Adam Lambert Cabaret 1/22 Matinee Audience Behavior

Just saw this on Facebook, and I thought it worth sharing here.

“An open letter to Adam Lambert,

This afternoon at Cabaret, as you were finishing the song "If You Could See Her" and you held the gorilla's face in your hands to say "She wouldn't look Jewish at all," you were but were cut off by people in the audience laughing at the joke. Not nervous laughter, not shocked laughter, but people who found the surprise that it was a Jewish gorilla legitimately funny. As I was shaking my head that we live in a world that didn't get the point of that joke, you turned to them and - without dropping character, without dropping the accent - said,

"No. This is not comedy. Pay attention."

Especially the week of this inauguration, I really appreciated that. And from the applause you got for it, I feel like the rest of the audience appreciated it, as well. Thank you so so much.

Tearfully,”

left out the persons name who posted it, as it was a shared post.

Sadly, far too many people are stupid and ignorant (yes, they are two different things). I’ve come to expect nothing from the public, thus I’m never disappointed.

Yeah, I was at this showing, and it was rough. It wasn’t just a few laughs, it was what felt like over half the audience. He just looked and stared at the audience for over 30 seconds, not saying a word. Audience continued to laugh for quite some time, then slowly stopped. The he said the line about this not being a comedy and paying attention, and the other half of the crowd gave a huge applause. He repeated the last line of the song, and got another applause.
It was…rather uncomfortable. And it seemed like Adam wasn’t that happy at the moment. But this was also a very discounted matinee with the main Sally out, and multiple people who didn't return at intermission, so who knows. It was just. Odd.

20+ years ago I worked crew for a production of Cabaret in a conservative town. One night the audience gave thunderous applause to the act one finale, “Tomorrow Belongs to Me.” One of the actors, stepping into the wings, said “as long as they don’t start singing along.”



The box office received a complaint about the show… because two chorus boys danced together during a song. That was the takeaway.

A 2010 production in Chicago had Ernst begin menacing the Cabaret dancers in the second act. After "She wouldn't look Jewish at all" the gorilla dancer removed her mask and bowed. Ernst rose from the audience and shot her. I felt it was over-egging the pudding.

Can I just check my sanity, the line "she wouldn't look Jewish at all" is meant to be shocking but it's so shocking that I could imagine some uncomfortable chuckles. Are we saying that there were people sincerely laughing along who didn't realise the subtext?

Also checking my sanity I would suggest that right now because of the Gaza situation the primary source of Jew hatred from what I can see does appear to be coming from a small amount of left wing people who conflate Israel with jews, some of which even sympathetic to Hamas. This has been a big political divide for a year now. So if we are saying that there are people clapping along sympathetic to Nazism I wouldn't personally assume they are indeed conservatives.

It kind of reflects Elon Musk's reaction (well one of many) to the criticism that he appeared to do (I assume unintentionally personally) give a nazi salute. "Liberals briefly pause chanting 'Death to Israel' to call Elon Musk a nazi" to point out this irony.

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Because it would be a dumb thing to do intentionally even if he was a Nazi (ie the social consequences are too high) and Elon Musk is obviously team Israel/jews as reflected by the statement of the prime minster of Israel. Maybe the Nazi symbol means something else today, but if we are trying to suggest Elon Musk is in any way a nazi that hates Jews I don’t think he is a Nazi that hates Jews. Basically, I am so over this ridiculous scare mongering committing by progressives I just don’t take it seriously anymore. I think one of many reasons progressives lost the election. In addition to other terrible missteps, such as trying to censor free speech that the Meta CEO described as very 1984like to contrast your post.


Look I’m not looking to start an argument or anything so please ignore me - I’m just not going to subscribe to this ideological thinking is all. It’s got too extreme for me. But I am going to continue just to give my opinion for the same reason that I have kept warning that Donald trump might win, which is unless you can find a way to be a bit more reasonable I honestly believe the progressive movement is going to become so marginalised that this extreme thinking is doing more harm than good to the progressive movement and we will all suffer as a result.


Calling leaders nazis etc is the ultimate expression of victim mentality because you get to pretend your very livelihood is under threat. That is absurd - Nazi means something very specific. Someone can even be racist and it wouldn’t make them a Nazi. We have spoilt the use of the word in our language and it’s losing all meaning.


You might not see it, but I believe this is the same kind of ideological thinking that lead to the closing of The Great Comet etc. it feels unhinged and in a different world to me. I don’t buy it.

Updated On: 1/23/25 at 10:44 AM

"but when you throw themes at the audience that weren't in the original show (like gender and race) and imply to a modern audience that that's what this show is about, I wonder if it doesn't dilute the original intent."

This is nonsense. It's a new production. The intention of the creators of this production is different than when it originally appeared... AS IT SHOULD BE. That's why theater survives. Theater needs to speak to the time it's performed in. Sometimes that means keeping the original intention and sometimes it doesn't.

However, I do not think this production does a great job with ANY of its intentions. I think the production also does a pretty mediocre job of merely telling the story which is why I think the audience is so out of control. If you don't know the plot of Cabaret I think you have a hard time tracking what's going on in this production so these sort of tone changes come as a surprise. I liked the production quite a bit, especially with the two current leads, but it's not particularly competent (in my opinion) and I think that's completely the reason this is happening and why its ultimately this specific directors fault and not because they're trying to speak to the current moment.

I remember my first exposure to the show was a bootleg from the 2021 production, it was Fra and Amy and what he did was he was using his normal speaking voice then he just yelled the word Jewish. It was long and drawn out and it got the point across so well that even I was shaking and uncomfortable a year after that performance happened.

Having seen Adam and knowing he whispers it, I feel like if you put more into it, scare the audience into what you’re trying to get across then it would work better. A tone change and a couple more seconds would help out a ton. Explaining it just takes away from the whole thing, and cabaret is a show that’s supposed to make you feel uneasy whenever shot goes from 0 to 100 in just a few seconds (I still think it shouldn’t be uncomfortable from the get go and should stay with tomorrow belongs to me but that gd my opinion.) When you have to explain why it isn’t good than you’re not moving your point across correctly.

Cabaret is a show that’s supposed to show you why it’s so ****ed up and why it shouldn’t happen again. Explaining it kills the suspense and the point you’re trying to make. I love this show, but it really could be done better to bring the point across.

People are either in denial, or wilfully ignorant if they think a lot of antisemitism isn't coming from certain groups of the left. While being Jewish, and isreal, are two different things, that doesn't stop people from equating them as the same and targeting them all as one in the same.

The left is equally as capable of being dangerously idiotic, just like the MAGA crowd. Some parts of the left have gone so far left they are becoming right wing.