Trip Report from Mistacor who saw the August 12th show of the CATS V Tour.
My CATS Trip - Atlantic City (NJ), August 12, 2001
~ Prologue ~
I woke up around 10:00 am, excited and more than a little surprised that I could sleep so long when I had CATS that day. A time later and me, my mum, and dad got in the truck at 11:20 am and headed down to South Jersey, Atalantic City, seeing a few deer on the side sof the highway on our 3-hour travel.
When we entered the city, the first thing I saw was the Caesar's Palace and Bally's Casino a little further down. What we did was drop off my dad so he could try his gambling luck at the Bally's casino room, while me and my mum then went on to find Harrah's. We had fun getting lost until we finally got directed correctly when on Martin Luther King Ave. We found a good parking spot on the 6th level right near the entrance and then headed on inside.
First thing we had to do was go to the Theatre Box Office to pick up our tickets. Rang up an elevator and first thing we saw when the doors rolled open was a shiny, beautiful poster advertisement for CATS on the back panel: "Create Some Memories This Summer...." and the two tell-all cat eyes staring out at us. I wish I had my camera so I could have taken a pic ((I'm always a big "tourist" when it comes to CATS trips =) )) but I'd accidently left my camera at home. :(
So me and my mum wait on line to the box office and there's this woman right in front of us. My mum decided to strike up a conversation with her as we waited and proudly announced that I had seen the show 3 times on B'way and that I had most of the production soundtracks for the show to which the woman was pretty impressed with and asked me who my fav Cat was. I smiled and told her that I was a full-time Mungoholic and part-time TumbleManiac. =O)
Got something to eat at 2:30 pm at the Club Cappuccino and then went up to the second level ((which reminded me a LOT like a regular old movie theatre, only on a lot better scale)) to head into the theatre to wait for the show to start for 4:00 pm. I was going to hand the usher a $10 note but my mum said $5 would do just as well in the way of good seating. She was right. We ended up getting "the best seats in the house," blue level, high up but 3 levels down in the centre near the stairs. They really were AWESOME! You could see EVERYTHING: spotlights, the conductor screen, either the lighting or sound pit near left centre, Christmas lights, everything. Only thing I would complain about would be that there was no Cat Interaction available on that level... I mean, of course, that other than the Overture, the Cats restricted their running about to the first 4 levels from the bottom.
It was around 3:30 pm when me and my mum saw a guy with a "CATS On Tour" shirt selling CATS brochures on the far left of the theatre. It didn't look as though he had a lot of them and, thinking they might be the New Tour brochures, I volunteered to sprint down and get one before they were all sold out. Of course, with my infamous rotten luck, I got there and he had just sold his last one. I found out from him that they were the brochures left over from the previous CATS National Tour, not the new one. The New Tour's, he said, would be released in the next city. I still would have liked the old Tour brochure but whatcha gonna do? LOL =)
Two people - a little girl named Ashley and her mother or grandmother named Julia were seated at our table on the opposite side and we found out that they were MVPs of Harrah's who would have been seated down below in front by the stage but Ashley had wanted an upper seat so she got to sit with us. :)
The stage appearance - curtains closed (they were a velvety red, btw) and on the two walls on either side of the stage were strings of Christmas lights. When the curtain finally opened at 3:45 pm, it was amazing! Beautiful! I mean, if I were a cat I'd LOVE to live there! The liscense plate on the car I think read: NAP11 A. There was a sinked-down black top hat at the corner of the right side. The oven on the left had a closed door, while in the video, it was left wide open. The Christmas lights continued on the insides of the yard, almost like a wreath. It really was gorgeous, bathed in a dark, shadowy greenish-silver light.
Finally, a little bit after 4:00 pm, the house lights began to darken and the customary announcement came as follows with an unexpected but pleasantly witty touch. " Ladies and gentleman, welcome to... CATS. Some of the special effects employed in this performance will be pyrotechnics, haze, smoke, and strobe lights. And since Cats don't like any abrupt noises, please turn off all cell phones and pagers at this time. Thank you for choosing Harrah's and enjoy the show."
