Curtain Call: Kiki & Herb Are a Hit on Broadway

Well, Ben Brantley at the New York Times busted a nut over Kiki & Herb's Broadway debut:

"Though they may disappear when the lights go down, and the makeup comes off, Kiki and Herb onstage are Alive with a capital A, with all the human vitality and fallibility that that implies. This is more than can be said for the synthetically enhanced automatons appearing in most Broadway musicals."

This, after he meditates for two paragraphs on the rhinestone teardrops afixed to Kiki's lower eyelashes. Whoa, simmer down Brantley.

Though the rest of the reviews were positive...a few thought the performance lasted too long and might not draw anyone but the hardcore Kiki & Herbsters to the show. Maybe not, but then the very fact that the Booze-addled duo is on Broadway is an brilliant act of subversion; and if they can touch just one person (and get away with it), well...mission accomplished.

The Broadway show includes some new revelations about the lives of our favorite septuagenarian songsters. For instance, Kiki danced with Maya Angelou at a titty bar: "I know why the caged bird sings. She can't write." They also happened to be present at the birth of Jesus, and are now immortal thanks to Daisy the Cow and the afterbirth of the messiah (don't ask). The audiences are also treated to some old chestnuts about Kiki's family: Bradford, Miss D., and the deceased Coco; as well as her fondness for her father, "If you weren't molested as a child you must have been an ugly kid." And of course "retard," they still own that word.

Their musical repertoire adds Gnarls Barkley's "Crazy," performed as an autobiographical dirge, Public Enemy's "Don't Believe hype", and when Kiki sings Bright Eyes' "First Day of My Life" she promises to do it while manufacturing genuine emotion. A cover of Alphaville's "Forever Young" is perfectly rendered, and their "showtune" of choice, "Total Eclipse of the Heart" has become their anthem.

This in between scathingly funny social commentary (Kiki likens the treatment of gays and lesbians in the US to apartheid). We're pleased as punch the critics didn't skewer our beloved duo. And, if a rave in the Times draws some unsuspecting audience members into their clutches, all the better. To the non-iniated, don't be afraid of Kiki, she's not there to scare you, just make you think. If she could love, she would love you all. Even the matinee crowd.



Kiki and Herb [Google News]
Did Critics Cheer Kiki & Herb: Alive on Broadway? [Broadway.com]

Kiki & Herb ;Broadway ;Musical