Madison Square Garden
January 17, 18, 2004
Jonathan Jones, Madison Square Garden, Saturday 17th I attended the show two weeks
ago at Nassau Colliseum and tonight at Madison The most surprising change in the show (besides the fact that Her husband and Soph were sitting ten feet away from me [along with Toni Basil, Joan Collins and Calvin Klein]) is that the Tour Book has been changed entirely. The only thing that is the same about it is the cover, the two page spread showing pictures from her films and the two page spread of "September". All the text about Delores is gone. All the fun text in the front with the cool fonts and everything with the lyrics to "Kiss My Brass" is gone. It's all been relaced with images from the tour. Akh! They've changed the text in the pics from the films too. In the old one, I believe it just had captions explaining where the pictures where from (My Mom has the old one - so I can't check it now). In the new version, there is a blank box that has a caption for "The Stepford Wives" and there are also quotes about the other pictures: For the Boys: After this shot - lunch. The First Wives Club: A rare, but successful, excursion into the world of brunette living. Some People's Lives: A production still from my screen test for the Kate Winslet rols in Titanic. Hocus Pocus: I loved Winnie. She cast spells and flew around on a vaccuum cleaner. Nirvana! The Rose: I dropped dead right after singing this number. Top that, Sally! Gypsy: Something Bob Mackie whipped up for Rose to wear at one of Baby June's auditions. The fur came from the fox Lucille Ball caught in Mame. Ruthless People: And the pounds just melted off! Stella: I really should have read the script. Isn't She Great: Another excursion into brunette living, somewhat les successful. This is one of Jackie's eighty-seven costume changes, each nuttier then the last. Down & Out in Beverly Hills: Two great even-tempered actors with very boring reputations. The stills from the tour are amazing - but I want the old version too!! KICK IN THE BRASS January 19, 2004 -- SHE swears like a sailor, vamps like hooker and sings like a diva. Bette Midler has become the perfect New York City saloon singer, and she proved it at a pair of Madison Square Garden shows over the weekend. Most who heard Midler's solo
extravaganza at the Garden would probably agree. Photo: Nicolas
Khayat Brassy-voiced Bette used her horn posse upfront in the show to get everyone's attention and to musically translate her work ethic. She told the audience, "I'm not going to retire, and you're not gonna make me." The opener, "Kiss My Brass," was the oil that loosened the audience, Midler's voice and her band. Still, it wasn't until this people's diva dusted off the Andrews Sisters classic - "Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy" - that she gained total command of the crowd. That crowd, who appeared to be Midler's contemporaries in age and attitude, heartily approved of the program that not only covered Midler's career hits, but also paid homage to Rosemary Clooney's song book and tapped into some classic '60s radio favorites. She was also outstanding during her soulful cover of "When a Man Loves a Woman." While "Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy" was presented in a lavish, constant motion production that was all eye-candy and nostalgia, it was when Midler and company slowed the show to yield to the Clooney classic "Hey There" that the performance attained its moment of musical greatness. The song's easy jazz swing was beautifully rendered by her ensemble, and Midler was emotive as she sang the lyrics about a woman too much in love for her own good. On the fun factor, Midler's banter rated high - she was the picture of humility and humor. She told a number of truly tasteless jokes, and the punchline was below the waist. Her self-deprecating approach allowed the audience to empathize with her everywoman style. But the show was far from perfect. The after-intermission set, a Broadway parody, was too Broadway for comfort. And the sound throughout the night was terrible, especially when Midler spoke. Yet in the end, Midler triumphed over these small adversities and lived up to her nickname - the Divine Miss M. Sally, Madison Square Garden, Saturday, Jan 17th, 2004 I attended the Saturday show
at Madison Square Garden and all I can say is, “wow!” What made the show extra special
was that she really sang and talked to us as if she felt at home.
