Some Dreams Do Come True

Okay so I haven't posted my thoughts about "Equus" or "Mary Poppins" (I didn't see "In the Heights" like I thought I would). But I will, eventually. Things are just busy. In the meantime, I'd like to share Susan Boyle with all of you.


Ms. Boyle, of Blackburn, Scotland, decided to go on "Britain's Got Talent" because, as she said, she'd always wanted to sing before a large crowd. She sang "I Dreamed a Dream," and she gave the song a completely different meaning to me. Her version, also, is the only one that has ever gotten me verklempt. Truly. I would post the video itself but YouTube has disabled the embedding feature for this clip.

UPDATE:

I found a copy of her performance:

Foreshadowing

Ladies and gents, it's been a long time since I reviewed anything on my own. My last stage review was this summer, with The Muny's production of "My One and Only."

Fear not, though. This weekend I am making a much-anticipated trip to Broadway. Yes, I will visit the Great White Way. The Fabulous Invalid. For the first time, no less!

I'm going to visit a friend who lives in New York; sadly I won't be able to visit all my friends this go-around, so I know I'll have to return. But while I am there, I do plan to take in some theatre. Friday night I'll see a play that will close soon: "Equus." It stars Harry Potter star Daniel Radcliffe. I'm excited. I will also see something new: "In the Heights." I'm not sure how much I'll love a show of hip-hop and rap, but I'm going to be a trooper (trouper?). Ad majorem Dei gloriam, or something.

So, expect a review or two soon!

A New Season at The Muny

The Muny has announced it's 2009 season. Four shows are a repeat from 2004 (Annie, 42nd Street, Meet Me in St. Louis, and The Music Man); 5 years is the minimum lapse time The Muny requires before restaging a show. Godspell had a 6-year lapse, being last performed in 2003. Camelot has waited the longest, with a 7-year lapse; this is not entirely surprising because The Muny has restaged the other Lerner and Loewe classic, My Fair Lady, since then, and because the last production of Camelot received some mixed reviews.

The "premier" show this season will be Hairspray. Not surprising at all. The show has been on ballots for a while. Key to The Muny's acquisition of production rights, however, has been the announcement that the Broadway production will close on 9 January 2009. The Muny rarely produces a show that is on Broadway; this rule staved off productions of both Miss Saigon and Les Miserables until their Broadway runs closed.

Hairspray also should bring in large crowds. No doubt it will be a high-expense show, but it should also be a high-income show. Public awareness of the musical has been high since the 2007 film starring John Travolta was released.

The Muny is currently on nerve's edge due to the Highway 40 closing. Personally I think the worst is behind the theatre. The closing between I-270 and I-170 was painful because there was no easy way to get around it; Clayton and Manchester Roads were not designed for such heavy traffic, and I-44 is pretty far south.

Now, however, the highway is closed between I-170 and Kingshighway. Most theatregoers traveling from the east exit Highway 40 at Kingshighway anyway, so the closing will only hurt the few brave west-bound commuters who attempted to exit at Hampton. Furthermore, the closure at I-170 for east-bound commuters (e.g., residents of Chesterfield or Town & Country), is mitigated by the new Forest Park Parkway and the direct access to I-170 from Highway 40. Drivers' first stop from the highway is at Pershing, which is closer to the theatre than many probably think.

No matter what the traffic patterns are, however, Hairspray should get people to the theatre this summer. The Muny also banks on Annie, the "kids" show, to fill the theatre with small children in full-price seats. I've questioned this assumption before, in part because of the number of free tickets it hands out to the children in the chorus, but no matter. It makes The Muny's board sleep soundly at night.

42nd Street is another show that will pull in big crowds, without the need to entice children. The dancing (rightfully) was astounding five years ago, and I don't doubt that The Muny will get that right again this year. If The Muny does nothing else correctly, it can at least pull off a song-and-dance show like nobody's business.

I'm also looking forward to The Music Man. I'm openly partial to Kim Crosby, who was Marian 5 years ago, but I'm being realistic: she probably won't be back. Le sigh. Camelot should be a good show, too, unless King Arthur is as flaccid as overcooked broccoli (I hope I don't repeat that line this summer).

Godspell and Meet Me in St. Louis are okay. My favorites they are not, but who gets everything they want for Christmas? Certainly not I. But I will do my best to judge them fairly.

I know, it's new for me. Consider it my New Year's resolution to the four of you who read this!

The Advocate Review: "Were the World Mine"

Yesterday's edition of The Advocate reviewed "Were the World Mine." I know this is the third post in a row on this film, but whatever.

