Review-Hairspray tour- 3/20/05

[Bret]

Posted: 3/24/05 at 11:48pm

This past Sunday evening, I had the pleasure of seeing HAIRSPRAY here in Dallas. It was the best night of theatre I’ve had since ANYTHING GOES in London last year. The show was so much fun, and I’m glad I got to see it.

Observations-
-Little Inez is now just Inez(To save money on a tutor??)
-The 10 piece orchestra sounded surprisingly well.
-From what I hear, there were a few minor set changes, but I thought it was still great.

Keala Settle(Tracy)- EXCELLENT! She is very right for the role. She has an excellent singing voice, and had the acting and dancing down pat. 100% believable. I prefer her to Marissa Jarret Winokur, whose voice can grate on you after a while. I personally hope she takes the role to Broadway when her tour contract is done.

John Pinette (Edna)- I tried to like him. I really did. But I just couldn’t. His comedic timing was off, and he seemed almost to be phoning in parts of the performance. He was very obviously NOT a singer, which made for some painful moments(he could not find the pitches in “You can’t stop the beat”). I did, however, thoroughly enjoy his “You’re Timeless to Me”. The weakest link, IMHO.

Serge Kushnier (Link)- Pretty good talent, and a solid preformance. Good singing, acting and dancing. My one objection was that he occasionally sounded a bit too New York/country (wierd combo, I know). Nothing huge though.(And his looks didn’t hurt either!)

Charlotte Crossly (Motormouth)- Excellent. I’ll keep her portion simple. Very powerful voice, and the part is a perfect fit. "IKnow where I've been" is wonderful.

Jane Blass (Female Authority Figure)- VERY funny! My favorite role was the lesbianic coach! She had great timing, and her ad-libs were funny. Solid performance.

Susan Henley (Velma VonTussle)- Good for the role. She was good, but not excellent, though her “Baltimore Crabs” was a hoot!

Alan Mingo Jr. (Seaweed)- Wonderful! His “Run and Tell that” was a show stealer. He was a great Seaweed.

Paul McQuillan (Corny Collins)- Good. Nothing much to say about him. Small role, but he handled it well.

Kahliah Rivers ([Formerly lil']Inez)- I liked her a lot. Not a huge role, but she has much talent!

Chandra Lee Schwartz (Penny)- The show stealer. Great voice, great comedic timing, and perfect for the role. She was an absolute riot. I hope she too goes to Broadway.

Worth Williams (Amber)- Good. She sounded a little bit sick (she may have been getting over something) , but she still gave a great performance.

Stephen DeRosa(Wilbur)- Good. Had a laughing outburst during “Timeless…”, which was very funny. A solid performance.

I really hope y’all get to see this cast. They are absolutely wonderful!

[Parks]

Posted: 3/25/05 at 12:02am

John Pinette is in it?! My brother is obsessed with him as a stand up comedian. I plan on going to see it hopefully tomorrow or Saturday. Wahoo!

[ticenewyorkcity]

Posted: 3/25/05 at 12:21am

Bret
first off oh so glad you could see the tour as I live so far north it will never come near.

I went to school with Chandra, and even then we ALL knew, WHEN SHE WAS CAST IN HER SECOND SEMESTER TO BE IN FORBIDDEN BROADWAY that she was going to do "WELL"/
i have heard nothing but great things about her on this tour. she was in the broadway co. for a little while and then was out on tour. she was cast from the open call of GYPSY with not equity credit and cast as Agnes.
SHE IS AMAZING

[Bwaybaby109]

Posted: 3/25/05 at 12:29am

I agree, Keala was amazing! I liked hearing her over Winokur as well. The whole show was so darn good, I was impressed, it was the best touring show Atlanta has seen in a while. Charlotte Crossly as Mototmouth brought me to tears in that song she sings in the 2nd act ( I dont know why I cant think of the title right now) but I didnt really have much of a problem with anyone really, I loved it!

[focusingonmoviesmatt]

Posted: 3/25/05 at 12:57am

i agree with u on the country, new york sounding with link. i saw him as link this in january on broadway and i said the same thing.

[msutton]

Posted: 3/27/05 at 9:44pm

i saw the show in dallas on friday, and i loved it as well. I didn't think pinette was that bad, sometimes I thought he was actually quite terrific. But yeah, he couldn't sing worth **** and he did fly over a couple of jokes that could have been great. His speech for Broadway Cars donations, though, was funner than the whole of teh show! That was impressive.