A Wicked Good Time

            When my marvelous friend, Kate Sterling, called me a few months back and asked me to see Kristin Chenoweth at the Boston Opera House with her, I squealed like teenager with Justin Beiber tickets. Ms. Chenoweth originated the role of Glinda in Wicked on Broadway. It’s a role that requires the voice of an angel and the voice of a seasoned belter and you need great comic timing. She played it to perfection. If you’ve never heard her sing you should watch this. Go ahead. I’ll wait.

Most recently she was a part of the short-lived series GBC. I take full responsibility for the show being cancelled. Any time I enjoy a television series, it gets cancelled. I should have waited for it to run a couple of seasons. But I adore Kristin and I couldn’t resist. Plus, Annie Potts was in it and I love her too. I was weak! I watched it. I loved it. It was cancelled. Sigh. For the record, it isn’t my fault that her gloriously quirky and adorable series Pushing Daisies was cancelled. I didn’t discover that until it came out on video.

So Friday night I found myself with my best friend at a sold out Boston Opera House. I knew Kristin Chenoweth could sing from her recordings. I knew she was funny from television. I knew she was genuine and humble from her memoir A Little Bit Wicked: Life, Love, and Faith in Stages. But I did not expect to be absolutely inspired by Kristin Chenoweth. She performed with grace, humility, gratitude, and love.

The program for the evening was eclectic. She sang Broadway classics, patriotic ballads, country tunes, and spiritual music. She even paid homage to Madeleine Kahn with “I’m so Tired” from Mel Brook’s Blazing Saddles. It seems there is no style Kristin can’t sing.

The highlight of the evening came when Ms. Chenoweth called for a volunteer to help her sing “For Good” from Wicked. She spoke to a handful of teenage girls in the audience, asking them their names and ages. When she came to a sixteen-year-old named Karen (if you’re a regular reader of this blog you’ll understand why I decided this was some kind of sign from above), she asked her, “Do you really know the song?”

“Are you kidding me?”  Karen said.

“Come on up here. You’re it.”

The young woman was thrilled to be on stage with her idol and it looked like her idol was happy to have Karen there. Not only did Karen know all the words, she harmonized, which Kristin, visibly impressed, pointed out to the audience. By the end of the song, I was in tears. Having been a singer myself for most of my life, I knew what that moment meant to that young woman. Not that I had that kind of chutzpah at sixteen to be able to pull it off. I’d have fainted if a Tony and Emmy award-winning actress called me up on stage. I probably had the vocal chops back then, but not the guts.

As we were leaving the theatre, I overheard some older women suggesting that the whole thing had been staged. They couldn’t imagine that a girl that age could possibly get up and do what Karen had just done without rehearsing. But I believe it was real. A number of young women I know through community theatre and through their parents could do just that. The Mollies, Noras, Gabbies, Allysons and Morgans of this world could all step up to the mic and make their dreams come true. Those are the girls I was thinking of when tears rolled down my cheeks at the Opera House on Friday night. Girls with talent and guts. Girls who are fortunate to grow up with great role models like Kristin Chenoweth.

When I was in my early twenties, a voice teacher told me, “You have the voice of a leading lady in a character actor’s body.” I wasn’t offended. Like Kristin Chenoweth, I’m four feet eleven inches tall. I had never seen a leading lady my size. I was always been cast as the sidekick, the comic relief, or chorus girl number six. Around that same time Kristin Chenoweth arrived in New York with a big voice and a huge stage presence in a little body. Her big break came when was cast as Precious in Kander and Ebb’s Steel Pier. Kander and Ebb wrote a song for her. Two years later she won a Tony for You’re a Good Man Charlie Brown. Kristin Chenoweth has taught the musical theatre world a very important lesson: you can be a leading lady and a character.

And Now for Something Completely Different...

