Last week, I went to a preview of Piece of My Heart: The Bert Berns Story, now playing at one of the theaters in the Signature complex. I was given a comp by a member of the creative team, so I'm sure I have some issues of perspective here. I had a pretty good time at the show - Bert Berns' songs were always catchy, the cast is fantastic, the choreography is really great and the show moves at a nice pace. A lot of excitement was generated throughout the evening. I didn't know anything about Bern Berns or his very interesting backstory, so I was always interested in what would happen next. I do think that there's an inherent problem in a jukebox musical where you're shoehorning songs into scenes - it seems like the dialogue has to be written around the lyrics of the song, so the song doesn't really flow organically and advance the plot. That's not a bad thing, necessarily, especially when they're so well sung, but the numbers that came off best, to me, were the performance numbers. The end of the first act, opening up the recording session for "Twist and Shout," was quite exciting and made you really hear the song and not listen to how awkwardly the lyrics had to sit on top of the dialogue. Perhaps that's just me. And I did have a few questions about some of the conflict, which didn't seem quite earned. I also felt as if one of the performers, though excellent, was actually in a different show than everyone else, but basically the show is extremely well-sung and well-executed. The audience around me seemed to be having a fantastic time, so whatever quibbles I had didn't seem to matter to them.
Last night I attended a preview of Summer Shorts 2014 at 59 E 59 Theater. I wanted to see Series A because it featured a piece by Warren Leight. Leight's Side Man is one of my very favorite contemporary plays and I'm also a big fan of his No Foreigners Beyond This Point. (full disclosure: I know him a bit, so again with the no perspective thing.) I like his writing. I just like the way his characters seem so real and his dialogue is so natural and individualistic. I feel like I know these people, yet they're not cliches or stereotypes. Anyway, his piece was the second in the evening of three short plays. The first was The Sky is the Limit by Roger Hedden. I found this piece a bit confusing, though certainly a story I haven't seen before. Two young men are out in the desert - one has jumped, trying to get from one cliff to another, and he has fallen and landed hard. While he's lying on the ground, his friend takes the safer path. It turns out the guy who fell wants to have his wedding out there and he takes his best friend with him to check it out. There's a lot of joking between the two of them and you get a good sense of their relationship. I thought the actors were pushing the humor a bit too much, but their rapport was very nice. There were some clever lines and I certainly didn't see the twist coming. I was surprised by the twist, but completely didn't understand the coda. So there you have it. Confusing much?The third piece was Riverbed by Eric Lane. It was a two-character piece, with monologue, direct address and limited scenework, about a married couple who experience a loss and are trying to reconcile it. I was very intrigued by this piece and found it mostly quite compelling and poetic, though I didn't respond to the male actor. I don't know what it was, maybe he was cast for this very quality, but I felt he distanced me instead of drawing me in. The female actor was very engaging and drew me right in but I didn't really enjoy the guy, so that hindered my complete enjoyment of the play. I would be interested in seeing another play by this author, though. I thought he had a very unique touch.
Warren Leight's Sec. 310, Row D, Seats 5 and 6 was the clear star of the evening. The audience responded instantly and were super engaged. I mean, it helped that the piece was fast and funny, but it was also quite poignant, as you saw the lives of these characters just pass before their own (and our) eyes. Three guys share two NY Knicks season tickets, so each scene is a different pair at a different time in their lives. It was just a nice, revealing, slice of life story, both about men and their relationships to each other and also about our relationships with sports. I can certainly relate to the fan aspects explored in the play, the ideas of the jinx, the love/hate relationship you have with your team. I just laughed with such recognition at these guys and could've watched them for another few playoff series. And, I'm sorry, I don't think there's a funnier bit onstage right now then the guys reliving what happened in the last eighteen seconds of that playoff game against the Pacers... :)
Briefly, I saw two new musicals at NYMF (New York Musical Theatre Festival), and the first act of a third. I'm just going to refrain from mentioning any titles. I have to say that I cannot be objective in the very least about the first two because I know and love the creators. So now I know and love their musicals. It's a curse. The third piece, which my handsome generous friend and I left at intermission, made me wonder about NYMF's selection process. Although I thought the music was intermittently vaguely interesting, the rest of the production was so...so...so wrong in every way that I wondered how it even could've been in the festival. I don't know. I've since read other online reviews that really liked the piece, so what do I know? I do hope my friends' musicals get future lives and that the festival was all they hoped it would be. I probably won't be seeking out future productions of that other piece, though... 
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