Based on the popular 1988 film with Steve Martin and Michael Caine, DIRTY ROTTEN SCOUNDRELS centers on two con men living on the French Riviera.
We saw Sunday afternoon, at the Denver Center for Performing Arts.

Our view of act 1may have been colored because we were 5 minutes from the ballpark, without tickets to the final world series game between our local Rockies and my Pompa's beloved RedSox. Maybe too because I drank too much soda at lunch, but our seats were dead center in the front row of the balcony, so I couldn't leave in the middle of the show without pissing off at leasy 40-50 people (2 dozen alone just stepping on their feet to get out).... But by the intermission (after my succesful run for the ladies room) , Clayton and I looked at each other with that "is this all?" look. There wer some great voices, and the occasional funny line, but nothing particularly spectacular.

Like many shows these days, though, the story really came together and things improved greatly in the second act. Even knowing what was coming, thanks to the movie, we still laughed our heads off as the con unfolded. Even better were some of the added subplots. I won't go into detail as that would spoil some of the fun.
I'm only giving it a 3 -- one star off for the slow first act, and one off because while the songs were well written, witty, and fit nicely in the show, I just didn't come away humming.
But I still definitely recommend it as a fun show - probably even more so if you've never seen the movie. Just don't be deceived if act 1 runs a little slow (especially if you've seen the movie half a dozen times.)

Start:	Oct 28, '07 2:00p
Location:	Denver Center for the Performing Arts

Balcony, front row center.

A few weeks ago, we went to the first public showing of Disney's newest broadway-bound show - The Little Mermaid.
If you'r not familiar with the process of getting a show to Broadway, Being the first preview in the "out of town tryouts" in Denver, the show is not yet "complete" or at its peak... the actors are still figuring out the roles, and the show itself is likely to be tweaked before both the official opening night in Denver, and then probably even more before it actually officially opens on Broadway (in November)

So give some leeway for all that as you read this review. I have left off a star because there is definitely some work to do - but from what we saw, I think it's likely they'll reach that 5th star by opening night. (Maybe not quite as awesome as Beauty and the Beast or the Lion King on Broadway, but still pretty darn awesome).

That said, here are my notes on the show:

The downs:
--A few of the numbers didn’t quite flow—but I guess that’s the sort of thing these tryouts exist to figure out.
--Triton, Ariel's father, was bland bland bland -- not sure if it was the writing or the actor (probably some of both)
--Sebastian was pretty weak in the first act. (just the actor. The role was well-written.)

The middlings:
-Ariels’ sisters had a number (at the spot in the movie when they are all sitting around deciding Ariel must be in love…). Some of the sisters were a hoot, and their voices were great… but the number jsut didn't quite seem to fit into the flow.
-"Under the Sea" was neat, but not as showstoppingly awesome as it should have been.
-Some of the old songs from the movie were performed a little too exactly like the movie, and just didn’t feel like the actors or the show has made them their own yet.
- Flounder (played by a kid) was good, but hasn’t quite found his niche..

The good:
-Costumes were imaginative and well-executed.
(the mermaids had their tails sticking out behind them, with matching skirts covering their legs. Tough to describe, but it really worked; to make the swimming/gliding effects, most of the undersea characters were on shoes with wheels (think like those “Heelies” sneakers. It worked really well. )
-Sets were fairly simple, but in the same way a Vera Wang dress is simple… they were just incredible (they have these shims of a plasticy watery-looking substance they’d bring up and down that really worked well – Apparently they actually worked with 3M to develop a new material just for the show to have all the properties they wanted. And the ship was this whimsical thing that came down from above, as the water moved down… very cool.)
-The actors playing Ariel and Ursula were incredible. So were Eric, Grimsby, Carlotta, Flotsam & Jetsam, & Scuttle…. And Sebastian warmed up by the second half (and may have had some mike adjustments) and then was awesome.
-Additions to the story and some of the new songs and edits of existing songs were really good. (Eric got fleshed out a little more, the search for the Voice became a singing contest to try to find the girl… And in this version, he chooses Ariel anyway *before* he knows she is the voice (even after he hears the voice coming from somewhere else, he decides to stick with Ariel.)
-Scuttle and his backup gulls were hilarious.
-Kiss the Girl was every bit as showstoppingly awesome as it should have been.
-The cast was largely race-neutral in a way that really worked. (the sisters were a mix, Triton was black, they have 2 flounders thay play alternate nights, and one’s very black and one’s very white.)
The Little Mermaid is not one of my husband's favorite Disney movies anyway, so he was just kind of eh. But allowing for it being their first performance for an audience, it was pretty awesome. I’ll have to see it again someday, maybe when it goes on tour, or if we ever make it to New York, to see how they tweak it.

We caught this at the Pikes Peak Center in Colorado Springs Friday night.

Facts: This is one of those broadway musicals where a story was created around the existing music of a popular musician/group... in this case, ABBA.
The basic plot is that a youg woman is about to get married. Raised my a single mom, she doesn' know who her father is. She finds her mother's diary from 1979 (the year she would have been conceived), and figures out it could be one of three possible men, so she secretly invites them all to her wedding, in hopes that her real father will end up walking her down the aisle...
So naturally, chaos ensues.

One star off because there were several points where the orchestra drowned out the singing... but otherwise, I realy enjoyed the show.
Rather than the typical broadway show playbill format of listing the songs in order, with the characters who sing them, this show simply listed all songs in alphabetically, so we never quite knew what was coming next.
Some of the old Abba songs (Dancing Queen) came in just where you expected, and others (Take a Chance on Me) popped in at more surprising times, giving me giggle fits as I recognized the opening words.... All in all a very effective trick... especialli since the denoument of the story itself was fairly predictable (but in that good old cheesy broadway way - which is not a bad thing!)

And most importantly, I left singing.

The show is well worth the time and money for anyone who likes broadway-style shows, or who ever willingly listened to Abba (even if you won't admit it).