After a few delayed seconds of the theatre becoming completely dark, the show began.
~ Overture ~
The music starts up at a quick, dazzling pace and I saw one of the exit doors on the far left of the theatre open and some of the Cats sneak in among the crowd, getting ready for their musical cue to run amuck. I saw brilliant flashes of white light and then blinking green cat eyes. A few moments before the big cue, the Cats began to slither and jump all around as coming from where we first came, leading me to figure out that they - or, at least, some of them must have come out from the backstage door in costume and gone in the way we did. Lots of them ran through our platform and one of them on the steps reached to indirectly flash his cat eyes at us. The UFO - shaped very much like a large bell - floated up and I never saw so many bright colours!: purples, greens, blues, gold. Plus all during this, smoke was filling the stage, giving it that hazy, sultry look. The most beautiful Overture of CATS I've ever seen!
~ Prologue of Jellicle Cats ~
Okay, first-off: Munkustrap (Grant Turner) deserves some applause because other than Michael Gruber, he is the first one I've ever seen who can actually "slither" down off the car to sing his line and he delivers a very strong, good first impression as a Munku. Instead of the trapeze, it's a series of flips and cartwheels between Mungojerrie (Bryce Bermingham) and Tumblebrutus (Brad Barnes). The shoe doesn't come down with a loud *thump!* like it does on B'way, which leads me to believe that either the shoe was too light-weighted or it just didn't have a leathery bottom. Munkustrap is the one in the formation to leap off the tyre and move the shoe. Mungojerrie is in the second group that goes forward to name all the different kinds of cats there are.
~ The Naming of Cats ~
Asparagus (William Harttery) races forward to fall to his knees and stare disapprovingly at an offending human in the front right side. Mungojerrie, a little later, slides to the edge and stares at the chosen human also before backing into the formation. Many of the Cats stayed on stage, like Victoria, Sillabub, Old Deuteronomy, Munkustrap and another female kitten ((I couldn't make out who she was but I saw she and Sillabub were kneeling together at the front stage reciting the poem)). Mungojerrie was in the front of the row to the right beside the stage while a female Cat took a seat on the ledge of one of the booths down below. I saw Skimbleshanks come right up to the level below mine and another male Cat climbed over the audience down below but none of them ventured up.
~ Invitation To The Jellicle Ball ~
Victoria creeps to the centre of the yard and let me just say that this Victoria (Shylo Smith) was definately one of the BEST! She was graceful and beautiful and her makeup wasn't so heavy as it is on B'way. The lighting was added to this - lovely white and pale blue lights that made her clearly stand out... It was like a chrysallis around her. The music in how they orchestrated the number was also complimental - done completely by keyboard and flute. She doesn't do the bicycle with her legs but it doesn't even matter compared to her grace! =) It's cool! The last note which signals for Mistoffelees (McCree O'Kelley) to run out strums up and hangs, getting louder and louder on the keyboard and then "flashing" like the thunder sound used on Disney's Fantasia. While Victoria and Misto dance, Munkustrap sings from on top of the old car. The choreography has some new moves in it not seen on B'way.
~ The Old Gumbie Cat ~
It was in this song that I realized something about the large pipe and that is that there's a flap of dark shredded leather inside so, beyond that, who knows? Jenny comes out of the oven, the door going up slowly to reveal the Gumbie cat. When the first beetle runs out to wreak havoc, Jenny slaps his rear to make him run off. Julie Garnye makes a very CUTE Jenny! Much of the tapping part was cut out and feels a lot like the video's choppy editing but, in some ways, it really wasn't all that noticeable. Besides, Skimble being grumpy to the music on the ford cheered me up! =) A male Cat from the end of the line tryed stalking Jenny with his fork very cutely but got caught in the act and sent off back to his place which he did reluctantly. I loved it when Munkustrap, Jellylorum, Demeter and Bombalurina marched out from stage left to get in front for the big tap finale. And, as usual, Jenny had to be chased for her Gumbie coat to be put back on. =)
~ Rum Tum Tugger ~
Stan Stanley made an awesome-looking Tugger. He made his character both sexy and very self-assured but he gave me that first impression of John Partridge style. I really do love Stephen Bienskie for the part but that's probably because I'm so used to having him as Tugs. ^_^ Stan's Tugger just sounded sometimes like a really hyper Zazu from the Lion King... LOL I love the way he just burst out and poised with the "I'm so sexy" look. Munkustrap sings the "terrible bore" part himself.
