ADELAIDE CABARET FESTIVAL 2014

CECILIA LOW

They Say She's Different

The Space. Adelaide Festival Centre. June 19-20  2014

Reviewed by Peter Wilkins

Cecilia Low in They Say She's Different

Cecilia Low sure is one helluva wild one. Her channeling of 70’s funk rock fusion queen, Betty Davis is high octane power fuelled by Low in the role of Davis and her fantastic band and vocal backing singer who take on the roles of contemporaries like Jimi Hendrix, Devon Wilson and partner Miles Davis. On stage and film, They Say She’s Different takes us back to the explosive era of sex, drugs and rock and roll. The world was changing through the liberated Sixties when Davis was emerging on the scene with her unique brand of soul and forging a new music of raw, edgy, electric-wired soul. Musical director Tony Kopa winds up the audience, Oh yeah!!~, while the ear-splitting, chest rasping and mind blowing chords of the electric guitars rip and tear through the Festival Centre’s Space Theatre.

Low takes the stage with the inner power jet force of defiant attitude. In her tight black leather shorts, knee-length black leather boots and pink puffed furry jacket, which she later discards for a slink black slip she is Betty Davis. Her body slides with erotic obsession and her voice purrs, growls and roars from a throat born to scream her independence to the world through her bluesy, funky music. Apart from the lyrics, projected upon the screen with re-enactments of Betty’s life, the lyrics of her bluesy funk become an ear-splitting sea of sounds. It is unfortunate that Davis’s lyrics should be lost to those less familiar with her songs. The show swells to the Space as though it were in a stadium, and while I am swept away by the sheer power of Davis’s music and story, I give way willingly to the bombardment of attitude.

They Say She’s Different traces Davis’s journey from the mid Sixties when she met the Chamber Brothers at the Electric Circus night club and presented her song Uptown in Harlem to them. “She just wouldn’t shut up”. It’s 1966 and the age is ready for Davis’s unique fusion of blues and soul. Throughout the one hour show, Low intersperses Davis’s classic songs, such as Your man, My Man, Your Mamma Wants You Back, and songs from her Anti Love compilation with accounts of the people in her life, such as close friend, Jimi Hendrix, Jimmy Reed, Muddy waters, B.B. King, Mohammed Ali and her partner Miles Davis, whom she introduced to Hendrix and revived his flagging career.

The pain, anguish and struggle of her life and the troubled, turbulent lives of her contemporaries are captured in atmospheric black and white on the screen behind the band. Here is the harsh truth of life in the heady world of her contemporaries. “it was not all glamour” Davis tells us. “It was hard work. It was emotional pain until you don’t know who you are.” The show is a lament for lost lives, dreams and fractured relationships. Betty Davis, the girl from North Carolina, who would never apologize, and paved the way for Prince, Madonna and the musicians of funk fusion, also gave the world the power to be yourself, stand tall and bear to be different.

In a show that is loud, brash, raw and powered with jet-force attitude, Low’s Davis is mesmerizing, seductive and unapologetic. Kopa’s incitement to bring the audience to their feet needed little urging. They were the possessed, transported back in time to an era when freedom moved the spirit and Betty Davis showed the way.   

ADELAIDE CABARET FESTIVAL 2014

Adelaide Festival Centre in association with Mario Maiolo presents

AN EVENING WITH DARLENE LOVE

Festival Theatre. Adelaide Festival Centre. June 20 2014

Reviewed by Peter Wilkins



Darlene Love

 

 

Adelaide, you are one lucky city! Adelaide Cabaret Festival Artistic Director, Kate Ceberano, has secured a coup in bringing living legend Darlene Love to perform a one night only concert in the Festival Theatre. It’s no surprise that she should walk on to the stage and be greeted by a full house of adoring fans. Her sparkling dress is matched by an even more sparkling smile which stays with her and lights up the theatre throughout the one hour concert. Backed by an orchestra under the direction of musical director, Michael Jacobson the irrepressible Miss Love launches full on into The Crystal’s number of He’s Sure The Boy by Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil. It’s an echo of the past filling the theatre with the sounds of Phil Spector’s wall of sound hit factory.  Fifty years of song give power to the lady’s voice, a voice that can tug at the heartstrings or give vent to the sheer force of life. We are in the presence of a star.

