Oh God, my favourite utterly, completely bad piece of theatre -- I can't believe I forgot this when the thread started...
Barbary Coast, a bound for Broadway musical that started life in San Francisco in about 1982 or so. Written by a guy in LA who made a fortune in real estate, it was the story of Gentleman Jim Corbett, the boxer, and Cynthia Whatever Her Name was, some socialite Jim was hopelessly in love with. Set at the beginning of the century, the opening number ("We're on the Barbary/We're on the Barbary/We've on the Barbary Coast!") had no less than
four fullstage set changes, including a cable car on a revolve that was never used again the rest of the evening. This thing was enormous, with scenery set at 3" centres, and I commented to Steve (my date) that the only thing this thing was missing was the Transamerica Tower (that's the pyramid shaped building in SF).
So we go back in for Act Two. More bad songs. More lavish scenery. More of Jim and Cynthia consciously avoiding each other. Then, three quarters of the way into the second act, they're outside his saloon (in the Barbary Coast, of course), and she says,
Jim, say the words that will make me stop loving you!, spins on her heel, and walks off.
BAM -- here comes the Earthquake.
Now, the earthquake is suggested by everyone shaking a piece of scenery, a chandelier from a ballroom scene that came down, stayed for about five seconds, then went right back up when someone figured out they'd grabbed the wrong line. The chorus runs back and forth on the forestage while a sound like someone flushed every toilet backstage roars out.
Blackout.
Lights up on the chorus in their Ace bandages, decoratively placed in front of a drop that looks like thew view from the top of Russian Hill down to the Wharf, with smoke and ruins and all that. Jim and Cynthia rush to centre stage, decide they've been right for each other all along, and (I swear, guys, this was in there) promise to get married as soon as they make sure her husband died in the quake. The chorus, healed through the power of love, rises and comes down in a line, singing "Love is like a day in spring/Love makes you do strange
thing" (cringe! cringe!). Behind them, the ruins drop goes up to show the Daly City Hills south of the city, with the sun coming up behind them. Then out of the flies: the Golden Gate Bridge, the Bank of America Building, the Hyatt Regency Hotel, and -- you guessed it -- the Transamerica.
I couldn't stop laughing at this point. Then, this rather large woman in front of me turned around and snapped, "Young man, I dont know what you find so funny. I think this is wholesome family entertainment."
I had to leave the theatre, I wasx laughing so hard.
Oh my god, what a night.....
"That duck was a sexual toy, and it was on display!" -- an unknown Nashville town leader
