Adam Lambert Cabaret 1/22 Matinee Audience Behavior
Adam Lambert Cabaret 1/22 Matinee Audience Behavior
qafgenius122
Stand-by Joined: 5/3/14
#1Adam Lambert Cabaret 1/22 Matinee Audience Behavior
Posted: 1/22/25 at 10:49pm
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.
MemorableUserName
Broadway Legend Joined: 3/27/19
#3Adam Lambert Cabaret 1/22 Matinee Audience Behavior
Posted: 1/22/25 at 11:15pm
I've read plenty of commentary over the years about how conservatives don't get irony and how art that is intended as criticism is instead embraced as positive, like all the people who watched "All in the Family" because they agreed with Archie Bunker and the fans who didn't see--or care--that "The Boys" aren't intended as heroes (and the show is explicitly criticizing them) but view them as such.
Are we finally at the point where Cabaret is viewed by some as a feel-good story for Nazis of their rise? Or has that always been the case? There was a similar post on Reddit recently where Lambert emphasized the line a second time when some audience members seemingly laughed (though that was enough and he didn't go as far as this example). Someone responded that if the actor has to do that for the audience to get the point, it's a failure of the performer and the production. Unfortunately, I'm not certain it is. Increasingly, and dispiritingly, it may be that some audience members really are reading it exactly the opposite as intended, and it has nothing to do with the production. After this week, it seems entirely too plausible.
#4Adam Lambert Cabaret 1/22 Matinee Audience Behavior
Posted: 1/23/25 at 4:09am
Some of Adam Lambert's one-liners in this are quite funny. I loved his performance and wonder if he opened the show whether it would have been received differently and whether the Tony race would have been closer.
"You can't overrate Bernadette Peters. She is such a genius. There's a moment in "Too Many Mornings" and Bernadette doing 'I wore green the last time' - It's a voice that is just already given up - it is so sorrowful. Tragic. You can see from that moment the show is going to be headed into such dark territory and it hinges on this tiny throwaway moment of the voice." - Ben Brantley (2022)
"Bernadette's whole, stunning performance [as Rose in Gypsy] galvanized the actors capable of letting loose with her. Bernadette's Rose did take its rightful place, but too late, and unseen by too many who should have seen it" Arthur Laurents (2009)
"Sondheim's own favorite star performances? [Bernadette] Peters in ''Sunday in the Park,'' Lansbury in ''Sweeney Todd'' and ''obviously, Ethel was thrilling in 'Gypsy.'' Nytimes, 2000
MasterThespian 2
Understudy Joined: 3/22/22
#5Adam Lambert Cabaret 1/22 Matinee Audience Behavior
Posted: 1/23/25 at 6:40am
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.
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