Bombalurina walks out and faces the audience, holding out her arm as she sings, "The Rum Tum Tugger is a curious beast!" and Tugger goes over to her and gives her a look, sliding his hand down her arm and then indifferently turning his back on her. Upset, she goes for it again and gets declined with a long sniff and a bratty, "Noo!" He jumps out into the audience directly below me and picked a woman in a blue outfit to dance with. After their slow dance, they both looked up at the people on the higher ledges and blew a kiss.
Something I didn't like was at the end where Tugger stands amidst his little fan club. It just seemed too timed - he would "abou-ouuuu!," they would scream after a pause as if they were counting seconds and then screaming to make sure they'd do it together. Plus, they didn't have Rumpleteazer going crazy at the end which I love seeing. ^-^ Maybe I was just expecting too much from a casino-edited show but I understand that it's a tour and things get altered in the mix.
~ Grisabella, the Glamour Cat ~
On B'way, you hear a lot more instrumentation but on the tour where you have about 7 instruments, it really is a pleasant, simplistic change. Hearing the beginning done strictly by keyboard without any of the oboe or flute strains. Gretchen (Grisabella) has a beautiful, bone-chilling voice that carries well over the audience and doesn't hold the vibretto ((which I don't like very much)) that final B'way cast member Linda Balgord had.
I loved the part where Victoria reaches behind her to hold onto little Sillabub's hand and they slowly step closer and closer to Grisabella until Jellylorum finally chases them back. Tumble is the one egged on to scratch Gris's arm and then run off to hide. Cassandra, I could see, obviously hated the old queen because she made a scowl and a hiss and kicked back dirt at her. Demeter had a nice voice, really fantastic, but I have to note that I'm still very much partial to Celina Carvajal's interpretation and voice more. Bombalurina was cool, too, and she definately had the sexy, sultry attitude down but Marlene Danielle and Rosemarie Ford are still very high up there on my ranks.
Even as the American sirens go off and everyone on stage panics, it's cool to still see Grisabella walking away, totally unaffected as she walks off slowly up the aisle and to the left. Alonzo jumps beside Munkustrap and they have a little panicked exchange before all the others run, not in the audience, but offstage. Alonzo then runs backstage stage left and Munkustrap stage right.
~ Mungojerrie & Rumpleteazer ~
Silence. And then you hear a soft, delightfully wicked giggle and a "Shh!" Then suddenly, Mungojerrie and Rumpleteazer climb out ontop of the car, carrying their enormous red and white loot bags. The choreography is a bit different than B'way, with a lot of jumps and fun-looking cartwheels replacing the giant leapfrog done by Mungo at the mention of policemen. In fact, to note on that, the whole middle of the song ((like the video's version)) was sadly cut out of this production and probably won't return for the other states. :(
Rumpleteazer (Emily Haag) has the cutest voice ever and her mischievous giggle is just as wonderful and rivals B'way's Tesha Buss. She has the sweet, kittenish mirth I always adore in the Rumple character.
Mungojerrie (Bryce Bermingham) was just as awesome ((....& handsome)) as I thought he would be. His expression when they bump backs is priceless! To me, despite knowing that he hadn't spoiled his interpretation of the character itself by listening to other recordings, it sounded as though he had a mix of the Original Cast Australian and B'way (Roger Kachel) versions along with his own blend of cuteness and humour.
