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| Sheena Easton brings poise and star quality to an energetic revival that suffers from its bloodless and out of date source material |
We attended the musical 42nd Street at Eau Claire Centre Cineplex via HD live.
This show is the West End revival of March 2017 at the Royal Drury Lane. One of the best lines from the musical is when the character Julian Marsh (Tom Lister) says the most beautiful words in the English language are (with a long pause), musical theatre. Debatable? Yes. But not when I am sitting in the theatre and watching tap dancing and singing of this nature.
On the way home Lurene said she couldn’t get the melody of “42nd Street” out of her mind. I thought back to the other oldie, “Lullaby of Broadway” and “I Only have Eyes for You”. Each of those songs was worth the price of the ticket alone.
Lurene and I both commented on why this might be the musical that we hear Wyona rave about so much. The change of sets of astonishing, the costumes were exquisite, the melodies of the songs, lush, and occasionally a single instrument wound its way around a verbal complaint, of leads Dorothy Brock (Maggie Jones), known for her inability to dance, or Peggy Sawyer (Bonnie Langford),whose feet tapped their way across the stage and back with such style.
Sometimes I think back to those old musicals I saw in the 1940’s with my grandmother. I didn’t think life could get much better than that. Now a person can be transported to the London theatres via satellite. There is little need to feel sorry for myself because I can’t travel. Such great entertainment is available just a bus fare away. Lurene, Zoe and I were transported into the place of the two best words in the English language: musical theatre.
For those who may wish to take a look at newspaper reviews of the musical, here are three of them.
42nd Street review – move over, La La Land
42nd Street review – dancing and dazzle distract from jarringly sexist lyrics
Quality Street! This chorus line throwback is another winner: QUENTIN LETTS says you know you are in for a good night from the opening note of 42nd Street
I was reading about ear worms the other day since I couldn't get "the lusty month of May" out of my mind. Harriet Brown, writing for Scientific American, reports having had the same tune stuck in her head for 3 decades. Ouch. I have a tune stuck in my head from totallyadd.com, which is the tune from the "Bill's ADDventures." It pops into my head when I find myself not using my tools for addressing my ADD and something comical happens. For example, today I was showing off my basket at a convenience store, tossed in my purchases, and the basket tottered over onto the floor, my ADHD meds rolling out of the basket and under a shelf. Cue the tune ... "dun, duhdung, duhduh, duhduhduhduh, duh, duhduh, duh duh, duh duhduhduh, duh, tootoo tootootoo."
ReplyDeleteWhat is there to say, but "Oh no!" I would have helped you retrieve them. But I find when I get down on the floor like that (maybe to change the filter in my furnace, for example), I have to make sure there is some aid to help me get up afterwards -- like a chair close by. Otherwise, I have just created another problem that has to be solved.
ReplyDeleteOh yes. Got any new songs stuck in your head, lately? I have been practising the words to "I Know Where I'm Goin'" as I walk on the treadmill, and I can pretty well see each note on the staff as sing the tune now.
ReplyDelete