“I don’t do excerpts” she says as she announces her Marvin Gaye medley. “I do the full song.” It is a mark of respect to a dear departed friend as well as her audience and her towering talent. Backed by the twelve piece orchestra and her vocal backing group of four singers under the direction of Milton Vann, Love takes us on a journey through the classics that have been the shining milestones in her long and illustrious career. For half a century, Love has been the darling of the music industry, as backing support for people like Elvis Presley, Cher, Tom Jones, Aretha Franklin and Bruce Springsteen and as a member of The Crystals and Phil Spector’s Wall of Sound, as a member of The Crystals and as a solo artist in her own right.

Nobody sings Roberta Flack like Darlene Love. In her second medley for the night, there is such soul in her voice as she gives her rendition of Killing Me Softly With His Smile, joined by Vann. With a voice as matured as a well cellared wine, Love makes a cover her own and fills the song with love. Pop, Gospel, Soul or Rock, they are all the triumphs of a career that has seen her work with the most remarkable singers and musicians of the last sixty years, culminating in her induction into the Hall of Fame and the garnering of an Oscar for her autobiographical documentary, 20 Feet from Stardom. For the audience at this concert, Darlene Love was dead centre in the heart of stardom. They bopped along to Da Doo Ron Ron, clapped to the beat of Mountain High – River Deep and swayed in their seats or tapped their feet to such classics as He’s A Fine Boy or He’s A Rebel.

As she launched into the Tina Turner number Mountain High – River Deep (“Phil Spector promised it to me!”) she brought the audience to their feet. There was little need for encouragement as this enduring singing sensation brought her concert to a close. Then almost as quickly as it had begun, the show was over and it was left to Michael Jacobson to announce that “Darlene Love has left the building”, but with a promise from her to return.

For those lucky enough to be at this brilliant evening of song from one of the all-time greats, it can’t come soon enough.

 

ADELAIDE CABARET FESTIVAL 2014

Brian d'Arcy James

Under The Influence

Dunstan Playhouse Adelaide Festival Centre June 18 - 19 2014

Reviewed by Peter Wilkins

In a conservative cabaret grey suit, subtle tie and polished black shoes actor, singer and Music Theatre star Brian d’Arcy James looks more like a public servant than the Broadway shining light of  such shows as The Apple Tree, Next To Normal, Titanic and Shrek the Musical in which he played the title role. His is the uniform of the cabaret greats – of Sinatra, Martin, and Bennett. Smooth and svelte and with a voice capable of gliding with gentle emotion and soaring with passionate power, d’Arcy James fondles the microphone like an old friend and acknowledges his backing band on piano, Bass, drums and guitar with appreciative warmth.

 Under the Influence honours the artists that inspired the kid from Saginaw, Michigan. The pop singers of the seventies and eighties stirred the ambitions of a lad destined to be a Broadway star with two Tony Award nominations to his name. His one hour cabaret show is recognition of the link between those teenage musical heroes and the Broadway musicals, some of which are now being composed by artists such as Sting, Carol King, Bob Dylan and Phil Collins. His hero, Billy Joel has written the musical Moving Out  with Twyla Tharp.

From Sondheim to Stevie Wonder, another Saginaw lad, d’Arcy James takes his eager audience along the varied musical paths that have shaped his career but never veered from his love for the songs that inspired him along the way. There is no artifice to the performance. His voice is strong and sure, his breathing the well-trained servant of his passion and his charm relaxed and easy with band and audience. He is the artist in whose company you feel entirely secure, willingly seduced by his song and his stories of auditioning  for his idol, Billy Joel, or his mentor, the late, great Marvin Hamlisch. His respect for their great talent imbues his renditions of Billy Joel’s She’s Got A Way or Marvin Hamlisch’s I Cannot Hear The City from his musical Sweet Smell of Success with sweeping emotion that carries the listener along on his song of sentiment.

