4 Seasons Total Sh!tshow! (Fringe22)

 Spoilers ahoy!

Anybody remember when Rudy Guiliani held a press conference at the "Four Seasons" in Philadelphia to "prove" election fraud?  Only no one had hired out the actual Four Seasons so they held it at a landscaping company?  This was right after the 2020 election.

The 4 Seasons Total Sh!tshow is a wonderful script with some very fine actors, focusing on one of very many absurd events vis-a-vis the 2020 election.

I emphasize the script is funny.  I want also to emphasize the cast are clearly very talented.

But it is seriously under-rehearsed.  I asked one of the producers about this and learned several cast members were felled (temporarily) by Covid just before opening.  Oh.  My.  God.  That is a horror story.  But it has had an impact on the timing and flow of this otherwise delightful farce.  

The 4 Seasons Total Sh!tshow plays Wednesday June 22 at 6pm and Saturday June 25 at 5pm, 2022, at the Stephanie Fleury Studio, 5636 Melrose Avenue.

The Legend of Georgia McBride (review)

Spoilers ahoy! 

I enjoyed this show immensely.  Even the concept alone grabbed my attention.  Imagine of you will a struggling Elvis impersonator (Taubert Nadalini) in Panama City (which is on the Florida Gulf Coast--I grew up across the bay from it in real life) with a loving wife (Karese Frizell).  The owner (Tom Trudgeon) of the bar decides to try hiring a drag show in hopes of bringing in customers, headlining his cousin (Jeff Sumner) and her friend (Donzell Lewis), the latter of whom drinks a bit too much.  One night, said drinking makes a performance impossible.  Our lead ends up having to go on instead, in a panic but with a theatre background that says The Show Must Go On!

And in the process, he finds out not only does he have a huge talent in this direction, he also loves it very much.  To his own personal shock, btw.  Amidst his panic, he also makes a big mistake--namely, not telling his wife the complete truth of where all this extra income is coming from.  Which in turn blows up in his face, big time.

But all that is just an outline.  As promising as that outline looks, what counts is the execution--which was great!  I had such a delicious time my only real regret was being alone so I had someone to gush with about the show on my way home!  Yes, the performances were all good (including a bunch of truly delightful lip-sync drag numbers, of ever-increasing energy and power), but what I loved most was the execution of this story.  Each character had their own arc, their own moments to shine, their own understandable motives as well as revelations.  My one worry early on was that the show might simply exploit this cultural element that is drag, but by the middle of the second act that worry had vanished in a puff of sparkling smoke.  The Legend of Georgia McBride is more than a flamboyant show that uses drag, it respects and appreciates it, without demanding we share one specific point of view on the subject.

Which helps make this one of the best pieces of theatre I've seen all year!  Strongly recommended not only to tickle your funny bone, but touch your heart, open your mind, and put a grin on your face.

The Legend of Georgia McBride plays Thursday, Friday, Saturday at 8pm and Sunday at 2pm until June 26, 2022 at the Long Beach Performing Arts Center, 330 East Seaside Way Long Beach, CA 90802.

To Bah or Not To Bah Humbug (Fringe 22)

 Spoilers ahoy!

I don't know who came up with the idea of fusing Hamlet with A Christmas Carol but kudos to the comedy weirdness!  The result is To Bah or Not to Bah Humbug! all about Scroogelet and the visit of the ghost from his former partner 

Everything about this show is fun.  The music, the musicians (especially the very dark lyrics), the oddly steampunk/elizabethan aesthetic, etc.  Full of energy, the jokes come fast and furious, but along the way some startling moments of pathos, even poignancy emerge.  Which is part of what makes it work.

I suppose it could do with a little more rehearsal, and a bit of polish.  The result would be better, but that might imply there's anything wrong with what we get.  But no, it remains delightful.

To Bah or Not to Bah Humbug! plays at the Broadwater Sunday June 19 at 2pm, Friday June 24 at 10pm, and Sunday June 26 at 11am (30 minutes).

Beautiful Monsterz (Fringe 22)

 Spoilers ahoy! 

A riff on Oscar Wilde's The Painting of Dorian Gray (it even says as much in the press release) Beautiful Monsterz updates the setting to the modern world of models and advertising.

So far, so good.  Rather wittily, the product being sold within the show is a cream which promises to slow down aging.  The slogan "You won't only look beautiful, you will BE beautiful" is well and cool.  The parallels with Wilde's classic novel work nicely.

What doesn't work is that the Dorian character, Lori Green (which is clever) has no real arc into depravity other than getting high, breaking into an office, then breaking up with her boyfriend.  Compare this to treating someone so brutally they commit suicide.  The leap of one year later to reveal Lori willing to commit murder on a whim, then demanding she face the consequences--this arc is not a journey but a huge leap over plot holes that qualify as chasms.  

The problem here frankly seems this is a full length play idea squeezed into less than an hour.  Lacking much context, the musings and emotional journeys of the central characters seem to come out of left field.  Methinks there's something really powerful and worthwhile in here somewhere, but in its current written form all the effort to bring it out is on the cast--and frankly they seemed to lack enough (or very well-used) time to develop that.  Most obviously, I don't think most of them usually knew exactly what they were really saying or why.  But again, they lacked any context to find that.

But I really hope the playwright expands on this and workshops it out a lot.  It could be magnificent, instead of simply interesting.

Beautiful Monsterz plays Friday June 17 at 11pm and Tuesday June 21 at 8pm at the Broadwater Second Stage.