I felt like the sentiment of being among neighbors and friends shone
through the entire night. Bette really seemed to be having a ton
of fun, and I’m sure that energy was boosted by what was undeniably
a really enthusiastic crowd (much more so than Nassau, which seemed
a little more quiet). Some local quotes: – Right before singing September, “I’ve been singing this song all over the country, but really it’s for all of you.” – When talking about how they found Saddam underground in some nasty, rat infested, dark place, she called it the “D train” (one of our subway lines) – More than a few mentions of cleaning up trash in the city – she said her biggest pet peeve is when she sees plastic bags in trees and encouraged us all to buy a plastic bag scooper from the internet to take them down. She also dedicated WBMW to a woman who bought 10 seats to the concert at the Hulaween auction (though she then dedicated it to the entire audience too). – She mentioned that she had been nervous to play NYC and so she’d been pretending it was Hershey PA all night! She did at least two of the songs she skipped at Nassau – Hey There and That’s How Heartaches are Made – and both were great. (I thought she might have skipped Keep on Rocking at Nassau but I think I might be wrong about that!) During her band introductions, she once again forgot Bette Sussman, and blamed this show’s oversight on the fact that being in NY has left her all “fatootzed.” It was very cute, Miss M walked over to Bette at the piano, who looked all depressed, and said, “Eeyore, Eeyore, will you forgive me?” Miss M took a lei that a fan had given her and placed it over Bette’s neck And then talked about how they were good friends who had met about years ago and how they had been playing so many benefits together. As Miss M walked back toward the front of the stage she said, “should we sing benefits?” And then started to, a cappella style. Bette Sussman jumped right in. So that was an extra song, too! Jim Matthews I am 48 years old and have been a Bette devotee ever since I caught my first glimpse of her on "The Mike Douglas Show" back in 1971. I have seen her live 10 times, one for each major tour she's mounted since then. (The first was in November of 73 up at Ithaca College--I still have the poster!) I would have to say that Saturday night's performance ranks right up there with the best of them. Amazing! I have to laugh reading some of the reviews of Sunday's concert, implying that Saturday's crowd of "assholes", as Bette put it, let her down in some way. From my point of view it was a great crowd. Very enthusiastic, perhaps not to the point of hysteria, but they loved her and she knew it. She did, however, make a joke towards the end of the show about a man sitting in the front row with his arms crossed over his chest, looking bored. "Yeah, I've been watching you all night sitting there like that. Your wife dragged you here, you had to mortage the house for the tickets, and now this! (imitating him with her arms)" It was a very funny moment. If Miss M wasn't happy with the crowd, she's an even better actress than I thought. She seemed totally relaxed and in fabulous spirits. Her infectious good vibes certainly had the people all around me on Cloud 9! I have rarely heard Bette in such great voice as she was on Saturday. Clear as a bell, soulful, tender, sometimes raw when called for, SO musical. This woman does not get enough credit for her vocal prowess. I think sometimes Bette the performing legend tends to make people forget Bette the grammy-winning musician. In my mind, she is terribly underrated as a vocalist. Also, I would have to say that this group of Harlettes sounded the best of any I've heard in the last 20 years. The vocal arrange- ments harkened back to what I would consider the "classic" Harlettes sound, that sort of angelic 40's blend that you've all heard on "Optimistic Voices", "A Dream Is A Wish Your Heart Makes" (from the 76 HBO concert), etc. Those girls also worked their tails off! It seemed to me they were featured even more than the Harlettes usually are, and that's saying something. The show was even more buoyant
