Kiss of the Spiderwoman

We just got home from the Signature Theatre where we saw "Kiss Of The Spiderwoman". I'm not the biggest fan of the show, but I can say this was an excellent production. I think the show does a bit better in a smaller house rather than a huge Broadway theatre. I actually was a bit tentative about going. Will Chase and Hunter Foster as the two leads both seemed woefully miscast to me, and while I love Natacia Diaz (she blew me away in tick...tick...BOOM!), she isn't exactly at Chita Rivera star level. But the great news was that it was way better than I'd expected. It is unfortunate that Hunter learned all he knows about playing effeminate gay from watching Roger Bart in "The Producers", but vocally he really knocked it out of the park, so I easily forgave all the acting-via-floppy-wrist-action. I always knew Natacia could sing, but boy can she dance too! She must get bored turning down offers for playing Anita in West Side Story, because she must kick butt at that part. But Will was the best of all, in great voice and looking far more rugged and genuine than I thought he was capable of. Even the ensemble rose to the occasion and gave a far more coherent performance than those of the other shows I've seen there. I just love good singing, and this production was chock full of it. More, please.

Speaking of singing, of course I am enjoying Idol. I was very sad to see David Hernandez go this week. He isn't much of a performer, and I can't deny that his song was pretty terrible this week. But from a strict vocal perspective, I think he was the best actual singer of them all. He wasn't a good enough performer to win or anything, but for me I was sort of hoping Ramiele was going. It is a season without a Bucky or Scott Savol, so I really can't complain about the talent level though, which is a great thing. Even Chickizie, who for me so far has been little more than a really fun name, totally gave the best performance of the week, I mean talk about fun! I'm perplexed, however, by the decision to torture the audience with re-watching the worst three performances. What douchebag made that decision? I could live with watching perhaps the three best performances again, but why on earth would I want to suffer through that country singer disaster a second time? Lame.

Since we were at the show tonight, I had to tape Survivor. I'll watch that tomorrow, I hate being behind but going out is fun too. Of course we leave for vacation a week from today, I can't wait! So I'll be two weeks behind on Survivor by the time we get back, that is gonna suck. But I'm sure the Florida sun will ease my suffering. ;)