Mmm, Splotchy.

It probably comes as no surprise to you that we consider Center Stage to be one of the most important and hilarious movies of all time. With Susan Stroman's classic choreography to the Red Hot Chili Peppers, the Shakespeare geek in 10 Things I Hate About You "fooling" us as a prima ballerina, and Peter Gallagher's eyebrows playing a bigwig Artistic Director, we've watched this movie too many times to count. So for all the rest of you who are obsessed with this film, join us as we recount our top 10 "what-the-heck" moments of Center Stage.

• We love all the Broadway performers who are in this movie, especially Debra Monk who plays snobby Maureen's crazy stage mom. It's such a climactic moment when she's watching the big ballet performance at the end and sees that her daughter isn't onstage dancing the lead role. She's so shocked, in fact, that she leaves in the middle of the performance to find Maureen. However, instead of going out the aisle that's probably directly next to her, she chooses to go out the opposite aisle, therefore giving Debra Monk a big opportunity to awkwardly climb over about twenty people, loudly.
• Eva Rodriguez, the tough Spanish girl who only has a Spanish accent about twice in the movie, is the rebel with the heart of gold. Somehow, she is allowed to show up to class at literally the most prestigious ballet school in the country late, with her hair in a mess, and the wrong leotard. And they don't kick her out! Nice. We love that in the movie, they find it necessary to include a 30-second scene showing us how tough Eva is- cut to her smoking a cig outside, dropping it on the ground, and putting it out with her POINTE SHOE. How symbolic is that?
  
• Sadly, Eric O. Jones hurts his leg in rehearsal and is unable to perform in Cooper Nielson's choreographic BA-llet premiere (anyone else notice that real ballerinas always have to put the emphasis on the "BA" part?). So, woohoo, Cooper is going to go on FOR Eric. Does anyone else think it's weird that the part that Eric O. Jones was supposed to play included him having an onstage makeout scene with Jody and riding on a motorcycle and getting in a dance battle with Charlie? Like, we're sure Eric was a great actor, but watching him make out with Jody? Let's just say it's a good thing he sprained his ankle and Cooper had to go on and tidily wrap up/summarize, in a 5-minute ballet piece, what we've previously sat through for about an hour.
  
• It's really cool that famous ballerina Julie Kent dances in the movie- but it's even cooler that she acts! We like the acting technique she employs: talking the whole time with her teeth shut together.
• One of our favorite parts in the movie is obviously the jazz dance class with Priscilla Lopez as the instructor. She totally plays the bad-ass, this-isn't-a-ballet-class, dance-the-*$&%-out-of-it dance teacher. So obviously what song does she choose to have her class warm up to? "Candy" by Mandy Moore. Obviously.
• Maureen is lucky enough to date Jim, a pre-med student at Columbia University. In one scene she's at the bowling alley with Jim and all of his cool friends, eating pizza and listening to a guy tell a HILARIOUS joke about an elephant and monkeys. We'd like to think that Ivy-leaguers tell jokes that are funnier and wittier than this one. It's so bad, and judging how much everyone's DYING laughing to the point that they're crying, apparently Columbia kids have really bad senses of humor.
• The Latin dance club scene is amazing, if only for the two lead singers of the band with the really long hair. Jody and Charlie go out onto the dance floor and do some "Latin dancing." Eva and Eric, the two ethnic dancers, OBVIOUSLY are better Latin dancers, so they go onto the dance floor and criticize Jody and Charlie, telling them "That's not Salsa! You want to see Salsa? THIS is Salsa!" They then proceed to shimmy and do a grapevine.
• How many times have we gotten upset during a rehearsal or a dance class and started to cry in the hallway? Hmm, we plead the 5th. How many times have we had this happen to us, then had a cute, straight male dancer reassure us that we're awesome and we shouldn't worry about our faces being splotchy? Um, zero. Jody Sawyer, you're a lucky biotch.
  
• Also with Jody, if she chooses not to be a dancer, she has a long career ahead of her as a hair stylist. Have you noticed how her hairstyle is literally different- and perfect- in every scene?
• Finally, we can't forget the best scene in the whole movie- the very end. The big ballet showcase is over, students have been selected for the company, Cooper's made his choreographic debut, and everyone's gathered in the Lincoln Center lobby. And who gets their name called out and roses handed to her by everyone? That's right, Jody Sawyer. Because... she emerged as a star dancer from just the training company? And was brave enough to tell Peter Gallagher to stick it and instead join Cooper's company? Yes, that definitely deserves a loud, "JODY SAWYER" followed by applause and bouquets of flowers.