Pop, Rock and Roll and Musical Theatre merge in d’Arcy James’s catalogue of influences. The less familiar Tempted By The Fruit of Another by The Squeeze features with the lesser known song We Can Build A City Of Man from Stephen Schwartz’s Godspell or the haunting A Light In The Dark from the smash hit musical, Next To Normal. Along the way, d’Arcy-James casts his heart back to the Saginaw composers, whose names may be unknown, but whose songs are classics of their time.  Isham Jones’s It Had To Be You, John Legend’s All Of Me  and of course Stevie Wonder’s Isn’t She Lovely. d’Arcy James’s love affair with his Pop and Rock heroes and his indulgent fantasies that have shaped his career find their resounding climax in Who I’d Be from Shrek the Musical.

This is d’Arcy James’s first visit to Australia and audiences at the Adelaide Cabaret Festival can count themselves lucky to be seduced by his charm, overwhelmed by his easy professionalism and entertained by a voice that holds his audience in its Pop, Rock and Musical sway. If you ever have the chance to see this star of Broadway, don’t stay in the dark. Happy are they who can say “I came under the influence of Brian d’Arcy-James”.

ADELAIDE CABARET FESTIVAL 2014

KATHY NAJIMY presents LIFT UP YOUR SKIRT

FESTIVAL THEATRE. ADELAIDE FESTIVAL CENTRE. JUNE 19 2014

Kathy Najimy in LIFT UP YOUR SKIRT

 



Kathy Najimy is larger than life. I don’t mean in terms of her weight, although she is the first to joke about her battle with the bulge. No need now. She looks great. As she walks onto Adelaide’s Festival Theatre stage, the audience erupts in cheers of adulation. Moments before glimpses of her many roles flash across a large screen at the back of the stage. We are reminded of her acclaimed roles in films such as Hocus Pocus, The Wedding Planner and Sister Act and TV appearances in shows such asking of the Hill, Desperate Housewives and her popular feminist show for HBO, the Kathy and Mo Show. Here is a star who opens with an apology for not being able to sing and then belts out a Streisand number with the force of fireman’s hose. She fills the vast Festival Theatre stage with a cascade of running gags, witty, quicksilver smart, delightfully funny and always with a touch of self-effacing mockery. In an instant, she has her audience hanging on every word, delighting in her effervescent energy and eager to come closer to the real Kathy Najimy.

The year is 2009. Najimy is in hospital undergoing a colonoscopy and the telephone rings. “It’s Bette Kathy. Is this a good time to talk?”  Najimy can hardly wait to ask her teenage idol and close friend what she thought of a show she had recently directed. There is a pause. “Do your own thing, Kathy!” comes the reply and that is where Najimy’s new semi-autobiographical show, Lift Up Your Skirt takes a  side-turn. Her wit remains sharp, her comedy hilarious, her repartee with her musical director, Ryan, easy and affectionate but the comedy now comes with a moral price tag that makes this show more than an acclaimed comedienne’s stand-up.  Her jokes, her anecdotes and her accounts of her encounters with her idol now pave the road to epiphany. There is no need now to joke about her weight or get the laughs at the expense of self deprecation. Najimy is a star on a mission and Bette Midler’s advice guides her through the years. The show is underpinned by her relaxed air, unabashed humour and instant rapport with an audience who have come to revel in their star of stage and screen’s true self. And that is what they get. And much much more. No-one could have seen her account of black comedian Richard Pryor’s homophobic assault at a Gay Rights gathering coming. Or her account of a singing telegram delivered to her idol, Midler, in a big white Bunny suit. Or the irony of Bette’s appearance in a bunny suit in Beaches. Irony is the meat of comedy and there is an abundant store of this in Najimy’s one night stand at the Adelaide cabaret Festival.

