Username: Password: Log in You are viewing cahwyguy's journal Explore LJ: Life Entertainment Music Culture Forgot your password? Create a LiveJournal Account Learn more Search... Interest Go Remember Me Recent Entries Musings of my Friends Posting Calendar LJ User Info California Highways Previous Next

LJ Profile Observations Along The Road - Willkommen, bienvenue, welcome / Im Cabaret, au Cabaret, to Cabaret (Roadkill along the Information Superhighway)

06:59 pm February 1st, 2009

Willkommen, bienvenue, welcome / Im Cabaret, au Cabaret, to Cabaret User: cahwyguy Name: Daniel the California This afternoon, I gave into Highway Guy workplace pressure. You Website: California Highways see, there were all these cahwyguy signs around the office About this Journal about how the employee This Journal is a place for me to drama club was doing capture the ramblings in my life. “Cabaret”. Add to that the You'll find out what is happening fact that “Cabaret” was one with me, as well as observations in of those Kander/Ebb I’d my areas of interest, such as listened to for years, but had musicals, the news, the highways, never actually seen. Yes, I books, and other such things. Feel knew it was community free to share your observations with theatre.... and where me. community theatre fit in the hierarchy of theatre (e.g., the level of theatre raises

Outside Links particular expectations, and run the range from school performances (which can be downright painful), LJ Home to community theatre (which can range from 100% non-actors to a mix of My Myspace non-actors and training actors, as we had with The Aerospace Players), to Facebook non- or partial-Equity professional theatre (which can be excellent), to Recent Comments full-Equity professional productions). So, I went in with community theatre About CaHwyGuy expectations... and for a community theatre, they didn’t do all that bad (only California Highways a few grimaces, and no urges to leave early). It wasn’t the caliber of acting, LJ FOAF singing, and dancing I would see at Cabrillo or one of the Equity-waiver LJ Syndication professional theatres. It was good community theatre. Mail.liberal-judaism Now, let’s get into the specifics. Cabaret was Kander and Ebb’s second S.C.J FAQ/Reading Lists musical, and featured a book by Joe Masteroff based on John Van Druten’s BoardgameGeek play, “I Am A Camera”, which itself was adapted from the novel “Goodbye So. Calif. Games Day to Berlin” by Christopher Isherwood. The musical tells two intertwined Talking Broadway stories taking place in 1931, just as the Nazis are rising in power: the first is a ACSAC revue centered on the decadence of the seedy Kit Kat Club, the second is a NIAP - CCEVS story set in the real world in which the club existed. The basic plot concerns Temple Ahavat Shalom American writer Clifford Bradshaw and his visit to Berlin. After making a Wilshire Blvd Temple Camps few friends and finding housing, Clifford visits the sleazy Kit Kat Club and My Amazon Wish List meets an English singer, Sally Bowles. The writer and singer soon fall in love. Meanwhile, Clifford's elderly landlord, Fraulein Schneider, gets Posting Calendar engaged to a Jewish greengrocer, Herr Schultz – not an easy decision given

February 2009 the increasing influence of the Nazis. Soon, Clifford discovers that he has been inadvertently helping the Nazis by delivering packages to Paris for a 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 German friend of his, Ernst Ludwig. Clifford ends up deciding to return to 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 the United States but Sally, after aborting their baby, decides to remain in 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 Berlin.

