Lord of the Prance
Saturday we went out and saw Lord of the Dance. It kinda went like this:
[beautiful music plays as dancers tap and whirl across the stage, dazzling in their simplicity and grace.]
THEN
[music changes; ENTER MICHAEL FLATLEY, he of the flowing locks (and receding hairline, as my two female companions pointed out)! He gestures! He dances! LOOK AT MY CHEST HAIR! I AM MAGNIFICENT! He raises his arms outward, like a god receiving the adulation of his worshipers!]
THEN
Repeat Step 1.
As we remarked to each other at various points, we can see why River Dance fired him - his ego was practically pushing people off the stage. He is, it must be said, clearly quite talented, but the over-the-top Lordiness was just suffocating. The ordering of the dance numbers was strange - they'd establish a narrative, and then bang! Something completely weird! We won't even get into the freaky military dance numbers that had me wondering if I'd wandered into a recruiting hall for Hitler Youth. The ones with the black masks were particularly weird - I could totally see them as some bizarro gay power-play dance troupe. Then there were the dancers in day-glo pastels. I think they were trying a bit too hard to "appeal to today's youth."
We enjoyed it (even if we laughed at some of it), we had awesome seats, and we went to Mr. Crepe for dessert. Life doesn't get much better than that. But we do need to go see Riverdance to see how it compares.
[beautiful music plays as dancers tap and whirl across the stage, dazzling in their simplicity and grace.]
THEN
[music changes; ENTER MICHAEL FLATLEY, he of the flowing locks (and receding hairline, as my two female companions pointed out)! He gestures! He dances! LOOK AT MY CHEST HAIR! I AM MAGNIFICENT! He raises his arms outward, like a god receiving the adulation of his worshipers!]
THEN
Repeat Step 1.
As we remarked to each other at various points, we can see why River Dance fired him - his ego was practically pushing people off the stage. He is, it must be said, clearly quite talented, but the over-the-top Lordiness was just suffocating. The ordering of the dance numbers was strange - they'd establish a narrative, and then bang! Something completely weird! We won't even get into the freaky military dance numbers that had me wondering if I'd wandered into a recruiting hall for Hitler Youth. The ones with the black masks were particularly weird - I could totally see them as some bizarro gay power-play dance troupe. Then there were the dancers in day-glo pastels. I think they were trying a bit too hard to "appeal to today's youth."
We enjoyed it (even if we laughed at some of it), we had awesome seats, and we went to Mr. Crepe for dessert. Life doesn't get much better than that. But we do need to go see Riverdance to see how it compares.