Whether divulging accounts of her somewhat dysfunctional Lebanese family, demonstrating her belly dancing technique or showing images of Bette Midler dancing Boogie Woogie “like a penguin on Meth” Santiago born and bred Najimy never veers from her goal to boldly and brazenly lift up her skirt as a metaphorical gesture of courage, defiance and independent spirit. It is the final gesture of her show, a triumphant display of the age-old adage of “to thine own self be true”, a doctrine enshrined in a host of world faiths and ancient philosophies.

Viewers of the Kathy and Mo Show will be familiar with the originality and comedic insight of Najimy’s characters and none more so than her Aunt Maddie, affectionately modelled on her compassionate and tolerant Aunt Alice. Seated on a chair, behind a music stand on which is placed a script from which Najimy occasionally reads, Aunt Maddie espouses her testament to tolerance. Attitudes can change, love is the life force of any relationship whether it be straight or gay, and through Aunt Maddie Najimy champions gay marriage and condemns intolerance. My only reservation is that throughout the lengthy excerpt, Najimy is largely hidden by the music stand, causing a staging alienation. Her Adelaide performance is a trial for her debut on the New York stage, and I expect that she will be more prominent in her presentation of the character.

At an airport. Marge introduces her daughter, June. “She wants to be just like you”. Bette Midler’s voice still echoes down the phoneline. “Do your own thing” and in a crowning gesture to a show that entertains, provokes, inspires and delights Najimy lifts her skirt in feminist pride and the audience rises to its feet in enthusiastic acclaim.

ADELAIDE CABARET FESTIVAL 2014

THE KERMOND

3 GEN VARIETY SHOW

The Dunstan Playhouse. Adelaide Festival Centre. June 18-19 2014

Reviewed by Peter Wilkins

Warren, Alexander and Wayne Kermond

 

Times change. Styles come. Styles go but star talent never dies. It may lose its limber but The Kermond 3 Gen Variety Show is living proof of enduring brightness and the power to light up an audience’s life and bring a smile to their lips. 124 years of professional show biz sparkles in the song and dance of father, Warren Kermond, son Wayne Scott Kermond and grandson Alexander (Zan) Kermond. As their opening number attests There’s No Business Like Show Business and they should know. The remarkable 78 year old Warren comes from two generations of theatre family, and he himself played the old Tivoli and shared the stage with legendary comedian Roy Rene (Mo). Son Wayne shook the hand of Sammy Davis Junior, who congratulated him on his dancing and said that the business need cats like him. What chance did he have? And as for Zan, the lithe and limber Tap Dog, well, his dye was cast from the time he was “ born in a trunk.”

There is schmaltz and schmooze in this showcase of song and dance with corny gags, some sleight of hand and slapstick routines. For just over an hour and backed by a three piece band on piano, double bass and drums  father, son and grandson strut their stuff with highlights from their years upon the stage in a performance that revives the very best of vaudeville in an atmosphere of family affection that swamps the audience with admiration, exhilaration and sentiment. There is a sense of a fading art in their reminiscence, of the need to preserve an entertainment that never sought to do more than delight and wipe away the woes. Throughout the cavalcade of songs from Gerschwin (Crazy For You) to Hamlisch (Chorus Line); from Harnick and Bock (Fiddler On The Roof) to Bricusse and Newley (Stop The World I Want To Get Off) the three Kermonds take the chiefly senior audience through a century of love and pain, struggle and success, laughter and tears and the joy that a song and dance man brings to the world.

Titanium hips cannot quell Warren’s tap routines. Wayne’s forward and backward flips might take his breath away for the higher registers of Kiss Today Goodbye from Chorus Line but he shows what he’s got with What Kind of Fool Am I from Stop The World I Want To Get Off. Zan, the youngest and the tallest of the three is able to put on the Ritz as well as any and his time with Dean Perry’s Tap Dogs has made him a full- fledged Candy Man along with his Dad and Pop.