Entry Subject Summary As noted before, this story is told by intertwining scenes taking place in the cahwyguy (no subject) [+2] Caberet that often echo what is happening in the real world, but in a more decadent or exaggerated sense. Thus, the “The Money Song” song echoes tags Cliff and Sally’s need for money; the title song “Cabaret” echoes how Sally abe-vigoda views life. No where is this better seen than in the controversial song “If You acsac Could See Here Through My Eyes” in the second act, where the MC dances advertising with a gorilla that he purports to love, ending with the “If you could see her aging through my eyes/she wouldn’t look Jewish at all.”. In the original 1966 ahavat-shalom version, that was too strong for the audience, so a song was added for the airplanes Jewish grocer to sing in the first act (“Meeskite”), and the lyric was changed alton-brown to “she isn’t a meeskite at all”. The Aerospace Players wisely chose to go with america the stronger version. animations anniversaries So, how did The Aerospace Players do on this production? It was good art community theatre. There were some outstanding performances (you can atta-boys see some pictures of the cast here and here). I was very impressed by the austin-lounge-lizards excellent Meredith M. Sweeney (Sally Bowles). She’s an upcoming auto-accidents professional with a BFA in acting and good experience -- she sang well, she automobiles moved well, she acted well. I was also impressed with the Emcee, Drew bad-customer-service Fitzsimmons, who has also done a lot of community theatre. Again, strong bat-mitzvah singing and dancing. As for the other major leads: I thought that Dave battle-of-the-sexes Fulton (Clifford Bradshaw) was OK with his acting, but his main singing birthday-poll number (“Don't Go”*) was weak. Jeri Snoke (Fraulein Schneider) was also birthdays OK in the acting department, but needed some more projection, especially birthdays-2004 when singing (this was really apparent in “So What” and “What Would You birthdays-2005 Do”)... although according to a co-worker who saw the production Friday birthdays-2006 night, she was much better, so this could have been an off performance.** birthdays-2007 Michael-Anthony Nozzi (Herr Schultz) was channeling Jack Gilford for a bit birthdays-2008 (which is a good thing), but there were times where it was overplayed... and birthdays-2009 again, his singing (“Married”) could be better. bleh bliteotw *: I originally had this as “Why Should I Wake Up?”, but the director blushing noted to me that “Why Should I Wake Up:” was from the original 1966 books score, but they removed that and added "Don't Go" in the 1987 revival, booze which was the primary source that they used for this production broadway-la (although they took some pieces from both the 66 original and the 97 brush-fires revival as well...). They didn't use "Why Should I Wake Up" at all. cabrillo-music-theatre **: It was confirmed by the director that she was having vocal problems california that performance. camp car-tipping As for the rest of the ensemble (you can find a full cast list here): The charities Kit-Kat Girls (Jen James, Kerry Riccio, Mandy Juarez, Laura Hecht, childhood Christina Rossi, Lauren Swanson) and boys (Steven Flowers, Roy Okida) childrens-television could have been doing an excellent job portraying weak dancers in a seedy childrens-toys cabaret... but what came across to me (at least for the Kit Kat Club girls) is cissp that they were focusing more on getting the moves right than enjoying the cluelessness dance and being in the role. No gaffes, but no enthusiasm either. This was colony-theatre especially apparent in the “Two Ladies” number with James and Riccio: comics compost compusaur computers what should have come off as erotic (and could have easily, as those ladies concerts had curves you don’t oft see these days) came off more mechanical. The cooking secondary roles of Fraulein Kost (Jeannine Barba) and Ernst Ludwig (Bob corporate-america Borich) were acted well; these roles don’t have significant songs of their own csun and did OK with “Tomorrow Belongs To Me”. The remainder of the small dads-accident-2004 ensemble roles didn’t particularly stand out in either a strongly good nor dancing strongly bad way. dear-old-dad decision-2004 The production was directed by Bob Minnichelli, assisted by Flora Morin. It decision-2005 was produced by J.C. Kern (a boardgamer) assisted by Susan Tabak. The decision-2006 sets designed by Bob Minnichelli were adequate to the task. The lighting decision-2007 design by Edgar Calderon seemed to be from the Cabrillo school of lighting: decision-2008 if one follow spot is good; two must be better. The follow spots were actually decluttering fine for the Kit-Kat scenes, but they should have gone with a more natural delurking-week lighting approach for the real-life scenes in order to distinguish the two directv better. Sound engineering was by Tim Edmondson and mostly worked well, disasters although there were some disconcerting times where the microphones cut disney out. The costumes by Jennifer James, Kerry Riccio, Mary Ellen Vojtek, dod-silliness Jeannine Barba were OK, although I felt the Kit-Kat costumes could have donna been seedier and/or more revealing, but then again, they were already dreams scared (evidence by "Mature Audience" warnings) that this show was too driving