Take your passion and make it happen
Apr. 19th, 2013 12:21 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
butterflydreaming Someone loved Flashdance, the movie from '80s, and made it into a stage musical. I never saw the movie, but I did see the show tonight. It was good! Coffeedaiv did see the movie, and he could confirm a place or two where I suspected that the tone of a scene had been changed.
The stage show is full of dancing fun. There is lots of bare skin, since the dancers where various skimpy costumes at time, yet the impression is very innocent. Even in the strip club, the pole dancers were kind of glamorous, more pretty-sexy than provocative-sexy.
You might remember the infamous bra-removal-with-shirt-on scene. Well, I loved how they played it on the stage. For this show, Alex (the woman) peels it off and drops it beside her chair with all the casualness of a person at home. She is telling a story, so her mind isn't on her actions. Nick (the love interest) was pure male ingenue. In this scene, he stutters and loses the ability to think when he witnesses the bra maneuver, and it is sweet and cute. The show plays up the "in love" aspect of their relationship. Nick gets a lot of character development to make him a hero worth loving.
I marveled at how 97% of the cast weren't even born when the movie version came out. I was at first perplexed by how *old* the audience members were, but then I did the math... and I felt old. I'm 41. I don't normally feel old. Most of the audience was over 55, over 65 in the loge section (the expensive seats) where we sat.
The show is a pretty good period piece. The trappings of the decade are there: moonwalking, breakdancing, hammer pants, painted on tight jeans in colors, shoulder pads, track suits, zipper skirts, and lots of suede ankle boots. D and I both noted the anachronistic plastic bucket drumming in one scene, but other than that, I think that they recreated the time accurately. In after show discussion, we talked about how the sexism (sexual harassment in the workplace, hello) needs the '80s setting to fit.
Best part of the show: "Put it On," youtu.be/QCqyRhfTDeU a lively number with the gems of the show, the two other dancers from Harry's. It was set backstage at Harry's, with the ladies whipping off their robes to show off an empowered bra-and-panty moment before going behind a changing screen and donning gold dresses. They end the number dressed in glittering bustiers and foompy skirts, with crown-like headdresses. Great number.
The well known water scene is sadly one of the weaker moments. I think that it was probably pretty dangerous once the water sprays started. Before the water, it's a wind scene that was done with style, her costume pieces yoinked away as if blown off by a strong wind.
The stage show is full of dancing fun. There is lots of bare skin, since the dancers where various skimpy costumes at time, yet the impression is very innocent. Even in the strip club, the pole dancers were kind of glamorous, more pretty-sexy than provocative-sexy.
You might remember the infamous bra-removal-with-shirt-on scene. Well, I loved how they played it on the stage. For this show, Alex (the woman) peels it off and drops it beside her chair with all the casualness of a person at home. She is telling a story, so her mind isn't on her actions. Nick (the love interest) was pure male ingenue. In this scene, he stutters and loses the ability to think when he witnesses the bra maneuver, and it is sweet and cute. The show plays up the "in love" aspect of their relationship. Nick gets a lot of character development to make him a hero worth loving.
I marveled at how 97% of the cast weren't even born when the movie version came out. I was at first perplexed by how *old* the audience members were, but then I did the math... and I felt old. I'm 41. I don't normally feel old. Most of the audience was over 55, over 65 in the loge section (the expensive seats) where we sat.
The show is a pretty good period piece. The trappings of the decade are there: moonwalking, breakdancing, hammer pants, painted on tight jeans in colors, shoulder pads, track suits, zipper skirts, and lots of suede ankle boots. D and I both noted the anachronistic plastic bucket drumming in one scene, but other than that, I think that they recreated the time accurately. In after show discussion, we talked about how the sexism (sexual harassment in the workplace, hello) needs the '80s setting to fit.
Best part of the show: "Put it On," youtu.be/QCqyRhfTDeU a lively number with the gems of the show, the two other dancers from Harry's. It was set backstage at Harry's, with the ladies whipping off their robes to show off an empowered bra-and-panty moment before going behind a changing screen and donning gold dresses. They end the number dressed in glittering bustiers and foompy skirts, with crown-like headdresses. Great number.
The well known water scene is sadly one of the weaker moments. I think that it was probably pretty dangerous once the water sprays started. Before the water, it's a wind scene that was done with style, her costume pieces yoinked away as if blown off by a strong wind.
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no subject
Date: 2013-04-19 02:20 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-04-19 03:38 pm (UTC)Flashdance is from 1983, and D and I are pretty close in age, so how those things fall on our timeline is similar.
I'm sure musically inclined people have been banging on plastic buckets for as long as plastic buckets have been in existence. The cultural time marker of plastic bucket drumming feels distinctly '90s for us, while the movie is "from when there was no PG-13."
I'm not trying to be pedantic. You incited me to check my assumptions. ^_^
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Date: 2013-04-19 06:19 pm (UTC)