It’s a little intimidating (okay, a lot) to review a classic show that’s been on Broadway before, and was also a classic movie. I’m talking about Cabaret. I can’t really say if I had seen it before, yet I know so much of the music without having bought the album, CD or mp3s.
Is Cabaret on Broadway appropriate for kids? We’ll get to that later on. But let me start by saying I’ve seen a lot of Broadway shows in my life. And I have never received as many emails before the show as I did with Cabaret.
Here’s what I learned from the Cabaret emails
–You can buy drinks and food ahead of time.
—You can upgrade your “experience” to get a 3-course light meal (here’s the menu. One course is a pretzel and hummus) for $95 plus tax (probably plus tip, too). The meal is vegan or charcuterie. It includes a half bottle of Moet & Chandon and a “local” dessert. Not sure if local means NY cheesecake or something German. I’d guess the latter. It also includes a private bartender and restroom. You get your treat during intermission.
–You can order champagne, rose or cocktails ahead of time.
–There will be stairs. Lots of stairs, potentially. Including if you have mezzanine seats. So if you can’t do stairs, read the fine print. I didn’t (because I am fine with stairs).
–You’ll need to cover your phone camera with a sticker. They’ll give you the sticker.
–There’s Wi-Fi!
–You can’t bring an e-bike. Or a scooter. Or firearms.
–They sell merchandise!
–You’ll find out what time to get there (an hour before the show, or 75 minutes if doing the seated light meal) and what door to enter. Though you’ll still get in the same line as everyone else. Bring ID if you’re older than 21. Though they didn’t card us – I guess we look the part.
–And by the way, there are stairs!
Entering Cabaret on Broadway. Copyright Deborah Abrams Kaplan
In spite of all the emails (which were tasteful and in character), we were very surprised when we showed up – surprised and delighted. Like when you’re entering the Harry Potter castle ride at Universal. Or Harry Pottter on Broadway – that theater experience. Ooh – aah!
As always when entering a Broadway show, there was a line, even though we got there at 1:40 for a 2:00 entrance and 3:00 show.
This is what we knew about what to expect: “We encourage you to come early and explore every nook and cranny of what the Club has to offer. With superb food and drink available, three distinct bars, and Prologue performers entertaining you in the bar areas before the main performance begins, your experience starts as soon as you walk through the door. This is Berlin. Relax. Loosen up. Be yourself.”
The Cabaret experience
We walked down a long alley (see top picture – red), which had posters and graffiti on the walls. Then we got to the end before turning left (the green photo). The neon side is the Kit Kat Club Cabaret logo. We were now behind the theater, climbing some stairs to get our phone cameras stickered. and then we entered.
We were greeted at the club by staff offering us a cherry-flavored shot (it’s included – I asked before taking it). I can’t quite recall the route we took inside but it felt like a dark maze. The walls were painted a dark rusty orange with Kit Kat logos and swirls. And the lighting was all awesome. We saw a dancer perched by the staircase. We went to the lower level vault bar, which had a stage of rotating dancers and musicians. The bar itself, down a few stairs in a room with a stunning ceiling, sometimes had dancers on it too. The bartender told us she forgot to properly secure her mixers at one point. Oops.
What did the preshow look like? You can get some glimpses here.
The scene was truly magical and almost worth the entire ticket price alone. The dancers were scantily dressed, with interesting make-up, and the music was Klezmer-like. An accordion, a violin and a clarinet. We stayed in that area the entire hour, though probably should have made our way up to the other two bars, which we saw when going to our seats.
Those bars, and the decor (wallpaper, ceiling, paintings) were evocative and sultry. I would love to just go have drinks at any of them. I rarely drink at Broadway shows because I have no interest in drinking out of a plastic sippy cup and also – bathroom lines! But my friend convinced me to get a drink (and hey, she paid), and the drink was delicious.
Okay, so I did sneak my sticker off my phone in the bathroom because – look at the bathroom! This was the ladies’ room in the lower level. And there were 13 stalls plus an all gender stall outside this area. The restrooms were appropriately labeled in German.
Cabaret on Broadway – the review
I also snuck the sticker off my phone to get this amazing photo above (ha ha, not amazing). I am in the third to last row, so few ushers were going up that high, though bussers did go up to retrieve people’s drink glasses. Yes, GLASSES. You could bring your cocktail to your seat in a real glass. Fortunately no one I saw spilled or broke a glass. Though a jerk in front of me was checking his texts after the second act started.
To be honest, I was a little jealous of the cocktail table seating by the stage. Especially given my view, which would have been better if I remembered to bring my glasses! I could still see but some of the details were a bit fuzzier than they would have been otherwise.