Audiences who recognize the songs will feel impelled to sing along or tap their feet to the beat. There is an infectious joy to this show, and a sentimental tribute to the song and dance and crazy banter and magic of the old days of Vaudeville. Musical Comedy, Tap and Showbiz have been the lifeblood of three generations of the male members of the Kermond Family. We don’t get to see the women who also played their part in a dynasty of song and dance. At the matinee performance before a house of senior gen audiences, the transitions could have been slicker and the banter quicker, but this did nothing to detract from the sheer thrill of seeing these three top- notch hoofers tap their stuff and sell the songs the audience loved to hear.

The Kermond 3 Gen Variety Show is a feel-good tribute to far more than the shining talents of the three performers. It is an accolade for the arts of Vaudeville and Variety and the need for the Candy Man to be a part of our lives as he  and she leave their footprints in the sands of time.

 

Henry V Bell Shakespeare

Link to Canberra Times review.

http://www.canberratimes.com.au/entertainment/theatre/bell-shakespeare-gives-henry-v-an-exciting-ww-ii-backdrop-20140616-zs8w5.html

Alanna Maclean

ADELAIDE CABARET FESTIVAL 2014

VANDEMONIAN LAGS

NEW SONGS OF TRANSPORTATION FROM THE PRISON WITHOUT WALLS

Devised and directed by Mick and Steve Thomas. Musical Direction by Mick Thomas. Adelaide Festival Centre in association with ROAR Film and DARK MOFO 2013. Commissioned by the Museum of Old and New Art (MONA) Festival Theatre. Adelaide Festival Centre. June 18 2014

Reviewed by Peter Wilkins

 

Vandemonian Lags. Festival Theatre. Adelaide Cabaret Festival 2014

 

When is a cabaret not  cabaret? When it is a Folk Musical. Whether Roar Film and DARK MOFO 2013’ Vandemonian Lags from Tasmania warrants a place in a cabaret festival is a matter for conjecture. What is ultimately relevant is that it should be judged on its merit, which is variable at best. The musicianship is undoubtedly outstanding, the film footage fascinating and the singing enthusiastic and true. Dramatically, this lengthy exploration into the convict history of Tasmania’s past is less engaging.

Vandemonian Lags presents 17 individual tales from the 73,000 convicts that were transported to Van Diemen’s land between 1804 and 1854. 17 original songs, comprising mostly folk ballads with a couple of surprising rock numbers to tell the tales of prostitute Jane Torr and Dickens’s inspiration for Fagin, Isaac Solomon, the Prince of Thieves. Each of the 17 stories is linked by actors Brian Nankervis and Tim Rogers, who take on a variety of roles from Melbourne Club gentlemen to Assize Judges. Their dialogue is perfunctory, serving merely to link the songs that tell the sad tales of the convicts and their ancestors. It is interesting enough in itself, but the show is seriously in need of clear and inventive direction. It is a song list in search of a drama, a concept without a spine, and the dramatic structure soon becomes predictable. What begins with the promise of a haunting and melancholy tale of a cruel and unjust history from the beguiling strains of a female voice singing Can You See Across The Sea, and shortly joined in chorus by two other singers in convict dress becomes repetitive as each character steps forward to the microphone to recount their sad tale in song.

There are moments of prophetic revelation in the stories of the convict refugees arriving in boats across the Bight that hide no relevance to a contemporary history, of mixed marriages or the unfortunate fate of a young lad who stole a book to further his education; of the woman forced to resort to a life on the streets to survive, and the convict whose fortunes on the goldfields gave him the wealth to buy the property where he committed his crime and of  the artistic ancestor of convicts who gave his life in the theatre of war. Each story deserves the theatrical fullness of its power. Writing, direction, musical direction and dramaturgy lag behind in need of artistic vision with theatrical flair.

Most of the performances in the Adelaide Cabaret Festival are 70 minutes in length. The dramatic telling of eight stories, embellished by striking ballads and articulate rock numbers, and accompanied by the intriguing projections that inevitably drew the eye from the performer to the silent footage would have shaped a show that had the might to mesmerize, fascinate, move and surprise.

The enthusiastic applause by members of the audience was worthy recognition of the strengths of the performance, but for this reviewer Vandemonian Lags remains a work in progress, a folk musical in search of direction and an interesting tale in search of a spine.