The Prom

I am a huge fan of musical theatre and, as such, I have a long list of shows that I want to see with The Prom near the top.  Since I can’t see it on the stage, seeing the movie adaptation last night was the next best thing. I had so much fun watching a feel-good story about having the courage to be who you are that is also a colorful and sparkly love letter to theatre!  I loved everything about it!  Down and out Broadway stars Dee Dee Allen (Meryl Streep) and Barry Glickman (James Corden) are commiserating over the fact that their show has closed on opening night because the critics don't like them as people.  They think the best way to resurrect their careers is to champion a cause to show the public that they care about something other than themselves.  They hear about a girl named Emma (Jo Ellen Pellman) in Indiana who wants to attend her high school prom with her girlfriend (Ariana DeBose).  Rather than allow this, Mrs. Greene (Kerry Washington), the head of the PTA, cancels the prom despite the support of the high school principal Tom Hawkins (Keegan-Michael Key).  They decide to help Emma and are joined by Trent Oliver (Andrew Rannells), an out of work actor who never fails to mention that he attended Juilliard, and Angie Dickinson (Nicole Kidman), a chorus girl who has been the understudy for Roxie Hart for twenty years, on a bus for a non-union tour of Godspell headed to Indiana.  They help get the prom reinstated for the good publicity but, when Emma suffers an additional heartache, they realize they actually do care about helping her have a night to celebrate who she really is.  I loved every single song but my favorites are "We Look to You," about the power of theatre (Keegan-Michael Key really surprised me with how good he is in this number), "Love Thy Neighbor," about the hypocrisy of believing that you are a good person when you hate and discriminate against those who are different than you, and "Unruly Heart," about the freedom to love who you want.  The choreography throughout is a lot of fun, especially the Fosse-inspired "Zazz" and the exuberant "It's Time to Dance." Streep is absolutely perfect as a narcissistic Broadway diva and I especially enjoyed her rendition of "It's Not About Me" because it is so over the top! There has been some controversy over the casting of Corden, who is straight, but his performance as a gay man rejected by his family is full of such pathos that it really feels authentic.  Despite the star power, I was most impressed with newcomer Pellman because she is absolutely luminous and her rendition of "Unruly Heart" is incredibly touching.  I also enjoyed Broadway veteran DeBose (she was in the original cast of Hamilton) and her song "Alyssa Greene" is one of the most powerful moments in the movie. I had a smile on my face from beginning to end (I laughed out loud at the many theatre references) and I am so glad that it will be streaming on Netflix soon because I want to watch over and over again!  Its message of acceptance is an important one and I highly recommend it (especially to theatre fans).

Half Brothers

Comedies are usually a hard sell for me but I decided to see Half Brothers because the trailer made me laugh out loud! I saw it last night in a packed theater (by Covid-19 standards) and it was a lot of fun.  Young Renato (Ian Inigo) and his father Flavio (Juan Pablo Espinoza) are inseparable and share a love of model airplanes and figuring out puzzles.  When the value of the peso declines in Mexico, Flavio feels that he has no choice but to travel to the United States to look for work.  He never returns and Renato (Luis Gerardo Mendez) grows up to becomes a cold and bitter, albeit successful, man.  When he receives a phone call requesting that he visit his dying father in Chicago, he is angry but he begrudging decides to go to appease his fiance Pamela (Pia Watson).  He learns that he has a heretofore unknown brother named Asher (Connor Del Rio) and that his father has arranged for the two of them to complete a scavenger hunt which will explain why he never returned to Mexico. The uptight Renato is jealous that the free-spirited Asher got all of their father's attention while he had no one to rely on but himself and Asher reveals that he always felt like he was a disappointment to their father.  Through a series of misadventures, they eventually bond with each other and learn some important lessons from their father.  The plot is a bit far-fetched, there are quite a few jabs at the politics and culture of the United States, and the humor sometimes feels forced and silly (especially the physical comedy involving a goat which is amusing but comes out of nowhere) but this movie is a surprisingly poignant look at the relationship between fathers and sons.  I laughed out loud, especially in a scene where the brothers have to rescue the goat (the needle drop here is hilarious), and I had a tear in my eye by the end of the scavenger hunt.  I enjoyed this so much (and so did the crowd at my screening) but I suspect that this is because there is a dearth of new releases right now rather than because it is a great movie so keep that in mind when deciding whether to see it or not!

