no, you weren’t supposed to put beef in the trifle.” So we’re okay. Kelli’s going to win the Olivier this year though, right??
Let’s get to tonight’s nominees already.
OUTSTANDING COMEDY SERIES
- Atlanta (FX)
- Barry (HBO)
- Black-ish (ABC)
- Curb Your Enthusiasm (HBO)
- GLOW (Netflix)
- The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel (Amazon)
- Silicon Valley (HBO)
- Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt (Netflix)
EIGHT? FORKING EIGHT NOMINEES and they still don’t get it right??? Ughhhhh. I haven’t finished ‘Atlanta’ so I can’t comment. I know it is genius but from what I’ve seen it is a drama. ‘Barry’ was great but was also FORKING HARROWING and made me terrified and anxious more than it made me laugh. And that ending?? And it’s a comedy? Fuck no! But it is great. GLOW I really like but it’s not best of the year! A few of the episodes this season were stellar but it took a while to get going. This is one of the shows that got really lucky with voters deciding to adopt it as one of its faves and nominating it across categories at every event even though it’s not the best. Maisel is the one show on this list that is actually outstanding, perfect in almost every way (the almost courtesy of the Jane Lynch storyline) and deserves to win. It is THE BEST. Maisel is absolutely pitch perfect from the writing to the music to the performances. And it has Tony Shalhoub! SHALHOUB! ‘Silicon Valley’ is an example of the voters’ rut they like to get stuck in, and more than that they should have gotten a year off after the TJ Miller bullshit. Now, as for our pal Kimmy. You know I am a long-term Kimmy Schmidt apologist. Despite its pitfalls, its had some of the funniest lines, and it introduced classic characters to us, mainly Kimmy and the unmatched Titus. I’ve even tried to excuse the Jane Krakowski storylines because of her incredible quips. But this season was NOT. GOOD. I honestly can’t believe it got nominated. Aside from the one part where a guy introduced himself to Kimmy and said “Hi I’m whatever” and she responded “Not me, I’m Kimmy”, nothing was really great about it. Give Titus and the writers a backdated Emmy for his viral interview scene in season 1, and get rid of this nonsense.
Now what should be up there? ‘Maisel’ should be fighting neck and neck with the most brilliant, hilarious, and surprisingly sincere comedy in existence, “The Good Place”. I honestly cannot get over how wonderful this show is. Every inch of the writing, the production (those special effects, my god), and the acting is across the board magnificent. It has an extremely clever premise that keeps getting twisted and turned onto itself, with storylines you just seem to get a handle on blowing up with equal chance of im- or exploding. And they’ve made a generation of tv-watchers interested in moral philosophy and being better people. It’s also beloved by critics. I love this show so much. Its absence is kind of hilarious, proving yet again that awards mean nothing.
Also, ‘Crazy Ex Girlfriend’ should be on this list. Its latest season was riveting, dark, and risky. They took chances that no other show would take, and kept a story, one that could have gone out of control, together with a steady hand.
And what about ‘Brooklyn 99’, after how much it was in the news after being cancelled (and picked up again)?? We love that damn show! I mean even my beloved ‘Jane the Virgin’ is better than some of the stuff on this list. And ‘Big Mouth’ in its debut season was flawless! Where is that? Ugh Emmy voters. Also, enough with these expanded categories. It’s clearly not helping to refuse to narrow it down, so keep it to 5. I hate treating this like participation trophies. When the best of the year aren’t competing, the winner isn’t really going to be the best, is it. When Federer or Serena decline to play in a slam it’s not like the eventual winner is the best if they didn’t play the best.
OUTSTANDING DRAMA SERIES
- The Americans (FX)
- The Crown (Netflix)
- Game of Thrones (HBO)
- The Handmaid’s Tale (Hulu)
- Stranger Things (Netflix)
- This Is Us (NBC)
- Westworld (HBO)
Ugh miss me with these extra long nominee lists, guys. It’s such nonsense. Nominations are supposed to mean something, not just be a slapdash list of all the shows an old man could remember at that given moment.
I’m so tired, like sooo tired, of ‘Game of Thrones’. Is it really still on? Still treating women like objects and what not? Hates it. I did love this season of ‘Stranger Things’, but not in like an ’emmy-winning’ way. They’re all FINE, I guess, but if anything but ‘The Americans’, in its perfect final season’, sweeps tonight, it’ll be wrong. ‘The Americans’ played the long game over 6 seasons, drawing subtle, nuanced storylines with outstanding performances and writing that came together in its depressing, unavoidable, great ending. It should absolutely win.
PERFORMANCES
I don’t have time to go into every category of acting nominees; I got a plane to catch. But I’ll say a few things. Ted Danson MUST win for TGP. He is American’s national treasure for a reason. If you thought his laugh in Season 1 episode 13 was iconic, wait till you see his relieved “Oh you guys!” from this season. I could cry just thinking about that and about when he solved the trolley problem. Tell me any of the other nominees deserve to win. I’ll wait. And then I’ll tell you why you’re wrong.
