Mynee's Musings

Into The Woods

This week's show was Into the Woods.  I knew nothing about it other than there was a movie by the same name last year although we didn't see it.  As you have probably guessed, we aren't big movie fans.  I can't sit still that long, ha!  Anyway, the story line weaves together the lives of Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood, Jack and the Bean Stalk and Rapunzel.  A witch casts a spell on The Baker and his wife who then must find a milk-white cow, hair as yellow as corn, a blood-red cape, and a slipper of gold to reverse the spell.  Well, you can probably figure out how that ties back to the other characters.  I don't really consider this a "kid" show because it is somewhat dark but w really enjoyed it.  The narrator was Ken Page, one of our favorites!

We ate dinner at The Culver Pavillion before the show.  Coconut shrimp, beef shortribs, various sides and salads.  Yum!  Next weeks show, Beauty and the Beast.  

The Buddy Holly Story

This weeks show was The Buddy Holly Story.  I’ve been voting for this show for years so I was glad they finally decided to add it to the lineup this year.  I didn’t really know a lot about Buddy Holly other than that he died in a plane crash along with Richie Valenz and the Big Bopper.  I was familiar with some of his songs such as Everyday, Peggy Sue and That’ll Be the Day.  I didn’t realize that he was only 22 when he died and that he married his wife after only knowing her for 5 hours.  I also didn’t know that Ritchie Valens was only 17 when he died. Wow!

We ate at Bottleworks before the show.  We started with the hummus and then I had the bacon mac and cheese and Bill had the BLT.  There were a few brews in there too…Brown for Bill and IPA for me.

Next week, Into The Woods.

Holiday Inn

This week's show was Holiday Inn.  We gave our tickets to my niece and brother-in-law.  My mom had outpatient surgery yesterday and my sister was out of town so I went to the hospital with my mom.  I wasn’t sure when I’d get back home plus Bill wasn’t sure when he’d get home because it was the second week with the new payroll system and he’d been putting in long hours.  We figured it would just be best to skip the show.  My niece and brother-in-law enjoyed it all worked out.

We decided to eat dinner at Morgan Street and were able to sit outside on their patio as the weather was great.  Yummy food and great brews!  Next week, The Buddy Holly Story.

Hairspray

This weeks show was Hairspray.  We saw it for the first time 5 years ago and really liked it.  Can you believe we’ve never seen the movie?  Anyway, the show is really cute and the actress who played Tracy Turnblad, Ryann Redmond, was really good.  It was her Muny debut.  Liz Mikel who played Motormouth Maybelle was fantastic.  Wow, can she sing!  This was her second Muny performance as she was in Seussical last year.  The weather didn’t look promising but luckily, it didn’t rain. 

We ate dinner at the Culver Pavillion before the show.  Years ago, we would eat there before every show when LoRusso’s catered the food but then the Muny formed their own catering company and we weren’t too impressed.  We tried it again last year and liked it so we decided to make reservations for dinner for three different shows based on the menu.  This week, one of the featured items was crab cakes.  Yum!  They also had various sides such as a meat, cheese and fruit platter, risoto salad, a roasted potato salad, green beans, salad, baked potato bar, as well as two other entrees; chicken and beef.  It was all really good.

The next show is in two weeks; Holiday Inn.  Stay tuned…

My Fair Lady

The Muny season opened last week with My Fair Lady.  Our season began the same way that last season ended…with a rain-shortened performance.  They were about 3/4^th of the way through the first act when it started raining.  There was about an 45 minute delay and the actors started to come back out on stage when it started raining again so there was another 15 minute delay.  The performance started again and about 15 minutes later, it started raining.  By this time, it was about 10:30pm and they weren’t even finished with the first act.  We decided to head home and, as it turns out, they ended up cancelling the rest of the performance.

Due to all of the rain we’ve been havnig this month, we decided that the grass would probably be too wet for a picnic so we ate dinner at Bottleworks before the show.  When it’s either too wet or hot to have a picnic, we usually eat at either Bottleworks or Six Row as both are relatively close to The Muny.  Well, Six Row closed earlier this month in anticipation of moving to a new location.  Sounds strange to me.  Why would you close before the new location is up and running?  I sure hope they do open again as it was one of our favorite microbreweries.

Next week, Hairspray.  

I Love Lucy

We saw I Love Lucy yesterday at Peabody Opera House.  I am a big Lucy fan so I was really looking forward to the show.  We had front row seats!  When I bought the tickets, I don’t remember them being in the front row so it was a nice surprise.  The only problem is that the stage isn’t eye-level but it’s cool to be so close because you can really see the actors expressions. 

The stage was the set of I Love Lucy and it was as if we were watching the filming as the live studio audience.  The two episodes that they “filmed” were “The Benefit” and “Lucy Has Her Eyes Examined.”  The actors really did a great job.  Their expressions and mannerisms were so close to the original actors that you forgot you weren’t watching Lucy, Desi, Vivian and Bill.   

After the show, we ate an early dinner at The Tap Room.  Always good food and brews.

Kinky Boots

We saw the last show of the season, Kinky Boots, at the Fox Saturday.  It is the story of a man who inherits a shoe factory from his father.  The factory had been in the family for years, beginning with his grandfather.  Sales were not what they once were so he considers closing the factory until he meets a transvestite, Lola, and he decides to make “kinky boots”.  The actor who played Lola, Darius Harper, was excellent! 