I see these two as littermates but since I saw them both paired up during Bombalurina's sexy dance for the Ball, who knows? At the first, "Was it Mungojerrie?" I detected a little slip of good ol' fashioned Cockney in the way he said "was." And tell me who can't resist them when the Notorious Duo bursts out laughing like mad at the Ming? I know I was trying to hold back laughter. :)
The double cartwheel was, of course, great to see but me and my mum have on a bet of controversy over it... I say it was one long fluid move but my mom disagrees, saying they were disconnecting and then having to reconnect at each turn. I certainly won't slight them on that, though, if it's true! ^_~
I especially loved the last note of the song right after, "And there's nothin' at all to be done about that!" It was a very sweet, cute piano chord near the softest part of the keyboard ((I never was good in musical theory so I have no idea which note that was)) but it was a nice change compared to the loud tuba-sounding note I've heard in other productions. Well done! =)
~ Old Deuteronomy ~
There's no Coricopat and Tantomile in this production so sensing the Old One is primarily Mistoffelees' job and his voice is once again channeled through Munkustrap who says hopefully, "Old Deuteronomy?" --- it sounded like he needed escape from all those unruly Jellicles jumping all over the place (aka Tumble & Pounce) *lol!* I think Jellylorum is the one to sing, "I believe it is Old Deuteronomy" but I'm not entirely sure..... It could have been Demeter. The instrumentation was fabulous - sweet and relaxing, just as it should be.
Skimbleshanks (John Sechrist) is the one to go down and get Old Deuteronomy and I saw him also quite a couple times as he went down right in front of me. Skimble has such an adorable face and there rarely was a single minute that I didn't see him without a heartwarming smile.
Munkustrap had a good, strong voice that was both compassionate and commanding at the same time and I was happy to see he could go between each tone so easily and not just stick to one through the whole song. Tugger also has a nice voice for the song with a tint of laughter in his tone which I think is a perfect compliment to the song.
This song always gave me spine-tingles but, after being so used to hearing it, the feeling had just faded. However, the feeling returned when I heard and saw this version. Skimbleshanks leading Old Deuteronomy to the stage touched me, for some reason, and Old Deut. just had such a kind face and gentle voice. It honestly made me wish he was my grandfather. ^-^
~ The Jellicle Ball ~
The Ball starts when suddenly lightning flashes and there's a huge *CRASH!* which are, I noticed, a lot louder than both B'way and the video combined. When you don't expect it, it can really make you nearly jump out of your skin! LOL Everyone clears the stage except for Munkustrap and Old Deuteronomy and there's a silence. The eerie music begins and it twice as drawn out because the dialogue has been snipped away from this version. Sillabub and Victoria are the ones to come out first and then the others follow and get into the first formation to do the slow balletic part as seen on the video. Things then go just like it would in the B'way production only it's a lot more fast-paced due to the time limit of the show. The mating dance is beautifully-lit with crisp colours and the music was soft. The most energetic part of the Ball strums up and the only word to describe both the music and Christmas lights startingt o go crazy would be: WOW!! Just as the finale starts, with that one pinging note, the spotlight shoots into the audience with the dappled different-coloured lights and then slides back in to the performers on stage. Then, it does it again. BEAUTIFUL!!!! Broadway never had it like that!
