Last night was The 5th Annual ABC & SOAPnet Salute Broadway Cares event at Town Hall in New York City. Having watched AMERICAN IDOL for many years it was hard not to watch a show like this and think of the many repetitive critiques of Simon, Randy, Paul and now, Kara. Sure, I heard a few "pitchy" moments, found a few "dawgs" and there were singers you could probably hear "at any hotel bar across the country". Oh, and I even saw a few "package artists" on stage. But this event wasn't about finding the perfect singer. It was about coming together to entertain fans and to raise money for an amazing cause, Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS. And there were plenty of singers who would give Danny Gokey, Adam Lambert or Lil Rounds a run for their money.
The evening saw over thirty ABC daytime favorites presenting and performing a wide variety of songs. There were also three skits, one for each ABC soap, played out by actors on each show along with a winning auction bidder. The GH skit with Bradford Anderson and Brandon Barash battling it out over Maxie was probably the cutest, but the ONE LIFE TO LIFE skit where the auction winner tried to decide whose life sucked the most between Cole, Gigi, Rex, Natalie and Jared was pretty hilarious. Druggie Cole won that contest.
The show kicked off with "Daytime Queen" sung by BethAnn Bonner, Hillary B. Smith, Chrishell Stause and later Susan Lucci. It was one of several songs on the night where the stars changed the lyrics (from "Dancing Queen") to match their soap characters. My favorite of these was probably "Mamma Mia" sung by Melissa Claire Egan, Kristen Alderson and Kathy Brier. Each versus featured the ladies singing about their characters losing their babies. Alderson's "Teenage Mama" was the funniest verse.
THE BEST OF THE BEST
"All I Need Is The Girl" by Jason Tam - This man was born to be on stage. He nailed it.
"Sweet Child of Mine", "Anyway" and "When Will I Be Loved" by Kathy Brier, Bobbie Eakes and Kassie DePaiva - Seeing these three together made me want to check out one of their "Divas of Daytime" shows.
"That's Life" by Darnell Williams - I have Darnell's old "Pure Satisfaction" album but had never seen him perform life. He was fantastic and loved the growl in his voice.
Walt Willey - He sang an original song (and played guitar) about not writing off the soaps yet. It wasn't on the program so I'm not sure of the title but it would be a YouTube sensation because it was funny and on point.
"Anthem" from Mark Lawson - Who knew he had such a strong voice and could belt out a song like this?
"Stranger" by Scott Clifton - He sang his own song and played guitar and did an excellent job.
"Waiting for Charlie to Come Home" by BethAnn Bonner - She has a very powerful voice and great control.
VERY FEW GLITCHES
There were some audio issues. Some singers were louder than others and the acoustics at Town Hall weren't great. Maybe it was just my lousy section but that's no excuse. But other than that, the show was very smooth and well put together. With so many performers coming on and off the stage it would have been easy for a one-time event to be full of awkward silences and gaps between action but there was very little of that. Director John Dietrich did a masterful job.
OTHER MEMORABLE MOMENTS
Tamara Braun introduced Eden Riegel who sang "Taylor, The Latte Boy". There were spoiler hints thrown in during the evening including one about a Bianca and Reese happy ending coming in the spring.
Anthony Geary and Bradford Anderson sang the duet "I Can See It" from "The Fantastiks".
Susan Lucci and Cameron Mathison closed the show dancing to "Too Darn Hot" putting their experience on DANCING WITH THE STARS to good use.
The one non-soapy moment came when the boys from "Billy Elliott The Musical" performed "Electrify". I really want to see that show.
The fans of Aiden and Greenlee on ALL MY CHILDREN raised the most money in the "$oap-a-thon" and fans of all the couples raised more than $50,000 dollars this year.
Overall, despite my seats up in the rafters, I had a great time and it was fun to see the stars perform in a different venue and out of character.
This year's event raised $325,000. If you want to make a donation to Broadway Cares, please visit their website at broadwaycares.org.
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Jason Tam was in "A Chorus Line" on Broadway before he started on OLTL, so it is no surprise he was great.
ReplyDeleteThanks. I would like to see him in a show. There were some audio issues here and there but whenver he sang it was loud and clear. It would be nice to see him in a Broadway show.
ReplyDeleteYou know, back in the day, most of the soap actors had theatre backgrounds and came from the theatre. This gave us many layered and rich performances. Today, most of the "stars" are former models or reality show contestants. No wonder soaps are lacking in the dramatic department!
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