By ALAN SMASON
For the past several weeks, I’ve been promoting this weekend as a way for the local theatre community to give back to Le Petit Theatre du Vieux Carré, the historic theater founded in 1916 and nestled in the heart of the French Quarter.
Friday night, September 6, was Le Petit’s annual fundraiser, The Curtain Call Ball, and featured a troop of talented local stars singing songs to promote the upcoming season. Also on the boards was Broadway phenom and Tony nominee Betsy Wolfe (& Juliet) singing three songs as a teaser for her full cabaret show on Saturday night titled “Pants Optional.”
As to “The Curtain Call Ball” – their tenth such event – the amount of money raised from ticket sales, sponsorships, silent and live auctions turned out to be their most successful to date.
The show ended with a terrific play on Cole Porter’s words to “You’re the Top” with new lyrics about Le Petit added and performed by Keith and Leslie Claverie. Accompanied by Jefferson Turner on piano, the Claveries were then were joined on stage by Stephanie Toups Abry, MyiaRené Carter, Monique Abry Knoepfler, Queen Shereen Macklin, and Jake Wynne-Wilson for the finale. Melissa Marshall also performed “Oh What a Night (December 1963)” from Jersey Boys earlier with Abry, Knoepfler and Wynne-Wilson.
But the star for both nights was Betsy Wolfe, who last graced the Le Petit stage almost exactly five years ago prior to the COVID shutdown and at least two years before her most successful Broadway stint, the Max Martin jukebox musical & Juliet. An imaginative and up-to-date gender-fluid retelling of the Shakespearean tragedy Romeo and Juliet, the musical comedy is interspersed with Martin’s massive hit songs from the pop world including “Hit Me Baby,” “Backstreet’s Back” and “I Want It That Way.”
Wolfe plays Anne Hathaway (“No, not that Anne Hathaway!”), the wife of England’s most famous playwright who elects to rewrite the ending of the tragedy in order to give young Juliet Capulet more options to live out her life without the lad from the House of Montague. Wolfe has announced her plans to exit the Broadway role she originated on October 20. (Her replacement has not yet been named.)
Accompanied by pianist Cian McCarthy on both nights, Wolfe proved to be a delight, a singer with incredible placement and power. She came with a few of her own chestnuts culled from some of her own personal triumphs such as “I Can Do Better Than That” from her starring role as Cathy in the off Broadway production of The Last Five Years. She added “What Baking Can Do” from Waitress in which she followed show creator Sara Bareilles in the lead role of Jenna Hunterson. She opened both of her appearances with “I’ll Never Fall in Love Again” from the Burt Bacharach- Hal David songbook, lovingly remembered as part of the Promises, Promises original cast and revival productions. “You’ll know this one and may want to sing along…but don’t,” she mugged the audience.
A comedic singer with fabulous timing, Wolfe also pulled out “The Boy From” on both nights, a Mary Rodgers novelty song with lyrics supplied by Stephen Sondheim using a pseudonym.
In addition to her own repertoire, Wolfe asked fellow veteran Broadway and off Broadway performer Kathleen Monteleone to assist her with a solo number she has written. Wolfe described writing one’s own songs as “badass.” Next, the two collaborated on a duet from Everyday Rapture the quirky off Broadway show in which they both had feature roles.
Wolfe’s ability to connect to the audience was evident throughout her performances, taking time to genuinely have fun with specific members of the crowd from whom she may have heard supportive comments or applause. But no one ever truly got one over her. She was always firmly in control.
Well, except for maybe that one fan who happened to wear his & Juliet pin on his coat lapel and who shamelessly brought his CD booklet and a Sharpie for her to sign. (Yes, guilty as charged.)
But even then, when she was having fun with a sing-along section of her show and without warning, Wolfe placed the microphone in front of me to get me to fill in a missing lyric from one of Max Martin’s many hits “It’s My Life.”
Well, I got it “half right,” but rather than scold me for getting it wrong – which she could have done – she pivoted and interviewed me as I told her a photo of the two of us was now my Facebook cover page. “Wait…what?” she questioned. Then, as she really listened to me, I told her she was one of the last performers to interact with my now deceased mother at that last show at Le Petit nearly five years ago. Gracious and supportive, she signed my booklet without any hesitation before thanking me for coming to her show.
She didn’t blink an eye when I told her I was a theatre critic. She took a step back and suggested she was falling for me. Fake love aside, it was evident she was genuinely moved and even acknowledged me again after she returned to the stage.
All in all, it was a terrific two nights of theatre and cabaret and a wonderful opportunity to spotlight a lovely and talented Broadway performer.
