Theater of the Absurd Ticket Prices

When a Broadway Baby says goodnight,

 it means you've struck out, fella ...

Broadway Beat

by Nels Noodleman

I am delighted to report, folks, that Broadway this year has been nothing less than ELECTRIFYING!   

Then again it might also be that my pacemaker is on the fritz.

Seriously, in all my days as a professional reviewer of the Broadway oeuvre, I have never before witnessed as many groundbreaking, innovative, and expensive as all hell plays as it's been my privilege to be comped to this season. It all began with the hip-hop Hamilton, an especially surprising smash hit since throughout his career Alexander Hamilton was always more known for his karaoke than hip-hop.

Here's a trio of three other great plays you should definitely see provided you know who to have sex with to cop a ticket:

Grease, Exclusively Starring a Cast of Baby Boomers

  

For the first time ever, a cast of 60-somethings and 70-somethings present a musical about a decade most of them hated while looking wholly ridiculous age-wise in the so doing.

Pockmarked and unappealing former Leave It To Beaver actor Jerry Mathers as Danny and solidly over-the-hill Sally Struthers as Sandy lead a marginally talented and highly wrinkled cast of washed-up Boomer TV stars whose limited thespian skills perfectly depict Boomer disdain for the white bread 1950's during which they were incessantly dumped on by their greasy haired older brothers and sisters while impatiently waiting for the Sixties to start so they could smoke dope.

GESCBB, as it's conveniently called, also includes some great new age-appropriate songs including Slumber Nights,  Look at Me, I’m … I Forget, and We Grow (Old) Together. 

At the Miles Lumpkin Theater. Tickets prices start at $450, but they are very big tickets, at least a foot and a half long.

Death of a Clown Man

In another sparkling reinterpretation of a classic theatrical work, every character in Death of a Clown Man is played by a professional clown, each of whom speaks exclusively by honking a clown horn.

Willy Clownman fears that the clown business may be ending due to a worldwide shortage of clown and all other makeup since the advent of Flo from Progressive. Willy’s world becomes even more topsy-turvy when his son Biff Clownman turns his back on the family business in favor of becoming President of the United States.

“Anyone want to buy a used horn?” honks out Willy, painted tears under his eyes growing till they cover his face. If playwright Arthur Miller could return to life for just one day, this theater critic bets he'd love this new take on the old play just as soon as he first gives up trying to find Marilyn Monroe for one last roll in the mezzanine!

At the Helen Haze Theater. Some discount tickets available if you can juggle and you’re quick with seltzer.

Bukowski, the Family Musical!

Love the type of bright happy musicals Rogers and Hammerstein used to deliver to our doorstep in days gone by? Then rush right back to Broadway for a tuneful, toe tappin' two and a half hours of drug addiction, alcoholism, deviant sexual acts, cannibalism, and an unnatural affection for licking the backs of U.S postage stamps such as you've never seen! 

Yes, from Disney comes the happiest new show on Broadway, Bukowski, the Family Musical!

From the very first moment he throws up on stage, Hugh Jackman so thoroughly inhabits the role of lowlife writer Charles Bukowski you can almost smell it!  Actually you can, if you're sitting in the Orchestra seats. The show features eight great new songs including Life in a Shithole, Life is a Shithole, and the rousing showstopper Hello, Shithole!  

At the Moe Monkfish Theatre, which is a shithole but still expensive as shit. With Kristin Chenowith and Jerry Stiller.

Also knocking 'em dead on Broadway these days is Avenue Q with the puppet roles all played by undocumented aliens constantly looking over their shoulders, a musical version of Fight Club with an all Jewish cast and no fighting, and Broadway's longest running smash hit, The Book of Orman.

And that's the latest news from the Great White/Of Color Way. (Yep, I'm trying to get the name changed, folks!)  See you there, assuming you have a buck or two but hopefully a trust fund.

From your very own Broadway Buddy, 

Mr. Nels Noodleman

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Nels Noodleman is a nationally known and reviled theater critic who occasionally writes for Nouveau Old, Formely Cute on the Broadway stage.   Whenever he's discovered writing on the stage he's usually thrown out of the theater.

Over the course of his checkered but mostly plaid career, Nels has reviewed all of the major Broadway plays of the last half century.  Someday he hopes to see them too.  

Oh, by the way, Nels thinks you're cute.

The World's Only Singing Bird (FF)

©Luther Siler
FF-Flash Fiction

Henry Squawkster was disillusioned, dejected, and half passed out on the floor of his backstage dressing room.

"I cannot do the act as the World's Only Singing Bird one more time," thought Henry. I cannot face another audience! Every day's an endless stream of cigarettes and magazines ..."

"Get up and get yourself together!" barked Henry's manager, Herbert Cohen. "The audience is depending upon you."

Cohen shoved Henry onstage with his guitar. Near feverish with booze and exhaustion, Henry gazed through the wire mesh fence into the audience of calico, Siamese, and alley cats, all licking their chops.

"If only I could perform in front of an audience of humans," muttered Henry, "instead of this damn social media world of cats!"

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Yes, Henry tawt he taw a puddy tat and he did, he did taw a puddy tat!  A whole audience full of them too. True, Henry has a lot of fans, but most of them are fans of his flavor, not his musical favorings.

Henry hitting the bottom is what I saw this week in the picture prompt above as part of the Friday Fictioneers Weekly Traveling Variety Show & Concert. Offerings of the other Friday Fictioneers are available by buying your ticket, taking your seat, and clicking here.

Good for Henry, he made it through another performance. No, Henry, don't give autographs!

Hooray for Hollywood! (FF)

Copyright-Rochelle Wisoff-Fields

I never would have believed it, Sid!  Two months in Hollywood and you've made it all happen!"