~ Memory ~
Grisabella walks slowly onto the stage again and all of the Cats run and hide. The younger toms tease her while Rumpleteazer, Victoria and Sillabub attempt to touch her but get pulled or chased away. Noting, Sillabub (Sara Schudde) has a gorgeous voice and she's just so small - like a kitten. ^-^ Her voice rivals Veerle Castelynn's dubber on the video. I'm serious here, people! :)
~ Moments of Happiness ~
Grisabella slinks to the back of the stage and stays there, seated dejectedly as the other Cats come out again, seeming not to notice her presence this time. They settle around and I saw seated together Pouncival with the Twins and Sillabub. As Old Deuteronomy sang, Pouncival layed on his stomach and would twitch his head slowly from side to side all while grinning that mischievous grin of his. Then, as Sillabub rises to sing, he helps by giving her his hand. Really cute of him! ^-^
~ Gus, The Theatre Cat ~
Gus takes a seat on, I think it was, a soda can and Jellylorum (Wendy Bergamini) sings about him. Her voice is a very nice soprano and her facial characterizations made me smile. The character comes off as cheerful and proud of her grandfather (?) and that' s how I've always viewed Jellylorum as being. :) I also caught something from the corner of my eye, that Skimble snuck from stage left and settled himself on the sunk-in top hat there... in a very uncomfortable pose, too... 0-0
~ Skimbleshanks, The Railway Cat ~
Pretty much like what's on the video though here we have the most hyper marmalade tom I've ever seen! :) Are ya kiddin'? Elderly? No way! He's practically jumping and dancing around as the kittens he care-takes. LOL! Seeing the train get put together live again after a year felt good! Still gives me spine-tingles when I see it. :)
~ Macavity, The Mystery Cat ~
Mwahahahaha! *ahem* So we have an awesome blaring of sirens and mayhem with lots of cool red lighting. Everett Taylor (Macavity) is a wonderful dancer - you can just tell. :) Bombalurina and Demeter sing and dance and the instrumentation on this song is so cool! The lighting actually looked a lot more "cabaret" here but with it, I couldn't really make out the faces, being so high up from the stage itself. I did get to note that there were I think 2 kittens each jumping into the audience to interact on the lower levels. I could see Pouncival fooling around on the far left and Victoria on the right below us. A lot of the audience was either drunk or wasn't appreciative of it though. :( Most of them, I heard, were just there for the show because they supposedly were invited by a Complimented Invitation by Harrah's. I would have been appreciative - one of those people should have traded seats with me =)
The Macavity fight was cool! In some productions, it looks too planned or too careful. Don't get me wrong, it IS supposed to be done carefully but not so the audience actually SEES it. Munkustrap got thrown out of the fight waaay early and Alonzo carried it on. The throwing sequence looked so realistic!
Macavity makes the lights blow out and then the spotlight switches on and sweeps the audience, going once over the lower levels and then back again over us. I never had the CATS spotlight on me that long in all the times I went to see the show. SO COOL!!! ^-^
~ Mr. Mistoffelees ~
Tugger appears on top of the large pipe to make his introduction about Mistoffelees, the Original Conjuring Cat, and the song is done almost just like it is on the video. I'm impressed with Misto (McCree O'Kelley) beyond anything. He makes such a cute Misto and he's always grinning! :)
~ Memory Reprise ~
Mistoffelees blows the spotlight onto little Sillabub (Sara Schudde) who's on the car and she sings in that sweet, gentle voice of hers. All there was was dead silence as she sang in the theatre - everyone could recognize talent when they saw it. :)
Grisabella comes back into the junkyard and all the Jellicles hiss angrily at her and move away til she faces Old Deuteronomy directly and starts to sing. Once again, Gretchen has a beautiful voice and it pairs very nicely with that of Sara's.
~ The Journey To The Heavyside Layer ~
Grisabella is accepted at last and she is sent to the Heavyside Layer. The hydraulic smoke was cool! They must have had a lot of it because it just flooded over the stage and way into the audience! So much so that I could actually feel it. =) I LOVE that part and the strangest thing is that I was eye level with the rising tyre the whole time. I usually always have to look far up to see Gris walk the steps to heaven but the action was all eye level with me, could see everything as clear as a bell.
~ The Addressing of Cats ~
Nothing much to say here. Old Deuteronomy descended a bit on the tyre and was yet again eye-level with me as he sang about cats. The cast down below didn't give many facial expressions but some of them did start to grin and groom themselves a bit at the mention of his/her favorite foods. :)
~ Bows ~
The CATS cast jumped into the audience and then took turns returning to the stage to take their signature bows. What was funny at the end was what went on between the Tugger and Bombalurina. Bom got all seductive and everything, diverting Tugger's gaze from the audience and when he got close enough, she rejected him just like he had done her during his song, sending him flat on his face. Then, she literally stepped across his back and waved her tail at him, grinning! Tugger gave a wide-eyed look to the audience like some lovesick Pollicle and then chased her offstage. That had to be one of the funniest things ever! LOL
~ Epilogue ~
So got outside to where the backstage door was inside and tryed our luck at meeting some of the cast. :)We waited.... and waited.... Then, finally the door opened and a stage manager walked out a bit to look at the VERY few people who were there and ask, " Does anyone here know Sharon? Sharon Honeycutt?" I was like, "That's the actress who plays Bombalurina that she's talking about!" to my mum. ^_^ Everyone gave an apologetic "No, sorry" and I took the time to peer over into the open back door to see what I could see.
