Long post about Don’t Monkey With Broadway/An Evening With Patti LuPone on Friday, July 12, 20

Long post about Don’t Monkey With Broadway/An Evening With Patti LuPone on Friday, July 12, 2019. First of all, for people who have never been at Davies Symphony Hall, it’s essentially a 360 house, with the stage in the center. Patti was pretty good at making sure she faced the terrace (the people behind her). I’m sitting at side terrace in the very front row (see pics above for reference), so I have a view of the audience’s faces. Patti was at center stage most of the time and I could only see the side of her face and back of her head, unless she actually turned around. Which she did a lot, actually, bless her soul. If you look at the pic above, I was sitting RIGHT in front of the water glass on the piano, so every time she drank from the glass she was directly facing me. Swoon. The first song after opening with Don’t Monkey With Broadway, she knocks her mic off the mic stand while reaching for it to take it off. It plonks onto the stage with a loud thump and EVERYONE (including the pianist) looks shocked and audible gasps are heard. She picks it back up and everyone including Patti laughs it off.During Big Spender. Props to the pianist, Joseph Thalken, who had a bell on top of the piano to ding on cue, which he would casually reach over to do. He also jumped up from his seat once, dinged the bell, hovered there a bit, and sat down just as quickly which got lots of laughs. Also lots of giggles from the expressions and movements Patti was making. I was sitting at terrace so unfortunately I couldn’t see her face for most of it, and boy, am I jealous of people who can afford orchestra seating, but I sure did stare at those swaying HIPS. She brings out a silver prop gun during If and shoots it (audience gasps) and there’s a very LOUD sfx BANG and scares the bejeesus out of everyone as we all jump a bit in surprise. Lots of giggles after.She brought out those two albums that her mom bought her at “the East Northport A&P supermarket checkout” and talked a bit about playing really strong women on Broadway and how that was never how she saw herself. She pauses and gives a look and the audience laughs. She riffs with that and says something like how she was always a shy and soft-spoken (lmao) kid, more laughs from the audience. She sang Don’t Cry For Me Argentina for the end of the first act, before the intermission. My god, she sounds as good as she always does. She did the iconic raised arms pose before the song started, at everyone (including terrace, she turned around and did it just for the people behind her), but not during the song at the part everyone expects her to do it in. I could only see the back of her head/side of her face but I could TELL she was doing those same facial expressions that she always does. And of course, the iconic palms out for each and every “don’t keep your distance”. At the end, lights black out and intermission starts.Beginning of act 2The chorus (SF Gay Men’s Chorus, yaaas) rolls out to do Trouble, right under the side terrace I was sitting in. Patti comes out, in a different outfit (it was like a black see-through-silky dress…thing, and she wore black pants underneath and black heels) and faces the side terrace (finally!) the whole time while they were on stage together. And they do it FLAWLESSLY, lots of giggles with the dramatic acting by the chorus. “Words like… swell?” the chorus GASPS, some people in chorus shout TROUBLE at the end of every other line as she goes through the rest of that verse. Lots of applause and bowing. Patti is smiling a lot and you can tell she’s having a blast.Blow Gabriel Blow. YES, someone in the chorus hit THAT iconic high note (you know the one) while waving his arms in the air, holding onto that note for dear life. The chorus all face him while he’s holding that note to make sure he stands out, everyone applauds as he does it and you can tell Patti is impressed, more smiles and laughter from her. Audience loves it, lots of applause.Give My Regards to Broadway. This song always gets audience participation. Everyone clapped in rhythm and sang along.She starts doing Sondheim. Sweeney Todd: Not While I’m Around, Company: Another Hundred People, Being Alive and…Before the next song starts she steps off backstage and comes back with a martini glass full of what looks like water. We ALL know she’s about to sing The Ladies Who Lunch. And yes, she throws the martini glass full of water INTO the audience, center stage, first two rows. I could see the looks on the audience’s faces, and it was priceless. For her last song, Some Other Time, the chorus is brought out again, behind Patti, center stage. Patti sets her mic down on the piano, and even without mics, she and the chorus are still quite audible. It was magical. -- source link
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