After the show, we went to Wildwood Pub & Grill to meet the family for Sarah’s birthday dinner (see previous post).  They have changed their menu and added a few new dishes.  I had the buffalo chicken pasta and it was super yummy. 

I’ll post a recap of the season soon.

Fleetwood Mac 2015

Fleetwood Mac was here in St. Louis last Friday and of course we attended the concert…hee hee hee.  Here is the set list

• The Chain
• You Make Lovin’ Fun
• Dreams
• Second Hand News
• Rhiannon
• Everywhere
• Don’t Blame Me
• Tusk
• Sister of the Moon
• Say You Love Me
• Big Love
• Landslide
• Never Going Back
• Over My Head
• Gypsy
• Little Lies
• Gold Dust Woman
• So Afriad
• Go Your Own Way

The encore was as follows:

• World Turning
• Don’t Stop
• Silver Springs

This time, they did not perform Seven Wonders or Songbird.  Songbird has never been one of my favorites so I ddin’t really miss it although I was surprised that they dropped it from the list since Mick at one point says something about the return of their songbird, referencing Christine.  I like Seven Wonders but I wasn’t really surprised that they dropped it.  It is a song from Tango in the Night and the only reason they performed it last fall was because Stevie sang it when she was on American Horror Story. 

Anyway, the concert was great but it wasn’t the only one we saw.  We drove to Kansas City on Saturday morning to see the concert on Saturday evening.  We left home around 7:30am or so and were in KC by 11:30am.  We went to 75^th Street Brewery for lunch.  Bill had a golden ale, I had a brown ale and then we each had a red ale.  What?  No IPA?  They were out of IPA.  Anyway, the brews were good.  For lunch, we had the brussel sprouts, crab cakes and blue cheese chips.  Yum! 

After lunch, we headed to the hotel, checked in and then went to the Nelson Atkins Museum of Art.  We spent a few hours there and then went back to the hotel to get ready for an early dinner.  We were at Power & Light by about 5:00pm and the place was packed.  We had wanted to eat at Gordon Biersch but the wait was 90 minutes.  Yikes!  We finally decided on Tengo Sed Cantina where the wait was only about 30 minutes.  The food was ok but nothing special.  I wouldn’t go out of my way to eat there again. 

After dinner, we walked across the street to Sprint Center. The setlist was the same as last night and the concert was great, of course.  After the concert, we had a beer in the Power & Light district and then drove back to the hotel.

The next morning, we checked out and then went to Eggtc for breakfast.  It was super yummy!  I forgot to write down what we had though…hee hee hee.  After breakfast, we headed home and arrived around 1:00 or so.  Greta was happy to see us.  It was a quick trip but definitely worth it. 

Phantom of the Opera

We saw Phantom of the Opera at the Fox on Saturday.  It's the tragic love story of a man deformed since birth and the Paris Opera House chorus singer with whom he falls in love.  He tutors her and terrorizes the rest of the opera house.  I had seen it before but it was a long time ago, I think back in 1991 or 1992 and Bill had never seen it.  I love the songs, especially Music of the Night, All I Ask of You and The Phantom of the Opera.

We ate dinner at Rosalita’s after the show.  We ordered the flautas for the appetizer and they were really good but very filling.  Ha, my eyes are always bigger than my stomach.  I then ordered the al pastor street tacos and Bill ordered tacos too but I forget which kind...hee hee hee.  Whatever it was, he enjoyed it and I really enjoyed mine.  Oh my goodness, I couldn’t eat all of it.  I ended up just eating the meat and leaving the tortillas for the second and third taco.  I think next time I order it, I’ll just tell them to leave off the tortillas and give me three scoops of the masa instead.

After dinner, we went to Alpha Brewing which is only about a block from Rosalita’s.  It’s been open for almost 2 years and this is the first time we visited.  I love the bar…

They call it the coin bar.  They have tasty brews and a cute little patio out front.  We’ll definitely be visiting again soon when the weather is nice.  

Cinderella

We saw Cinderella at The Fox yesterday.  It’s one of my favorites (yes, I’m still a kid).  I love the story and the music.  This production was, um, different. Don’t get me wrong, I still enjoyed it but there were several major changes.  First, the evil stepsisters and stepmother weren’t as evil.  Perhaps they didn’t want to scare the kiddos in the audience or perhaps they wanted to be politically correct and didn’t want to give “steps” a bad name.  Second, the prince didn’t find Cinderella’s glass slipper on the steps of the palace and then go searching for her.  She picked it up and took it with her.  Oh, and there was a whole story about the homeless people in the village.  I won’t say much more as I don’t want to spoil it for anyone but let’s just say, I don’t think there was anything wrong with the original.   

We decided to eat at Bridge since we hadn’t eaten there for a while.  They no longer take reservations so I figured that since we’d be early, we wouldn’t have to wait. It worked out perfectly. We started with the smoked Danish blue cheese with sliced pears, clover honey and focaccia.  Bill had the Civil Life Black lager and I had the Civil Life Rye pale ale.  For dinner, I chose the mac and cheese with roasted poblanos and tomatoes in and IPA cheddar sauce.  It was huge so half of it went home with me for lunch the next day.  Bill had the short ribs which were the special of the evening.  We also had a Santa Fe Black IPA.

Next show is in March; Phantom of the Opera.