and colorful than I expected. I was really pleased that she did "Hey There" in addition to "Tenderly". The Clooney Tribute CD really deserves more than just a nod in her shows. It's her best recording in a long time, and she should push it! Saturday night's "Hey There" was flawless, and the 2nd time through, the Harlettes sang the "other" part while Bette responded. Their gorgeous harmonies really added a different feel than on the CD. Other highlights: Stuff Like That There, Skylark (gorgeous and heartfelt), When A Man Loves A Woman (which brought the house down), Shiver Me Timbers. The Judge Judy skit was great. The Mister Rogers Tribute, which I thought was brilliant, seemed to go over the heads of some. Dolores was great, but maybe it's time for the old gal to take a sabbatical. She'll never top this one, and I'd rather hear 4 or 5 more regular songs than another Fish Tails sequel. But that's just my opinion! All in all, the show was yet another example of why Bette Midler is unparalleled among live performers, and why she really must be seen live to be completely appreciated. There is no one, NO ONE out there who can even approach the depth and variety of material that she has mastered over the years. BETTE, IF YOU'RE LISTENING, PLEASE PUT THIS ONE OUT ON DVD!! Monday, January 19,
2004
Bette Midler was at her best during the first set of her Saturday night concert at Madison Square Garden. This set had it all: tasteful music, tasteless jokes, crisp production numbers and the kind of quick-witted patter that's more often heard at a cabaret than a sports arena. It was a whirlwind of a set, a reminder that Midler has few rivals as an all-around entertainer. But during the 25-minute intermission,
Midler, 58, must have misplaced her edge. Her second set, which
was slightly shorter than the first, was dominated by stale slapstick
and corny ballads. The first set was full of the manic energy that initially made her a star. The second proved that the blander, more mainstream persona she has adopted at times isn't about to go away. Midler, who also performs at Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City on March 20, is currently on her first tour in four years. It's called her "Kiss My Brass Tour" because her 13-piece band includes five horn players, and because she couldn't resist the joke. The horn section, which boasts three members of the neo-swing group Royal Crown Revue, added punch to upbeat numbers such as "Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy" and "Walk Right In." It also helped boost the grandeur of the classic-soul ballad "When a Man Loves a Woman" (sung with enough intensity to make it seem fresh) and "From a Distance." Since Midler's last album was a tribute to the late Rosemary Clooney (called "Bette Midler Sings the Rosemary Clooney Songbook"), she sang two of those songs, "Hey There" and "Tenderly," while photos of Clooney flashed behind her. These were straightforward cover versions, sensitively sung but lacking Midler's usual flair. It almost seemed as if she resisted putting her own spin on them out of respect for Clooney. Tasteful restraint was not part of the equation during the most memorable parts of the show. Midler showed off her expert comedy chops with a series of risqu?okes in the style of vaudeville legend Sophie Tucker; viciously lambasted President Bush and Rush Limbaugh; and even poked fun at herself and CBS Television over her failed 2002 sitcom, "Bette." Midler admitted it was terrible but claimed it wasn't her fault. "Give Meryl Streep a sitcom and see how she does -- they'll be feeding her through a tube in two weeks," she said. Elsewhere, she poked fun at celebrity couples from Liza Minnelli and David Gest ("People in show business shouldn't intermarry or breed, but I guess there was no danger of that") to Bennifer. She also criticized pop stars like Britney Spears, complaining that none of them have ever called to thank her. "I opened the door for trashy singers with bad taste and big (breasts) -- and don't you forget it!" The second set sagged early on, with a long skit starring Midler's mermaid character, Delores del Lago. Desperate stabs at humor came from fish-related jokes (often using phrases like "piece of tail" and "working my tail off") and the sight of mermaids navigating the stage in wheelchairs, or coolly approximating Bob Fosse dance moves while singing "All That Jazz." The show never really recovered. Midler introduced the late children's entertainer Mister Rogers via an old videotape, and sang along with him on the song, "I Like To Be Told." It was sweet, but out of place in this show. She crooned the usually upbeat "Do You Want To Dance?" and, in the show's home stretch, leaned heavily on her most aggressively heart-tugging material: "Wind Beneath My Wings," "From a Distance," "Friends," "The Rose" and the 9/11 ballad, "September." The second half of the show did include the evening's most convincing hard-rock song -- a cover of Sammy Hagar's "Keep On Rockin'" -- but it was too little, too late. Midler's regression to feel-good predictability was complete. Chaz, MSG, Sunday
