Vagina Monologues and Pride Weekend

I have to take a little blogger vacation; I have a funeral to attend this weekend and I am not going to have access to a computer. I'll be back on Sunday for the Pride parade, but I will be missing everything up to that point. :-( I'm hoping my contributors will step up to the plate and tell you about all the fabulous things they are doing this weekend!

In the meantime, let me make a recommendation: go see The Vaginal Monologues at Falcon Theatre in Newport. You know, I had never seen it. I have friends that have performed in it; I've even had the opportunity to see it half a dozen times, and even once for its sister performance, The Coochie Chronicles. I finally got to see it last night with Jere.

I am in no way filled with the "vagina wonder" that the play seeks to embolden you with, but it's poignant, at times funny, at times depressing, and the Falcon brings its best quality to the table -- that is, the enthusiasm of the actors. I've said it before, for whatever the performances lack, I can never say that the thespians are uninteresting. Jere has a post up, and, he's right, there are some things you wish were there. Some of the monologues were developed half-heartedly or without the certain power that they need, but the overall effect is there. Unfortunately, Monologuesis the kind of show that lives or dies by the actors ... and, though good in general, the entire piece needs to be played up like the cuntmonologue, or with the quiet dignity of the opening monologue about an elderly lady worried about getting turned on and flooding the world with her wetness.

I left my program at the bar afterwards so I don't know any names, but I wanted to give a shout out to the woman with the purple velvet-y shirt on who does the monologue about going to the vagina workshop. You were, undoubtedly, amazing. The moaning woman -- the monologue about the dominatrix escort -- deserves its own little special place in Falcon history, if not for the litany of moans from the cast... hopefully no husbands will be in the audience to hear what it sounds like when it is, indeed, faked. And, to the sole woman of color on the cast (which was disappointing), your coochie snorcher monologue was beautiful. And to my lesbian reader (singular, I think :-)), you'll be a little more than excited by Julie Niesen's description of woman-on-woman love... shockingly, I wished it would have gone on longer.

As we left, Jere asked me: I wonder how many people who see Monologues actually need to? I suppose I am one of those people that need to see more shows like this -- I can be, at times, mildly misogynistic and perhaps inappropriate when it comes to womankind -- and I would challenge you to take the opportunity to see if, maybe, you are one of those people by checking it out.

Tickets are $15 (online reservations), and I would say you probably get a good $11 or $12 of enjoyment out of it. I think you'll leave glad you went, even if, at times, it drags a bit.

And besides, what better way to spend one of your evenings of Pride? Seriously, folks, it's like the Falcon planned its opening to correspond.

Anyways, sorry I won't see you guys out this weekend :-(, but catch you at the parade!

Poseidon: An Upside Down Musical

Disappointed that Avenue Q closed in Cincinnati this weekend? I am, too. It was an excellent romp of blasphemous and potty-mouth puppets that you should have seen. Many thanks to the Cincinnati Movie Bears and their fearless leader, Brian, aka @cincycub, for putting our little outing together this weekend that included AveQ and then the most heavenly food at Nicholson's Pub downtown. Followed, of course, by a fabulous evening at the stop) aids fundraiser at Below Zero, where I drank too much but did not make too many PLC's (poor life choices). Thanks be to the goddess, for that.

However, if you missed Avenue Q, do not fret, there is another equally fabulous, tragically campy, utterly laughable musical going on here in the 'Nati that you would be sore to miss -- Poseidon: An Upside Down Musical, as brought to you by Falcon Theatre (636 Monmouth in Newport). 

I have only been to the small Falcon Theatre once before -- to see their production of Hamlet (my review here). I enjoy Shakespeare, and it was strong work by a community theatre to put it on and do a decent job of it. Regardless, I was not expecting much from Poseidon. I have worked in community theatres before and, undoubtedly, musicals were the bane of our existence. It's hard to find good singer/actors who will work for free... and there is an endless parade of details that are usually dealt with poorly or overlooked completely. The production of Poseidon has a lot of these problems, but it more than makes up for it with fun and strong cast who never forgot the joke.

Poseidon is based off of the 1970s classic, The Poseidon Adventure, which I have never seen. I have caught parts of the more recent remake on cable TV, but apparently it's about a big boat that capsizes and a daring cast have to escape through the bottom of the ship. The original 1972 movie posters bost: Who will survive -- in one of the greatest escape adventures ever! I have no idea how closely they kept to the storyline, but it doesn't matter as 99% of the jokes stand alone without prior knowledge of what's to happen (at Below Zero last night, the Bears and I compared notes and the play, apparently it sticks pretty close to the story). 

