Frozen at the Eccles

I had the chance to see a preview of the musical Frozen in Denver before it transferred to Broadway and I absolutely loved it!  I was so excited to see it again last night while the Broadway touring production is making a stop at the Eccles Theater through November 13.  The musical follows the movie pretty closely and begins with a young Elsa (Natalie Grace Chan) and a young Anna (Victoria Hope Chan) building a snowman together.  When Elsa accidentally freezes Anna with her mysterious powers, the King (Kyle Lamar Mitchell) and Queen (Marina Kondo) tell her than she must hide herself away from Anna and the rest of Arendelle.  When the King and Queen are lost at sea, Elsa (Caroline Bowman) must open the doors of the castle once again for her coronation.  She loses control of herself, with devastating consequences, when Anna (Caroline Innerbichler) requests permission to marry Hans of the Southern Isles (Austin Colby) and she flees Arendelle.  Anna follows her, hoping to save Arendelle from the endless winter, and is aided by an ice harvester named Kristoff (Mason Reeves), his reindeer Sven (Evan Strand), and Olaf (F. Michael Haynie), the snowman built by Elsa and Anna as young girls.  Elsa fears that she is a monster but it is her ability to love that ultimately saves Anna and Arendelle.  Many of the well-known songs from the movie are included, such as "Do You Want to Build a Snowman," "For the First Time in Forever," "Love is an Open Door," and, of course, "Let It Go," but my favorite songs are two new ones, "Dangerous to Dream" and "Monster," because they provide more insight into Elsa's character.  I also really loved a song that was added since I saw it in Denver called "I Can't Lose You" because Bowman and Innerbichler sing it so beautifully.  The sets and costumes are also informed by the movie as are the delightful puppets used for Sven and Olaf.  The special effects in this show are dazzling!  I especially loved it when the young Elsa makes it snow inside the castle and when the frozen Anna is thawed by Elsa.  However, "Let It Go" is absolutely magical with projections in sync with Elsa's gestures and a quick costume change.  All of the little girls sitting near me were giggling with delight (and I may have been, as well).  This is such a fun show to welcome patrons back to the Eccles Theater and I highly recommend getting a ticket (go here).

Ass at PTC

Last night I went to see the world premiere, delayed twice by Covid, of Ass at Pioneer Theatre and, while I found it to be incredibly thought-provoking, I did not particularly enjoy it.  Jule Waterman (T. Ryder Smith) is a world-renowned artist known for his larger than life sculptures of specific body parts that are so captivating they suggest the whole person.  He is a genius but he is narcissistic and difficult.  He is also suffering from kidney disease which necessitates daily dialysis treatments while he waits for a transplant.  He is married to Tory (Laura J. Hall), a significantly younger woman who is the latest in a long string of wives and girlfriends.  Because she is insecure about her importance in his life, she is desperate to be immortalized in one of Jule's sculptures.  His son Will (Ben Cherry) has been immortalized in sculpture but he still feels unimportant to his father.  His wife Ana (Elizabeth Ramos) is anxious to have a child but she can't conceive and needs expensive IVF treatments.  She pressures Will to return to his childhood home to ask his father for a loan and Tory pressures Jule to ask Will for a kidney so he can continue working on a sculpture of her.  It takes a dialysis nurse named Ray (Vince McGill) to get Jule and Will to express their feelings to each other.  The title of the play comes from the imposing sculpture in progress that completely dominates Jule's living space (I liked the set which is an eclectic New York loft complete with an elevator) and from the fact that every character (with the possible exception of Ray) behaves like one.  Even though the subject of familial relationships is universal I couldn't really relate to any of the characters because they are so unlikable and the unnatural dialogue, which sometimes seems really bombastic, keeps them at such a distance.  Most of the humor falls flat (I only laughed once and I can't even remember what prompted it) and there are surprisingly few emotionally satisfying moments.  I did find some of the themes to be compelling, such as the degree to which someone should be indulged simply because they are a genius and how the children of famous people suffer by comparison yet often ride the coattails of their parents to unearned fame.  This show is interesting but I didn't love it as much as other productions at PTC.  It runs through Nov. 6 (go here for information and tickets).

Ron's Gone Wrong

Last night I finally had the chance to see Ron's Gone Wrong and it is both a touching story of friendship and a cautionary tale about the dangers of social media.  Barney (Jack Dylan Grazer) is a socially awkward teen who feels even more left out because he is the only student at Nonsuch Middle School who doesn't have a B-Bot.  Mark Weidell (Justice Smith), the CEO of the Bubble corporation (a tech giant obviously modeled on Apple), has created a robot that uses information from an owner's online profile to become his or her best friend and to find other online friends but Andrew Morris (Rob Delaney), the COO of Bubble, has more sinister plans for the B-Bot.  When Barney's dad (Ed Helms) and his Bulgarian grandmother (Olivia Colman) realize how much he wants a B-Bot, they go to the Bubble store but are told that there is a three month wait-list to get one.  Not wanting to disappoint him, they pay a delivery man under the table for one that fell off the truck.  Barney's B-Bot, named Ron (Jack Galifianakis), is defective and cannot download any of the software or connect to the Bubble network.  Barney tries to take Ron back but ends up bonding with him and decides to teach him manually how to be his friend.  Ron ends up teaching Barney how to be a friend and helps him to reconnect with the friends he had in elementary school.  What I loved most about this movie is that Ron serves as real friend to Barney rather than an online one and I loved the scenes where they are laughing and having fun playing together.  I also think it is interesting that all of Ron's former friends, Savannah (Kylie Cantrall), Rich (Ricardo Hurtado), Noah (Cullen McCarthy) and Ava (Ava Morse), ultimately become disillusioned with their B-Bots and find a more meaningful connection with Barney.  This is a theme that I particularly enjoy (go here and here).  The character design of Ron is really cute and Galifianakis's portrayal of him is incredibly endearing.  I also enjoyed all of the subtle humor, especially the digs at Apple (as someone who dislikes the Apple store intensely, I absolutely loved that the Bubble store employees, with their tablets in hand, could do nothing to fix Ron because it mirrors my own experience exactly).  As a former teacher, the docking station for the B-Bots at the school made me laugh out loud.  This is a really fun movie with a lot of heart and I highly recommend it.

