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A is for Albany High School awards

Albany High School was up for six awards in an event fashioned after Broadway’s Tony Awards®

Hairspray Director Gregory Theodore Marsh, Annabelle Duffy , Theatre Ensemble Director Ward Dales

Back on Saturday, May 19, the family went to Proctors Theatre in Schenectady to attend the 2nd Annual High School Musical Theatre Awards for New York’s Capital Region in partnership with The Broadway League.

Albany High School was up for six awards in an event fashioned after Broadway’s Tony Awards®. The evening celebrated “the achievements of the region’s theatre students from 23 area high schools, highlighting the importance of arts and theatre education.”

The AHS March production of “Hairspray” won for best musical, best technical execution and best choreography execution. Moreover, “Albany High junior Annabelle Duffy won best actress for her portrayal of feisty Tracy Turnblad.”

She received an all expenses paid trip to New York City to receive training from working Broadway professionals. Annabelle and a young man from the area participated in the Jimmy Awards, the national stage in which high school performers across the nation acted and sang, on June 25.

At Proctors, our family applauded wildly for AHS and also my young niece’s high school; one of the supporting characters in their The Music Man was nominated, which somehow meant that the niece got to perform in the energetic opening and closing numbers.

Truth is that some of the Albany High School rooting was a bit of chip on the collective shoulders of the city dwellers. On the standardized tests, the urban schools don’t fare nearly as well as the ones in the suburban districts. But as someone wrote on a Facebook listserv:

“What I do know is my children will have experiences like many others won’t. They are exposed to the world thanks to classmates, teachers, and courses not available in many locations… Remember money talks and those districts with most living in poverty are underfunded and inundated with unfunded state mandates.”

Not incidentally:

Grammy-nominated jazz artist Stefon Harris (Albany High School ’91) was named a recipient of a 2018 Doris Duke Artist Award – “one of the most prestigious arts grants in the country – for his continuing contribution to jazz.

“Harris is one of seven performing artists that will receive $250,000 in flexible funding, along with up to an additional $25,000 to encourage contribution to his retirement account.”

For ABC Wednesday

Our month of theater, or theatre, if you will

“‘Beautiful’ could have easily been nothing more than another cliched jukebox musical gathering together the hits by songwriters of the Brill Building era.”

We go to the theater a fair amount, but the first half of April 2017 was quite the outlier.

Sunday, April 2: The Little Mermaid – Catskill High School (three of us)

One of my nieces was in her fifth production, and the three of us have seen them all. This was her largest role yet, playing Flounder. She was quite good, actually, and I say this not out of familial loyalty.

In general the girls were better singers than the boys. Ariel’s sisters were fine as were Ursula’s assistants. But the hits were Sebastian (Edward Donahue), Ariel (Ade Spencer) and especially Ursula (Anna White).

Thursday, April 6: The Sound of Music – Proctors Theatre, Schenectady (three of us)

Proctors has had Broadway-quality productions for a number of years, and this was no exception. The trick with the musical is that the movie is so imprinted in the brain. My Favorite Thing is sung at the abbey, Do-Re-Mi at the Trapp villa, and The Lonely Goatherd in Maria’s bedroom, when she calms the children freaked out by the thunderstorm.

While the two leads (Charlotte Maltby, Nicholas Rodriguez) are fine, and the children are amazingly good, the largest applause went to Melody Betts as Mother Superior after she sang Climb Ev’ry Mountain.

We bought tickets for next season’s shows, including Fun Home, The Color Purple, Finding Neverland and On Your Feet! (the Gloria Estafan story). Buying a subscription THIS year will mean getting dibs on buying toicxkets for Hamilton in 2018-2019.

(Only somewhat off topic: Alison Bechdel is Vermont’s cartoonist laureate. She created Fun Home.)

