Back in the spring of 2000, Contact opened to rave reviews on Broadway. It was an interesting mix of music, dance and story rolled into one three part show. The first part took place in 1767 in a forest glade. Called “Swinging” this segment had virtually no dialogue and showed an ambiguous love triangle between two guys and a girl. Next was a scene from 1954, an Italian Restaurant in Queens, where a wife dreams of escaping her domineering husband in a segment called “Did You Move?” The third part was called “Contact,” set in 1999 NYC, where a suicidal ad-exec finds the girl of his dreams. It’s from this third segment that today’s specific Geek Out comes from.
Contact relied solely on pre-recorded music, much of it classic songs that the audience would know, such as “Runaround Sue,” “Beyond the Sea” and “Simply Irresistible.” From the first time I saw “Simply Irresistible” performed on The Rosie O’Donnell Show I was hooked. The dance is so sharp and energetic it makes you want to get up and move with it. Check out the cast’s performance at the 2000 Tony Awards (we were lucky enough to see this in person… Will can attest to the fact that I was positively giddy in my seat in the third balcony at Radio City Music Hall). The show won four Tonys that year, including Best Musical (a somewhat contentious award in some people’s opinion since the show had no original music), Best Actor Boyd Gaines (the guy who’s trying to dance with the girl in the yellow dress) and Susan Stroman for her choreography.
And in an unrelated-to-Contact Geeky moment, I have to share a clip of current Broadway fave Xanadu. Kerry Butler and Cheyenne Jackson were on The View earlier this week, so enjoy them singing (and skating) to “Suddenly.”