Night Madison Square Garden, Sunday, January 18, The Divine Mrs. M & Chill Hil OMG It was another fantastic
night spent with the Divine Miss M. But before all that, the first
FOLLIE came when she was singing HEY THERE, and unlike Philly she
did start in the right register but stopped about a minute into
the song and just started "screaming I can't hear my ears just
went out" she looked at the crowd and said "this might
happen again and again tonight, I may sing every She did not sing TENDERY or THAT's HOW HEARTACHES ARE MADE, the latter bums me out a little but it was a great crowd and she gave us everything she had and she teared up a couple times, saying it's so hard to play at home. The PROGRAMS were new last night, tons of GORGEOUS tour photos a new letter from Bette on the inside cover and other delights!!! Anywhooooo, I am tired and wanna do it ALL OVER AGAIN...... .........WALK RIGHT IN - WALK
RIGHT OUT - WALK RIGHT IN - WALK RIGHT OUT, that's what song is
all ABOUT!!!!! Thank you Bette & the KMB band - you are DIVINE!!!!*** Bette Midler -- Kiss
My Brass (Madison Square Garden; 20,000 capacity; $200) Musical director, Bette Sussman; choreography, Toni Basil; writer, Eric Kornfeld, lighting, Peter Morse; sound, Timothy Winters, Richard Schoenadel, Christopher Fulton; video, Carol Dodds; stage manager, Richard Bray. Opened and reviewed Jan 17, 2004. Closed Jan. 18. By ROBERT L. DANIELS The divine Miss M. returned
to the Big Apple in typical gaudy grandeur. To the sounds of crashing
surf and soaring seagulls, Bette Midler descended from high above,
riding a merry-go-round stallion, to land upon a seaside boardwalk.
Her fevered fans loved every minute of it. Met by her beguiling
Harlettes as bathing beauties, and a crackerjack brass section,
the lady launched into "Kiss My Brass." "New York,
I'm home," she proclaimed, and it appeared a hungry Gotham
crowd couldn't ask for anything more. From the hot G.I. '40s jitterbug "Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy," the song that started it all, to her trademark ballads "The Rose," "Do You Want to Dance," "Friends" and "Wind Beneath My Wings," Midler again proved she can switch from sentiment to slapstick with inimitable know-how. She displayed an uncanny sense of timing, balancing glamour and sophistication with guts and clowning. An all-too-brief nod to her latest Columbia CD, "Bette Midler Sings the Rosemary Clooney Songbook," is set against stunning pics of the beloved late singer. Midler sings Clooney classics "Hey There" and "Tenderly" with an affectionate sense of warmth and remembrance. The Johnny Mercer-Hoagy Carmichael classic "Skylark" is on the slate as well, and Midler makes it a picturesque remembrance. Also recalled is beloved kiddie show host Mister Rogers, with a warmly shared film duet of "I Like to Be Told." It was a sweetly defined, sentimental sidebar. Of course, there's nothing quite so outrageous as Midler's salty humor and delightfully wicked barbs. Noting that Britney is wearing pasties and G-strings, the queen of bad taste boasted, "I opened the door for them!" She also quipped, "Now that Saddam is cleaned up, they'll likely cast him on 'Queer Eye for the Dictator.' " Her unprintable Viagra jokes prompted huge yuks. The biggest and longest second-act skit found Midler and the Harlettes as seductive mermaids in flapping fins touring a pre-Broadway musical revue, "Fishtails Over Broadway." From "Everything's Coming Up Roses," "One" and "Hello, Dolly!" to "All That Shad" (in lieu of "All That Jazz"), it was a concept that peaked much too early. Also off-key was a brief filmed court session with Judge Judy focusing on the demise of Midler's short-lived CBS sitcom "Bette." Why bother to dredge up a career mishap with sour-grapes comedy? Band was tight and crisp. Special effects and lighting were effectively glitzy and served as impressively glorified accents. Sound often was muffled by excessive volume in some corners of the arena. STILL DIVINE Orfeh's not the only brassy blonde getting her act together and taking it to Atlantic City. The Divine Miss M herself, Bette Midler, is scheduled to end her Kiss My Brass tour (which started in December) in the city by the sea on March 20 at Boardwalk Hall. I had the good fortune of catching the thrillingly theatrical Kiss My Brass on January 18, the second of two shows Midler played at Madison Square Garden, and I'm warning you now--if you're