Sunday, July 01, 2007

Hot, sweaty, hot, tired, hot-- that's what today felt like. It was fun and entertaining, but boy was I glad to get home finally and take a shower. We started the day by meeting for breakfast at 7:45, which meant I had to get up and on the road by 7:15. Those are definitely not my summer hours lately.

Yesterday afternoon we saw a performance of Joseph and the Amazing... You Know The Rest. It's gotten rave reviews, and this was an extra performance that was only added as of early last week, because everything had been sold out for weeks. Now for those of you that don't know my history with this show... I saw it at the ACenter many years ago. I saw it several times and loved it. I saw it a few more times. I ended up seeing it about 60 times over four years. I bought standing room tickets at least three nights a week. I got to know some of the performers. The leads and a couple of the cast came to my 5th grade classroom and spent the morning talking about the show, acting, and answering questions. I have a pretty long history with the show, and I know it intimately. It's probably the one show I know every single word to every single song. The people at the ACenter took pity on me and finally just asked me if I wanted to be an usher... and that's how I got started with that.

So I'm wondering if a person intimately knows a show that well, should they really go see it in another venue with another cast, and expect to love it? Don't know that answer. I did enjoy the performance yesterday--heck, I love the songs. What's not to love? It's peppy, happy, funny. The problem? I kept making so many comparisons and judgements based on all the other performances I had seen. And when the curtain went up for the second act I said out loud (probably not a great idea in retrospect) "Hey--those are the costumes from the ACenter! Did they rent them? And the same wigs! And the same choreography!"

So the final analysis? It was fun (even though the Joseph actor sang flat so many times it was earbending). I enjoyed it (but the sound mix was so awful the taped music completely overpowered the singers). And the music was canned-- don't even get me started on this one.

Bed. Go. Now. Zzzzzzz.

1 comment:

Laurie said...

I am that way about several things. It can be exhausting, huh!? I still have times in restaurants (I managed a couple of restaurants and have worked in 5-6, dining room and kitchen) when I just want to get up and bus a few tables. I am uncomfortably empathetic when a place is "in the weeds."