caroline, or change
oh wow! theater is alive & well in los angeles – my faith has been restored! i was very very lucky to see last night’s performance of this tony winning/nominated musical at the ahmanson theater – downtown LA – just in previews – the show opens nov 14th and it plays through dec 26th – it is a show that reminds me that modern musical theater is still thriving and continues as an important and viable portion of the american musical theater landscape – it is works like ‘caroline, or change’ where chances are taken – typical musical theater material and rules are tossed aside – and i was riveted by the entire show about a black maid in louisiana in 1963 and her relationship with the jewish family she works for – the show was completely sung – and the performances were amazing – especially tonya pinkins (in her tony nominated performance) as caroline thibodeaux – and anika noni rose as her daughter emmie (who snagged the tony for best featured actress in a musical – a voice of an angel) – but the night was made extra special… when my friend rick spotted playwright tony kushner who wrote the book and lyrics for ‘caroline, or change’ and he also wrote the epic – brilliant – pulitzer prize winning angels in america – in my opinion he is the greatest living american playwright of my time – he is pure genius – and any of you who were lucky enough to see angels on broadway you know what i mean – and then there was the mike nichol’s directed film version of the first portion millennium approaches – which just snagged a bunch of emmys and rightly so – i can only hope there is a planned version for the second half of angels – perestroika… |   |
so there he was quite close as we were in our seats – and i called out to him – and he was so gracious and kind – introduced ourselves – i was able to thank him for his work – and let him know how excited i was to see the show – and of course i had to mention popbytes – and told him i would be posting about the show and on him – and during intermission i gave him a card with popbytes on it – so hello to tony – i hope you made it here – last night was brilliant – and again thank you for your genius – and your words! it was a true honor to see the show in company with the playwright – and it being tony kushner was the rather large cherry on top of the whole thing! popbytes beaming & super happy and out!