jamesq | Last Person Into the Last Show

Chicago was playing at the Pumphouse Theatre the last two weeks. On a spur of the moment, I decided to check it out.

Being the last night (and a Saturday) of a popular musical, I knew I'd have a hard time getting seats. But karma is weird sometimes.

I got to the theatre about 20 minutes before curtains. The show was sold out but they had a waiting list in case there were any no-shows. I put myself on the list and I was fifth.

Curtain time came by and their weren't enough seats. One of the people waiting was a young woman who was with her family (and they had seats), so I told her to go ahead of me. She demurred, but I insisted. There was another woman (who was next on the list). She objected, thinking that if I wasn't going to take a seat, she should get next grab. She changed her mind when that statement left her mouth though.

The guy in charge of selling the tickets then said that there was one seat left. The two women then went into goofy gopher mode, as they tried to decide who should get the ticket.

"Ladies first. You can decide which of you can go yourself. Me? I'm content to leave my spot for either of you. You can duke it out if you'd like.", I said.
"That's very chivalrous of you" said the seat guy.
"Well, yeah, except for the duke it out part." I replied.

Then the lead boss usher showed up (I remember her clearly as she looked like Cate Blanchett, except with glasses and a better figure - and damn did that ever set fire to my libido) with news: As luck would have it they had found two more seats (or rather, they pulled two seats out of there collective ass by bending the fire code regulations) so I ended up sitting next to second woman (who looked like a young Julianne Moore) in front of the fire exit.

Now you're thinking, "damn, last minute seats in front of the fire exit - those must have been about the worst seats in the house". In fact they were amongst the best seats. They were center stage, second row. We were literally sitting next to the video cameras they were using to film the performance! We saw everything. Given the fact that every woman on stage was in lingerie, I do mean everything.

So how was the show? I was expecting amateurish. It's a musical for $20 at the Pumphouse. I mean come on - how good could it possibly be? Well it was fantastic! Easily the equal of any musical I've seen in Cowtown or the Left Coast. And I've seen a lot of musicals in both Calgary and Vancouver. The singing was great, the dancing better. The two leads (Velma Kelly and Roxie Hart) owned the roles so well that I forgot about the movie version. Roxie especially got exactly the right amount of shrillness to convey her white trash background. The actress who played Velma Kelly was also the choreographer, so talented in multiple ways.

Great dancing, great singing, fun story and lots of eye candy (for both the boys and the girls). I'd recommend it to anyone, except I saw the last show so you're out of luck.

After the show, I invited my attractive neighbor out for coffee. Ok, I'm making that last part up, though it did cross my mind.

Thanks to