We know this was a ridiculously long blog post, but oh, it's so worth it to us to spread the love and ridiculousness that is Center Stage. Please, watch it. If you haven't, you can borrow ours... and you're not splotchy.

Where's Waldo

The other night Elyse couldn't get to sleep, so like any other normal person, she decided to count sheep. And by count sheep we mean she went through all her old Broadway playbills to see how much the actors have changed. It's so funny seeing things like, "Marc Kudisch: Broadway debut!" Oh Marc Kudisch, you and your bow legs have come so far.

Anyway, she was looking through the Annie Get Your Gun playbill from 1999 and saw something really funny. Click on this picture to make it bigger. And no, we're not talking about how different headshots look now than they did back then- can we say hello Chesterfield Town Center Glamour Shots white-washed background? See if you can find what we're talking about:

That's right, folks. Patti D'Beck, the director and choreographer of Millie. Literally two rows under Bernadette Peters. And we thought it was cool to be sitting three rows in front of Adam Lambert. Sheesh. We wonder how long she has had her signature hairdo. And we wonder how we beat Bruce to posting this on his blog.

Farrah Fawcett was Upstaged

Just Elyse here. Annie has given me permission to write this. It's SO horrible that Michael Jackson died. Annie said that when she was walking down the street in NY, everyone was talking about it. But in the light of tragedy, you have to still be able to laugh about ridiculous yet touching things your sister has to say. Here is our text conversation that we had pretty soon after the news broke:

Annie: I just started sobbing over mj
Elyse: Oh no
Annie: Yeah, "beat it" was on. And mom and dad were like, he wasn't the same guy as that. And all I keep thinking is heaven for him will be a time where he can do "thriller" and "beat it"

We love you Michael Jackson.

One Night in Blogkok.

Those of you who have gotten sick of the Alanis-Morissette-imitating-and-movie-acting Idina Menzel might not know about the fact that Idina recently starred in the Chess benefit concert, and it's on DVD- oh, and you know she's pregnant, right?! Yeah, old news. The concert was also on PBS, for free, and we realized that fact basically immediately after we ripped open the DVD from Barnes and Noble. Anyway, Adam Pascal, Josh Groban, and Kerry Ellis also headline. Other than the fact that there literally needed to be a letter from Tim Rice in the DVD cover explaining that no one really knows or understands what the storyline of Chess is, we really enjoyed the show! The guys from ABBA teamed up with Tim Rice to write the music, and they do a great job of balancing the two styles. Just when it gets too Evita for your taste, they mix in some Mamma Mia. Our personal favorite song is "The Deal." It's so good.

Idina is just so amazing singing "Nobody's Side," minus the fact that she throws in her signature speech impediment: singing it "Lobody's on lobody's side." Kerry Ellis sings "Someone Else's Story," but she decided to make her mark on the show by creating her own speech impediment: pronouncing her S's "sh." Now WHY they would give the song Someone ElSe'S Story to someone with an S problem, we will never know. Josh Groban is a little lame to tell the truth - acting is definitely not his strongest suit. His voice makes up for it, though, in a very Polar Express kind of way. Adam Pascal is ridiculous. We've watched him sing "One Night in Bangkok" about 64 times already. Finally, watching Kerry Ellis and Idina Menzel sing "I Know Him So Well" together is awesome just because of the fact that you can't help but think- and hope- that they're going to screw Chess and instead just break out into a Who Can Riff the Best at the End of "Defying Gravity" contest.

So if you're bored this summer, curl up in front of the TV and watch Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dancing Queen. Idina's back in town!

P.S. Elyse was at dinner last night with a group of people and one of the girls said, "For my new car I want to get a Peace Frogs sticker. I wish that was still around." Elyse had to tell her the sad truth that there was, in fact, a Peace Frogs store just 5 minutes from her house. We stand corrected about the demand for peaceful amphibian gear.

Tim Burton + Johnny Depp = <3

... Oh, we meant to say Tim Burton + Helena Bonham Carter, but it's basically the same thing, right? Anyway, because the Disney version of Alice in Wonderland- and the creepy made-for-TV version with Whoopi as the Cheshire Cat (perfect casting, by the way) and Martin Short- wasn't freaky enough, Tim Burton's decided to have a go at it, making the movie even FREAKIER.

Here are the pictures they've just released to give us a sneak peek at how ca-razy this movie is going to be.