planning on skipping Bette this time out, think again! Broadway stars packed into MSG for the Sunday night show. I didn't check all of the 20,000 seats in the room, but I did see The Boy from Oz's Hugh Jackman, Matthew Broderick and Nathan Lane of The Producers, Wicked's Joel Grey, Christine Ebersole, A Chorus Line legends Donna McKechnie and Thommie Walsh and a pack of Hairspray stars (including Tony winners Harvey Fierstein and Dick Latessa), who came to cheer on original cast member Kamilah Martin, joining the illustrious ranks of Midler's Harlettes for Kiss My Brass! The theater folks in attendance had plenty to enjoy, especially in the Act Two opener, which found Midler's wheelchair-bound mermaid character, Delores Delago, headlining on the Great White Way in "Fishtails Over Broadway." The extended sequence, which may or may not play well in Peoria but had New Yorkers in stitches, offered Midler the chance to tear into showstoppers like "Everything's Coming Up Roses," "Tonight," "Cabaret," "You'll Never Walk Alone," "Tomorrow," "All That Jazz," "One," "Hello, Dolly!," "Oklahoma!" and even "(And I Am Telling You) I'm Not Going," with a nod to Michael Bennett's original Dreamgirls staging thanks to Broadway boy Richard Jay-Alexander, Midler's clever director for the tour. (The evening's high-energy choreography was provided by '80s icon Toni Basil.) I never imagined I'd get to hear the divine diva sing Effie's heartbreaker, and I also never expected to hear so many of my favorite Midler hits in one night. I was especially thrilled that she included so much of her '70s music, including four songs from her iconic debut album and not one, not two, but three songs from The Rose, which she delivered with a rock and roll roar that I didn't know she still had in her. Other highlights: Midler and her Harlettes dancing along with a video of an early Midler TV appearance on "Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy," the image of Miss M. flying off on a white carousel horse to the final notes of the evergreen beauty "Shiver Me Timbers," a heartfelt duet with Mr. Rogers via video screen, and, of course, "Wind Beneath My Wings," which always tears me up by conjuring up the image of CC Bloom and poor doomed Hillary Whitney (and her bloated lips!) sitting on the patio in Beaches. Midler herself served up a lot of drama; she was clearly moved to be performing for her hometown crowd. But don't get me wrong--Midler is still the trashy, sassy broad that we all fell in love with many years ago. She also happens to be the greatest showman we've got these days. My only wish is that we somehow get her back to Broadway, where she first starred in the original Fiddler on the Roof and caused a sensation in 1975's Clams on the Half Shell Revue. There are whispers of a Hello, Dolly! revival built around her, but I think Kiss My Brass! could work fabulously in a big Broadway house, too. Drop it down for a month-long run and watch the box office records get broken and Midler walk off with a Special Theatrical Event Tony Award. After all, shouldn't Broadway get to experience the divine again? |
Square Garden. She perfromed two songs she didn't perform last time
- the Rosemary Clooney tribute in Nassue consisted only of "Tenderly".
Tonight, she performed "Hey There" and then "Tenderly".
Next, she performed "Chapel of Love", followed by "(That's
How) Heartaches are Made".
At
Saturday's performance, the 58-year-old entertainer worked the sold-out
house with risqué jokes, a wheelchair ballet, fish tails
and her belting voice that made a guy sitting nearby exclaim, "She
got leather lungs." 
I
am still smiling from the show. I have seen Bette in concert many
times, including one other “Kiss My Brass” performance at Nassau
Coliseum, but this was probably the best show I have ever seen.
She sounded incredible on every song she sang, 
NEW
YORK -- Rarely has one concert seemed so much like two. 
After
singing WBMW The whole place stood and didnt sit down again, so
this was over 3 songs. Bette said Stop and wiped away a tear. During
the 3-4 songs some people in the front entered and Bette said 'Your
Late! I see all' Bette revealed that 'Hey There' was only put in
on 17th therefore wasnt up on it, so funny and professional!
There
a few hilarious follies, thunderous roars and the whole place stood
through KEEP ON ROCKIN, WIND BENEATH MY WINGS AND FRIENDS, she said
we were a much better crowd "then the ASSHOLES here last night"
(standing at the mic with ther arms folded giving a look of "yeah
were not impressed") eheheheh very funny.