Department of Theater and Dance
I’m a fan of the form of cabaret and I hope you are too or will be.
So many cabarets feel like the chance for a performer to arrange a selection of songs that tell a story or allow a tribute to a composer or artist in a way that no other form seems to allow–intimate, personal, the “queering” of a song out of context to allow the audience to see the song fresh through another performer’s eyes. I especially like this because we tend to associate a song so strongly with the original performer of that song, so having it be performed by someone of another gender or race or in a different context encourages us to look at a song as something alive, something malleable. I love that we get to pay tribute tonight to the musical mastery of Joe Raposo, whose songs continue to influence generations, and I think had such an impact on Gen X-ers in particular.
I’d like to thank all the students for leaning into this theatrical experiment and contributing so much original thought to it. Kudos to John and Helen, polishing their contributions as senior projects and telling stories in their own individual ways. Extra thanks to Gameiotics, whose technical wizardry made the interactive portions possible.
After so much pandemic tomfoolery, it’s such an incredible thing to be back in a theater, watching performers do their thing live.
RW