There is no real "lead;" rather, each role -- even the minor ones -- has their moments in the sun. There is a central cast  of ten who, more often then not, work together on stage beautifully. Ten people on stage would usually lead to upstaging and distracting action, but not during this performance. Undoubtedly, though, Joe Stollenwerk -- who plays Belle Rosen (Shelly Winters in the 1972 movie) -- stole the show. It's easy to assume that sticking a fat guy in a dress with a hackneyed old Jewish woman accent would be funny without trying, but Stollenwerk played it off brilliantly ... again, never forgetting the joke. Marypat Carlettii as Linda Rogo (Stella Stevens in the original) played her part with brilliance. Again, it would been easy to write off a former hooker turned leacherous drunky wife of a cop, but Carletti plays it on point. (I am dying to work her song about panties into a Kristy performance.) I found myself watching Stollenwerk and Carletti while others were acting because their reactions were, sometimes, funnier than the joke. 

Sean Mize as Acres, also, deserves acclaim for his part as the flamboyant waiter desperately trying to get Mike Rogo's (played by David Radtke) shirt off, as does Chuck Knippen (especially in his role as the mildly creepy, doll loving, socially inept Jim in the secondary story of "Poseidon-ites" watching the movie) , Burgess Boyd (for all of her sharp-tongued fierceness), and DeAndre Smith (again, in his role as a cross-dressing Poseidon-ite). And, finally, Donnie McGovern's role as the not-so-sexually confused 11-year-old Robin Shelby had his moments of hilarity. 

I just talked up well over half the cast, but that's not to say the remainders were a waste. Every single cast member had amazingly memorable moments, but I simply cannot recount the entire show to you in this posting. They were having fun, and it was obvious and it translated into a rowdy good time for the audience. The cast even adopted an audience member who received a lap dance from Carletti and then, later, was pulled onto stage in a dance number. The poor guy was an instant superstar, but the cast's interactions with him tell us that the Falcon Theatre cares deeply about their audience.

All of the wonderment aside, the show lacked a few key points. Some of the performers were clearly not singers, or they were poorly cast into the wrong singing role. John Langley, for example, had some of the more disappointing solo's, despite a long history of professional performance. I was informed, later, that he was a tenor cast in the role of a bass, which explains why, half the time, you could not hear what he was singing even from my third-row seat. The remaining faults were excusable, though I was disappointed one of the very first songs -- Bachelor Habberdasher -- came off weakly, though the actor, Earl Lehkamp, made up for it later with some well-timed one-liners that will leave you with side pain ("You're my only chance to get laid!"). Even Carletti was a weak singer, though she made up for it with the amount of fun she was clearly having that transferred to the audience. At some point, I made a note in my program: "Is the music played this loudly to cover up the gaps in some actor's abilities?" Meh. 

The remaining "stuff" you hear about in reviews -- costumes (decent, correct for the show, nothing spectacular), sets (it's a small theatre, they made do), etc. -- was unremarkable and unspectacular, but it worked because the cast made it work and never let the obvious pitfalls stand in their way, often times playing up the goofs. I am left with the same impression of Falcon that I left Hamlet with: everything else they don't do well is made up for the talent and enthusiasm of their actors.

The musical has already garnered a little bit of buzz -- our little AveQ troupe this weekend was talking about it. I told a handful of people at the bar, and they said they had heard good things about the show. I have a feeling that, by the time the run is over (two more weekends, Fridays and Saturdays only), quite a few people will have enjoyed it, and I make a firm recommendation that you be amongst the people who have seen it. You'll be disappointed if you don't.

Of the $15 it would take to buy a full price ticket -- you will definitely get $13.50 or $14 out of enjoyment from it. (Order tickets here.)

STRUMPETS!

If you're like me, then your experience with Hamlet can be summed up in two phrases: "high school English" and "Mel Gibson." Seriously. So when Julie N. of Wine Me, Dine Me, Cincinnati invited me (and all of us bloggers) to come, my initial reaction was: GOD NO!!!!!! I don't have good memories of Hamlet.

I'm pretty glad I went, though :-).

Watching HAMLET, the first thing you'll notice is that 99% of the lines in the play have been referenced or alluded to in other plays, movies, and productions. Beyond just the two stereotypical lines of "Alas, poor Yorick" or "To be or not to be," there are whole sections that are part of our common language -- "What dreams may come," "Get thee to a nunnery" (why did I think that was Macbeth), "Frailty thy name is woman" (duh), "neither a borrower or lender be" (sage advice, these days), "brevity is the soul of wit," etc. etc. etc. In short: it's good to go back onto plays like Hamlet and other English classics simply to remind ourselves of the beauty of our language and from whence some of our vernacular arises.

But, back to Falcon Theater's Production of Hamlet at the Monmouth (on Monmouth in Newport) (Falcon Theatre webpage, Monmouth Theatre webpage, Facebook event):

After its negative review in the Enquirer -- stating that the play lacked vision or something -- I was a little worried about the 2h and 45min I would be spending watching the play. However, the last time the Enquirer loved a play -- Dead City -- I couldn't figure out what the play was about and ended up dozing through half of it. Goes to show you: don't trust the Enquirer make up your own mind.

