Review: Todd Buonopane cleans up with ALL WASHED UP at The Green Room 42

Todd Buonopane is anything but All Washed Up, judging by his performance at The Green Room 42, last Sunday night. In fact, Buonopane was veritably shot out of a cannon to begin his rousing hour and a half of flat-out, laugh-out-loud entertainment. All Washed Up gets its name from Todd's history of "Bathtub Theatre", the YouTube series he developed and filmed in his tub during the lockdown due to the coronavirus pandemic. In this act, Todd wields many of his talent swords, from stand-up comedy to dramatic monologue, from raconteuring to musical theatre belting, while sharing himself with his audience, and hiding nothing of his personal life. This is the real deal Todd.

Once Mr. Buonopane landed on the GR42 stage, having been shot out of said cannon, his rendition of Ring Them Bells (complete with props, alternate voices, individual characterizations, and, yes, bells, lots of bells) revved up the crowd to an ebullient pitch that predicted a promising evening. We were never let down. His extremely jocular banter allowed us into his very being. He was brutally honest and open about who he is, occasionally using raw language (to warn those future audience members who might be a bit puritanical). During the course of the program, he shared why he chose the songs he has for this performance, declaring: "They are songs I wanna sing". And thank goodness he does. He refers to the options as "Lady Songs" because they were all made famous having been sung by female entertainers. In order to represent as many singing actresses and songs as possible during the time allowed, Todd has had incredibly deft arrangers Dan Pardo and Kevin David Thomas meld together medleys to great impact. The amazing Megamix put together by Buonapane and Thomas covers so much ground that Todd admits, "I can't give you everybody but I can try", exhibiting ingenious transitions and acting choices. It was a spirited delight.

In a satisfyingly smoothly-structured evening of a life story well-told through music, with tons of laughter, crowd clapping and audience participation, this writer was struck by a few very light, sweet, and even emotional moments such as "Will He Like Me?", an Angela Lansbury medley of "If He Walked Into My Life" and "Not While I'm Around" arranged by Dan Pardo, and a song from a musical based on the book and film Sheila Levine is Dead and Living in New York. It was comforting to see this side of Mr. Buonopane, having heard a lot of traditional Broadway character-man belting, at times a bit too close to the microphone (as if he even needs a microphone).

One would be remiss without mentioning the musicians who were part of this cohesive presentation for the patrons' merriment. Kevin David Thomas guided the trio from the piano, while Adam Wolf on drums and Chris Agar on bass rounded out the whole musical package. Although this feast of entertainment is called All Washed Up, this reviewer has every confidence you'll never want to wash this man out of your hair.

Find great shows to see at The Green Room 42 HERE

Visit the Todd Buonopane website HERE

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