FIG

Avenue Q (The first musical I've ever attended)

Tonight's feature presentation at Jesse Auditorium was Avenue Q, a Broadway musical created by Robert Lopez, Jeff Marx and Jason Moore.

The musical is a basically an adult version of the popular children's show Sesame Street. Like Sesame Street, most of the musical's characters are portrayed by puppets. Some of the characters in Avenue Q are even based on Sesame Street characters. For example, the characters Rod and Nicky are roommates who both turn out to be gay, though it takes until later in the musical for Rod to admit it. This is a parody of Bert and Ernie, whom are often assumed to be gay by the popular culture. Also, there is a character named Trekkie Monster, a parody of Cookie Monster. Whereas Cookie Monster is obsessed with cookies, Trekkie Monster is obsessed with porn.

The musical covers various obstacles of young adulthood, from relationships to paying for the rent to "coming out of the closet." It covers widespread issues such a prejudice, stating that "everyone is a little bit racist." It also covers basic morals like caring for others.

This musical is definitely not for children. There is plenty of profanity with some of the dirtiest humor I've heard in an on-stage show. There are some racial jokes, a lot of sexual jokes, and even some jokes about suicide. However, this is not a complaint; it is a warning. Do not take young children to see this show.

Despite the harshness of the jokes, they are well executed and hilarious. My personal favorite jokes came from two bears that call themselves "the Bad Idea Bears." Though they're only minor characters who don't get a whole lot of stage time, they're the ones that put me to tears the most. But that's not to say they steal the show. All of the characters deliver great lines and are performed quite well by the actors.

Though the musical is generally comedic, there are a few serious moments that usually come when dealing with a relationship between two characters, Princeton and Kate. The two fall in love but are eventually torn apart when Princeton decides that Kate is getting in the way of him finding his "purpose." When Princeton runs into Nicky, who is homeless at the moment after being kicked out of his apartment by Rod, Nicky tells Princeton about how he has to stop thinking about himself and start thinking about others. Princeton decides that he can win Kate back by building a school for monsters, something Kate had always wished to run.

So Princeton and Nicky have to start collecting money, and this is where the musical actually interacts with the audience. The actors run off the stage and up the aisles of the auditorium, holding out hats as if they are looking to collect money from the audience. When they return, one of the characters makes a nice connection to the audience, saying, "We didn't get anything. All we got was a ticket stub to go see the Tigers," which is an obvious reference to Mizzou, where the show of course is taking place. I like it when stage performances make connections to the audience in this way. It shows that the crew is aware of the audience and wants to connect to them at some point.

The music was outstanding. The lyrics were fluent and creative. The visuals were executed perfectly -- well, almost perfectly (I will explain later). The lighting was executed nicely; I was able to identify what was part of each scene. The actors positioning was done well. There were some cool special effects, mostly shown in one scene where Princeton receives a message that he must propose to Kate, and he suddenly starts seeing hallucionations of he and Kate married. The best visual was when Princeton sees a giant version of Kate's head appear behind the building, which, by the way, was the only set used.

There was a hiccup near the end of the musical. When the characters are unveiling a banner fro Kate's monster school, the banner doesn't completely come down. The actors did a nice job of staying in character until one of the actors went to fix the banner, and it was just another moment of laughter for the audience, despite being unintended.

Avenue Q makes me want to see more musicals. It provides entertainment and laughter non-stop from beginning to end. It has gotten me wanting to show it to some of my friends who haven't seen it, and I recommend anyone with an easygoing sense of humor to see this musical in whatever form they can. I just don't recommend it for children.