High School Musical
With charm and imagination to spare, the magic of Were the World Mine is worth singing about
By Kyle Buchanan

Queer culture may be “fabulous,” but the world of gay independent film hasn’t lived up to that glittery standard as of late; too many modern gay films are small, hermetic, and shot in a style that aspires to little more than single-camera sitcom quality. Into that world, then, the new musical Were the World Mine arrives like a bolt from the blue. If gay film has seemed for too long to be stuck in a black-and-white Kansas rut, Were the World Mine feels like a glorious Technicolor Oz by comparison.

For sensitive teenager Timothy (Tanner Cohen), all the world’s a stage – at least inside his head. There, he retreats from high school bullies by imagining musical fantasias that often star sexy jock Jonathon (Nathaniel David Becker). Still, despite his yearning for the theatre, Timothy has to be talked into trying out for the lead in the school’s big production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, directed by unconventional drama teacher Ms. Tebbit (Wendy Robie). Soon enough, Shakespeare’s plot plays itself out in real life as mischievous Timothy, who ends up playing Puck, begins to scramble the sexuality of those around him, using a mysterious magic flower to drive Jonathon into his arms and to send the school bullies screaming out of the closet.

For a low-budget production, World looks fantastic – the cinematography is rich and the choreography is continuously inventive – but its biggest asset is Jessica Fogle’s beautiful score. Adapted from Shakespeare’s own test, Were the World Mine’s songs swoop and soar, and the actors nail every falsetto. The film’s not perfect (a pointless subplot following Timothy’s mother as she sells makeup door-to-door seems to have wandered in from a completely different movie, and should have been excised), but that’s almost part of its charm. Like an unexpectedly terrific high school musical, Were the World Mine has an infectious “let’s put on a show” vitality.

The film’s sense of discovery extends to its cast of young newcomers and scarcely seen veterans. Cohen’s perpetually frowning portrayal of Timothy is so right-on as an awkward, shy teenager that it’s a thrill to watch him come alive during the film’s musical numbers, which he brings off with a rich, confident voice. Just as fun is his “heteroflexible” best friend, Frankie (Zelda Williams, daughter of Robin), who announces, “I’m straight, but shit happens.” Still, the cast’s most valuable performer is surely Robie (who memorably played the eyepatch-clad Nadine Hurley on Twin Peaks). As the eccentric drama teacher, she takes what could have been a hammy role and imbues it with serene warmth. She’s the encouraging mentor every musical theatre-loving gay boy wishes he could have had.

During World’s barnstorming tour of the gay festival circuit this year, director Tom Gustafson was repeatedly asked if he had any plans to adapt the film for the stage – the film itself was adapted from his 2003 short Fairies. He claimed not to, saying he’s ready to move on to different material, but it’s not hard to see the film becoming a hit on the stage. Like Hollywood, Broadway has suffered lately from lumbering, expensive projects short on originality and imagination – two qualities Were the World Mine has in spades. Don’t be surprised if, on the film’s final curtain call, audiences stand up and applaud.

NY Times Review: "Were the World Mine"

The film "Were the World Mine" has been designated a Critics' Pick by the New York Times!

Puck’s Love Potion, Splashed Across Town
By Stephen Holden
Published: November 21, 2008

What teenager hasn’t fantasized about wielding magic to transform an indifferent object of desire into a besotted lover? In “Were the World Mine,” an indie alternative to Disney’s “High School Musical” franchise, Timothy (Tanner Cohen), a persecuted gay student at a private boys’ school outside Chicago, acquires such magic while rehearsing the role of Puck in “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.”

When a purple flower spurting Cupid’s love juice mysteriously springs up in Titania’s bower, Timothy plucks it and later tosses its liquid into the eyes of his secret crush, Jonathon (Nathaniel David Becker), the ostensibly straight star of the rugby team. Mutual puppy love is instantaneous and intense.

In Timothy/Puck’s prankish scheme, every helpless target of such magic falls madly in love with the first person in sight, inappropriate or not. And for the next 24 hours Timothy dashes around his small town making unsuspecting homophobes, including the rugby coach, fall ridiculously in love with dumbfounded members of the same sex; before long, the streets are crawling with cow-eyed, spooning gay couples.

This small, endearing film, directed by Tom Gustafson from a screenplay he wrote with Cory James Krueckeberg, has already won a number of awards, including outstanding narrative feature at Outfest, the Los Angeles Gay and Lesbian Film Festival. In its giddiness, “Were the World Mine” echoes “High School Musical 3” right down to featuring balletic choreography on a basketball court.

With original music by Jessica Fogle, and lyrics (some original and others adapted from Shakespeare) by Mr. Krueckeberg, it is an enchanting, mildly subversive fantasia that reconciles sassy teenage argot with Elizabethan. One moment it is this, the next that. Ms. Fogle’s most striking music, especially the title song, sets Shakespearean dialogue in an ethereal Minimalist style that has the entranced intensity of centuries-old sacred music.

