Sunday, November 04, 2007
E-N-T-E-R-T-A-I-N-I-N-G
G-O-O-D I-D-E-A. Itching to see a play, shake things up, Christi and I yesterday enjoyed the witty, engaging "25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee" on Broadway. This show won a 'best book' Tony for its lyrics/dialogue in 2005.Like many a success, its entertainment value simultaneously milks and soars above its premise.
That is, takes a subject ripe for parody, but laughs with it as well as at it, creating sympathetic characters who are in one breath over-the-top and utterly recognizeable.
At left, the central six spellers, all of whom are actually adult actors.
An example of its ridiculous humor: after a host of difficult words, one candidate is given 'cow,' to the loudly voiced chagrin of the other contestants. That candidate then proceeds to ask the befuddled vice-principal to give a definition ('it means cow') and to use it in a sentence ('please spell cow!).
We'll run 'Bee' through our 5 criticism parameters now...
1. Four words that encapsule: "L-A-U-G-H W-I-T-H A-N-D A-T"
2. Haiku (5-7-5)
'Parade the children
nervous, nerdy, needy, smart
One wins; the rest fail'
3. Oblique Comment(s): As a child, why didn't I ever hear about, or participate in, spelling bees? I was just the type of kid you find at these things...
4. Insight: a) Putnam's set - and audience seating - were presented as a large grade school gymnasium, this which I tried to surreptitiously photograph before the show. I failed abysmally. You'll see the results soon enough; b) Several contestants were quickly eliminated. It was only after the show that Christi pointed out to me that these losing contestants were pre-chosen from the audience! One kid, to the dismay of the actors playing the hosts, was hard to get rid of as he kept spelling difficult words correctly!; c) Spelling bees are a uniquely American tradition; partly because few languages are spelled as unpredictably as English, since English is drawn from so many Latin, Germanic, and Gaelic sources;
5. Link - the show's website is A-W-E-S-O-M-E, including the Spelling Bee Game, where you can play along!
and here's the opening number from the Tony Awards - as you can see they can 'improv!'
Cartoons du jour:
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