Peace Blogs

Sorry we haven't updated in a while and you've been forced to watch our video over and over again. It was actually pretty funny how it was made: we got home from our Forum audition with a surprising amount of energy and Elyse said, "Hey, can we learn every move Liza does in the Tony opening and then tape it and put it on the blog?" To which Annie replied, "Sure, and I'll be Anne Hathaway in the audience being obnoxious." Next thing we know, Annie's hair is in a French twist, Mom is styling a wig, and Elyse is getting changed into as many black sequins as possible. Welcome to the Steingold household. 

We have so much to talk about so we're going to try to pace ourselves. First things first: has anyone been to Short Pump Town Center lately? This doesn't have anything to do with theatre, but why on earth is there a need for a Peace Frogs store? The economy is bad, however we'll revive it by buying t-shirts whose popularity peaked in 1997 - when Elyse was frequenting the Peace Frogs kiosk and Annie was wearing a ridiculous amount of denim Bugs Bunny shirts from the Warner Bros. Store, both at Regency Mall (speaking of popularity peaking in 1997...). 

And speaking of frogs who promote peace, Mom recently stumbled upon the cutest song on the Sirius Broadway channel. It's from The Little Mermaid on Broadway and is definitely worth 99 cents. It's called "She's in Love" and is sung by Flounder (who we now have a crush on and who we think sounds a ridiculous amount like Eric Pastore) and Ariel's sisters. Try to spot the Sutton wannabe. We just know we really want to get a group of girls - um, and Eric - to sing this with us. Harmonies - love them!

Summer shows, summer shows! There are so many going on. We saw the Millie IDR and are excited to talk about it. And we're randomly hearing about shows that we want to see! For example, today at Baker's Crust our waitress looked vaguely familiar. Finally Elyse said, "Did Robyn O'Neill take her headshot?" And that's how we recognized her, from Robyn's site! So Annie asked her if she was an actor and if Robyn had in fact taken her headshot and she said yes- and also looked at Annie like she was a bit of a stalker. Her name is Alison Haracznak and she's going to be in Aloha, Say the Pretty Girls, a Night Live Collective production. We just looked at their blog and hopefully we'll be able to check it out. She brought out our roasted chicken grinders with only mayo, chicken, and bread perfectly, so just for that we want to go out there and support her! Mayo, chicken, and bread- we choose to only eat the healthy parts of the sandwich. We were too embarrassed to tell her to hold the chicken.

Stay tuned for our two-cents on Millie, Busch Gardens, Wintergreen, and Chess. 

Elyse with an S

You know how much we love Liza, and her performance in the opening number of the Tony Awards really was something. We made a video to pay homage to this legendary performer and her legendary performance. Watch the original first - she comes in at 2:03 of this video. Seriously, watch this first. It's worth it.

Now watch this. It's even more worth it. Elyse is playing Liza. Annie's playing Anne Hathaway.

Allison Janney Down the Octave

Last weekend we were lucky enough to see Dolly Parton's 9 to 5. And we mean lucky enough. It was so great and fun! After crying through the last two shows we saw- Hair and Next to Normal- this was a nice change. We were really sad our mom couldn't see it with us, though, because it involves everything she loves: Dolly Parton, country music, Allison Janney, and feminism. If the show had somehow involved gourmet mints then she would have been a producer.

Megan Hilty, Stephanie J. Block, and Allison Janney made the most perfect trio. Megan Hilty literally looked, sounded, and acted exactly like Dolly Parton which was incredible. And made us really jealous. Stephanie J. Block had the most awesome strong, single woman song that blew us away. And Allison Janney is just too much. She's hilarious and so real onstage and she really knows how to hold her alto harmony. After the show Elyse said, "We can be like the three of them!" And our friend Chris said, "Yeah! Elyse, you would be Megan Hilty because she's the one with the big boobs, I would be Allison Janney because she's the gay one, and Annie would be Stephanie J. Block because she's the Jewish one." ...Okay. Is that not an amazing quote?

There were only three things we didn't like about the show. First, we didn't like that they had the same video screen backdrop thing as Guys and Dolls did during their Tony performance. Second, we didn't really like the choreography. It was done by the same guy who did In the Heights. Okay. His choreography is PERFECT for those of us from Washington Heights. However, there's only but so much popping and locking that needs to be done to country music in a suburban workplace in the 1970s. Just sayin'. Third, Marc Kudisch is really really bowlegged and it weirded Elyse out. Annie and Chris didn't even notice it. BUT she was right! Conrad Birdie himself knows he's bowlegged. And now Elyse feels kind of bad for being so freaked.

