Wow, three weeks into September. Quiet, mostly. Trying to get my ass in gear with the important stuff that I’ve been neglecting most of the year. But much as I really don’t want anyone else telling me what to do, I’m a poor taskmaster for myself. I know I can ignore myself, and do. Anyway, not interesting, moving on.
What was interesting? I attended a fun get-together of the local Savoynetters to hold a post-mortem/dish the dirt about our recent Mikado. I won’t dish the dirt here, since almost everyone involved is a friend and I don’t want to piss anyone off, but I think the general consensus is that our Mikado was not a success, even though it was well-cast and we performed it well. Because of the concept, it wasn’t colorful, and the costumes weren’t particularly interesting, and there wasn’t a ton of movement to compensate. I have always found that Mikado, despite its brilliance in both script and score, loses its charm on repetition. Something about the surprise of the humor and many many plot twists and jokes are essential – if you know they’re coming or already know they’re there, what’s left is to enjoy the production values and the singing. The singing we had, for the most part. But Mikado, in contrast to – say – Pirates (which is always funny if it’s halfway good), just isn’t that much fun the 20th time around, and most of our audience had those other 19 Mikados under their belt.
We’re all excited, though, about the potential in the two shows we’re doing next year: The Zoo (a cute little one-act by Sullivan, but not Gilbert) and HMS Pinafore, which we haven’t performed since 2007. More on that anon.
I also had my neighbors down to watch the Emmys. That was fun, and although the impetus was more to catch up with the neighbors than rooting for various TV shows, I found I’d seen enough stuff this year that I generally had favorites. We talked TV in general, of course – there was a lot of , “have you seen X?”, and for me, the answer is generally “no”. There is so much content now, so good, and I have been rotating through a lot of stuff. I finished Season 1 of “Poker Face” and currently rotating through (in random order) Bosch:Legacy, Northern Exposure, Only Murders in the Building, Hacks, The English Teacher, Succession and Resident Alien. That, plus the MSNBC stuff, is plenty.
Oo, I got a ticket after work last Wednesday to Once Upon a Mattress. It’s a show I’ve never done, but I saw the last Broadway revival with Sarah Jessica Parker (I liked it a lot), I’ve seen at least two TV productions, and local company Blue Hill Troupe did a great job with it a few seasons ago. I love Sutton Foster, and Winnifred is a much better role for her than Mrs. Lovett or Marian the Librarian (although she’s welcome to expand her wheelhouse any way she wants, it will always be some form of good). And I love Michael Urie, who I’d seen recently enough in Spamalot, although he bowed out after Act I, missing his big song.
This production was another transfer from Encores!, and I do get fed up with a setless show at Broadway prices, except I realized that, with the orchestra in the back behind the castle walls (floating above the moat, essentially), the only thing I would have had with a set is a blue sky backdrop instead. The cast was really great across the board. Sutton Foster and Michael Urie were both delightful. My favorite bit from Sutton is she would ‘poke’ people as a joke, but do it with her foot. And Prince Dauntless is so cossetted, he doesn’t actually know how to go up stairs (which turns into a very funny physical bit), although he figures it out at the end. Ana Gasteyer, who hadn’t gotten flawless reviews, was fine, I thought, as Aggravain, and David Patrick Kelly, who was such a delight as the Narrator/Mysterious Man in the last Into the Woods, was again delightful as the silent King. Understudy Ben Davis was on for Prince Harry – I liked him so much I sent him a fan email. (I think I saw him as either Lindquist or Carl-Magnus in the last Broadway Night Music. He’s very … handsome.) Nikki Renee Daniels was a charming Larkin. And Brooks Ashmankas and Daniel Breaker were fun in their roles. (I was confused, because I kept waiting for the cute trio involving the silent king that I remembered from the last production I saw, but it never came and afterward, I realized that two of those three characters had been combined into one, so no trio…)
So… recommended!
I got my COVID booster on Friday afternoon and, accordingly, planned nothing for Saturday, figuring I’d be laid out. And I was… got nothing done, But felt better in the afternoon than in the morning and, inspired by my Succession watching – where Matthew MacFadyen plays (wonderfully) a character completely different from his Darcy, I decided to rewatch the 2005 Pride & Prejudice. I belong to that huge mass of populace that adores the 1995 BBC series above all things, and didn’t particularly like the 2005 movie the first time I saw it. It’s rushed, of course, compared to the 6-hour miniseries, and made me wonder how it was even understandable to someone who didn’t already know the story. But I enjoyed it a lot more this time. All the Bennet sisters are great (and they’ve all gone on to do really interesting things afterward – I mean, Kitty, the least interesting sister, is played by Carey Mulligan, of all people). Mrs. Bennet and Mr. Collins aren’t as delightfully bitch-slap-worthy as their predecessors (which you could say is either good or bad). The deliberately more ‘rural’ depiction of Longbourne can be startling, especially the shot of a big fat pig with enormous testicles being led through – it can’t be the house, can it? Why are we seeing this? Donald Sutherland is always wonderful, but in this movie, he looks like he smells bad. MacFadyen’s Darcy is even more subdued (and not as handsome) than Colin Firth’s. This is all faint praise – and friends of mine have pointed out that a lot of the costuming is risible, but I don’t know enough to know what they’re talking about – but there is some really fine acting going on and some beautiful cinematography and certainly better wigs than the BBC. Anyway, I’m glad I watched it again, and I certainly appreciate MacFayden’s performance more than I did the first time around, but it will never be my go-to.
Big birthday week. More on that when the time comes.
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