Saturday, April 8, 2017: They Built America: The Workers of the Erie Canal – local school (two of us)

This is a Capital Rep show commemorating the 200th anniversary of the groundbreaking of the engineering feat that went from Albany to Buffalo. “Meet the real men, women and children, the politicians, farmers, merchants and laborers who…[built] the Erie Canal.” There are four actors, and three of them, the two men and one of the women, play multiple parts. It was quite good, about an hour long and suitable for children.

The Daughter should have come.

Sunday, April 9: Oliver! – Albany High School (two of us)

This was, aside from some occasional sound problems, extraordinarily good. I was’t familiar with the story, though I sang Consider Yourself in glee club in high school. It’s a dark, sordid, violent tale.

The standout were the terrifying Bill Sykes (Ackazemas Myers), the show-stopping singer Nancy (Williemae Fiddemon), and the shifty Fagen (Raphael Cohen), who had a fun bit with the violinist in the orchestra. Oliver was played by sixth-grader Hassan Laing who was good, but occasionally miked badly.

Saturday, April 15: Beautiful: the Carole King Story – Proctors Theatre, Schenectady (two of us)

I saw this on the calendar months ago and said, Who scheduled this for Holy Week?” It’s only on the Wednesday through Sunday. I have to sing or rehearse or travel the other days. Based on the packed house for this matinee, many folks were in the same boat.

Just from casual conversation with the folks around the Wife and me, it was clear that almost everyone knew the Tapestry album from 1971 but few were familiar with the songwriting of Carole King (the wonderful Julia Knitel) with husband Gerry Goffin (Liam Tobin) well before that, competing to get their songs pitched to the right singer or group that might make their songs #1.

As Greg Haymes noted in Nippertown: “‘Beautiful’ could have easily been nothing more than another cliched jukebox musical gathering together the hits by songwriters of the Brill Building era, i.e., ‘Smokey Joe’s Cafe’ (Leiber and Stoller) or ‘Leader of the Pack’ (Ellie Greenwich). But thanks to some smart, comic dialogue by Douglas McGrath, deft direction by Marc Bruni and strong, all-around performances by the cast, ‘Beautiful’ is a snappy musical that rises above the level of the usual jukebox musical expectations.

“But it’s not all about King, and the title of the show is something of a misnomer. The secondary couple – portraying the songwriting team of Cynthia Weil (Erika Olson) and Barry Mann (Ben Fankhauser) – and their music is crucial.”

Yes, it wasn’t just a Kingfest, as the early “1650 Broadway Medley” had songs from Neil Sedaka (singer of “Oh, Carol”), Leiber and Stoller, Phil Spector and many others. The Mann/Weil hit You’ve Lost That Loving Feeling was a standout.

But Act 2 belonged to the former Carole Klein. I LOVED this show.

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time

Bermel was “inspired by tempestuous letters written by Hungarian composer Bela Bartok, [reflecting] on the struggles of living as an immigrant in an unfamiliar country,” the United States.

The family went to the Wednesday, November 23, 8 p.m. showing of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time at Proctors Theatre in Schenectady. It won the 2015 Tony Award for Best New Play, and is now on its first North American tour. Simon Stephens has adapted Mark Haddon’s best-selling novel.

Fifteen-year-old Christopher is extraordinarily intelligent but has difficulty with everyday life. “When he falls under suspicion for killing his neighbor’s dog, he sets out to identify the true culprit, which leads to an earth-shattering discovery and a journey that will change his life forever.”

Though the words autism or Asperger’s are never used, it’s evident that Christopher is on the spectrum. The point of the play is that WE, the audience likewise experience it, which is loud, occasionally confusing, compartmentalized, and, sometimes, oddly symmetrical.

We thought it was astonishing what could be conveyed with light and sound, and intentional misdirection worthy of a magician. The mostly black set was a three-dimensional grid with concepts and locations written up it. (And if that did not make sense, I understand.)

The two people behind us thought the play was terrible, and they left at intermission, and I doubt they were the only ones. But we thought it was worthwhile, as did a relative of mine and one of her daughters, who saw the matinee that day.