I saw the Gumbie Cat costume that Jenny sheds in her number close up and it looked really heavy. 0-0 I then looked up and saw a rack full of yak hair character wigs - I noticed that one was Jennyanydots and the other might have been Skimble's.
The stage manager noticed my looking and grinned, saying, "All the props and costumes we use are from the old National Tour." She then looked to the man I had met in the theatre wearing the "CATS On Tour" shirt and asked absently, "This stuff isn't going on Ebay when it's over like Broadway's, is it?" The man answered that it wasn't and that all the stuff would get packed up again for the next tour.
We asked if any of the cast members were going to be coming out and the stage manager said, laughing, "Probably not since they have another show at 7:00 pm. Most of them all make a b-line to the cafeteria, as soon as the show is over." We nodded and I went down the stairs in front as me mum tried asking about the brochures.
Then, suddenly, I saw Brad Barnes (Tumblebrutus) come rushing out from the backstage still in his makeup and wig and wearing his jacket. He talked to one of his friends, asking if he liked the show, and then made a half zip around the corner and ran up the stairs on the side to the cafeteria. I was nearly booting myself for not having my camera on me! It would have been a perfect shot and everything! Grr... *sigh* But a wise friend of mine online once told me, "At least, you have the visual picture of it and no one can take that memory from you." ^_^ She's a hundred percent right. =)
Headed off through the noisy casino area and got to our car. Picked up my dad from Bally's and then headed off back home. Around 7:30 pm, we got stuck in a huge thunderstorm and had to pull over into a restuarant parking lot. Once the rain kinda died down, I went out there with me mum to buy some hot cinnamon rolls for us. As we got back into the car, guess what was playing on the radio....? A really good techno version of Memory!! It was like Fate or something. It just started ten seconds after we got back in. So we listened to that while we ate and then went back to drive home. =) Finally got back around 8:30 pm and while my parents were as tired as ever, I was hyper and didn't finally get to sleep until 2:00 am in the morning. LOL!
Viva La CATS! ^_~
Purrs,
~ Mista
Trip Report from Jenny who saw the show on August 8, 2001.
Harrah's Atlantic City, August 8, 2001 @ 7pm
The morning of the show I was very excited! I woke up at 7 am and headed to my aunt's house at 8:45. At around 10:30, we started out towards AC. The trip took about 2.5 hours.
We arrived at Showboat (where we were staying) around 1:30. We checked in and headed up to unpack. Then we walked around the boardwalk for a while,taking in the sites. At around 3:45 we headed back to the hotel to get ready to go to the show.
We left for Harrah's at around 5pm. It was a 5-7 minute cab ride. We thought the open seating started at 5:30pm, but it started at 6pm instead, so we just hung around outside the theatre. At about 5:45 we headed in. There was already a line! When we got in, the usher came over to seat us, and I already knew where I wanted to be. Taking my father's advice, I said, "Hey, can I get a good seat?", and gave the usher a $10 bill. He said, "Sure thing. Follow me.". Well, that paid off because we followed him right to the FRONT AND CENTER! I could practically reach out and touch the cats! We had to wait approx. an hour for the show to start so we sat and chatted with the people with whom we were seated with at the table. I snapped a picture of the set, too! It came out GREAT, I think.
