Friday night review, Disney Descendants: The Musical! (With Maya/Tiny Tim in the ensemble.) Christmas Carol cast in the audience: Other Jennifer and Alex, Felicia, Don, Victor (I did see Arthur, Jean (costumes), Sierra with her bestie and bestie's kid, Rachelle, and Annie and her doggie. Shorthared Sarah and Stacy were manning the food booth. I picked up the infamous purple Maleficent cookies (made from some kind of sweet potato) before the rush hit, but I haven't eaten it yet, am still curious but also full + wearing a mask right now. We did all have a meetup in the lobby as per my request, which made me happy. Don was ridiculously happy to be done with rehearsal and watching a kids' show, I must say. Other Jennifer said she's watched the video a bunch of times and we (meaning her and I and everyone else in the graverobber scene) did really well.

Oh, and I also wore my Mal-from-Descendants wig I bought in 2020, because so far it's only gotten to go out for Rocky Horror. Steve did an up-and-down and figured it was me from my tie-dye sweatpants outfit. I asked about the leak and he said, "I was right! It was the skylight!" (Also, why is there a skylight on the roof of the theater?!) The skylight has now been removed and blocked over. Huzzah. "I thought I told everybody but turns out I told no one."

Okay, onto the show: I first saw the movie several years ago while bored at the Craft Center and I think it's one of the most lulzy things ever. It cracks my shit up, and the musical did the same. The songs "Rotten To The Core," "My Love For You Is Ridiculous": (note: not its official title in the program, BUT IT SHOULD BE CALLED THAT, HELLO) and "Chillin' Like A Villain" in particular were quite amusing. I did crack up that the literal stealing-candy-from-a-baby moment from the movie happened in this one, albeit it looked like the kid just handed Mal the giant lollipop.

As for Maya, she deserves bigger parts, but I can see why she didn't get one officially in a show that's about teenagers when she's 11. (Lotta small kids in this. Auradon Prop must serve all ages.) I will repeat what Don said to her after the show: "When I wanted to see what the dance moves were supposed to look like, I looked to you." We noted that that kid has done "Be Our Guest" a WHOLE lotta times by now because it's in this show too.

Per kids' shows, sometimes the casting is...amusing...when the kid playing the parent is officially shorter and younger than their child. But the funniest version of this I've EVER seen was a very small boy playing the Beast (er, Prince Adam, he's not hairy in this.) I kind of presume at this point the director picked that kid for the visual lulz, but he did deliver all of his lines and growl a little. I note that Belle apparently got 24 hours notice that she was suddenly playing Belle, so good for her there.

The standouts to me in this were:

Maleficent was fantastic. I'm not sure how old she is (maybe 16-17?), but she was badass amazing, living up to Kristin Chenowith and just goddamned fabulous at the role. I went up to her afterwards and said what we'd all said at intermission: she should try the adult shows. Fingers crossed sometime she does it, because WOWZA. Also, it was mentioned in the credits that she wrote an extra scene for the show--I presume they needed time for everyone to get changed for the coronation, so they show more of the parent villains trying to get the TV to work and fighting over what kind of bird Jafar had and things like that. Reminded me of the looooooong improv about Thanksgiving Scott and Cameron had to do in Coney Island Christmas, for the same reason. So, good job to her for writing a scene!

Also especially good was the kid playing Evie. She really rocked it. Loved her. Very cute, very sassy, very enjoying being smart, all of it. Like I seriously wondered why she wasn't cast as Mal and spent the whole show trying to figure out why. (I hate to be catty, but Mal...wasn't ...I'm not sure how to describe it, other than maybe more pouty than anything else? You need a good Mal to sell the role and she wasn't quite doing it for me. I was in Shrek with that girl and I had no issues there, but...I dunno, she just wasn't quite working for me there. A little flat, I suppose.)

Also good: the kid playing Jay was attitudinal in a fun, enjoyable way. The kid playing Snow White didn't get that much to do (more of a news commentator), but hopefully she gets more in future shows.

Other folks: Evil Queen made the most of her scenes. I really enjoyed Cruella's outfit (even though I think the Descendants version of the character isn't great--I love Original Cruella better, I can't figure out what this one's up to?). I sorta wondered at the director casting her son in the lead (I had heard various mumblings by people who will remain anonymous that he perhaps isn't ready for the lead parts he gets), but I think he was probably the best choice to play Ben and he certainly gave it his all. I think I enjoyed his "Chillin' Like A Villain" the best, in which he tries to dress like a kid of the Isle and act down and dirty.

I will note at one point the "good kids" form an angry mob against the evil ones, and somehow this turns from angry into the "angry mob" shaking their booties on one side of the stage for like 5 minutes while the evil ones congregate, and when "angry mob" was mentioned, I looked at them shaking their asses and cracked up.

Anyway, a fun night was had by all.

Saturday day: pouring outside again. I'm grumbly I can't go to the parade or to the craft fairs that Dawn and Loretta are now hitting up instead, but at least I'm not out in the wet. I heard from Jean last night that the parade (a) was being held at night (4-6) but was NOT any kind of night parade with lights, so people wouldn't have been able to see it and (b) it's been canceled for pouring rain anyway. So not missing one of the things, I guess.

I was on Zoom for about four hours with Meg/Sarah Brown*/Doreen and then later Meg and Val when Val got on for a craft-in-check-in. That went pretty well. Val in particular was feeling kind of emo since her husband's deathaversary is coming up + holidays, so apparently I managed to cheer her up? Go figure on that one. For once I wasn't being so negative, she said (faint, thud). We talked about the elf show because she went last night--she said they got a lot more people, but sounds like her review of it was around the same as mine, i.e. well, some plots are better than others. She said she saw kids at the show and this wasn't really a kids' show, so they were bored.

* yes, there's a ton of Sarahs mentioned here

While doing this, I finished a few more of my daily advent calendar projects, an avocado and a camera. So, go me, those only took about two hours apiece. Then Ashley called, wanting help on making a nose for her bear. I sent her instructions as to how to sew on a triangle nose, then she sent me a picture of a VERY LARGE nose...she's redoing it.

Mom has said she can't handle walking-around events, which figures. If I do any, I'll do them alone/without her, probably.

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