Today I received a text from my friend, Adam, who invited me to an off-Broadway show. The whole thing was very last minute, as he had gotten 2 free tickets to a show at the Algonquin Theater, which is right around the corner from the 23^rd street building of Baruch. We got there and were given our tickets to An Evening at the Carlyle. We were told our seats were really good because they were in the 5^th row! Yes, we were seated in the 5^th row… but they forgot to mention that there are only 7 rows in the theater.

Nevertheless we were excited because while the theater was small, it was intimate, and the set looked really cool with a scene of a New York City bar as the stage. We took our seats and waited for the rest of the audience to file in.

We quickly noticed that the audience was a lot older than we had expected. We were in the back, so we could only see the back of their heads, but most of the heads were either gray or bald. The audience was at least 2 generations ahead of Adam and me.  The show started with a fun song about Belmelmans Bar, which captured the attention and confidence of the audience.

This musical comedy recounted an evening and night in a bar in New York City. The 24 songs described the kind of people that are seen at this fictional bar including two unlikely roommates, a CEO of a company, Donald Trump, Ann – the whitest white woman in the USA, Barbara Streisand, a Yankee fan, two lovers, a lonely woman who had a little too much to drink by the end of the night, a Frank Sinatra wannabe, and a woman who I think was Liza Manley.

Although there were often times when the elderly audience was laughing while me and Adam turned to each other and shrugged because the joke was before our time, there were enough instances where we understood the humor that we could enjoy the show for the comedy that it was.

One of the amazing aspects of this show was that there were only 6 actors. One woman played at least 5 different roles, and nailed each one. Her costume and makeup made it nearly impossible to recognize her, and the subtle nuances that came with each character made each one unique.

My favorite scene was one where two lovers came into the bar, and the boyfriend proposed to his girlfriend. He proposed through a lovely song about how it was so easy for each of them to love each other. I was wearing a heavy sweatshirt, but still managed to get the chills during this scene. After the show I was discussing this scene with Adam, and he admitted that he almost had tears in his eyes during this scene as well.

I would not normally suggest seeing an off-Broadway musical show, but I am very glad that I am in New York City and had the opportunity to do something that I would not ordinarily do. I cannot wait to use my cultural passport to go to more events like this one.

After the show, Adam and I waited for the cast to see if we could interview them for the IDC blogs. I had planned to ask one actress, the one who played many different characters, which character she liked playing best, and which one she most related to. I had a few other questions as well, but unfortunately we were unable to interview the cast.

Although we could not video-record them, we were allowed to take pictures with the cast, and two of the cast members were nice enough to take the time to take a picture with us.