Day 294/365 - The Color Purple

I never thought I would like this musical. I haven't ever seen the movie (it looked too girly), so when the Kennedy Center announced they were bringing a touring company production of the show to town I was less than impressed. But then earlier this week they sent me an email advertising the fact that tickets to many of remaining performances of "The Color Purple" were being discounted to $49, so I figured 'what the heck, I'll give it a try.' Glad I did.

I went to see it tonight with my friend Pia and her musical-mad niece and we all enjoyed it. It's certainly not the happiest and most lighthearted of musicals. There's a lot of sorrow and suffering, hardship and hate in it, but despite that it manages to be very uplifting with numerous laugh-out-loud moments. The story focuses on the struggles of a woman who loses everyone she loves and is victimized by everyone she doesn't. The play follows her from the age of 14 to her grey-haired old womanhood and recounts the many memorable characters that pass through her life and the trials she endures.

The set design and staging is very stylized and evocative and the music and songs are memorable and rousing. The performances are simply outstanding. American Idol winner Fantasia burns brightly in the lead role of Ceelie. I was surprised at how good an actress she is. She doesn't play the part so much as she inhabits it. And man, can she sing! Her voice is an unstoppable force unto itself. As good as Fantasia's performance is however, the play is absolutely stolen by the actress portraying the feisty and unyielding Sophia. Her "Hell, no" song was the highlight of the evening for me.

Now after enjoying the play I'm going to have to rent the movie and give it a chance. Sometimes being proven wrong can be a good thing.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 279/365 - Spring Awakening

Saw the musical "Spring Awakening" at the Kennedy Center tonight. It was good and well-deserving of its haul of Tony Awards. As have a thousand stories before it, it works the inexhaustible mine of teen angst. Despite the fact that it's among the oldest of story lines (as supported by the fact that the non-musical version of the play was first performed -- and promptly banned -- over 100 years ago), it still manages to seem as fresh, frenetic, raw, and real as youth itself.

This may not be the first choice of play to go and see with your mom or minister given that it deals quite bluntly with sex, sexuality, incest, child abuse, teen pregnancy, masturbation, suicide, and abortion, but it is certainly worth seeing. The set design is excellent, the costuming is quite good, the performances are all solid, and the songs (for the most part) are both good and hummable.

My only quibble really is with the final number, which comes across as a desperate ploy for a "Seasons of Love" type moment. It seems jarring and out of place given the scene that precedes it and the overall tenor of the play to that point. A key character faced with a very trying ordeal decides to resist rather than surrender in a powerful set piece, and then the cast effectively joins hands and sings 'Kumbaya" and chipperly asserts that everything will be alright? WTF? The play should end with a defiant, 'set the world on fire' anthem instead of a limp, treacly, ballad.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 202/365 - Ragtime

I headed over to the Kennedy Center tonight to see their revival of the musical "Ragtime." It was the first time I'd seen a show in the recently renovated Eisenhower Theater. The Eisenhower is the smallest of the Kennedy Center's three main theaters. It's roughly the size of a small Broadway theater. Before the renovation it was drab, dark, and rundown. The makeover is quite startling. It's now warm and bright and cozy, all gold and blue and blonde wood. Unfortunately the acoustics are still problematic. Before the renovation, it was very difficult to hear the actors lines from the upper balcony. I don't know if that is still the case, but I can report that the prime orchestra seating isn't so prime from a sound standpoint. Many of the song lyrics, especially in the group numbers, were impossible to distinguish. It was largely just a fuzzy, foggy, blur of sound. Hopefully that's something they can tweak going forward.

The play itself, despite the sound issues, is excellent. It's based on the novel by E.L. Doctorow and concerns three strata of American society at the beginning of the 20th century -- the privileged white upper class, the disenfranchised black middle class, and the struggling immigrant lower class. The story mixes fictional characters with an eclectic array of historical figures such as Henry Ford, Booker T. Washington, Harry Houdini, Evelyn Nesbit, and JP Morgan. With a large cast of characters and a lot of plot points to cover, the play proceeds at breakneck speed but still manages to avoid seeming rushed or hastily sketched. It's a great story and it inspired me to purchase a copy of the book from the Kennedy Center gift shop immediately upon exiting the theater.

The primary theme of the play is the individual search for identity as reflected by one member of each social strata -- the white homemaker, the black musician, and the immigrant artist. The three struggle to define themselves and discover who they will be in this new American age and their journeys toward self discovery are contrasted with the white husband's mania for exploring the world's boundaries while studiously ignoring his own personal frontiers.

The cast is strong and is composed of performers who are both good singers and good actors. In particular, each of the three leads does excellently in his or her part. The staging is stark but effective and the costumes are very good. The music is lively and well done, but the songs tend to sound largely the same. There are a few standout numbers, but for the most part it isn't the sort of score you'll go around humming the next day. The compelling story, rich characters, and skilled performances though are enough in themselves to make the show well worth seeing. But I'm still irked about the acoustics/sound design.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 180/365 - High Brow/Low Brow

Today was a pretty apt summation of my random and eclectic interests. This afternoon, I attended a rehearsal of the Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra of Venezuela in preparation for their concert tonight at the Kennedy Center. Then tonight, I met my friend Chris at the theater in Georgetown to see the new "Fast & Furious" movie. Both were entertaining in their own way.

The Youth Orchestra was excellent. The kids were very skilled, talented, and energetic and the conductor was so lively it looked like he was dancing at the podium. The movie was escapist fun. It's essentially a two-hour long adolescent male fantasy of fights, guns, good buddies, fast cars, and hot women.

It's good to be well-rounded.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200 and processed using Microsoft Publisher)

Day 87/365 - At the DC Neujahrskonzert

The Neujahrskonzert, or New Year's Concert, is a traditional Viennese performance of the music of the Strauss family and other Austrian composers held annually on January first. DC's version of this tradition is part of a series of coordinated concerts across North America called Salute to Vienna and it's held at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts a few days after New Year's. This year it was held tonight and I went.

I'd never been to this before, but I'd been wanting to for a while. It's not just a classical music concert, it's a sort of performing arts sampler platter. In addition to the philharmonic part (btw, if your last name is Harmonic then I think you should be required to name your child either Phillip or Phyllis), there are arias from Austrian operettas and excerpts from ballets. The Kennedy Center used to stage a similar 'survey class' each year as part of the Kirov Festival, but they haven't done that the last few years. Bummer.

Tonight's performance was held in the Kennedy Center Concert Hall and featured the Strauss Symphony of America, ebullient guest conductor Sascha Gotzel, the Budapest Ballet, and a pair of ballroom dancers. As you can see from the photo, my seat was in one of the stage boxes. I'd never sat up here before but it's very cool and I'm definitely going to keep this in mind the next time I attend something at the Concert Hall. It's kind of like a home plate seat at a baseball game, minus the annoying netting. You're right on top of the orchestra and you can't see much of the rest of the crowd, so it's like they're performing just for you. Plus from that vantage point you can really see musicians' technique and the conductor's facial expressions (*cough* not to mention having a great view of the soprano's cleavage and the dancers' legs *cough*).

I really enjoyed this concert. It was light and joyous and lively and it had a great mix of performance pieces. The part where the conductor conducts the audience's applause during the 'Blue Danube' encore might seem a bit cheesy or contrived, but it's actually quite fun. The New Year's Concert/Salute to Vienna is certainly worth keeping in mind when next January rolls around, especially if you can luck into getting a seat in Box 60 like I did. Then it's just pure awesomeness.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)