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Aug. 12th, 2007
Jerry! Jerry! Jerry!
Aug. 12th, 2007 07:33 pmLast night I attended the second performance of the second production of Jerry Springer: The Opera at Playhouse On The Square, featuring Mrs. Cwabs in the chorus.
Everything after this paragraph might just be a spoiler.
JS:TO is ultimately a weak show, well-performed. The first act strikes a pitch-perfect operatic mockery of The Jerry Springer Show, complete with a rambunctious audience, cheating spouses, transsexuals, strippers, and the Klan. We have escalating action, several cute jokes, and a set of commercials sung by the chorus that seem like faint damnation with American culture by someone who hasn't watched much American TV--a commercial about tampons or giant compensating SUV's would have struck home much better than a commercial about breast implants, or guns, or many of the other things they don't advertise on television.
Act One ends with Jerry inadvertently shot by a guest. Act Two opens in a form of Purgatory where the souls of the damned are wearing hospital scrubs and are laying about on the floor. Unfortunately, there's no visual to convey the idea that this place is Purgatory (or Jerry's imagined version of it) whatsoever, and twenty minutes go by without any advancement in the plot, after which the Warm-Up Man from the first act reveals himself to be Satan, and that he wants Jerry to come to hell to perform a "very special edition" of his show.
This "very special edition" comprises the bulk of the second act, and we get to see many of the characters from Act One playing various biblical and theological beings: the stripper and her redneck husband become Adam and Eve, the diaper fetishist becomes Jesus, etc. Save a clever face-off between Jesus and Satan, and God's solo number, there's nothing in the second act that fulfills the promise and energy developed in the first act. Act Two ends with Jerry spouting some nebulous aphorism about all life being holy and beyond that morality being tenuous at best, and we're returned to Jerry's studio, where he dies in the arms of Steve, his security guy. The end. Everybody take a bow.
But wait! After bows, the entire cast comes out dressed as Jerry Springer and does a really bang-up tap number, which doesn't make any sense at all, but saves the audience from ending the show thinking, "What the hell was that?"
What weaknesses there are in the show fall squarely on the script, however. The creators had one acts' worth of good material, and couldn't stretch it out sufficiently. Still it's something to have seen.
Our local production of Thoroughly Modern Millie, featuring folks that I can't stand in supporting roles, opens in two weeks! Watch this space for updates!
Everything after this paragraph might just be a spoiler.
JS:TO is ultimately a weak show, well-performed. The first act strikes a pitch-perfect operatic mockery of The Jerry Springer Show, complete with a rambunctious audience, cheating spouses, transsexuals, strippers, and the Klan. We have escalating action, several cute jokes, and a set of commercials sung by the chorus that seem like faint damnation with American culture by someone who hasn't watched much American TV--a commercial about tampons or giant compensating SUV's would have struck home much better than a commercial about breast implants, or guns, or many of the other things they don't advertise on television.
Act One ends with Jerry inadvertently shot by a guest. Act Two opens in a form of Purgatory where the souls of the damned are wearing hospital scrubs and are laying about on the floor. Unfortunately, there's no visual to convey the idea that this place is Purgatory (or Jerry's imagined version of it) whatsoever, and twenty minutes go by without any advancement in the plot, after which the Warm-Up Man from the first act reveals himself to be Satan, and that he wants Jerry to come to hell to perform a "very special edition" of his show.
This "very special edition" comprises the bulk of the second act, and we get to see many of the characters from Act One playing various biblical and theological beings: the stripper and her redneck husband become Adam and Eve, the diaper fetishist becomes Jesus, etc. Save a clever face-off between Jesus and Satan, and God's solo number, there's nothing in the second act that fulfills the promise and energy developed in the first act. Act Two ends with Jerry spouting some nebulous aphorism about all life being holy and beyond that morality being tenuous at best, and we're returned to Jerry's studio, where he dies in the arms of Steve, his security guy. The end. Everybody take a bow.
But wait! After bows, the entire cast comes out dressed as Jerry Springer and does a really bang-up tap number, which doesn't make any sense at all, but saves the audience from ending the show thinking, "What the hell was that?"
What weaknesses there are in the show fall squarely on the script, however. The creators had one acts' worth of good material, and couldn't stretch it out sufficiently. Still it's something to have seen.
Our local production of Thoroughly Modern Millie, featuring folks that I can't stand in supporting roles, opens in two weeks! Watch this space for updates!