I don’t have time to go into every category of acting nominees; I got a plane to catch. But I’ll say a few things. Ted Danson MUST win for TGP. He is American’s national treasure for a reason. If you thought his laugh in Season 1 episode 13 was iconic, wait till you see his relieved “Oh you guys!” from this season. I could cry just thinking about that and about when he solved the trolley problem. Tell me any of the other nominees deserve to win. I’ll wait. And then I’ll tell you why you’re wrong.
As for lead actress in a comedy, it doesn’t even really matter. Rachel Brosnahan on ‘Maisel’ is the clear best option, and even if a properly done category should probably win. But all her competitors should be different. This hundo p should have been Rachel for ‘Maisel’, Kristen Bell for ‘The Good Place’ (absolute BRILLIANCE), Rachel Bloom for ‘Crazy Ex Girlfriend’ (if you aren’t jumping up and down in agreement, you haven’t watched her), Tracee Ellis Ross for ‘black-ish’ I guess, and Gina Rodriguez for ‘Jane the Virgin’. No matter what you think about that show, how telenovela it is (ps it’s a telenovela), Gina is sensational. And yeah, that’s five. FIVE NOMINEES PEOPLE. IN EVERY AWARD SHOW, IN EVERY CATEGORY. DO IT.
As for lead actors in drama, if anyone but Philip and Elizabeth, our beloved Russian spies, win, it’s wrong. WRONG.
What else is wrong?
Supporting actress, comedy: How D’Arcy Carden wasn’t nominated for ‘The Good Place’, I’ll never know. She’s a critical darling, like everything about that show, and created an entire KIND Of character. I also would have voted in Donna Lee Champlin for ‘Crazy Ex’. She’s remarkable. I don’t even want to talk about how many people are in this category (too many) and how many make no sense. But lets please give it to Alex Borstein for being incredible on ‘Maisel’.
Supporting actor, drama: Does a category that doesn’t include Noah Emmerich in ‘The Americans’ even count? No, no it doesn’t. Stanny Beems will always have a place in viewers’ hearts, and no one else on this list can come close to what he did.
Ok I am going to stop ranting about awards that DO NOT MATTER and finish taking this out of my suitcase (it’s too heavy (as always)). Watch tonight and let me know your thoughts in the comments; I’ll be on a plane so keep me informed. And if you haven’t watched the shows on this list that I’ve said are amazing, what are you waiting for???
The View Upstairs at the Soho: Heartfelt Yet Uneven Tribute with Potential
It’s Theatre Thursday! Today’s show is The View Upstairs, playing at London’s Soho Theatre until August 24.
The best kinds of theatre tell a story somehow relevant to today, regardless of the time period or subject matter of the show, and get the message across in nuanced, powerful ways. In The View Upstairs, Max Vernon’s 2017 musical about the LGBTQ+ community, they’re getting a lot right, but there’s room for improvement. They’ve got the emotion, the politics, the lofty goals of what they want the end product to do, and a game and talented cast, but the nuance and art of it need work to make the show as a whole sing. With all that emotional honesty at the ready, the show has the potential to be great with some focus on fixing the weak spots.
Going into this production, the European premiere of Vernon’s musical that played off-Broadway in 2017, I didn’t know what it was about. I didn’t even know it was a musical (best kind of surprise you could ever gift me, universe), and I definitely didn’t know it was about the 1973 New Orleans arson attack on a gay bar called the UpStairs, the biggest, deadliest attack on the queer community until Pulse. If you read that and thought ‘they made that horrible depressing story a musical?’ then you don’t know the power of musical theatre to tell any and every kind of story. The musical treatment feels right for this intimate, heartfelt play, with it becoming overall a lovely tribute to the victims. However, it wasn’t cohesive enough as a whole to be truly great theatre just yet. I feel like if they were willing to make some changes at this stage (preview period baby!), it can be.
Roughly, the story is about a 2019 fab-u-lous young influencer named Wes (a fabulous Tyrone Huntley, like wow you are a star and must be exhausted) who is trying to redefine and grow his brand by buying an abandoned building in New Orleans, the future home to his clothing line/influencing products I don’t know I don’t understand instagram. The realtor explains that some of the damage is the result of a fire, obviously the Chekhov’s gun of realtor comments even if you didn’t know what the show was about. I was like OH SHIT OH SHIT WE’RE GONNA SEE THE FIRE I HATE FIRE AHHH WHERE ARE THE EXITS. Wes sings the best song in the show, “#HouseholdName (I’m sorry the # is in the name I have to do it), does some drogas, and suddenly is in 1973, his building now (/then) a fun semi-secret gay bar filled with all sorts of characters. He’s a little confused – is he tripping? is he time-travelling? (Mantzoukas voice:) what’s going ON?! – but quickly rolls with whatever’s happening. His rolling with the punches/homies is uneven, because he doesn’t seem to ask any questions or do a ‘wait, what?’ moment, which is fine I guess, but then later in the show Wes begins a song with a lyric about how he’s been freaking out all night trying to figure out what’s happening and I was like, um no you haven’t? you were just kind of immediately cool with this?