The show finally began. The sound, lighting, costumes and everything else about it was absolutely fantastic. The cast really sang and danced quite well. I was very impressed! In the first act, I especially loved Mungojerrie and Rumpletazer. Bryce and Susanna were outstanding! (Susanna Hirst was Emily Haag's u.s.) The tap in the Gumbie cat was so well done for a fairly new group of people! The girl cats at the end of RTT were so cute squealing at him! It had the whole audience laughing! And during The Naming of Cats, one cat had a staring contest with someone. It was amazing that neither of them started laughing, and they were doing it for a while. There was no Pekes, and no Bustopher. (Everything will be back for the rest of the tour, save Pekes). The Jellicle Ball was shortened. The second act was just as good as the first. There was no Growltiger and Misto's number was shortened. My favorite part was Skimbleshanks. John Sechrist was so good. He had a great voice and performed his part so well. I loved it when all the cats wake him up in the beginning of his song! He had the cutest expression on his face! Mistoffelees was great too. McCree O'Kelley is a great dancer in that role! Well, Misto is one of my favorite cats. ;) It was great to be so close during the Journey to the Heaviside Layer. I could see all the way up into the ceiling where Griz goes! (Heaviside Layer). The smoke and lighting effects were great! I almost wanted to cry during The Ad-dressing of Cats. I didn't want it to end, and I just imagined myself sitting in the Winter Garden and it brought back alot of memories. :*(
After the show let out, I asked the usher if the cats would come out. He said no because they were in between shows and had to eat. He told me to come back after the 10pm show ended, around 11:45pm, and then they'd be there. I did that, and met a whole bunch of cats! I got a chance to see Bryce Bermingham (Mungojerrie), Sara Schudde (Sillabub), Grant Turner (Munkustrap), William Hartery (Gus), Shylo Smith (Victoria), Jessica Lea Patty (Demeter), Ronnie Smith (Alonzo), Julie Garnye (Jennyanydots), Brad Barnes (Tumblebrutus), Everett Taylor (Plato/Macavity), McCree O'Kelley (Mistoffelees), John Sechrist (Skimbleshanks), and Susanna Hirst (u.s. for Rumpleteazer). They were all such nice people who seemed to get along quite well. I got a few pics, too. And I could tell Misto right away. He had such a distinct face. I said to McCree, "You're Mistoffelees, right? I can tell!" and he was like, "Yeah!" It was hard to tell who they were because their makeup makes a difference! Everett, Brad, and John were so funny together! They had me laughing so much, as you can see from the pic below! The roses were given to Everett (I think?) and they were joking around with them. Before my sister took the picture, John said he was "presenting " the flowers! See how he's holding them? When my sister was about to take the picture she said to them, "Can she pretend to be a cat? Jen, stick your leg out or something." I was like, "I'm NOT that flexible!" The guys thought that was pretty funny. :) It's true though. I can't lift my leg higher than 2 feet off the ground. It comes with training I guess. :P
I had the time of my life, thanks to everyone involved! Even though there was a very disturbing person in the audience who I do not care to discuss (e-mail me if you really want to hear about it) it was great otherwise. The effects, music, singing, dancing, set, and interaction with the audience was excellent! I enjoyed this production just as much as the Broadway production. That was comforting, too, being as though there is no more B-way show. And I will be seeing it again in West Point, hopefully more than once during that weekend.
Trip Report from Dax who saw the first show of the CATS V Tour.
*Note, I got this off of musicals.net and assume since it was posted there that I can keep a copy of it here. If Dax doesn't want his report here, he can e-mail me and I will take it down.
After seeing the show in AC and knowing that the cast had (I think Adas mentioned it) less than a month to practice, I was most impressed. However, I really can't say because of that. Still, I have to say it definitely looks promising. I look forward to seeing it again. The lighting effects are the best I've ever seen. (Yeah, I know. So what. You just have to see it to believe it. Incredible)
The musical direction is by a veteran. Stan Tucker from Bway. (My personal preference would have been Larry Pressgrove. I know most people don't seem to pay much attention to that sort of thing but I am just rambling here.)
Couple more notes before I drop to sleep at my desk. The choreography is led by Suzanne Viverito and Mark Moreau, 2 Bway vets. (NOT dancing mind you. Important point there) Bustopher Jones, Growltiger and Pekes and Pollicles numbers cut from the show, Certain dance sequences also were not added. (You see the Bway and WestEnd shows enough, you'll catch something "missed" during the Jellicle Ball.) The most noticeble dance sequence cut from the show was the "Conjuring Turn" in Mr. Mistoffelees.