You can hopefully see that this is a theater in the round. The stage was quite small but it packed a punch. Without giving away too much, the outside ring of the stage rotates (like at fancy rooftop restaurants) and the middle goes up and down for dramatic entrances and to set people up higher. The lights that are blocking the view (for us in the peanut section) do rise during the show so there is no more blockage. The orchestra is in the boxes on either side of the stage – at the higher level. There was a piano in one of those!
Around the stage, as mentioned, were cocktail seats (you can pay more to get food/drink service there during the show). From those seats you have a spectacular view (I’m guessing), especially as the actors are moving through the tables and exiting on two sides. You can get sweat and spit on!
Check out the ambiance from the show on its website. And looking there, I could finally see up close what everyone looked like and was wearing. Next time – I will bring my glasses!
So, the show. A lot of lead-up to the show! A brief plot: Sally Bowles (Gayle Rankin) is a singer/dancer at the Kit Kat Club – the emcee is Eddie Redmayne. Sally gets booted. At the show is an American struggling author, Cliff Bradshaw (Ato Blankson-Wood) who comes to Berlin to find something to write about. En route he meets Ernst (Henry Gottfried) who is (surprise! spoiler!) a Nazi. Cliff gets a room in Fraulein Schneider’s (Bebe Neuwirth) boarding house. Sally and Cliff hook up. Nazis are coming to power. Schneider has a romantic interest who is Jewish (Steven Skybell). And what happens next?
The first act is 1 hour 45 minutes and the singing and dancing is incredible. The staging is also awesome. What’s not great? Casting Blankson-Wood as Cliff (he was super boring in the part) and there was no chemistry between him and Sally, though he could sing. Others have criticized Rankin’s casting in the role, though I thought she did a good job. Not sexy at all, though, very jarring, very brash. If you are a Cabaret fan, you might have issues with how Redmayne plays the Emcee (or you might not – he got a Tony nomination and won an Olivier for his portrayal in the West End). Just try not to compare him to Joel Grey or Alan Cumming, because it’s quite different.
The second act is 45 minutes and for my Cabaret-savant companion (and me to some extent), that’s where the show lost its fizz. There were some parts in the show overall that I didn’t quite get in this context, like the Emcee singing “Tomorrow Belongs to Me” the first time (I couldn’t really hear the words, though it sounded lovely). “If You Could See Her,” a song which involves a gorilla – made no sense. Some of the clothing choices were odd, like Sally’s fur coat. They used a green fuzzy thing that I never connected to being her fur coat – because it was like a ratty thrift shop find that looked nothing like fur. The Emcee’s costume choices were a bit odd, with one costume my friend described as a Storm Trooper look. But with beads where a bikini would be? It was a vision choice to be sure, but maybe not the vision the audience would have chosen.
And the ending, with everyone wearing drab identical suits – didn’t look like a Nazi scene, it looked like a weird Wall Street scene. There was no visible rise in Nazi power seen, just some allusions. No emotional crisis when Fraulein Schneider and her fiance split. So the ending kind of fizzled out and you didn’t see the dramatic shift to the Third Reich that I quasi-remember from maybe seeing it many many years ago (or hearing about it?). Also Cliff wasn’t so likeable or interesting, so him leaving at the end also didn’t matter too much.
Is Cabaret on Broadway appropriate for kids?
The show recommends ages 13+ to attend, with no one under age 4. Holy cow, don’t bring anyone between 4 and 13 either. The show definitely could have been raunchier, but the dancers in the preshow are sultry and sometimes dance in a sexual way or with sexual gestures (the abs on those bodies!). Mostly there was no one sexy in the show – it was all harsh, jerky dancing (probably the intent) though people were very flexible. The opening scene, Wellkommen, has some dancer moves that are not G-rated (and there are some later in the show as well). Some of the lyrics aren’t G-rated either. And then there’s the context – Nazi Germany. There’s also talk of abortion. If your kid is mature (or maybe if you have seats where we were and they can’t see too well), it could be fine. But this is a show you probably want to leave the kids at home unless they’re huge Cabaret fans.
About those stairs
Here’s what we got in the email about the stairs: From Door 2, there are 11 steps up to the first level of the theatre from the sidewalk, and 25 steps down from there to the Vault Bar. The East Mezzanine is on the 2nd level, up 47 steps from the Vault Bar. There are approximately 2 steps up/down per row in Mezzanine 1, 2, and 3. Please note: There is a stair lift to the Orchestra level from 52nd Street. You do not have to be a wheelchair user to use the lift. Please see theatre staff at Door 1 for assistance. All stairs at the theatre have handrails.
Have you seen Cabaret? What do you think?