Chris’ View of Bumbershoot 2015, Day Three

Chris’ View of Bumbershoot 2015, Day Three

Monday opened, for me, with the Lady Parts Justice event at the Bagley Wright Theatre. It was hosted by Lizz Winstead, comedian/writer/”Daily Show” creator. The event was to kick off the new app from Lady Parts Justice, Hinder. It looks like more of a website that is mobile-friendly, but it does provide a valuable service in showing you the steps anti-choice politicians are going through to restrict access to family planning services. Winstead made a quite funny (and likely true) joke about how she thought 2pm would be the best time for their show because everyone would probably be too fucked up by 5.

The show itself, at 90 minutes was the longest thing I saw at Bumbershoot all weekend, was enjoyable. It had a diverse group of comedians. I particularly enjoyed Joyelle Johnson and Leah Bonnema. Hari Kondabolu was a surprise guest, and he was great (as expected) but he did the same set, more or less, that I saw yesterday in the Super Secret Comedy Show (but it was very funny). One thing I did realize was that his story about being told to go back to America took place in Denmark, not Amsterdam, as I noted in Sunday’s recap). Helen Hong and D’Lo Kid. D’Lo had a funny joke about being trans, so he’d be having a same-junk marriage instead of a same-sex marriage.

Continue reading “Chris’ View of Bumbershoot 2015, Day Three”

At Seattle Opera, a <em>Madama Butterfly</em> to Convert the Haters

At Seattle Opera, a Madama Butterfly to Convert the Haters

In Seattle Opera’s Madama Butterfly, the singing, the singers, and the music stay squarely center stage. And the singing in this production was glorious. Patricia Racette played Butterfly (or Cio-Cio-San) with grace, joy, and humanity, using all parts of her voice for dramatic effect. She is a consummate artist, and was in lovely voice on Saturday. She’s one of the bigger-voiced Cio-Cio-Sans I’ve heard, and had a nice warmth and depth from the top to the bottom. Continue reading At Seattle Opera, a Madama Butterfly to Convert the Haters