Ticket giveaway: Standing On Ceremony: The Gay Marriage Plays
***This giveaway has concluded***
Some of the most exciting plays to see are the ones dealing with timely subjects. Standing On Ceremony: The Gay Marriage Plays is a showcase of short plays, both comedic and dramatic, about same-sex marriage. The production features an A-list roster of writers, including Moises Kaufman and Neil Labute. The impressive cast features Beth Leavel, Craig Bierko, Richard Thomas, Harriet Harris, and Mark Consuelos. Stage Rush is giving away a pair of tickets to this new theatrical event.
Here are the easy steps you need to take to have your chance to win these tickets:
- Enter on Facebook by writing on Stage Rush’s Facebook wall
- Enter on Twitter by retweeting a link to the Standing On Ceremony: The Gay Marriage Plays contest page (a retweet button is located at the top of this page) OR one of Stage Rush’s tweets about the contest (@StageRush must be mentioned somewhere within your tweet, or else we won’t receive your entry)
- Subscribe to Stage Rush’s weekly newsletter. (Previous subscribers will automatically be entered into the contest.)
You can enter this contest one time via each method. So if you enter through Facebook, Twitter, and the newsletter subscription, you will have three entries in the contest. No more than three entries per person will count. If you play through Facebook, you must be able to be contacted via private message. If you play through Twitter, I must be able to direct message (DM) you (you must be following @StageRush in order for this to happen). The winners must acknowledge their acceptance of the tickets within 24 hours of being contacted, otherwise new winners will be chosen.
The giveaway will end on Friday, November 11. I will notify the winners through email, Facebook, and/or Twitter private message. The winners must be able to attend the show on a Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday performance between November 12 and December 18, 2011 at the Minetta Lane Theatre. The tickets are not valid for resale.
What are you waiting for, Rushers? Get over to the Stage Rush Facebook wall, retweet us on Twitter, and sign up for the weekly newsletter—it couldn’t be easier!
Tickets are provided by Standing On Ceremony: The Gay Marriage Plays.
Review: Baby It’s You!
Theater needs to feel genuine, and in the case of the new musical Baby It’s You!, it comes off as a marketing ploy concocted by executives doing musical theater algebra. Commercial success Jersey Boys + all females (because women love to go to the theater) = Baby It’s You!. Only this equation doesn’t yield exciting results.
The musical focuses on Florence Greenburg, the New Jersey housewife who decides she’s bored and scoops up five female singers to manage. They become the Shirelles, and Baby It’s You! is set to their music. Don’t be fooled though; the show is about Greenburg and barely includes the actual members of the Shirelles. Florence all but abandons her husband and two children to manage the girls, climbs the music industry ladder, and enters a then-taboo affair with the Shirelles’ black producer, Luther Dixon. She and the Shirelles make pop-music history, but at what cost? Fame or family—which is more important? You decide.
Although there isn’t much else to ponder in Baby It’s You!. A musical that should be all about relationships (well, what play isn’t about relationships?) leaves all the personal connections undeveloped and cold. Beth Leavel and Allan Louis play Florence and Luther, and there isn’t one fiery ember of chemistry between them. Florence’s daughter, Mary Jane (played by Kelli Barrett) feels spurned by her mother who ditched her for the recording industry. She shows up after years without communication ready to ream her mother out, and all anger is washed away with a song. (Mary Jane can belt; how convenient. Watch out MJ, Mamma might try to sign you.) Most criminal is the lack of connection between Florence and the girls she manages. The woman who left her children to basically act as a surrogate mother to the members of the girl group shows no sign of deep rapport with any of them. What passes between the Shirelles and Florence is simply blank. Read more 
Broadway in Bryant Park recap: ‘American Idiot’ and ‘La Cage aux Folles’
The weather didn’t get the memo that Broadway in Bryant Park still had one more week left in the season. It drizzled on the massive crowd that gathered for the free lunchtime concert’s final show of the summer. But judging from the crowd’s reactions to the buzzy shows that performed, they didn’t seem to mind the rain.
The Cagelles of La Cage aux Folles, this year’s Tony winner for Best Revival of a Musical, took the stage first. I wasn’t surprised that Kelsey Grammer didn’t participate in the event, but Douglass Hodge, the Tony winner for Best Actor, could have showed up to belt out “I Am What I Am.” Instead, their merry mass of transvestites entertained the crowd to exuberant applause. Not donning any feminine garb for “We Are What We Are” did come off a bit strange (“Look under our frocks,” what frocks?!), but their energy was through the roof, especially as they spiked extra large beach balls into the audience. The song began strangely though, as the announcer introduced the song as “What Are We Here For,” and then interrupted the already-in-progress number to give it the correct title. Dale Hensely and Chris Hoch went on as Albin and Georges, respectively, for “With You On My Arm,” which came off dull. The duo then joined the Cagelles for their closing act, “The Best of Times,” in which they paled in comparison to the effusive ensemble.
Video: “We Are What We Are”
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