An Autumn Drive in New Jersey

It seems like about once every early October I get to do a 2 hour drive in the northeast to a client meeting.... either north to Massachusetts or south thru New Jersey. Today, it was the southern route. It was just a gorgeous drive...full fall colors haven't completely set in, but just having pockets of color as an accent is even more beautiful. As I headed into Princeton, I drive over a river / lake that is really pretty.

To help the time pass on the New Jersey Turnpike (which is NOT a pretty part of the drive), I listened to my sound track from Damn Yankees. It made me think about the musicals I used to see when I first came to New York City nearly 15 years ago.

Damn Yankees is certainly one of my top two or three. While one might not think it is on the surface, it is really a classic love story and has the right moral. I saw the mid-90s Broadway version perhaps 5 or 6 times. I'm one for finding something I like, and taking all my visitors to it when they come to town. As Broadway goes, it was one of the cleaner shows, though a male actor dropped a towel in a locker room scene to expose a bare butt. (When I took BYU interns, they were shocked, horrified and felt like I had taken them to the type of shows that used to litter Times Square.) I did get to see Jerry Lewis in the role of the devil a couple of times and he was great. And it's just got fun peppy dancing and songs.

Another favorite was Crazy for You, which is like the Mamma Mia formula where they took a bunch of Gershwin songs and made a story around it. It was just so laugh out loud funny. The star at the time was a really good physical comedy actor. I'd pay to see that again anytime.

The Fantasticks is another show that I think is just brilliant. I saw it about 8 times down in the Sullivan Theater (I think that's the name) where it ran and held the record for longest running, consecutive showings. It did finally close...and came back to Broadway last year in a bigger theater, but that's one that had to be seen in the small intimate theater. I think it held less than 100.

One last obscure show I saw 3 times but have never heard of since: "Two Piano Four Hands". It's a two-man show of really great piano players who illustrate the life of pianists. They came in and out of roles starting with the piano teacher forcing the kid to do his scales, then moved to when they were teenagers to the point that it became an addiction of sorts and that's all they did was practice rather than play sports, etc.

The end has them playing "Piano Man" in a bar....because what else could they do with these incredibly developed, monotone talent, so to speak (in other words, they played the piano and excelled in that talent to the exclusion of becoming well rounded). Extremely poignant and funny. Never been able to find this performed elsewhere....it takes just the right actors to pull that off who have the musical training.

That's my Broadway Beat.

Mark


PS -- On a completely unrelated note, never estimate the power of a cardboard box. I suppose that's why it was actually inducted into the Toy Hall of Fame. The three younger kids had the time of their life playing with the box that packaged the new dishwasher. Never seen them so happy or be so creative. Who needs real toys? (Oops...that's bad for me).