        So far all of my blog posts have had something to do with parenting. So it’s time to shake things up a little. I went out the other night. Moms can do that, you know. Not very often—my kids wake up really early. Getting the boys off to school is a little trickier when you’ve only gotten a few hours of sleep. Actually, it’s not so much the lack of sleep as the activity beforehand. There are plenty of nights I’m up late reading or writing (or slaying imaginary monsters in the boys’ bedroom). But if I’m in a bar, drinking and dancing the morning after is ugly. Plus, going out can be expensive and children have really expensive habits like eating and getting dressed.
       James Otto played an acoustic show at a local bar Thursday night. If you listen to country radio at all, you’ve heard his hit single “Just Got Started Loving You”. More recently his song “Groovy Little Summer Song” has been getting some airplay as well. The timing on that one was unfortunate. As the title suggests, it’s a catchy pop-country song about summer—driving with the top down, enjoying the sunshine, drinking, the usual. Although it was released in June, it didn’t get to the radio until late August. If it had gotten some play earlier in the year I suspect he would have had another hit on his hands. James, I have some friends who are really good publicists—maybe I can hook you up.
Anyway, the opening act had cancelled so he went on without one. He walked onto the stage and the first thing you notice is his size—he’s huge. I’m tiny myself so I rarely notice other people’s size because just about everyone is bigger than me. His two guitarists had their feet on the rung of their barstools. But he was so tall that when he sat down his feet were flat on the floor. You know how so many performers don’t sing particularly well without their studio magic? James Otto can really sing. He has a rich baritone that sounds more like a soul or gospel singer than a country singer. I didn’t know the first few songs but I was very impressed with his stage presence and talent.
       So I was getting into the music and really enjoying myself when I heard a conversation behind us.
       “That’s not him, is it?” a woman asked her friend.
       “I don’t know.” She taped me on the shoulder
       “Is that James Otto?” She asked me.
       “Um. Yes.”
       “It doesn’t look like him. Does it?”
       “I think so.” I told her and turned away to enjoy the music.
       “I’m so upset!” She told her friend.
       Upset? I thought. You’re upset because he isn’t as pretty as you thought he was? Sorry lady, some people are just talented not hot. I take that back. Real talent is hot. Some folks are just prettier than others.
       As the show progressed. Otto played a number of songs from his new CD as well as a couple of covers. He really got the crowd involved doing a sort of call and response thing with Bob Seger’s Night Moves. Irritatingly each time he started a new song the lady behind me would sigh like a twelve-year-old girl deprived of her cell phone and said, “He better play ‘Just Got Started Loving You’. I’m so upset!”
       Really? They guy has had one hit on the radio—he’s going to play it last so people will hear his new songs and possibly buy them. Haven’t you ever been to a concert before? I mean, I don’t get out much and even I know that. First the guy has the nerve to not be cute enough and then he has to play his new music first (which you didn’t get to appreciate how good it was because you’re too busy whining!).
       So I was there with my girls enjoying the music and trying not to get irritated by the woman behind me when I noticed something. Only about half the people in the bar were paying any attention to the band. I mean, we all paid ten bucks to get in. Don’t you want to listen? And watch? I’m beginning to believe there ought to be a class in public school called Being a Good Audience Member 101.
       This observation made me feel pretty good about myself. You see, I’ve taken the stage in this particular bar for karaoke contests now and then. I have been singing since I can remember—musicals, church choirs, bands, and so on. But I don’t have a whole lot of time to indulge that particular hobby these days—so karaoke contests are a sort of methadone for my performance addiction. The thing that I don’t like about singing karaoke in a bar is the fact that no one pays attention to the singer. I mean, there you are, in the spotlight, singing your heart out and everyone is having their own conversations or watching the game on TV. Well, apparently, they don’t just ignore soccer moms singing Martina McBride. They also ignore really big guys who have hit songs on the radio. That’s a piece of news will make me stand up a little straighter the next time I’m on that stage. That may be a while—who knows when I’ll recover enough for another girl’s night out.