Interestingly, before the performance, we ran into a couple of people who would be performing signing for the later shows, one of whom was a friend of ours. The other person, who grew up with sign language, sometimes has trouble with similes, metaphors, and other figures of speech. Coincidentally, the character Christopher feels the same way.

But, I was told later, this made the assignment easier because one could just sign the words, devoid of contextual meaning, that being how the word salad would feel to a person like Christopher.

ASO

The Wife and I went to hear the Albany Symphony Orchestra at the Troy Savings Bank Music Hall the weekend before. This was the fourth concert of David Alan Miller’s 25th Anniversary Season. He and the orchestra have been “nationally recognized for his adventurous programming and commitment to giving voice to new works by living American composers, [enticing] Capital Region audiences to explore new and diverse repertoire.”

After a half dozen selections from Handel’s Water Music, the Symphony played Christopher Theofanidis’s A Thousand Cranes for Harp and Orchestra, “inspired by the unique story of Sadako Sasaki, a young girl who was sickened by the atomic blast in Hiroshima, Japan; despite the intense and dark impulse of the event, Sadako’s story and A Thousand Cranes is a reflection of hope and faith in the future.” It was a very touching and lovely piece.

After the intermission, we heard Derek Bermel’s A Shout, A Whisper, and a Trace. It was a wonderfully energetic piece that featured three percussionists. Bermel was “inspired by tempestuous letters written by Hungarian composer Bela Bartok, [reflecting] on the struggles of living as an immigrant in an unfamiliar country,” the United States; it was a timely reflection. The program ended with a fine rendition of Schumann’s 4th Symphony.

We would go to the symphony more often except that it generally involves getting a child sitter. Fortunately, we got the tickets from Lee at church, who could not use them.

Polina, Michael Butler and connection

But nothing is graphic. Everything is inferred.

Thursday, November 12, my long-time friend Karen, who lives in New York City, emails me that Michael Viktor Butler is premiering a play called Polina (poh-LEE-nah) the next evening and that she’s coming up to see it. In Albany. About three and a half blocks from my house, at the Madison Theatre, primarily, but not solely, a movie house.

Michael and I know each other very peripherally, but he, who was a friend of one of Karen’s older siblings, became a muse to Karen, as he ran the experimental television in Binghamton in the mid-1970s, before returning to NYC himself, and she’s kept in touch with him.

I had no idea about this production until I perused this description on the movie theater’s website:

In This sensational scorcher, adapted from Butler’s novella of the same name, will be presented in the tradition of 19th Century Grand Guignol theater, complete with live salon orchestra and spectacular special effects. The title role is played by Madame Irene McMahon. Butler assumes all other parts, spectacularly interpreted in Delstarte Technique.

Polina also featured puppet master Erica Johnson.

Then I read Amy Biancolli’s preview about it in the Times Union, where Michael explains that Polina, “literally… steps out of paintings to snack on the man-parts of virgins… But nothing is graphic. Everything is inferred…”

Walking to the Madison Friday, I just happened to see Karen disembark from her car. And we and a couple of her friends she knows from a local radio station sat together.

Briefly: Polina really is a dark comedy. The first act’s too long, and the second much too short, but it’s the first production, so one discovers these things. Also, there were a few technical glitches, but nothing major.

Something I did not remember is that Michael Butler was living in my area, presently about six blocks from my house. We became reacquainted, and I got to see Karen for the first time since my birthday in March.

July rambling #2: Northwest disasters and Taxman v. Batman

Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Stadiums, a ripoff for taxpayers; bail; and poisonous mandatory minimum prison sentence.

Laci Green (no relation): Systemic Racism for Dummies.

Muslim Groups Step In To Help Black Churches Burned In Wave Of Arson.

Why it’s never ‘the right time’ to discuss gun control.

Wil Wheaton: living with depression and anxiety.