The movie doesn’t burst into song all that often. Some numbers are no more than clever asides, played on guitar and sung by Timothy’s sullen friend Frankie (Zelda Williams, daughter of Robin), a self-possessed tomboy who describes herself as “hetero-flexible.” Frankie morosely takes it in stride when Timothy experiments with the love juice on Max (Ricky Goldman), his best friend and her crush.

A subplot involves Timothy’s embattled relationship with his divorced mother, Donna (Judy McLane), who is having difficulty coming to terms with his sexuality. Donna takes a job as a door-to-door saleswoman for the cosmetics line invented by Nora (Jill Larson), the vain, bigoted wife of the school’s stuffy headmaster (David Darlow).

To some degree, Donna and Nora are John Waters-style female caricatures. So is the film’s mysteriously powerful guardian angel, Ms. Tebbit (Wendy Robie), the airy, arty English teacher who casts the Shakespeare production, oversees rehearsals and refuses to shut it down after the town goes erotically bonkers.

Ms. Robie, who bears a strong resemblance to Patricia Clarkson, plays the teacher as a benign sorceress who wears a secretive smile while using “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” to impart some lessons in tolerance. In what is shown of the final production, the gawky high school boys playing both men’s and women’s roles have turned into graceful actors comfortable with Elizabethan English.

“Were the World Mine” begins tentatively, but once its tone is established, its charm overcomes the inevitable weaknesses of a musical made on a stringent budget. Like its Disney counterparts, it operates on the assumption that the movie musical is a world unto itself in which ordinary rules of logic don’t apply. One thing doesn’t have to lead to another, and not everything need be explained. Movie-musical magic makes up the difference.

Movie Review: Were the World Mine

I think I've seen my favorite film for 2008-2009.

"Were the World Mine" is currently playing the film festival circuit, and it has gathered an impressive resume of wins - with good reason. With a funny script and wildly-imagined songs, the film is a fantastical/musical take on "A Midsummer Night's Dream."

Set in an all-boys school in a small town (population: 10,000), WTWM asks what would happen if a down-and-out gay high school boy, Timothy, cast as Puck in the Shakespearean comedy, were equipped with that fairy's magical pansy, and could make anybody fall in love at first sight. Answer: just what you would expect; he turns everyone else gay and lets them walk a mile in his shoes. When he finally turns everybody back to straight again, the townsfolk no longer condemn him with biblical verse; they embrace him instead.

The film has a slow start as we experience Timothy's growing pains and adult-approved ostracism. The other boys at school pick on him; his mother harps on him constantly; his father is missing (presumably because he couldn't handle having a gay kid). He reluctantly auditions for the senior play, AMND, and is surprised as anyone else to be cast as Puck. When he expresses his frustration at not understanding what's going on in the play, his eccentric director encourages him to press on by merging the rhythm of the verses with the words themselves. When he does so, he unlocks a secret potion that creates the magical pansy. When he turns it on the star rugby player at school, Jonathan, he realizes its full potential and starts using it on all the other boys at school who had caused him so much grief. Implicitly encouraged by the director, he teaches his classmates a valuable lesson about acceptance and embracing people despite any differences they have.

The film has a definite "gay" slant to it, but it is hardly a gay movie. The film does not emphasize sex or gratuitous nudity (although...) but instead focuses on Timothy's difficulties fitting in, and his retribution for getting harassed.

My favorite scenes were Timothy's musical fantasies, in which he imagined Jonathan lying on the teacher's desk with his shirt completely unbuttoned, or where he imagined a scene from the play in which all of the rugby players are his little fairies, dancing around him. There were other entertaining scenes in front of the courthouse or at the school fair, but those two were my favorites.

Thankfully the film will be released to cinemas in the coming weeks. St. Louis's Tivoli Theatre will play it in January, and the DVD should be available this coming spring. I may have to watch it again; I loved it that much.

A Good Day in St. Louis

It must be a good day to be in St. Louis or Columbia; I wish I were there to join the festivities. Thirty years of losing - badly - to Nebraska in their own stadium ended in a 52-17 win for the Mizzou Tigers last night. Coach Pinkel even sent in third-string players while the Huskers were still on their first string.

More importantly, though: justice, oh sweet justice was served up Los Angeles-style last night in Chavez Ravine. The Chicago Cubs lost the NLDS 3-0 to the LA Dodgers; the final score in Game 3 was 3-1. I don't have cable in my apartment, so I was unable to watch the game at home. Most of my friends also had other plans last night, so around 11:30 I decided to take a walk around the neighborhood and see if I could catch bits of the game from televisions in the local bars. I'll ya what - this town gets awfully quiet when they're staring down defeat. It's like they don't have 100 years of practice or something.

Congrats, Dodgers. And way to go, Tigers!