Omaha Reviews

[BEtourfan]

Here's a very positive review of the show along with a nice video interview. http://www.omaha.com/article/20121128/GO/121129616/1707

[kport]

Here's a very positive review of the show along with a nice video interview. http://www.omaha.com/article/20121128/GO/121129616/1707

That is a great review, and video. Thanks for posting it!

[jdmag44]

Great review. What a wonderful description of the story line and the highlights of the show. It should make a few people decide to see it.

Joe

[porschesrule]

Here's another great Omaha review -- this one from Broadway World Omaha:

http://omaha.broadwayworld.com/article/ ... y-20121128

[CJ-Rochester]

I must agree these are great reviews. Why was this thread put in the publicity section, instead of the reviews section? Perhaps Ellen can move it?

[ERinVA]

Yes, I'll move it. Thanks for the heads up.

[porschesrule]

Another good review from The Daily Nonpariel in Council Bluffs, IA:

http://www.southwestiowanews.com/counci ... 963f4.html

[jotunheim]

I probably should have done this sooner while it was a bit more fresh, but I wanted to share some of the observances from the 3 shows that I caught in Omaha. Please note that my background is not terribly well versed in dance and theatre, so I may have more of a layperson's description of what was noticed and there are nuances that someone with extensive training or background would pick up and I would be rather oblivious to. Anyway, I think the individual differences between a "normal" show are the most interesting so I will mostly comment on that.

First, the venue. The Omaha Orpheum is an older theatre built in 1927 originally for vaudeville shows but was recently updated with a $10M renovation in 2002. Capacity is 2,600 and seemed to be 90% full on all nights. As you can see from the images, there is actually a residential tower in front of the theater, so it does have an interesting facade. Images were taken either before or after the performance and were done with permission of the door ambassadors.













A little plug for the Magnolia Hotel below. The hotel is only 200 feet from the theater and is actually visible in the second image of the theatre above. The Omaha Symphony Orchestra also has their office off to the left side of the building. The hotel was great and would recommend to anyone staying in the area, especially if you are staying downtown or headed to the Orpheum obviously. Since I was traveling 550 miles by motorcycle, it was also nice not to suit up to go to the show, and really would have been impractical anyway. Temps were in the upper 50's to lower 60's, though it did rain and drizzle essentially the entire way through Iowa and is why the cycle is so dirty. Still it was a really nice treat to be able take the cycle out one last time before the winter hiatus and amazing to be able to do this in the upper Midwest in December!







Saturday Night - Ben / Cameron / Jake

I think the accelerated rotation of Billy / Michael was taking a bit of a toll on the "junior stars", as I noticed right away that the performances from the main cast seemed to be a bit flat from what I remembered 6 weeks earlier in St. Paul. To be clear, I did not notice any errors, but the energy level and passion in the performance seemed a bit diminished, though this did improve by the Second Act.


Cameron Clifford got a bit of the giggles when performing the exchange between Billy and Michael just after the Merry Christmas Maggie Thatcher when trying to articulate the "...just a little bit!" <pause> "...just a wittle bit!". This was then a little contagious to Ben and he also laughed a little at Cameron's difficulty with composure. It was fun to see them having a little fun on stage and I will say the energy in the performance was up to expectations after this moment. The audience reacted very positively to the comedy here and Ben and Cameron seemed to feed off of it. Of course, right after was the Dream Sequence which was fantastic as always, and Omaha loved this too with the audience audibly moved by the experience, especially once Billy takes "flight". Electricity was flawless with nailed aerials (love these!) and pirouettes timed to perfection with the orchestra.

Finale was great and overheard those close to me saying to be sure to give extra applause to be sure that they get to see this from the reviews they had read - I don't think they were aware this was part of the show. Ben nearly slipped into the pit while coming out to thank the orchestra, but recovered great and had a big smile on his face. The floor was apparently very slippery as there was an incident with Cameron on the bicycle on Sunday night, too.

Sunday Matinee - Noah / Jake / Cameron

As was the case with what I wrote above for Ben, I think the accelerated rotation had a bit of an effect on Noah too. Energy was a little diminished and acting was not exactly forced, but more rudimentary. On a technical aspect, I could only find a few minor timing issues at the end of Born to Boogie and synchronization during the Dream Sequence, but again, I think this was mostly due to the rapid rotation and did not notice this in St. Paul. I always liked Noah with the singing portions and he did not disappoint at all here, especially with The Letter and Electricity. I must also commend Noah for handling very well a minor "wardrobe malfunction" with the pink "toro" dress during Expressing Yourself. The sleeves seemed to be inside out from how the dress was being held by Jake and so Noah was never quite able to get one sleeve in, but he did hold on to the side to keep the dress on with the dance with Michael. If you had not seen the show before, you would have never noticed as the top of the dress was still over his shoulder. I am a sucker for acrobatics and I loved Noah's sequence of flips he does during Electricity, and like Ben, he nailed the sequence of pirouettes to close the number. Noah has an extremely bright future in Broadway!

After the show, Cullen Titmas came on to ask the audience to offer a donation for Broadway Cares in conjunction with National AIDS Awareness Day. As part of this, they were offering photo ops with Janet and Noah for $25 and I could not resist the opportunity! I waited until the end so there was not rush and could have a bit of a conversation. I complemented Noah on his great performance and just chatted about random nonsense for a few minutes. Janet was also equally pleasant and mentioned the incident with Ben and the letter in St. Paul and remembered it right away. Apparently there was a bet during that run of $50 I think she said that he would not be successful in taking the letter away. Ha!

Kat Hennessey was actually the photographer the photo op as well, and was very gracious to use my D600 as the camera instead of the house Polaroid. I was actually surprised only about 10-15 people wanted to have this done, but maybe the "super fans" have a vastly different viewpoint.




Sunday Night - Ben / Cameron / Jake

Sunday Night was probably the best overall performance that I saw of the three, as the energy seemed to stay up entirely throughout the show. As alluded to earlier with the slippery stage floor, Michael dumped the bicycle hard while turning around Big Davey. There was no hiding this on his part, but Michael went on his way walking the bike with no further unscripted events. Craig Bennett was most visibly amused with this and had a little difficultly hiding this, but seeing as Cameron was fine, it was probably unavoidable as it was pretty funny. Things like this add electricity to both the audience and the performers I think, as it was great the rest of the way through.

Most of the comments that were noted on Saturday also applied here, however, I should note that Ben's tapping was fantastic during this performance! Syncopation with both the orchestra and and the rest of the company was great and probably the most clean I have witnessed thus far. I think the audience seemed to notice this as well as the Born to Boogie number had numerous audience clapping / hooting interruptions during this number, which I don't recall having happening before to the shows I saw.

I like Ben's attention to detail as well. When Tony pulls him up to the table, there is a subdued but noticeable "ouch" and a little hesitation to get up on the table.

Anyway, that is all for now as this post has gotten too long! Next up is East Lansing in about 6 weeks and am looking forward to the next installment!

[BEtourfan]

Wow! Great photos and great reviews, jotunheim. Thanks!

[porschesrule]

My thanks to you too, jotunheim. A great read and wonderful photos.