The Cold Millions

The November selection for the Barnes & Noble Book Club was The Cold Millions by Jess Walter. I must admit that I really struggled with this because the subject matter was not particularly interesting to me and I found Walter's prose to be unnecessarily flowery. I picked it up and put it down again multiple times and barely got it finished before the live Q&A with the author on Tuesday. This sweeping historical novel, based on actual events, is set in the Pacific Northwest in 1909 and follows two orphan brothers from Montana who ride the rails looking for itinerant work. Gregory "Gig" and Ryan "Rye" Dolan end up in Spokane and get caught up the free speech demonstrations by the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), or Wobblies as they are more commonly known. Gig, the elder brother, is fiery and idealistic and and ends up in jail, along with hundreds of others, for giving a speech during a riot. Rye, desperate to get Gig released, becomes a pawn for an eccentric group of characters (both real and fictional) who use him for their own ends, including a wealthy industrialist hoping to eradicate the unions from his businesses, a vaudeville showgirl with competing alliances, a hard-boiled assassin out to prove he is still up for the job, a double-crossing anarchist with plans of his own, a Pinkerton detective who is not who he appears to be, and a union activist who happens to be 19 and pregnant. Will Gig survive the beatings and hunger strikes in prison with his idealism in tact? Will Rye sell his soul to save Gig? Will the unions do anything to change the inequality between the wealthy few and the cold millions who struggle to survive? It sounds like it would be a compelling read and most people in our virtual discussion thought it was. Unfortunately, I did not. There are a bewildering number of characters and the narrative alternates between too many different POVs. I sometimes found it difficult to keep all of them straight, especially all of the minor characters meant to provide color rather than advance the plot (I sometimes have the same problem with Dickens and Hugo). I was not very invested in any of the characters because they are kept at such a distance (maybe it is due to the aforementioned flowery prose) so it is hard to sympathize with any of them. I actually found Rye, the main protagonist, to be quite unappealing because he is so passive. He is merely swept along by the actions of other characters without really taking a stand and I was a bit disappointed with the epilogue because he seems to benefit from the labor movement throughout his life without much involvement. In fact, I thought the ending was anticlimactic after the slog to get through it but I appreciate the author's comment in our discussion about wanting to demonstrate that the struggle still continues today. I usually love historical fiction but this just didn't do it for me. I am clearly in the minority so I recommend reading it for yourself if the topic sounds interesting to you.

Note:  The Barnes & Noble Book Club is taking the month of December off and will return with a new selection in January.

A Christmas Carol at HCT 2020

With HCT's new guidelines for socially distanced seating (which I actually applaud), I didn't think that I would be able to see A Christmas Carol this year. Even though I have seen it more times than I can count, the thought of missing out on yet another Christmas tradition made me a bit sad. Then HCT released a few tickets last weekend and I quickly grabbed one for an early show yesterday afternoon! I enjoyed it so much, probably more than I ever have before! HCT's production is a lovely adaptation of the well-known classic by Charles Dickens about the reclamation of Ebeneezer Scrooge (David Weeks) by the Ghosts of Christmas Past (Jackie Spendlove), Present (Jonathan Fifield), and Future (Spencer Hohl). What I love most about HCT's production is the addition of Christmas music in between every scene by an octet (Brett Myers, Taylor J. Smith, Michael Von Forell, Josh Shimizu, Emily Hawkes, Mindi Hansen, Emily Leishman Roh, and Erin Camp Worland) and in certain party scenes by the characters. I love Christmas music so much and I think the addition really helps add to the mood. My favorite song by the octet is "What Child is This?" and I also really love "Bring a Torch Jeanette, Isabella" during the Fezziwig's party (it was my favorite song to sing when I was in the choir in college) and "It Came Upon a Midnight Clear" during Fred's party. This year they added a violin (Katie Frandsen) to the musical numbers and I loved it! Because I've seen this production so many times I always anticipate seeing the same actors return to the same role year after year but this year there were quite a few new faces!  I particularly loved Elijah Thomas as Charles Dickens/Fred because his performance of the opening prologue (it seems like it was expanded this year) gave me goosebumps, Anthony LeRoy Lovato as Bob Cratchit because he is so tender after the death of Tiny Tim, and Jonathan Fifeld as the Ghost of Christmas Present because he is jolly but also a little bit stern. Of course the young actor playing Tiny Tim (Payson Inkley) is absolutely adorable and he really works it when he says his iconic line at the end of the show. The elaborate Victorian sets on the turntable (I love the rag and bottle shop) and the opulent costumes effectively transport the audience back to London in the 1800s but, because I was sitting on the side in the back of the theatre, I sometimes had a hard time seeing all of the projections and I missed the climactic moment when the Ghost of Christmas Future shows Scrooge his name on the tombstone. It mattered not because this show is full of so much Christmas cheer that you can't help leaving the theatre with a smile on your face and a vow to keep Christmas in your heart all year long! I highly recommend getting a ticket and, last I heard, there are still some available for a few shows (go here)

Come Play

I really wanted to see Come Play when it was first released in October but, for one reason or another, I never made it.  I noticed that it was still playing in theaters and, since I had nothing to do last night, I decided to see it.  To be honest, the main reason I wanted to see it is because of Azhy Robertson who was so good in Marriage Story.  This time Robertson is Oliver, a young autistic boy who is non-verbal and uses electronic devices exclusively to communicate.  He is bullied by the kids at school and his parents, Sarah (Gillian Jacobs) and Marty (John Gallagher, Jr.), argue about what is best for him so he finds solace in watching Spongebob Squarepants whenever he feels isolated.  A children's story called Misunderstood Monsters suddenly appears on his phone and tablet and he reads about a monster named Larry who has no friends because he is different.  Larry tells Oliver that all he wants is for him to be his friend.  At first Larry manifests himself through various electronic devices but he soon enters the real world by draining power from electricity, most notably from lights, to terrorize everyone.  Ultimately, Oliver must decide if having Larry as a friend is better than having no one.  Reviews have been mixed but, while I wouldn't call this a great movie, I liked it more than I thought I would.  Robertson's performance is the best thing going for this movie (most of the other performances are incredibly bland) and, even though he has almost no dialogue, his facial expressions and body language convey so many different emotions.  He is riveting, especially in the scenes where he is overstimulated.  The message that screens are no substitute for human interaction gets a bit muddled in the execution but it is definitely thought-provoking, especially now when so many things are virtual rather than face to face.  There are a few really menacing sequences, particularly when Larry appears in front of Oliver's friends at a sleepover (which is incredibly scary!), but for the most part the narrative relies on cheap jump scares rather than on atmosphere.  It is inconsistent but I enjoyed it enough to recommend it to fans of the genre.