All in all we absolutely loved the show and are most definitely seeing it again with our mom in tow. So if you're in New York and want to see something which doesn't make you cry and boasts three amazing girls, opt for this. And speaking of Marc Kudisch, have y'all watched the Broadway.com interview with Gavin Creel, Sutton Foster, and Marc Kudisch at Ruby Foo's? It's a 30 minute interview that is totally worth it to watch just to see what they're like in real life. Our verdict? Eh, we'll pass.

We are Speechless.

...ok not speechless enough to not write a few sentences. Kid you not, just two days ago a commercial came on for Zack Morris's new show, and we were talking about how he's aged. And how adorable Zack Morris was and what a pop icon he is. And literally, there he is. Looking and sounding exactly the same! Eeeeeeee!

Video Recaps Full Episodes Webisodes

Minky and Co.

We have no shame when it comes to talking about how much we love our pets. Why would we? We know we're destined to become crazy cat ladies. Have you seen Annie's cat Minky's headshot album on Facebook? If not, it's definitely worth checking out. You know what else is worth checking out? The Daily Puppy. Seriously, it will put you in such a good mood when you're at work. Not only are there adorable pictures of puppies, but also incredibly bizarre comments that people write about the puppies: "Scootchin inna grass like only a Boxer can do. Thank you for keeping their ears natural."

Anyway, because Annie is in NY with Minky, Elyse and mom get about 20 texts a day with pictures of Minky posing. Dad would get them, too, but he still doesn't know how to send a text, much less open a picture. Last night, Annie sent this picture of Minky laying down on a binder of Annie's sheet music:

This was the text sent with the picture (from Minky): "What should I sing for my audition? Eh, I'll sleep on it."

Anyone else think we have a potential career on our hands in theatre greeting cards? Anyone? No one. Thanks for indulging us when we put up cute pictures of our pets. You've seen Buddy and Minky but you have yet to see Blinkin' and Maeby. Oh, you will. In due time... in due time.

Wow, SPARC news is pretty big-time isn't it? Maybe we'll hear more about it soon. Both of us did SPARC- for about a day- but we know how nice Jennie is and we wish them all the best.

News Feed

Ah, the Tony Awards. We all love 'em, and we all love to talk about 'em. And what better way to share your thoughts and feelings than by changing your Facebook status during every single commercial break... and every time an award is given to a play. You theatre people out there had a lot to say. Here are some noteworthy statuses- stati?- and the comments we never left on your wall.

Michael Hawke what's with the touring shows on the TONY'S???
- Elyse and Annie: Oh, Michael Hawke. Thank you for your 50 status changes throughout the night. Aren't you glad you're getting a shout-out on our blog? Anyway, we totally agree with this comment, and we also appreciate the three question marks. But seriously, what WAS with them? And more importantly, what was with their costume choices? The three Mamma Mia women were backed up by H&M's entire island collection, circa 1998.

Emma Orelove WATCHING the Tony's hoping I'll be on that stage someday.

- Elyse and Annie: Oh, aren't we all. Even our cat Minky. And every kid who did All-County Chorus in 5th grade. We feel like for the two of us, it would be a miracle if we were lucky enough to be the guy who ran Titus Burgess's microphone onstage. Unfortunately, knowing us, we'd run into the fly that was being dropped on our way offstage.

Keith Chadwick Bret Michaels almost got decapitated on the Tonys. How did NONE of us catch this tonight? (For the record getting hit by a set piece coming in from the fly is my biggest theatre fear).
- Elyse and Annie: THAT'S your biggest theatre fear, Mr. Chadwick? Listen to this. We were in a show once and knew this stagehand who was always trying to scare us, telling us something about our hands and our eyes. He was kind of an ass. Anyway, one time we were getting ready to go onstage when all of a sudden the backdrop lifted and the stagehand's CORPSE was hanging from the rafters. THAT. Keith. Is what you should be afraid of.

Beth Sinnenberg > Amy Farley Your "Rockin the Boat" rocked...Broadway...not so good...go Amy

- Elyse and Annie: We couldn't agree with you more Beth! Once again, we contend that Amy Farley is a directorial and choreographical (not a word, thank you squiggly red line) genius. Rolling church benches that turn into makeshift boats? Amazing.

Joshua Burns Did anyone see the woman in the red dress with the heaving breasts on stage at the Tonys...um, not pretty, cover those up yo!

