Gypsy

I had originally booked Redwood as my show for the special slot of the Saturday evening show prior to the Tony Awards. In 2023, I had seen Shucked in this slot, and it was such a fun experience. It was also very impressive how quickly the company started moving set pieces into a moving truck immediately after the show, in order to take part of the set to the United Palace in Washington Heights for their Tony Awards performance that year. Tony Eve shows are fun.

Back when I first started organizing this trip, the two shows I was most excited to see were Redwood and SMASH, which I booked to be my Friday night show (I also snuck in Sondheim’s Old Friends for a Saturday matinee).

I was of course so disappointed when Redwood got canceled, after not receiving any Tony Award nominations, and I began looking at my show schedule to see what shows from the following week I could move up to this special Saturday night slot. I am a seat snob, so I also needed a show that had at least as good of a seat open for this Saturday night show as what I already had booked. I also realized the box office likely wasn’t going to help me unless my new seat cost at least as much as the seat I was asking to move. At the time, there was significant buzz around Audra McDonald’s performance in Gypsy, and I did find a front row center mezzanine seat available. I called up the box office and asked if I could move my seat to the Saturday night show, and they helped me out.

Front row mezzanine at Majestic Theatre isn’t perfect, as there is a safety rail that blocks the view of anything happening downstage. This meant that periodically, all of us in the front row would lean forward to see downstage activity. This was rare enough that it didn’t bother us, and it gave us something to laugh about at intermission. I do, however, wonder if it was annoying to the patrons in the second and third rows of the mezzanine that we all kept leaning way forward in our seats several times throughout the show. If I had to do it over again, I would still likely book front row center mezzanine, as it does give you the best overall view of the musical, and you eliminate the risk of a tall person sitting in front of you. For musicals, I tend to do either this seat or an inner aisle on one of the sides of Orchestra seating, since that aisle in the side section gives you a diagonal unobstructed view to the stage, even if there is a tall person in front of you (it just doesn’t work great if you are with a date or friend). I find that too often the center orchestra section just doesn’t have enough elevation from row to row, and you are in bad shape if a tall person sits in front of you.

The risk of seeing a show immediately before the Tony Awards is that your star may call out. This might be due to a conflict with a Tony Award performance rehearsal, or the star might just be exhausted. Performing eight shows over six days every week is exhausting enough, but now the actor has to deal with media, promotions, and just the nerves and excitement of Tony Award nominations. Indeed, Audra apparently called out of her Saturday matinee performance, Nicole Scherzinger apparently called out of her Saturday evening performance of Sunset Blvd., and Brooks Ashmanskas had called out of my Friday evening performance of SMASH. I was very lucky, and Audra indeed performed at my Tony Eve performance.

Saying my expectations were high would be an understatement; I was about to see a legend perform. Audra and the rest of the cast delivered. One thing I was not expecting was just how incredible this audience was. The energy level was through the roof, and we caused the show to run for over three hours! The show is supposed to be 2 hours, 40 minutes long, which means we added a full 20 minutes of additional applause and standing ovations. I cannot recall any other show where we interrupted with applause and mid-show standing ovations so often. Just the audience experience itself was a special experience most of us in this audience will never forget. The only somewhat similar experience for me, but to a lesser degree, was Cole Escola’s performance in Oh, Mary! on Monday night, the first show after winning their Tony Award. That audience was also special.

On the critical side, I am not sure I would enjoy this production as much without this cast. This cast makes the show. The set, costumes, lighting, and choreography are all great, but there are many great shows this season on Broadway that can say the same thing, and many of us have seen this story before. Do we need to see it again? Probably not, but we did need to see this cast. Experiencing Audra and this cast is a bucket list item, and I will always treasure getting to see Audra perform in this show.

I need to specifically call out Audra’s performances at the end of each act, as these were next level - beyond what you expect even of Audra. While Audra was fantastic throughout the show, her performances at the end of Act 1 and again at the end of Act 2 are performances you only get to experience maybe a few times in your life. They are jaw dropping, heart stopping, tear-invoking performances that only a great can do, and dare I say it is life changing to experience these performances firsthand. It is the type of performance that reminds any other actor in the audience, “yes, this is why I do this work and what I aspire to be.” She gave it her all and put so much into this performance that I sensed perhaps a slight vocal injury in her performance the next night at the Tony Awards. While her performance Sunday night at the Tony Awards (which I also saw live) was excellent, her performance the night before was significantly stronger, aided by being in the context of the story versus a standalone musical number Sunday night.

This is not a show I ever want to see again, because I want to keep this memory of this specific performance.

At the performance I attended, I also felt like Danny Burstein was a standout. The entire cast was excellent, and it was adorable watching one of the child performers sign autographs after the show. She was proud of her performance, as she should be.

A special treat was saying hi to Kristin Chenoweth as she left the show, and a wonderful part of the theatre community is seeing one legend going to support another legend.

Audra won’t remain in this cast forever, so catch her while you can.

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