(Reminded of this from the Study Abroad thread)
Does anyone here know anything about "Up with People"?
I believe that it is a semester long program in which college students tour various countries putting on an original musical theatre revue (the write a new one every year, I think).
I vaguely remember seeing it once when I was in middle school, but I never hear about it anymore.
Does it still exist?
I have never heard of that but it sounds wonderful!
Broadway Legend Joined: 7/30/04
I saw it when I was in middle school too! Man, I'd forgotten about that. We hosted a couple of the girls who were in it.
Wow, random...
Anyway, I don't know if it still exists.
the show went kaput in 2000.
http://www.cnn.com/2000/SHOWBIZ/Arts/12/07/up.with.people.ap/
OMG.
"Up. Up with people.
You meet 'em where ever you go.
Up. Up with people.
They're the best kind of folk we know..." (and envision really goofy choreography....)
Saw them a couple of times when they came to my high school in the early seventies. The were selling the straight-laced, squeaky-clean, Norman Rockwell version of America. We made fun of them. But then again, I might have had a jaded impression, having been no one's version of either straight-laced OR squeaky-clean at the time....
Broadway Legend Joined: 5/20/03
Are they still around? My impression is the same as iflitifloat. Think of cheerleaders putting on the most saccharine musical you can think of. Wasn't Glenn Close in it for awhile?
Iflit - YOU weren't straight laced? YOU weren't clean cut? Good lord, all that I envisioned about you is being slowly shattered and stripped away...LOL...you GO girl!...Diane Weist ain't got nothin on you!
One of my high school friends, Terry, was an Up With People cast member. She ended up working with them professionally after college. They were ever so squeeky and wholesome, but I loved them anyway. I also still watch Lawrence Welk reruns -- go figure!
I actually have a song book and a CD from one of the Up with People shows.
The songs are very... forgettable.
The plot was basically West Side Story, but set in Kosovo or something.
The songs include "What's Up with That?", "I Am a Person, I'm Not a Number", "We're Not Buyin' It" and "We've Got It Goin' On".
Broadway Legend Joined: 12/31/69
I saw them a number of years ago.
It put me into sugar shock.
Yes, Glenn Close cut her teeth with Up With People.
Broadway Legend Joined: 12/31/69
it was just SOOOO damned sappy. It was almost comical.
wasn't it run by a religious organization??? They came to our town every year and sugar and sap do not even BEGIN to describe -- I still shudder at the thought of the "pretty polyester" costume....
SOMMS,
My God do I LOVE watching those old Lawrence Welk reruns on PBS. Freaking GENIUS!
Those Christmas specials are too much!
Broadway Legend Joined: 12/31/69
We're friends with Ralna (English) and Tom (Netherton) from the old Welk show - they still do the live Welk shows around the country. It's pretty entertaining listening to stories of theirs!
Broadway Legend Joined: 12/31/69
I especially love the old Lawrence Welk Christmas shows where they pass the mic around to EVERYONE on the show who in turn introduces EVERYONE in their family.
Like anyone gives a damn, then or now.
"And now we have a message from our friends at Tylenol"
Lawrence Welk was good people though, he sent a letter to my brother when he (my brother) was nine and in the hospital.
The absolute BEST about some of the xmas shows was the fact that not only did they introduce the families...but the families all had to PERFORM!!!!
very yuletide!
Broadway Legend Joined: 12/31/69
yea, there's nothing worth a damn on TV anymore, except reruns of Lawrence Welk and Star Trek.
Broadway Legend Joined: 2/20/04
Didn't Nick Tortelli's "lovely wife Loretta" tour with a similar group called "The Grinning Americans?"
Stand-by Joined: 5/10/04
FloweryFriend...is this where you have been hiding?Seems since your family trip to NYC and Hairspray...you have been almost invisible on the main board...
ScottWalker, I was just about to say the same thing about you. Where have you been?
Stand-by Joined: 5/10/04
I have been here...Do not usually go to the off topic board.Someone had me checking out the Harry Potter Thread.I do not post alot...just about the same few things.Hairspray.All Shook Up...Beauty and the Beast with Brooke...Mostly I keep my opinions to myself...Unless I feel very strongly about something...But I`m always reading the threads...
Lawrence Welk, SOMMS? Yeah, well, me, too. JoAnn Castle and her ragtime piano, Myron Floren, and my beloved Lennon Sisters. I SO wanted to be Peggy.... (FYI, Tinny...that was *before* I WASN'T straight-laced or squeaky-clean.... Lawrence Welk and Co just didn't mesh with fighting the revolution...)
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