- Elyse and Annie: Oh my gosh! Yes! It was Gregory Jbara's wife who he pulled onstage for his acceptance speech in a sweet, romantic, husbandly gesture. But man. They were heaving. All of the bored husbands whose wives made them watch the Tony Awards at that moment became interested in musical theatre.

Jason Marks wants to know why Alice Ripley just yelled at me, and all of America.
- Elyse and Annie: That's HILARIOUS. She apparently wanted to make sure people could hear her speech because she could barely hear any of them all night. Frankly, Alice Ripley could have yelled her speech in Pig Latin and we still would have been so freaking excited for her. In fact, hearing Alice Ripley give a loud speech in Pig Latin probably would be pretty awesome. Ut bay why idn't day "Ext Nay o tay Ormal Nay" in way the Ony Tay Award or fay Est Bay Usical May? WHEW. That was hard.

Really, we loved reading everyone's statuses once the Tony's were over. Please let us know if we are breaking any copyright laws by posting and commenting on other people's thoughts. Our people will talk to your people if there's an issue.

Bewitched, Bothered, and Bret Michaels

Well, ladies and gentlemen, last night was the night of all nights. The gay man's Super Bowl. The Tony Awards. Man oh man how excited were we to watch the one awards show a year that we can actually sit through. We were even more excited to turn on NY1 here in the city and see "Live on the Red Carpet". And our excitement faded after one minute when we realized how horrible it was. Tony Awards fashion is definitely not as exciting as Academy Awards fashion. But the night isn't about fashion - it's about incredibly talented artists who can't dress to save their lives (see: Carrie Fisher). And the nominees for Best Featured Bullets in a Blog are...

• Let's get the bad over with. The two bad things about the show were the ridiculous choices of musical numbers and horrible sound engineering. Sure, Shrek isn't the most amazing musical on the block, but they could have picked a much better number. And Billy Elliot should have picked a different song, as well. We haven't seen the show yet, but judging from that one performance, we would say that Next to Normal kind of got robbed. And all the sound mixing was way off. Thank you alto 2 part... and Jennifer Cody.
• The first go round we completely missed Bret Michaels getting clotheslined during the big opening number. Then we watched the video over and over. We don't necessarily think him falling is funny, but we think the fact that Stockard Channing completely has no idea what's going on is pretty funny.
• Of course we had a lot of fun watching the Rock of Ages performance. How cool was it that people in the audience had lights? And we will never stop loving Amy Spanger. But what we loved the most about this performance was the ridiculous camera angle at the end of the song. Did anyone else notice?? Hello crotch shot.
• How about that Guys and Dolls backdrop, eh? It reminded us of the national tour of Starlight Express. And that should never be an association made with a Broadway show.
• The opening number was amazing. That was the first time we cried last night. Other times included Karen Olivo's speech, Next to Normal's performance, the "In Memoriam" presentation, and when we ran out of bean dip.
• We're so glad the Tony Awards weren't hosted by Hugh Jackman. And of course we loved Neil Patrick Harris's final song that was written by the hilarious South Park guys, Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman. Does anyone else think Neil Patrick Harris and Gavin Creel would make a cute couple? They would have gorgeous kids. Dad? Help?

Even though a lot of sound engineers were fired last night, we think the 2009 Tony Awards was very entertaining! Next time let's leave out the touring shows. And get ready for a blog starring YOU guys! That's right, let's see what you all thought of the Tony's!

This blog is dedicated to the valiant man who ran Titus Burgess's microphone onstage when he was in dire need of salvation.

It's the Day of the Show, Y'all

Update time! Keep your eyes open for posts about Toxic Avenger and 9 to 5 which we just saw! They're coming we promise. Right NOW, though, we're too busy getting excited about Chef Chris Collins's famous 7-layer dip.

OH. And the Tony's. We cannot wait. We're expecting to feel literally every emotion known to man. Get ready for a crazy Tony's blog!

Bloggin' and Boppin'

Everyone, it's summertime. Meaning lunch is eaten at Melito's everyday, Gelati Celesti is eaten for breakfast and dinner everyday, and there's generally no thought of getting in a swimsuit because of the fact that Melito's and Gelati Celesti is all we eat. But for those of you who CAN chill by the pool and not get second-degree burns after being outside for three minutes, working out to fit in your itsy bitsy teeny weeny bikini or speedo (?) is a must. In workout magazines, celebs often give their ultimate workout playlist for their iPod. Since we're celebs, and since we work out (again, insert question mark in parentheses...?) we've decided to give you the ultimate playlist for your iPod- BROADWAY STYLE!

