Getting Ready

Welcome back suckers!!!!!! As we all know, Xanadu opened on Tuesday night after over a month of star crossed previous. Now, I have been championing this show for over six months, getting nothing but a chorus of "is it really necessary"'s from anyone who would listen and seeing negative article after negative article in the press. Well, Wednesday morning, guess what the best reviewed new show in years was, and by Wednesday nighgt was setting box office records and well on its way to selling out? That's right you cynical skeptics, Xanadu is the show to see and yours truly will be there front and center tomorrow night because I had to foresight to see how awesome it was going to be. Look for the full rundown Sunday.

Speaking of the trip, I am finishing up preparations here. I am already checked in, which should hopefully reduce some anxiety tomorrow morning as you know a certain someone isn't going to have his act together. I'm finishing up a load of laundry and charging all the electronics and should be finished packing shortly. I've been keeping an eye on the weather, and while its not supposed to rain here until tomorrow afternoon, the New York weather could be a bit more problematic, although as far as I know they're not calling for anything extreme, so hopefully we should be good to go.

Lastly, the music drama just doesn't end. As I mentioned earlier, I had picked up Annie (and oh my God Andrea McArdle was an ugly child, she's really had to grow into her looks), the 2001 revival of 42nd Street, I Love My Wife, Fiorello, and Kismet from the library. Being typical library CD's, they of course were phenomenally scratched and scuffed. However, between my two home computers and my work computer, I was able to get complete, blemish-free recordings of all of them except 42nd Street. The second to last track, which is less than 2 minutes long, refuses to copy cleanly, and of course its the only CD that's out of print. There are no other copies in the library system, it's not in my parents' library's system, and I can't find it on any download sites, and it starts in the mid-$30 range on half.com. Hopefully I can track down a copy in New York, although I still hate to have to buy the entire CD just to get one short track. Still, it could be worth it, especially if they dnt have any plans for a re-issue any time soon. So on Wednesday, I fired up my laptop and attempted to copy March of the Falsettos. Music Match ran fine and acted like it copied ok, but the sound quality was still horrible. So, I hooked up my cell phone, hopped online, and took a closer look at emusic.com, and was much more impressed with what I saw. They may not have the blockbusters that I had been looking for, but they have plenty of little known gems, including Skycraper, High Spirits, the 1995 concert recording of Pal Joey with Patti and Bebe Neuwirth (whom my car is named after), among others. So I signed up and downloaded March. I haven't listened to it all the way through yet, but the spot checks appear fine. On Wednesday I also got Coco in the mail, and in the age of The Devil Wears Prada and Ugly Betty, it is totally due for a revival. The score is superb even though Katherine Hepburn's performance cannot be called singing no matter how you stretch the definition, and the story is full of backstabbing, bitchery, and strong independent women which are really in vogue on Bway right now. The only disappointed was that Rene Auberjonois only had one song, but I can see why he won the Tony with just that song. I do have to say though that whoever wrote the original liner notes, which were reproduced in the booklet, must have failed out of grammar school. That was the most incoherent, rambling, self-indulgent drivel I have ever read. I'm also a little offended by the characterization of Rene's character as half man half woman, but the show's willingness to at least hint at the character's orientation (come on, would the leading fashion critic in Paris really need a roommate and would a real roommate be anywhere near as flamboyant as Rene's character?) in 1970, several years before the APA de-classified being gay as an illness is commendable. I'd love to see this show make a comback. Yesterday I returned the CD'S to the library and while I didn't want to stock up on a whole stack of them with the trip coming up, I did have to check, and this time I was able to find Carol Burnett, right where she was supposed to be, so I grabbed her and picked up On the Twentieth Century Both lof them are hardly scratched, and Carol did copy fine, and about halfway through, Twentieth Century so far has copied fine. Then when I got home, The Act was waiting for me. I was a little worried because it was on the same label, DRG, as March, but it copied fine as well. Now I'm just eaiting for the CD's from BMG, it's been about 2 weeks since I ordered them, I'm not sure what's taking so long, although the last time I ordered clearance CD's from them, it took about 6 weeks before they shipped them, so we'll see. I just hope they don't come while I'm gone because our post office has a nasty habit of thinking that if we don't pick our mail up for one day that we've moved and they start sending everything back. For now though, that's not much of a worry. I got the half.com CD's and BMG will always get in touch with me if they get the package back at their office. My bigget worry now is the weather tomorrow. So, it looks like the laundry is done Time to get packed and make it an early bedtime, I'm getting up at 4 in the morning. See you in New York!