Bringing Back The Cotton Club of The 30’s, One Dance Number At A Time
Wednesday night I had the pleasure of attending the Broadway production of “After Midnight”. The musical revue is based on an earlier play titled “The Cotton Club Parade” that was first shown in 2011. “Midnight” began it’s run on Broadway in November of 2013 and has been going strong since.
Originally the musical had featured ex American Idol contestant and constant headline maker (for the wrong reasons) Fantasia Barino. Currently, the show features the incredibly talented and always beautiful Vanessa Williams. Williams is by no means the dancer that so many of her fellow characters in this very fast paced and lively play are, but she definitely holds her own while singing and sauntering across the stage. Dule HIll of Psych & West Wing fame plays “The Host,” and from the first second “Midnight” starts, he does just that.
The content of the music/dance numbers, as well as Hill’s use of quotes by famed poet of the era Langston Hughes creates a very loose story about life, love, death, and not advertising your man – as Dormeshia Sumbry-Edwards puts it in one of her hilarious numbers. But the story is really an afterthought, the revue thrives thanks to the impeccably executed and unequivocally impressive dance numbers. Whether it’s tapping or flipping, tandem numbers or group choreography, the artistic direction helmed by famed performer Wynton Marsalis is nothing short of amazing.
What I loved most about the musical is that so much of it is an homage, paying tribute to the days of music and culture that really in so many ways are responsible for current trends and styles of music, dance, and life in general. Without Cab Calloway’s “Zaz Zuh Zaz” would rap music even exist? Without those nights during the Harlem Renaissance when folks from upper and lower classes alike came together to (illegally) get their drink on and listen to some great music, would we have the current culture of festivals and turning up? The answer is obvious. But what makes this incarnation of the oft romanticized time period so impressive is the way it incorporated newer and current dance moves and styles back into the 30’s culture so efficiently. First Virgil “Lil O” Gadson busts out some sick freezes and flares in true b-boy fashion during “East St. Louis Toodle-oo” then next thing you know “Hottentot tot” turns into a full fledged dance battle between the ever so smooth pop locking of Julius “iGlide” Chisolm and the power moves of the aforementioned Gadson (both performers gained notoriety on So You Think You Can Dance). Even the dialogue and slang is somewhat a blend of the past and current sounding themes, you cannot tell me Sumbry-Edwards character is not just a little bit “ratchet”.
When After Midnight opened Director/Choreographer Warren Carlyle stated “it’s a modern interpretation of this music, I’m very keen on bringing this music to a new generation, I’m very keen on having jazz music on broadway, it’s very important .” He couldn’t be more right, having the roots of jazz music on broadway and on display for a new generation is integral to continuing the legacy of arguably the most important art form there is: music and dance! Go see this show, you will not be disappointed.