1. "So Much Better" from Legally Blonde- The rhythm is perfect, and all you need to do is picture all the tiny sorority girls in this show and you'll be sure to crank that treadmill up to 6. Or 5.2.... for a minute and then stay on 4.0 for about 30 minutes.

2. Literally any song from Altar Boyz- did you see those Swift Creek boy banders? Talk about a workout! And with songs like these (we especially love "God Put the Rhythm in Me") you'll be sweating almost as much as Chris Stewart and Annie did after "NYC" in Annie.

3. "Mamma Mia" from Les Miserables- Har har. But again, perfect rhythm, great tune. Just try not to picture Meryl Streep when you're pumping.

4. "Go, Go, Go Joseph" from Joseph- Stop laughing. Or rolling your eyes. The only problem is fast-forwarding through the blah of the Baker and the Butler or whoever.

5. "It Won't Be Long Now" from In the Heights- Karen Olivo is SO awesome on this song. And Lin-Manuel Miranda, well, you know how we feel about him. Just pretend that you're running toward him...

6. "Comfort and Joy" from Bat Boy- This song is GOOD. We'll always have memories of Scott Wichmann doing such an awesome job at this role at the Firehouse. Just pretend that you're running toward him...

7. "It's Your Wedding Day" from The Wedding Singer- Who doesn't like working out to 80s music? Or in this case music that sounds like it was written in the 80s and comes with choreography that literally throws in every stereotypical 80s move in a time-span of about 90 seconds?

8. Literally any song from Fosse or Movin' Out- We particularly like "Crunchy Granola Suite" or "Angry Young Man." Just think of Elizabeth Parkinson's ridiculous abs and you'll push yourself like crazy. Or hop off the Elliptical and down a milk shake because really, how will you ever get your body to look like hers? Seriously.

So let's start sweating to showtunes so we can stroot our stoof. If you have any other musical theatre workout songs, let us know!

Next to Perfect... a.k.a. The Post with the Cheesy Title

Friday night while Elyse was still in NYC, the sisters went to see the Broadway production of Next to Normal. We've heard so many awesome things about it, so we were excited to see it for ourselves. We were even more excited when Mario Cantone sat down two rows in front of us. Celebrity spotting week! And we will choose to ignore you if you are one of those people who's like, "Please. Celebrities go to the bathroom just like the rest of us." Umm. First of all, never use the word "bathroom" to prove a point. And second of all, no matter what, it's always fun to see how much you tower over them in real life. Anyway, let's talk about the show!

It was incredible. Seriously we're not yanking your chain or saying we loved it just because there are songs we can belt in our car or because Aaron Tveit (a.k.a. Nate Archibald's cousin on Gossip Girl) is perfect-looking and can sing perfectly and has a perfectly-flexible back arch that sort of comes out of nowhere. This is a show where you are literally hypnotized the whole time. Word to the wise, do not read the synopsis beforehand. Annie didn't and it was so amazing for her to be able to gasp and choke and sputter and cry while Elyse pretty much knew what was going to happen.

Every single one of the characters was believable with voices that blew us away. J. Robert Spencer (who looks a ridiculous amount like Ricky Martin) had us in tears in a good way every time he sang. Jennifer Damiano is a teen prodigy. Alice Ripley is just TOO GOOD. With her slightly Irish twang and her somewhat crazy eyes, she delivered a performance that was so heartfelt, you sometimes can't believe someone can actually be packed with that much talent.

Usually woe-is-me, woe-is-our-family stories tend to annoy us, because a lot of the times they're not done genuinely. The teenager is usually a stereotype, pissed off at the world but only because a 50-year-old writer wrote her that way. This show presents a family whom you connect to, who you root for, and who you pity. We know we're coming off a little bit serious here, but to us, this show proved a point. Although the lite-brite set with its sliding panels were awesome, they could have done away with that and just presented us with a group of musicians and actors- and the show still would have been incredible. This was a rock musical, with belting and a lot of riffing on the electric guitar. Yet there was no unnecessary stomping. There was no yelling to get a note. There was no forced emotion. It was incredible.

Hopefully this show will last really long, even if it doesn't win the Tony. Which it totally should. And we say that having not seen Rock of Ages or Billy Elliot. We feel like since that show won every award possible in London, it shouldn't be allowed to win that many again. Although we do love Elton. Speaking of Elton, do you remember when he sang with Eminem on that awards show? And speaking of Eminem what are you guys' thoughts on him walking out of the Movie Awards? Was that fake?