Dinner and a show, Sweet Charity

When I heard that Christina Applegate was planning on leaving Sweet Charity, my wife tracked down tickets as fast as she could. Stacey has always felt that Christina is a very talented actress and really wanted to see her perform live and this show would be the only way, at least for now.

Our tickets were for December 2nd at 8:00. We met by 6:30 on the corner of 46th Street and 8th Avenue -- Restaurant Row. Stacey was running a little bit late so we went to the first restaurant we knew we could get good food fast: Vita's. It's a quaint little Italian Restaurant between 8th and 9th with a bit of a Spanish flair. They have really great food and really amazing varieties of Sangria. Stacey had the grilled shrimp and vegetables, and I had the lasagna. Both were good choices. The food are service there are perfect. What wasn't perfect was the unruly party of screeching women there. They had knocked out a couple pitchers of Vita's fine and strong Sangria. So they were all at least a littletipsy. They couldn't remember what their orders , they were noisy, and were complaining about everything in teh entire place. The manager spent so much time at that table that he almost seemed like a part of the party.

Sweet Charity plays at the Al Hirschfeld Theater, 302 West 45th Street, which is just around the corner from where we dined. By 7:30 they started letting people in. Stacey acquired very nice seats low in the first mezzanine towards the middle.

The lights dimmed. The orchestra began to play. They did a great job. They sounded perfect and were mic'd very well. Many of the numbers were very drum intensive which I found particularly pleasing. But getting back to the opening, the curtains opened up and Charity, played by Christina Applegate, was there. She looked lovely, sang beautifully and played the part very convincingly. The entire cast were delightfulin this charming tale of a girl who desires something better from life. The songs were pretty. The choreography was brilliant. Just a fun show to see.

There's rumors that Britney Spears has been in negotiations to replace Christina when she leaves the show this month. I would highly recommend seeing this show before such a perverse change takes place.

See the official site here:
http://www.sweetcharitythemusical.com/

I pic I took of the Billboard on 12/01/2005. Click for larger version