Concluding with The Banana

Well, I'm stuck in the burbs for Mother's Day weekend. I came out Saturday early afternoon and should be back home later this afternoon. Instead of sitting around bored, I decided to make the best use of my time out here. I brought my laptop and Saturday afternoon made the rounds at local libraries snapping up Broadway CD's and copying them. From the St. Charles library I got Baby, Barnum, and Jerry's Girls, as well as Ragtime so I could copy one song that didn't copy right when I got it from the Batavia library last summer. From the Batavia library I got The Full Monty and Chess. Unfortunately, with such a time crunch, I only have time to copy them. I can't listen to them to make sure they copied ok, but I'll do that in the next few days when I get home and can earmark what ones I either need to find elsewhere or pick up again and try doing a live audio capture the next time I'm home. I'm very interested in the Jerry's Girls CD especially. There wasn't much of an insert, only a tri-fold with a track listing, 3 pictures from the show, and a VERY '80's picture of Carol Channing, Leslie Uggams, and Andrea McDonald in red sequined shirts standing around a very young looking Jerry Herman. The desperation in Carol Channing's eyes is overwhelming and neither Leslie nor Andrea look very happy to be there. Unfortunately, there was almost no commentary other than a line stating that the show premiered at a dinner theatre in Florida and Harvy Fierstein was one of the writers. Nothing about how the show came about or how it was received. I know Carol got a Tony nomination, so at some point it did move to Broadway, although obviously not very successfully. I'll have to do more research.

After the libraries, I went to Banana Republic in the Geneva Commons to use that $20 card they sent me, and I am over that store for good. First of all though, I have to say, how cool is it to drive around the burbs with the window down and Barbra's new concert CD blaring on the stereo? Well ok, for the vast majority of people out there it's not cool at all, but for a once upon a time misfit who grew up there, it's a big f-you to anyone I went to high school with that might still be around, or at least in town themselves for Mother's Day. I'm comfortable with who I am dammit and will listen to whatever music I choose no matter how uncool it is, and that makes it pretty damn cool in my book. Anyways, I went to the Banana and they were having a sale on fitted T's; they were $16.5o each, but 3 for $39. I needed a new black one, and then picked out a white one (which no one ever has in small) and an off-white/vanilla one. I went to the register and they all rang up for $16.50. I pointed out to the cashier that they were supposed to be on sale since I bought 3 and she couldn't figure out why they didn't ring up that way and had to call someone over. Well, it turned out that the white one was a different type of fitted T that was not part of the sale even though it was on the same table and looked exactly the same as the other 2 shirts I had. The only way to tell them apart was that they had different codes on the tags, so I don't understand why they were all lumped together on one table. It's very misleading, bordering on bait and switch. So, she went back to the table to check and there were no small white fitted T's in the style that was on sale. She then checked the back, and they had one Medium, and several Larges, Extra Larges, and Double/Triple Extra Larges (and people that need XXL should not be wearing fitted T's to start with), no smalls. Again, when I was at Target this is where we would just give the person the shirt at the sale price. However, she asked me if I wanted to pick out another color. I was so over them by this point I just said no, I'd take the two others at the regular price. She tried to talk me into taking a 3rd so I could get the sale, but I was steadfast, I was so over them. So, then, she rang them up and I gave her the $20 card, and it wouldn't go through!!! She tried it 3 times and the terminal kept rejecting it, saying it was invalid. I was about to just turn around and leave the store but she offered to call the 1-800 number and see what was going on. She did and they were able to look up the card and tell her how much was on it (the full $20), but they didn't know why it wouldn't work. She tried it again and it still wouldn't go through, so then, at last, she showed some customer service initiative and just gave me a $20 discount off the shirts so that I paid what I would have paid had the card gone through. I cannot believe that. I don't know what their problem is, but sending out bogus appreciation cards to people who have already made a complaint is not going to help them retain customers, and they are not retaining me. If the card snafu hadn't happened, I could have overlooked the "we're going to put a bunch of shirts together on a table that all look the same, but some are on sale and some are not and we're not going to tell you how to determine which ones are one sale and then the size and color you want will not be in stock in the sale style" debacle, but finding out the card was bogus was the tipping point. I do appreciate the cashier's willingness to go the extra mile on that issue, but I'm so done with them.

Then, I went to Border's for a much better experience. I got Martin Short's Fame Becomes Me CD and the new "Music Edition" of All That Jazz, and then found the mother load, a book called "Second Act Trouble: Behind The Scenes at Broadway's Big Musical Bombs" by Steven Suskin. Of course I had to snatch that one up. I actually have cast recordings from several of the shows profiled, included Mack & Mabel, Hallelujah Baby!, and Kelly. While there's no discussion of Darling of the Day or The Happy Time, I'm hoping that Darling will at least be mentioned in the Hallelujah Baby! chapter and The Happy Time should be mentioned in The Act's chapter. The only slight disappointment is that Carrie is not covered. However, it appears that the book discusses true Broadway shows that were created in the Broadway/New York scene, and since Carrie was a London import, it may have exceeded the scope of the book, although successful (or at least mildly successful) foreign shows that then have a disastrous Broadway life would be a great subject for a follow up book, as long as Carrie and Dance of the Vampires are included. I can't wait to start reading.

So, that's about it. Happy Mother's Day to all my mother readers, and look for Tony analysis, if not Tuesday, sometime fairly soon after.