"I told you, Johnny, I'm your man: Sid Swifty,  Agent to the Stars!"

"And here already I'm playing the Palace!  You are the best agent in show business, Sid."

"And tomorrow, kid, you'll be working with Harrison Ford!"

"It's a dream come true."

"Well, kid, we're at the Palace now."

"I’m so excited, Sid!  Where do I go?"

"Over by green booth.  That's where you pick up the cars to valet."

"Got it." 

"And if all goes well, Harrison Ford will be lunching here tomorrow!"

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

If you're going to make it in show business, you need a good agent.  Too bad our protagonist got himself Sid Swifty.  I wonder how much 10% is of $7.25 an hour?

If Sid reps authors too, I'd advise the rest of our Friday Fictioneers to steer clear. I don't have too much to worry about because 10% of zero is probably not worth his while, but if Sid checks out  the other Fictioneers' responses to the picture prompt above, his mouth may be watering.

Who knows, guys?  Wanna work with Harrison Ford?

You're Such a Lovely Audience

Thank you, Everyone! 

Your applause is wonderful!  Let's bring out that terrific cast again ... Meryl .... Meryl .... my sensational co-star, Meryl Klepperstein, take an extra bow!

Y'know, folks, it's great to be back in my home town of New York starring in Broadway's latest smash hit,  Kinky Boobs! You were all fantastic tonight, a truly phenomenal audience! You're such a lovely audience I'd like to take you home with me, I'd love to take you home!

In fact, I will take you home!

I've had 14 buses dispatched directly outside the Helen Hunt Theater to transport all of you to my condo at 87th street.   Ladies, rest assured there are bathrooms on each bus with much shorter wait times than at the Ladies Room here in the Helen Hunt Theater so you won't  all be dancing around like Native Americans preparing for war by the time you get to my home.

We have ordered trays of food from the Plotkin Deli including corned beef, swiss cheese, roast beef, cole slaw, white fish, herring, chopped liver, baklava, cheese cake, and many other delicatessen delicacies guaranteed to give you reflux for the next week. Our Jewish audience members are going to feel like they're at a shiva but with the added bonus that no one's dead.

Now please all file out by section into the buses.  Orchestra seats go first, then the mezzanine, next the balcony, and lastly the abysmal seats slammed against the rear wall of the theater and sorry, folks, but your seats on the bus will be slammed against the rear of the bus as well.

When we get to the condo, feel free to throw your coats on my bed.   Remember that many coats look alike, so when you leave and you're parsing through 600 coats on the bed be careful to take yours and not one of the other audience members or you'll be going through life as a 34 short London Fog from Woodbridge New Jersey when you're actually a 38 long Burberry  from Greenwich Connecticut.  

I want you to feel totally at home in my home. Traipse through each and every room, admire the artwork - especially my paint-by-numbers --- and peruse my photo albums. You'll notice that my first wife was exceedingly hot but about as stable as the lower half of the periodic table, and my second wife had a great ass but the personality of the love child of Martha Stewart and Martha Stewart if Martha Stewart could mate with Martha Stewart. And I know Martha Stewart!

I'm looking forward to meeting all of you and spending quality time.  I want to hear about children, grandchildren, new jobs, retirements, divorces, operations, accidents, and existential angst and/or weltschmerz that may have you close to pondering ending it all. If necessary, I'll hug you through the night after the others have left.

Remember I don't give autographs.   

Why am I inviting an audience into my home after all my years in show business?

Frankly,  this is something I've wanted to do for a long time, but I had to wait for a truly responsive, enthusiastic,  and appreciative  audience --- a lovely audience. Tonight, folks, you were at long last that lovely audience!  

You applauded loud and long for our very marginal show, laughed at even at the stupidest and most unfunny jokes we padded out the script with, and hummed along with the utterly forgettable score.  If every theatrical audience were as naive and undiscriminating as all of you, Kinky Boobs would run forever and I could extend my waning career at least another 4 or 5 years, at which time I'll be the BIG 7-0, Goddamnit!

Thank you from the bottom of my heart.  Remember to take off your shoes at the door, or I'll never hear the end of it from my third wife!

Hope you like the chopped liver.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Show Biz Satan (FF)

"Perfect, Satan!  Just perfect!" 

"Thank you, Solly."

"That shot worked super due to your outstanding lighting skills! You're the best in the business!"  

"Well, I am the Master of Darkness!  To understand the dark, you also must comprehend the light."

"Luckiest day of my life when you came calling on me. Who knew you were enamored of show business?"

"I was ready to take your soul as the most corrupt producer in Hollywood!  But you offered me a job I couldn't resist."

"And since then we've made show business history!"

"But when will I realize my dream to work with Meryl Streep?  You recall, Sol Berman, after that is when I take you!

"Sorry, but ... umm ... Meryl ... uhh ...  is on location for another six months."

"By the fires of Hades!  Now what?" 

"Satan, say hello to Mark Ruffalo." 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I'm so glad Satan found his metier and may be leaving us all alone for a while.  For that you can thank producer Sol Berman and the Friday Fictioneers, to whom this brief story (alright, 140 words, what's it to ya?) is the weekly offering by yours truly based on the intriguing picture prompt above.  

I don't know why I think Mark Ruffalo is kind of an amusing reference.  He's a good actor, but I find something funny about him.  Then again, judging from my success as a humor writer, what do I know about funny?  The other Fictioneers know funny, and dramatic, and poetic, and much more so it's time to leave me, Sol Berman, Mark Ruffalo, and Satan back in the studio and click here.

Devil with the blue dress on?  No, devil clutching an Oscar.  Next March.