Ballet West's Dracula

Last night I went to see Dracula, the first production of Ballet West's 2021-2022 season and the first large-scale ballet performed since the pandemic.  I was really looking forward to this ballet and I loved it!  In Act I Dracula (Chase O'Connell) emerges, dramatically, from a tomb in the crypt of his castle and summons all of his brides who dance at his command.  I loved the choreography because Dracula controls them with just a glance or a gesture and he works them up into a frenzy where they leap (and sometimes fly) across the stage.  Dracula's chief henchman, Renfield (Joshua Whitehead), brings a young woman named Flora (Emily Adams) to the castle in a horse-drawn carriage (I loved that the horses are portrayed by dancers).  With the help of his brides, Dracula detains her and then beguiles her in a gorgeous Pas de Deux before transforming her.  In Act II an Innkeeper (Jordan Veit) and his wife (Katlyn Addison, my favorite dancer with Ballet West) are celebrating the birthday of their daughter Svetlana (Beckanne Sisk) with a group of villagers who perform various folkloric dances (I especially loved the use of ribbons in these dances).  Svetlana is in love with a villager named Frederick (Hadriel Diniz) who asks her father for permission to marry her and, when it is granted, they dance another beautiful Pas de Deux.  They also dance a series of solos and I especially liked it when Svetlana twirls on her heels (I'm sure there is a proper term for this).  Dracula, who has heard of Svetlana's beauty, sends Flora, now under his control, into the village and they capture her.  In Act III Flora and the brides prepare Dracula's bedchamber in the castle (Flora flies dramatically across the stage and this made me gasp out loud) for Svetlana's arrival.  Dracula beguiles Svetlana in another amazing Pas de Deux where she appears to glide across the stage.  Frederick and several others from the village arrive at the castle to rescue Svetlana and a battle ensues (with some great special effects).  In addition to the choreography and performances, I loved the music by Franz Liszt (some of the themes reminded me of Symphonie Fantastique by Hector Berlioz), the costumes (especially the cape worn by Dracula which, when unfurled, looks like a bat's wings and the ethereal white dresses worn by the brides), and the sets (particularly the dark and atmospheric crypt in the castle).  I enjoyed this beautiful production so much that I now count Dracula among my favorite ballets and I highly recommend attending one of the remaining performances (go here for tickets and information).

James Taylor at the Maverik Center

I really love James Taylor and I have seen him live many times at many different venues including, rather memorably, the LDS Conference Center with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and the Utah Symphony.  I try to see him whenever I can and I was so excited when he announced a new tour.  The SLC show was originally scheduled for the last day of school in 2020 so I bought a ticket thinking that it would be the perfect way to celebrate my retirement.  We all know how that turned out!  Fortunately, the concert was rescheduled and I enjoyed it just as much last night.  The opening act was Jackson Browne and, since I had never seen him live before, I was looking forward to his set as much as Taylor's.  He sang quite a few of his more recent songs and I enjoyed them even though I didn't recognize them as much as the hits.  I loved "Somebody's Baby" at the beginning of the set, "Doctor My Eyes" in the middle, and "Running on Empty" at the end.  Another highlight was "The Pretender" because he was joined on stage by Taylor, to the delight of the audience.  Taylor began his set with "Country Road" and then included a few of his lesser known songs in the first half.  Of these, I really enjoyed "As Easy As Falling Off a Log" from his latest album, American Standard (which consists of covers from the American songbook), and I also liked his renditions of "Mexico" and "Steamroller" because his incredibly talented band basically turned these songs into improvisational jam sessions.  However, I have to admit that I absolutely loved the second half of the show because he played his most well-known hits, including "Sweet Baby James," "Fire and Rain," "Carolina in My Mind," and "Shower the People" (one of my favorite songs).  He ended the set with an emotional performance of "How Sweet It Is (To Be Loved by You)."  For the encore, he sang a cover of the Eagles song "Take It Easy" with Jackson Browne (which Browne co-wrote with Glenn Frey), a beautiful acoustic version of "You've Got a Friend," and "You Can Close Your Eyes" with his son Henry.  Taylor told lots anecdotes about his songs (at one point he said that his intro to a song was longer than the song itself) and his interactions with the audience were really funny (when multiple people yelled that they loved him he said that it was becoming a bidding war).  It was a wonderful show that was definitely worth the wait!

Note:  There is always one song from an artist's back catalog that I want to hear and with James Taylor it is "Handy Man."  I wasn't too disappointed that it wasn't included last night because I've heard him sing it before.