risque for their audience (which, when we saw the show, was about 90% drugs people from the Red Hat Society--and as ellipticcurve noted, they drumcorps didn’t look like Linux lovers). Hair and makeup by Carol Hitchcock, Karen earthlink Hill, Flora Morin was fine. You can find a full crew list here. earthquakes economy Musically, the production was both good and weak. You can find the education orchestra list at the bottom of this page. Someone seemed out of tune, or environment something seemed off, because there were just occasional flat notes. Again, family that would be fine for the Kit-Kat band (which is supposed to be family-tree unprofessional), but where it was off in the realistic songs. The pit orchestra festivals was enhanced by an on-stage quartet of Sandy Nitchman, Hugo Vazquez, folk-music Andy Meyer, Dave Champagne, who actually seemed to be pretty good (and food whose male members seemed to enjoy dressing up as women). food-sensitivites th fountain-pens Cabaret continues at the James Armstrong Theatre through February 7 . freberg Half-price tickets ($9) are available through Goldstar Events. friends fruit-joy As for us? As for us, next Sunday takes us back to the Ahmanson Theatre to fubsy-women see “Minsky’s” at 1:00pm. Valentine’s weekendtakes us to Burbank and fueling-the-fire “Candida” at the Colony Theatre on 2/15 @ 2pm. The following weekend is furnishings Pasadena , where on 2/21 @ 8pm we have “Stormy Weather” at the gaming Pasadena Playhouse. March will also bring “Little Shop of Horrors” at Van gardening Nuys HS (it is running March 12, 13, 14 and 19, 20, 21 -- let me or geekiness nsshere know if you want tickets). That’s all I have booked so far (other gifts than season tickets, such as “One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest” at Rep East gluten-free 3/13 through 4/11), but there a number of “shows of interest” I plan to going-postal ticket, including “big” at West Coast Ensemble (5/9-6/28); “The Green good-old-days Room at Hermosa Beach Playhouse (5/19-5/31); “Is He Dead? at ICT Long great-livejournal-outage Beach; and “Dirty Rotten Scoundrels at Theatre League Thousand Oaks grocery-markets (4/28-5/3). growing-up Tags: other-theatres, reviews, reviews-2009, theatre, theatre-2009 grrrrr halloween headache headlines How I'm Feeling: headachy health What I'm Listening To: The Civil War (Studio Cast): Northbound Train hebrew help-requests high-holidays 3 Observations · Share an Observation history hobbies Comments holidays hollywood-bowl Thread started by Daniel the California Highway Guy honda-crv house-of-blues From: cahwyguy Date: February 4th, 2009 03:19 pm (UTC) (Link To housing This) humor i-hate-bugs ict-long-beach ipod israel For the record, I received the following email from the director at work: judaism jury-duty Daniel, kitchen las vegas I checked out your theater review today. I think it was pretty candid and accurate -- I would agree lausd with about 90% of it. left-handedness legal Since critics don't normally get a direct link to the production staff, but you know that I am life-is-weird listening, I am curious -- what single "adjustment" might you recommend between opening and linguistics closing weekends to further improve the show? (Obviously, casting and/or orchestra staff changes livejournal are out of the question...) los-angeles maps Bob marking-time math P.S. I'll also confirm your speculation that Jeri (Fra Schneider) was having an "off performance" on mccabes Sunday. In fact, on Saturday, it was even worse, as she had no voice at all about 2 hours before media curtain. Somehow, our vocal folks got her functional even for Saturday, and she pulled it off medical remarkably well. By Sunday, she was back to about 50%. So.... good guess. meeting-friends memes To be honest with you, I was surprised that you weren't tougher on the sound engineering -- the memes-aboutme one consistent complaint I got this weekend was folks having trouble hearing the dialogue over the memes-aboutyou stage band in a couple of scenes. memes-books (Reply) (Thread) memes-commenting memes-food From: cahwyguy Date: February 4th, 2009 05:13 pm (UTC) (Link memes-friends To This) memes-images memes-interests memes-interview memes-livejournal My reply to him: memes-movies memes-music I checked out your theater review today. I think it was pretty candid and accurate -- I would memes-poetry agree with about 90% of it. memes-questions memes-quizzes Thanks. As with those in your group, it's not my day job, and I've been trying to get better at it memes-rant memes-religion memes-travel over time. We see a lot of theatre (this weekend is Minsky's), and since 2004, I've been memories reviewing what I see. I think you did a good job with what you had. middle-east mitzvah-day Since critics don't normally get a direct link to the production staff, but you know that I am mlj listening, I am curious -- what single "adjustment" might you recommend between opening modern-technology and closing weekends to further improve money the show? (Obviously, casting and/or orchestra staff changes are out of the question...) movies music Two things. One, I might try to figure out what instrument had the off note, and see if you can my-sweetie get it tuned. If I recall correctly, it was likely one of the horns, but I'm not an expert. You natick might also tweak the lighting for some of the scenes in Cliff's