Aunt Dottie’s Sing-Along Cabaret
Aunt Dottie’s Sing-Along Cabaret
Featuring Aunt Dottie and Nephew Erin
Breakthrough Theatre, Winter Park, FL</strong>
On cruise ships passing happily amongst tropical islands, entertainers like Aunt Dottie spend their days beneath decks and their evenings attempting to engage the passengers in safe, PG rated entertainment based old top 40 hits and silly stage antics. Tonight’s crowd was a bit tough, the folks at Breakthrough Theatre don’t have a liquor licenses and the crowd needed a few drinks to get up to full energy. Her concept is simple: Aunt Dottie is an experienced woman with a passion for sparkly eye shadow and ex husbands, while Nephew Erin plays the ivories and acts as her straight man. She’s between divorces, and he’s crashing on her the couch in the basement. It’s an interesting relation.
Tonight they’ve made the long drive from Washington State to Central Florida, and the house is packed. Chairs are set on stage to handle the overflow, and at least half the audience is a relative or ex-co-worker from a local amusement park. Each seat has a sheet of paper with her songs, the audience makes requests, and she belts out the music. Most of the songs require a volunteer from the audience, and they all receive a prize – either an autographed photo or a button featuring Dottie or Erin. It’s a fair trade and solid marketing. The audience was as entertaining as anything explicitly planned on stage: A short older gent gyrated to “Dancing Queen”, some little girls hula hooped to “Rockin’ Robin” and young woman up for “YMCA” became angry at her friend who refused to come up and dance with her.
Dottie’s vocals were fine for the material, although occasionally her shtick became tedious. Erin sang a pair of songs, apparently “you ALWAYS sing two songs” is part of the deal. His “Crocodile Rock” was a hit, and he took the drugs out of “Space Cowboy” to please Aunt D. The funniest song came from Dottie; she replaced the lyrics to “La Bamba” with dramatic readings from the menu of a local Mexican dive restaurant. It’s one of those silly things that just hit right tonight. Unlike the cabarets that appear in other local playhouses, this evening was not about virtuoso performance or the classic music of stage or film. This is simple, middle class comedy aimed at an audience that wants to be entertained, but not challenged. They loved it.
For more information, please visit http://www.breakthroughtheatre.com
