Interlude: Some Like It Hot

I know I said in the last article that I was gonna talk about producing plays/musicals. I know, ok?

However, I felt that, being my first Broadway musical, I was compelled to tell my experience, which was nothing short of mesmerizing and fantastical. So, let me break down the musical for you (I'll try not to spoil), my thoughts about it, and I'll also give you a few advice about seating and the Shubert Theater as well.

Before The Show

Before it started, we were eager to get to our seats. I certainly was. We all thought they were on the first floor because it only looked like there was one floor when we booked our tickets. You can imagine our shock when we realized our seats were on the second floor and that too, blocked by balcony seats(?) or something of the sort. Because of this, we couldn't see part of the show. Suffice to say that next time we watch a Broadway show at any theater, we'll try and book on the first floor.

Although, if we also read the reviews on the theater, we would've known that those seats were not great seats and our view was going to be blocked. But, in our defense, we didn't know about that at the time (prolly 'cause we were too busy booking the other stuff). On another note, what if someone else wants to watch Some Like It Hot and these are the only seats they can get? Do they droop their head down? I know the Shubert Theater is over 100 years and old and we should preserve history, but everyone should also be able to see what's going on. Just saying...

Also, also, quick side rant about the bathrooms there. There was a huge line for the bathrooms and the bathroom itself was quite small (about 3 stalls and 2 urinals) and dirty, not to mention old. Also, I don't think there were any hand dryers there, either. For shame, Shubert Theater. For shame.

On a positive note, the theater does look gorgeous and the seats were not painful to sit on. The staff was quite accommodating as well and I quite enjoyed my Sierra Mist-like whatever-I-had as well as the cup it came in. I might add that I completely geeked out when I read the Playbill as well, my first one (I plan to collect in the future).

The Show

Now, in spite of having to duck my head a few times, the show was a banger. All the songs were fantastic as was the score (by the wonderful Marc Shaiman). The performances were all excellent (with a standout by Kevin del Aguilla as Osgood Fielding III). The costumes gave everyone a unique character and felt very detailed and I haven't even mentioned the set yet, which I was surprised by. See, I never saw a Broadway show before this so I thought that every scene change meant changing the walls and they'd have to blackout and so on... However, much of the time, they just added some doors, a rug and a desk and it was just as convincing.

The dancing was great as well and I believe it even won a Tony (the production won 4 Tonys in total) for it. I also feel that it "wokeified" the original movie pretty well. There were only a couple of lines where I did an imaginary eye-roll, but aside from that, it's a perfect balance between preserving the wacky spirit of the original whilst also creating new roles for women, people of color, LGBTQ+ people as well as commenting on the intolerance of the time. The humor of the play got a good few chuckles out of me though I would say that the performances definitely helped with that.

Overall, the plays works for both fans of the original and young people who've never even heard of the film before (though I do think that watching the film helps). It's funny, well-acted, got a lot of humor, visual flair, and it was just a wonderful time overall.

After The Show

After the show, I was kind-of in a state of euphoria. It had been seventeen years since I last visited NY and for this to anchor my last full day there was an awesome goodbye to the city of New York, to say the least. Then, as we stuck around there for a while thinking about where to eat, we saw the guy who played Spats (Mark Lotito) come out. Sadly, no one was clapping for him, which sucked because he did a great job with the role, though it was small. Also, we saw a lot of technicians (or maybe the ensemble) come out and no one was clapping for them either, which hurt me as a former member of tech theater because without them, there is no set, there is no sound or lights and therefore, there is no show. So, for them (and for the ensemble/Mark, who give depth to the story), here is some applause.

After that, Christian Borle (who played Joe) sort-of ducked out (maybe he had somewhere to go, I dunno) and then came the rest of the cast. Everyone started cheering, I started cheering. I got three out of four signatures of the actors who came out. Those four were Angie Schworer, Adrianna Hicks, NaTasha Yvette Williams, and J. Harrison Ghee (who won the Tony for this, btw!). All the actors were great during autographs, but Adrianna Hicks was especially bubbly and fun.

Sadly, though, after all of them left, one of the security guards told us all to go home, which bummed me out because I also wanted to get Kevin Del Aguilla's signature, who was my personal favorite role of the musical. However, I was not gonna let that bum me out of a wonderful experience that I'mma remember forever.

Epilogue

After the show, we went to Junior's (which was right there) and ate a late dinner. The food was fine, but the service wasn't great and I could tell the server seemed like he was on his last straw (some other customer kept screaming at him over the bill). Yet, even then, that still couldn't bum me out Some Like It Hot. It was my first musical on Broadway, but it certainly won't be my last, both viewing-wise and producing-wise.