Jeff Sharlet: I went to Skid Row to report on Charly “Africa” Keunang, “an unarmed homeless man held down and shot six times by Los Angeles police. I had to get to know the people of whom I was asking these questions.”

Conquering 100 fears, one at a time.

‘I’m No Longer Afraid’: 35 Women Tell Their Stories About Being Assaulted by Bill Cosby, and the Culture That Wouldn’t Listen.

Of all people, Jimmy Kimmel on Cecil the lion I was also hoping it wasn’t an ugly American.

Jaquandor: Keeping Ahead of the Smiths: Random Thoughts on the Minimum Wage.

Daylight Saving Time Is Terrible: Here’s a Simple Plan to Fix It. “Losing another hour of evening daylight isn’t just annoying. It’s an economically harmful policy with minimal energy savings.”

12 Lost American Slangisms From The 1800s. Slangisms?

An earthquake will destroy a sizable portion of the coastal Northwest. The question is when. Obviously, in response, a dildo epidemic hits Portland (OR) power lines.

Cousin Lisa discovers Finding Friends Through a Shared Vision.

Patti LuPone Offers Five Rules of Theatre Etiquette, Starting with “Respect”. 1, 2, and 5 also apply to the movies.

Ringo Starr turned 75 this month. Other drummers talk about him, from Ringo’s 2015 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame presentation on HBO, plus Ringo Reveals The Secret Of His Distinctive Rhythm from CONAN on TBS, 2012.

“For half a century, Beach Boys songs have promised unending summers of fun in the sun — not at all like the life founding Beach Boy Brian Wilson actually led for many years.”

Woodstock 69: The Lost Performances. The Band, Canned Heat, Joan Baez, Crosby Stills Nash, Janis Joplin, Melanie.

Amy has resharpened her poetry pencil: Bossa (Getz, Gilberto, Jobim).

SamuraiFrog’s Weird Al countdown: 30-21.

The Beatles’ Taxman Vs. the Batman theme song (Mashup). Yes, The music of the Harrison piece was inspired by the theme song for the popular 1960s TV series.

God Bless America, sung by John Wayne, the cast of Bonanza, Rowan & Martin, and many others, some of them actual singers.

Evanier didn’t like the movie version of Driving Miss Daisy but linked to the new Angela Lansbury-James Earl Jones version on PBS.

“Loosen the Ties and Put Some Sweat on Them”: 12 Angry Men (1957).

Ken Levine writes a spec Dick van Dyke Show script, found in Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, and Part 4. Levine’s snarky response to the reader feedback, DVDS writer Bill Persky’s comments, and Levine’s final thoughts.

Happy 75th Birthday, Alex Trebek! His 6 Funniest Moments on Jeopardy!

Speaking of natal days, the claim that “Happy Birthday to You,” a song written in 1893, is somehow under copyright until 2030, is very likely hooey.

Chuck Miller on Reading the movie Ant-Man. It seems that ADD enjoyed the film.

The Unknown Assistant of Carl Barks.

Just Another Day at Hanna-Barbera.

Now I Know: Why Do Coupons Have a Cash Value of a Fraction of a Cent? and The Big Bang Theory, in Theory and Pop Goes the Kernel and Control-Alt-Delete.

When did I become “that” neighbor?

Muppets: Rain fall and Federal Housing Administration ads and The Muppet Show opening, in German, and, most importantly, the 10-minute pitch reel for the ABC TV show coming this fall.

This is troubling: I remember the lyrics to theme of The Real McCoys, a TV show I haven’t seen in well over 40 years.

GOOGLE ALERT (me)

Arthur@AmeriNZ answers my questions about closeted gay performers, in a different era, and flags and national discussions and candidates for US President, with a specific Hillary scenario.

The Renaissance Geek was complaining about what he thought was a boring post, so I asked him a question. This turned into THE FIRST EVER ASK EDDIE ANYTHING!

SamuraiFrog likes But It’s Alright, too.

Jaquandor on Neil Simon on how to finish a day’s work. He also tells bad jokes.