Political Pop

David H Koch Theater, Lincoln Center, NYC

🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩

““No pants here! NYC ballet stays on trend for spring.”

Justin Peck – Act I

Is this called a “Threesome?”

Get ready for the next Skims ad: Leotards and pastels. Watch out for the woman in gray underwear and a black crop top. Prima ballerina is on alert as the John Meyer wannabe in purple unitard can’t keep his hands to himself. I know the florescent type gained headway circa the Jessica Simpson era but paired this lavender version over a white turtleneck says onesie and done.

Tiler Peck – Act II

Jewels has found it’s 4th act: Sapphires!!

Tiler brings it with quick tempo catch and release, foot-loose and fancy-free. Costumes by Zac Posen captivate. Catch her while you can!

Alex Ratmansky- Act III

Odessa was perhaps the most traditional piece it shows both haunting and ethereal in its duality. Dancers cavorted in red shadow, while couples in the foreground danced in baroque. You could really tell each choreographer without even looking at the program. Tiler Peck is clearly pulling together all her years as a principal dancer into one stunning masterpiece.

This trio of performances is a treat!

“He was gay and killed himself and I was gay and became a lesbian cartoonist.” – Allison Bechdel, Fun Home

Review. Mimi Jacobs

“He was gay and killed himself and I was gay and became a lesbian cartoonist.” – Allison Bechdel, Fun Home.

The final Republican Presidential candidate debate before the Iowa caucuses had Nikki Haley head to head with DeSantis while toeing the line between patients’ rights, a parents’ purview and teacher autonomy on all such topics LGBTQIA+ women. This brought me back to this week’s 10 year reunion revival of Fun Home at Joe’s Pub. Will Niki Haley support the show’s female author or ban the comic book version from school libraries? Can this piece survive the woke wars or will it be getting it from both sides?

It’s not every day that you get to see a Tony award-winning Broadway show return to its original off-broadway roots with the original cast, so I took my bets and blindly bought the last 2 tix available for Fun Home’s return home, a benefit for Outright International.

When the original child star of the cast zoomed in, I was unsure what to think. But then she ended with, “I hope you can feel my heart say ‘hi.’ And as cheesy as that is, you could not help but feel the love. The entire audience erupted in applause and the show had not even begun.

Some standouts: the new crop of kids 8–10 years old performing the wry Fun Home commercial to an updated tune of the Jackson 5’s ABC; plus Joan, the GF, for comedic timing; and Andrew Carmellini never fails to get it right: eat the bitter greens salad which is anything but, with pears, hazelnuts and red wine vinaigrette. Come for the salad. Enjoy the show.

Does it stand the test of time? I came across a PDF of the original comic book on which Allison based the musical on the shared drive for English teachers at school and pondered those same questions. When I flipped through the book, the drawing of a college years scene with two women naked in bed, a full frontal of Allison’s breasts, I asked, perplexed, “Do/did we teach this? And if so, which class and grade was subject to this?” Now what’s wrong with breasts you ask? Women can nurse and even be topless in public in NY. I still feel a move to Florida coming on. But, as Tucker Carlson would say, I’m just asking questions. “Where’s my bronzing stick?”, indeed.

NYC Ballet: 75th Anniversary Season-The Evolution

Welcome to Fun Home: Not Quite Drag Queen Story Hour But Definitely Denounced by DeSantis