The cast of characters Wes drops in on in 1973 are enjoying the UpStairs bar, a place where they can be themselves without worrying (too much) about the outside world. There’s Buddy (John Partridge), the lounge’s piano player (who reminded me so much of some old-timey musician but also of Jack Skellington), a closeted gay man with a wife and family whose resentment comes out to hurt everyone and not just himself, but for some reason no one seems to mind what an asshole he is. They mind that Dale (Declan Bennett), a clearly troubled man who needs help, is an asshole, but is he that much more of an asshole than Buddy? His song was really moving; I just wish it (and others) weren’t set up so clunkily.
The talented cast all get some moments to shine, some more than others, but some are miscast or mistreated. A standout for me was Cedric Neal’s Willie, who gets the perfect balanced role of making both funny and poignant comments while showing off his ridiculous voice. I loved Carly Mercedes Dyer as Henri, always reliable for belting her face off, but it was strange that she didn’t get a solo but Freddy’s mother had two?? I mean wtf. I loved Victoria Hamilton-Barritt in In the Heights, but her Puerto Rican accent did not work here, and the Ines character, mother of Freddy, has two too many songs. They bring the action to a screeching halt. Also, she looks at oldest in her early 30s, so casting her as the mother of someone who looks…also in his early 30s is beyond ridiculous. Yes yes actors should be able to play whoever and whatever they want (just ask ScarJo) but if you want to portray the emotional beats of a mother and son, they shouldn’t look like man + little sister who just came from church.
But the most disappointing part is how the pivotal role of Patrick is treated. Andy Mientus has come over from the great broad way to teach us how it’s done over here, and while he himself is fantastic as always, Patrick is not fleshed out as much as the role should be. First of all, Andy, one of the best musical theatre performers of his type right now, is given the two worst songs to sing. They do nothing to show off his voice; they kind of feel like first drafts. The second song was so close to being strong but it was clearly in the wrong key, and like, minor? Make it major and it would improve exponentially without hurting the song’s message. As for his character, Patrick seems like all the other ‘70s people, living their normal lives when Wes just drops in on them. But at the end, he acts like he’s been some sort of narrator or leader to Wes like forking Cuba Gooding Jr. in What Dreams May Come. But he wasn’t! But make him one! It would be so interesting (and really help with cohesiveness) if there was this constant thread of Patrick as narrator or guide. His talking to Wes at the end makes no sense (especially his big joke line about being ‘f-ing magical’, though funny) unless the character is retooled throughout the body of the show to actually be f-ing magical, some sort of guide through this memory.
Although I wanted to ignore any problems and focus on how important this story was, the problems are too obvious. The transitions between dialogue and songs feel very amateur and clunky, with a lot of spoken moments between characters that might as well have set up the next song like, “here, let me sing about what I mean.” It diminishes the flow of the story and the character development to set it up that way. It kind of felt like Working. It shouldn’t.
One more problem I had was the contrast they kept trying to force between the community in the ‘70s versus today. There are sooo many compelling differences to discuss, yet the focus seemed to be on how people today are vapid attention whores who just want influence online and strong branding, at the expense of real relationships and love, and that the gay community is purely and coldly transactional. That’s true for Wes, clearly, but I don’t see that as true for many people today. Yes, many spend lots of time forging internet presences, but most of them also have real lives, so that’s not a universal problem and shouldn’t be treated as one. I mean maybe the message of the importance of community is just meant for like YouTube stars who go to see it but I doubt that. It would be stronger if it focused more on Wes’s personal struggle instead of trying to blame an entire generation for the bad parts of the internet.
This feels like an opportune time to point out one of Laughfrodisiac’s favorite – and defining – movie quotes:
I’ve shared a lot of not-nice thoughts about this new musical but only because it’s all there, all the groundwork, all the emotion, all the heart they need to make it magical. (Now I need to quote Cuba: ‘I’M ALL HEART MUFUCKA!’) With a bit of work it can be great.
INFORMATION
During early previews, the show ran 2 hours straight through, no interval. There were several moments were it would have been fine to break the show and have an interval, which is highly recommended so other people don’t get UTIs. Also, not worrying about keeping it to one act could let more transitions be fleshed out fully.
STAGE DOOR
The Soho doesn’t really allow for regular stage-dooring, so you just wait outside the main entrance (as of now) for actors who want to come out from the lobby bar to come out. Cedric Neal came out first and was incredibly lovely and amazing, followed by Mientus who was also really nice. I left before anyone else came out. I think they were all hanging in the bar so if you are cool and at ease in bars you could just stick around in there.
