Returning to The Metropolitan Room Sunday, December 6th at 7:00pm, Daryl Glenn and Jo Lynn Burks return to play and sing in Robert Altman's last "Nashville" of the year! Special guests will be Jay Rogers, Tanya Holt & Brad Wills. Below is a review posted from earlier in the year at a prior performance of "Nashville"
Heeee-haw and yippee! Walking into the Metropolitan Room in New York City, we might we’d walked into Nashville instead once you hear the twang and harangue and what the musical gang sang. Well, we did walk into an unabashed love-fest saluting and reliving Nashville –the Robert Altman movie from the 1970s full of country songs and country music performers exaggerated a few degrees to the larger-than- life point bubbling between adulation and good-natured ribbing. The twang is there but not as thick as molasses (but almost as sweet), the enthused harangue is all about how darn wonderful the film was (I bet you’ll feel convinced somehow even if you never saw it), and as far as what they sang…. Well, the skill and beaming delight the performers bring to the movie’s songs is a treat. The zeal is contagious. Bet someone $20 you won’t be tapping your foot and grinning and you’re sure to lose the bet. (And you need the bucks for your cover charge, but you get your money’s worth in this big show that features singers, a band, a few stories, and a trivia contest with chocolate candies as prizes.) And if you protest that you ain’t no guldurn country music fan and won’t have a good ol’ time, you may well lose that bet, too, y’all.
The Vince DeGeorge-directed valentine to the movie gets two more bliss-fests this week on Sunday and Monday, March 16 and 17. Before things began, I accidentally put my press kit too close to the candle on the table and it briefly caught fire. (“Well, that was exciting for about a minute,” said another reviewer sitting nearby whose own now-published positive review echoes mine here.) And a few minutes later, the act caught fire, too (metaphorically, this time) as soon as Daryl Glenn, in western attire, began to play guitar and sing and talk to the crowd and by sheer will and talent made us all part of the fan club for the movie and songs he has long worshipped. One highlight was his rendition of the film’s best-remembered song, “I’m Easy” which won the Academy Award that year for Keith Carradine who wrote it and performed it in the film and on his hit record. But that ballad is really an atypical representation of the score which is mostly high energy, knee-slapping and fun. A couple felt too similar and one might be shortened to allow for some more talk or the cabaret equivalent of bonus DVD features about the important and unusual movie.
Daryl (who anchors the show and is its heart and soul) has a co-star --- a well-cast lady who looks the part of the classic female country and western star: it’s Jo Lynn Burks who sings and plays piano and did the arrangements. Her credits include playing for Broadway shows and major music acts and here her smile and joy are as big as her hair--- which means she’s really swell and she sings and plays up a storm. And she has two fitting costumes (form-fitting, in fact. Welcome to the ‘70s).
Jay Rogers is the spectacular special guest, singing the film’s fervent patriotic declamation, “200 Years,” leaving his trademark imp persona behind and becoming a one-man Fourth of July fireworks explosion. Decked out in a white outfit with stars and stripes, he sings almost maniacally as if the whole country’s winning a war depended on it. Bravo! But damn, it’s his only appearance in this show…but what a showstopping turn! It’s also regrettable that the two splendid back-up singers, Tanya Holt and Brad Wills, didn’t get some solo lines--- I really wanted to hear them spotlighted on their own instead of just their consistently excellent blend and support. Likewise, the band is so first-rate that more solos and longer instrumental breaks would be more than welcome. Ivan Bodley (bass), Chris Delis (guitar), Warren Odze (drums), Andy Stein (fiddle) and John Widgren (pedal steel guitar) along with Jo Lynn on piano are wonderfully entertaining and almost an embarrassment of riches like a full-course country dinner with the best grits and hamhocks and cornbread. Mmmmm. I’d be ready for a second helping. Of course, the clock ticks and shows in a cabaret room can only be so long. But I also wanted to hear more references to the quirky film’s dialogue and plot twists, which were just mentioned here and there in passing, sometimes as part of the Nashville trivia questions. Oh, here’s one: which member of this group actually was in a Robert Altman film in this decade?
This show is quite a production. Cowboy hats off to all of y’all.
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