Grey Gardens

I was still somewhat tired when I got back to the hotel. Dealing with the cold and snow had not helped me wake up. I took a brief nap and by the time I woke up, my companion was back from work. We decided to have dinner at Firebird and that was a great choice. That was one of the best meals I have ever had. It must be a new restaurant. When I was there last year, I looked up Russian restaurants on Citysearch and only got Samovar. This year Firebird popped up as well, and since we hadn't been wowed by Samovar, we decided to try it. We had a fantastic meal and then headed to Grey Gardens, which was the perfect cap to the evening. We had main floor seats, probably about a third of the way back, on the aisle of the right section of the theatre, so it was almost center. Christine Ebersole was very definitely over her flu. That was one of the best shows I have ever seen. I've noticed that the cast recording can get a little grating, especially towards the end as it consists mostly of two old women yelling at each other, but on stage, live, it electrifies. We both loved it. The story is very well told and everyone's acting was top notch. We had the understudy for Joe/Jerry but it seemed like he was part of the cast. It was a very enjoyable two and a half hours. The only problem was that my cold was getting worse and I had to keep coughing, so I was trying to wait until the end of each song so I could cough during the applause and that got very uncomfortable, but the show was so good, I quit paying attention to my need to cough. Definitely if you are anywhere near New York, run to see the show while Christine's still with it, and let's hope she'll tour and do the movie version.