Side Show

The second Side Show performance on Thursday night, April 15th was the night that I attended the show. The show started at eight o’clock but I got to the University Theatre early so that I could sit in the middle of one of the front rows and have a closer view to the stage. Most of the performers are UT Dallas students, they went to the show to earn scholarships for art students, and I’ve been told that they had practiced almost a year to make this show.
Side Show is a musical show so there were people singing as a conversation throughout the entire play, and the orchestra was just the back ground music for the performers. When the lights were off the stage and everything became silent, the performers started to sing and showed up; some of them came out from the front stage, back stage, and some even from the side of the theatre to create a surprise moment for the audience. The music was low until the performers raised their voice and jumped on the box and right after that it was silent. The music that they played gave the feeling of a mysterious magic was in the air, this effect was created by their polyphony. Because of the music being the background for the performers, its tempo was slow and matched to the performers’ pitch. In the show, the twin and most of the girls sang with high vocals while men only used low vocals to distinct the contrast among each group, and for most of the time they were singing duets as the conversation continued. When the stage was rearranged the music kept going to keep the environment lively. The performers had impressed their audience by the colorful outfits and the vivid paintings on their faces, and they also matched the time and place of the play. All together they created the lively mood for the stage and the theatre. The performers often come close to the audience and made the audience feel like they were on the stage together with the characters. The faster the singing, the faster the movement, and the faster the music played. It perfectly caught the entire attention of the audiences in the little theatre. The twins played the important roles in the show but the attractions were also important because at each sense, the attractions were playing as the background described and emphasized the mood for the ongoing conversation between the twins and the two business men. One example was of the party in New York, everybody was walking and drinking around the twins, but when Buddy Foster proposed to Violet, everybody just stopped moving and expressed the surprise on their face. Then everybody was drinking and singing and it created the happy environment of the wedding. Most of the audience was UTD students and some of them were relatives of the performers. They clapped at the end of every single song which sometimes interrupted the performers and delayed the show. The stage was decorated with yellow and red color themes as the background to help the audience feel like they were in the circus and on the side of the stage there was a sign that said, “The Midway, Vaudeville or the Follies…” Because the theatre wasn’t big, and the stage was almost half the size of the theatre the audiences could hear every single word and could watch every single movement. It helped the audience get more into the play and to feel connected with the play.
The audience seemed to take in every moment of the play, because of the great performance. The performers seemed to be enjoying themselves and they deserved it because they had put a lot of effort in the play. The night was not yet over and the music made it feel like there was still plenty of energy left for it to continue. The play was done really well and the polyphony created through the background music and the voices made it that much more enjoyable.
Work cited
Side Show. By Bill Rusell. Dir Robert Longbottom. Perf UT Dallas student. Dallas. 15th Apr. 2010. (Side Show)
Pham, Anh. Program notes. Side Show. 15th Apr. 2010. Dallas. Pham.