The Wiz

Frank and I went to a matinee performance of The Wiz at the San Jose Center for the Performing Arts Saturday, January 31st. The colorful stage debut we viewed while we were awaiting the opening was intriguing. It bode of good things to come. We had our usual vantage point from Row 12.

As usual at this venue, the staging was impressive and the costuming was flamboyant. The dancers were amazing with the amount of flexibility and limberness they demonstrated. I did not know a body could bend in the way the scarecrow did. The tin man really was stuck in certain locations of this body as if those joints were indeed welded and his movement truly reflected the constraints.

The music was loud, I mean really LOUD. The power, range, and modulation skills of the singers was positively awesome. The songs were impassioned. They were pulsating. They got lots of thunderous applause. I could be impressed the with talent of the singers but not with the indecipherable finished product. If we could have understood more than 10% of the lyrics perhaps we would have gleaned more from the plot. Simply put, the soulful screaming of songs, with scatting to enhance the notes, was not my cup of tea. I recognized only one of the songs from the production, "Ease On Down The Road". The others I cannot even tell you what they were about. 

My expectations were that this production was a jazzed up reinterpretation of the Wizard of Oz and I knew it had an all-black cast. There were long dance scenes that, although lively and raucous, seemed to slow down the pace of the show to me. I acknowledge that they are to be enjoyed for an entity unto themselves. The connection to the Frank Baum tale was far looser than I had anticipated. The return from the Emerald City was anticlimactic with no joyful reunion with Auntie Em and a tieback to the farm hands. There were no munchkins. There was not even a yellow brick road! Ok, we did "Ease On Down the Road" several times but that was not the same ambience. I even missed Toto ... there was no dog sadly. 

I am glad Frank and I got out of the house. We were in a bit of a funk, not looking forward to this outing and therefore having low expectations. We have a theory that low expectations generally means higher enjoyment — because when something exceeds expectations, happiness often follows. That theory did not pan out for this show. On a positive note, taking at face value the colorful costuming, energetic dancing, and boisterous singing, and looking beyond the context of relaying a story, there was entertainment to be had. The entertainment was beyond the realm of what we were expecting, I guess. It was more in the land of "Aahs" rather than "Oz".