If you don't remember anything from the play, I'll give you the heads up: Hamlet talks. A lot. That is, the character feels it necessary to soliloquize and monologue every couple pages. Thank god Ted Weil, also the Artistic Director of the company and one of its founding members, knows how to do Shakespeare. Is he a Kenneth Branaugh or (ha) Patrick Stewart? No. However, it's clear that Weil knows how to perform a Shakespearean speech and pulled them off with the intensity that is required for the part. He was able to use them effectively as part of the story line, rather than detract from my enjoyment, which could have happened with less talented persons.

The rest of the cast was variable, but nothing truly stood out as truly bad. In fact, I would say that rather than leaving with a negative impression, I remember mostly good. Though Carrie Mees as Ophelia started off as one of the weaker players, she absolutely stole the show by the end. When the character goes bat-shit crazy and starts playing with the broom as if it were a bunch of herbs, I was mesmerized. Simply amazing -- I'm actually quite concerned for the actress's mental health, after that performance. I wonder if the theatre would ever put on Scotland Road; if so, Mees would be an absolutely stunning "Woman" (blah blah, one of those plays with a character with no name -- I know -- but I always liked the show). The Player King (Michael C. Potter, I think), also, had an amazing moment when Hamlet asked him to recite a speech from... oh, God, I was sounding so smart and now I forget where the speech comes from. And I hesitate to write "the Death of Garbanzo" because I doubt it was about the passing of a bean. It also turned out to be one of the stronger points of the play -- rather than being embarassed by the melodrama (as I am apt to be in movies and plays), Potter played it off perfectly and made it seem almost natural.

The costumes, by the way, were stand-out amazing. They were beautifully made, so much so that I want to bring back in the tunic-leggings-and-leather-boots look for men. I totally think its time for Victorian revivalism in fashion. The set was minimalist and was completely utilitarian -- nothing spectacular, though I disliked staring at the turret about halfway through. Regardless, I'm glad the company didn't try to create an expansive set; the simplicity allowed us to focus on what clearly is Falcon's strong point -- the talent and enthusiasm of its players.

The only three complaints I really had were middling. First, there were two male roles played by females -- Horatio and Marcellus. Though I understand the Shakespearean history of cross-gendered performance, our two choices here were far too feminine. However, the parts were not expressly male (ie, we were not dealing with an awkward, sort-of-same-sex love triangle, though that would have been interesting), so it was not terrible. And, actually, Horatio (Holly Sauerbrunn) wasn't all that bad, and I look forward to seeing her in future roles (I never got the part of Horatio, anyways -- I think he was just put in there so Hamlet could tell someone "I am dead"). Julie, as well, is far more suited to glamor than to utilitarian guard duty as Marcellus (she got the chance as the Player Queen and the Ambassador). I wonder if the two characters would have been more standout if the company had taken the chance and just make them women, rather than try and take two talented actresses and put them into drag.

A side note: the term "drag" is funny because one of the supposed originations of the word is from Shakespeare, who would mark "DRessesd As Girl" in the sides of his scripts when you had a cross-gendered character. To use the term "drag" to refer to a female dressing as a male, especially in this sense, is teetering on inappropriate. But I digress...

Second, there were a couple of moments where there were noticeable "busy hands," where characters clearly were not sure what to do with their hands and were just doing whatever. It was rare, and it was far more noticeable in the first 10 minutes than in the rest of the play. I'd chalk it up to working into their characters, especially in the inital court scene where you have most of the cast just standing around reacting. Even when I acted, I was never sure what to do with my hands except put them over my mouth to gasp. (I never did butch well.) Third, there was not nearly enough hot guys around. I mean, really. But, then again, I thoroughly believe that I should have a litter carried by oiled muscle boys to take me wherever I go, so perhaps I expect too much.

Overall, my preview into the Falcon Theatre Company at the Monmouth Theatre was thoroughly enjoyable and top-notch. I look forward to going back and seeing more, especially since the company tends to run more mainstream shows (last season included The Diary of Anne Frank and Hair) mixed in with some new ones and things I've never heard of (including the next show, Poseidon: The Upside-Down Musical, which runs from May 1-16, which they promise to be full of camp and kitsch -- which you know I'm excited about).

In order to standardize my theatre reviews from now on (this is #3, and I think we'll have #s 4 and 5 in the next week or so), here's my new system for reviewing: how much of the cost of the full price ticket was this particular show worth? HAMLET's full price ticket was $15, and I'd say you would get a good $11 or $12 of enjoyment out of it. To my mind, that's a pretty good deal.

Oh, and I am going to try to work the term "strumpet" into my daily speech patterns. If you get called it by me, it's being said with love... and maybe a little vengeance a la Hamlet.