flat to bring up the realistic light news-chum (my daughter, who is studying lighting design at Van Nuys HS could nobel-ms give you the technical terms, and I'll ask her tonight), and tone down the two follow spots. noho-arts-center Basically, you want to distinguish the realistics from the cabaret a bit more. Lastly, although I nss-and-f didn't explicitly note it, you might add a sound effect when the MC throws the brick through nsshere the window obamarama (on Sunday afternooon, it went through a bounced, which sorta spoiled the impact). obituaries observations-2004 P.S. I'll also confirm your speculation that Jeri (Fra Schneider) was having an "off observations-2005 performance" on Sunday. In fact, on Saturday, it was even worse, as she had no voice at all observations- about 2 hours before curtain. Somehow, our vocal folks got her functional even for aka-news-chum Saturday, and she pulled it off orange-empire remarkably well. By Sunday, she was back to about 50%. So.... good guess. other-theatres pali I'm glad to hear that. The person I had spoken with was (name redacted) in our department, parenting who liked Jeri's performance when she saw the show Friday night. parties pasadena-playhouse To be honest with you, I was surprised that you weren't tougher on the sound engineering -- pesach the one consistent complaint I got this weekend was folks having trouble hearing the petrolania dialogue over the stage band in a couple of scenes. pets photography I didn't have that problem, although there were one or two scenes where the mics seem to pictures have gone out, but that was fixed. As I've seen that happen both at Cabrillo and the political-action Ahmanson, it seems to be a part of life. politics ppm By the way, if you want to see a good show in a small theatre, check out "A Streetcar Named progenitorivox Desire" being done at Rep East in Saugus (yes, we're valley folks). It is one of our favorite pron equity waiver theatres. For what's down this way, you might listen to and check out the purim music to "The Green Room". The CD is out, and it is getting its world premiere at Hermosa quilters-run Beach Playhouse in May. quote-of-the-day (Reply) (Parent) (Thread) rabbi-sheryl radio From: cahwyguy Date: February 4th, 2009 05:14 pm (UTC) (Link railgeeking To rant This) reflections relationships His reply back to me: religion religious-right-are-wrong My wife and I are also going to see Minsky's this weekend, too, on Sunday. remodeling ren-faire Should be interesting. rep-east restaurants reviews reviews-2004 And I've been wanting to see "Streetcar" for years, so we'll look into that, although the reviews-2005 calendar's pretty full right now, and Saugus is a bit of a trek (since we're still in our reviews-2006 "babysitter needed" years for adult entertainment, which was a real pain with both of us reviews-2007 involved in "Cabaret"...) reviews-2008 reviews-2009 We did have a sound effect for the window crash, which worked just fine on Friday and ridesharing Saturday -- our sound guy just missed his cue on Sunday.... Way back when, the rights Armstrong used to let us do a lot more of our own tech, including sound board and spot roadgeeking lights, which actually seemed to work better. Now that we have to use (and pay) their robert.w.service "professionals" for that, it's actually not as reliable. We do still build our own sets and run rules our own scene changes, etc. sacramento-and-davis san-fernando-valley I like the idea of softening the spots on the realistic scenes some -- we'll check that out. I scheduling think any flatness you might have heard in the brass section may just be where we stand school-fundraising in terms of orchestra quality at this point -- I'm guessing in the French horns. Although science we did have a sub for the 2nd trombone on Sunday, but he is a very good player, so I'm science-fair guessing it wasn't him. I'll mention your note to the conductor and see if he's noticed science-fiction anything similar. A few flat notes aside, though, I think we probably still have the best scjfaq volunteer pit orchestra in the region.... security seen-on-drive Thanks for the feedback. sf-bay-area sheep Bob shopping simchat-torah P.S. Just for accuracy's sake, the song that you meant to pan Cliff for is actually "Don't simi-valley-cac Go". "Why Should I Wake Up" was from the original 1966 score, but they removed that societal-questions and added "Don't Go" in the 87 revival, which is the primary source that we used for this special-days production (although we took some pieces from both the 66 original and the 97 revival as sports well...); we didn't use "Why Should I Wake Up" at all. st-louis status (Reply) (Parent) (Thread) stress stupid-dad-syndrome 3 Observations · Share an Observation sukkot summer talk-like-a-pirate taper-ahmanson tbhla tbtorah tea technology telephony television theatre theatre-2004 theatre-2005 theatre-2006 theatre-2007 theatre-2008 theatre-2009 theme-parks themed-listening this-is-not-a-tag tikkun-olam tom-paxton tools tourist-in-los-angeles toys transit travel tucson typography ucla usaf vacation vacation-2004 vacation-2005 vacation-2006 vacation-2007 validators-workshop valley-musical-theatre various-and-sundry visiting vnhs wally-world war-on-drugs wbt weather words work writer's block writers-strike wtf y-princesses yellow-shrub-of-texas yiddish ymca youtube-videos zombies