A (Short) Afternoon at the Theatre

In 1990 several of my co-workers and I left work early to see the movie Ghost. Apart from Patrick Swayze's performance, I thoroughly enjoyed the movie. Whenever it's on TV, I sit and watch. It's a funny and endearing movie.

A few years ago I heard the movie was being made into a musical. Huh. Okay. The movie is so iconic. Why mess it up?

Six months ago Chad purchased season tickets to DPAC's Broadway Series which included a tour of Ghost: The Musical. When he asked if I wanted to go, I said yes. I liked the movie and I was intrigued with the prospect of the musical.

It started out promising. The two opening songs "Here Right Now" and "Unchained Melody" were nice although I was a little miffed at the video projection of Sam and Molly making love. (I got that that was where they were headed. I didn't need to see it on the big screen.) The next number, "More," was so completely out of place. It reminded me of the telephone number from "9 to 5." Sam's famous "ditto" response to Molly's "I love you" was nicely done in "Three Little Words." Sam is shot and killed and the show went downhill from there. Hospital Ghosts came out singing to Sam that "You Gotta Let Go." WTH? An ensemble of Halloween costumed ghosts? I was shaking my head in complete disbelief of the number. It was just so out of place. The subway scene where Sam first meets the aggressive ghost was the coolest thing. And then we meet Oda Mae and she was played like a badly acted imitation of Miss Cleo from the Psychic Network. And her "Are You a Believer?" number went on about 10 minutes longer than it should have. Oda Mae should be funny, not over the top. Molly's "With You" was dreadful. She was lamenting Sam's death and killing me with her awful high notes. The act one final number had me wishing I could "Suspend My Disbelief" that this show was anything but drek. "I Had a Life" and Chad and I decided to go and live it. We left at intermission.

We stopped at Tyler's Taproom for a late lunch/early dinner. We did some research on the show and found out it only played on Broadway about 6 months. Even just seeing the first Act we understood why. The show just didn't have a flow to it. Some of the numbers completely stopped the show, and not in a good way. It was just awful.