Reviews: Miss Mayes and Much More Music in Manhattan

Let’s start with the sublime with praise and hoorays for Mayes.  In the world of cabaret, “Mayes” is not the plural of Marilyn Maye since she is one of a kind – the unstoppably busy and beloved lady spending the last four days of the year singing and swinging and getting ready for ringing in the new year in Manhattan at Birdland. She was named for a star of yore, Marilyn Miller, who starred in the title role of Sally on Broadway, and on screen in the 1920s.  Mayes is the surname of a real-life Sally, who returned to New York cabaret for the first of a series of shows called Now and Then at Green Room 42 – each different, but including favorites from her repertoire —  that will continue in 2024.  And that news is great.  So was her show...  

Sally Mayes is a prize: a polished pro, a pip with pep, a peachy-keen powerhouse with a big voice and a big heart.  A down-to-earth gal up to her old tricks, embodying characters and attitudes with details, facial expressions, and gestures, she is consistently engaging.  Told with smiles and shrugs and spice, her stories about performing – starting as a wee child and continuing through the grown-up audition grind to get to the big time on Broadway – feel like chatty dishing and memories shared with just a few close friends. 

She was joined by two familiar reliable musicians whose frequent presence in NYC shows is always what you’d call a good thing: Tom Hubbard on bass and Ron Abel at the piano (with whom she wrote one of the numbers, “The Last Cowboy”). The well-balanced program included everything from tenderness (Scott Evan Davis’s “Save Me the Rose”) to torch (the showstopper “What Did I Have That I Don’t Have?”), two nuanced story-songs from the perspective of recalled childhood, as well as others that were informed by a decidedly adult libido. 

A trip to Green Room 42 for “A Trip to the Library” — with Sally Mayes taking a trip back to her role in She Loves Me for that adorable number, and so much more — was a happy highlight of the year for sure. 

And now for something completely different — but also a special treat: something that’s occasionally out there in CabaretLand — and I do mean “out there”!   Cheers for The Lounge-O-Leers!   They have re-emerged, as if released from a time warp or post-lobotomy treatments, to land at Pangea in the East Village.  The Lounge-O-Leers are the cheeky but poker-faced personae of pals Ricky Ritzel and Aaron Morishita and they are a big tease, as they embrace and expose commercial pop culture cheese (the equivalent of Velveeta, Cheez Whiz, or some kind of real cheese that does not necessarily age well, except to trigger nostalgia for goofy, guilty pleasures). As you can probably guess, they are actually accomplished musicians having a lark.  We’re in on the joke and willingly go along for the ride. 

The mock schlock of their languid lounge “act” – such as it is — lets us enter their entertainment (non)sense reference points with pre-show film clips of laughably low-budget horror movies (without the sound) and teen-adjacent flicks with big hair and skimpy wardrobes.  The wacky tacky world of mid-20th century fluff continues when The Lounge-O-Leers takes their places behind the electric keyboard (Ritzel) and multiple percussion items (Morishita) to sing and play some slogging through de-fanged versions of such non-masterpiece material as “Oops!...I Did It Again” or a lugubrious invitation to “Shake Your Groove Thing” or to protest “ I don’t want ‘No Scrubs.’” There are innocuous TV theme songs anointed as opus-worthy and the decent 1960s song “Spooky” gets laughs when paired with scenes from monster movies and such. The visuals keep coming: clips from the dustbin of movies and TV, (“I Dream of Jeannie,” “The Love Boat,” “Josie and the Pussycats,” and animated characters from your childhood).  These are mixed mega-amusingly with cleverly crafted cartoon versions of these two performers floating past. Dancing guest "Nan" (Robin Cannigan) gamely danced her way through the room from time to time, blithely shaking and bouncing to liven things up. 

Some tracks are pre-recorded. Some technical troubles delayed the flow, but that somehow felt oddly appropriate, like a musical pipeline with clogs, and the patient audience was forgiving.  This loopy act is an acquired taste that can make you roll your eyes or roll in the aisles of the cabaret show room, giggling. It seems only fitting that the initials for the Lounge-O-Leers are L-O-L. 

Also happily caught at Pangea, in the actual lounge (known as the front lounge, as the piano is just a couple of steps inside the front entrance): the duo of vocalist Karen Mack and singer-pianist Elliot Roth.  Longtime familiar faces from cabaret, piano bars, and such, alone and with various kindred spirits, they are a likable pair, complementing each other and gracious.  They are clearly at ease with one another and at ease with different musical styles.  The night I popped in, the eclectic repertoire included her pensive take on “Skylark” and a sweet “Sweet Pumpkin,” his bluesy “Gee, Baby, Ain’t I Good to You” and a stroll through “Walkin’ After Midnight,” plus an especially cute duet romp through the 1945 song “Gotta Be This Or That” with their own quick-on-the-draw additional words. They cover all kinds of other songs for no cover charge; that’s the policy for the front lounge at Pangea, where customers can also have dinner or have drinks at the bar or, of course, see shows in the cabaret room.  With Mr. Roth's prodigious piano skills and the stylish singing of both the clear-voiced twosome are a clear choice for a nice downtown hang.

 

I don’t have to tell you that December is always full of shows full of Christmas songs, occasionally giving a cameo appearance to the Hanukkah, so it’s notable that 54 Below also carves out some time to give that holiday center stage, including seeking newer songs related to the holiday to be performed.  54 Celebrates Hanukkah: A Festival of Writers is the result.  I was more impressed, in general, with the voices and good intentions than with much of the material that seemed to aim for fervent, festive, or funny, but seemed forced. I was underwhelmed and only rarely engaged, but apparently I was at least sometimes in the minority, judging by other attendees’ applause, smiles, and chuckles of recognition and appreciation for references to things and attitudes that left this reviewer feeling like an outsider not pulled in.  It was a case of more pep than prep for some of the spoken comments and the presence of music stands to look at papers with the lyrics and music for participants in one group number.  (Interestingly, the singer with the most to learn in that was a child — the only one not consulting papers at all, and fully in the needed character!)  

I guess songs about being disappointed in the quality of presents, wanting money for gifts, and venting at family with curse words are supposed to be hilarious or just taken as filtered inner thoughts of disappointment. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the same limited repertoire of words and images kept reappearing: candles, dreidels, latkes, presents, family, menorahs, candles, dreidels, latkes, presents, family, menorahs, candles, dreidels, latkes, presents, family, menorahs. Singer-songwriter-pianist Joshua Turchin, age 17, managed some charming, sly humor with his piece, using a varied compositional structure, multiple topics with specificity, and savvy timing that all kept my attention.  Rather than limit himself to the more expected family of rhymes –menorah/ hora/ Torah – he resourcefully name-dropped “Sephora” to mention one of the stores one might consider for procuring a present or gift certificate. Another number included a sweet acted-out story about a father taking on the guise of an invented Santa Claus-esque figure for his son. Saving the best and the zest for last, genuine joy came through like a rainbow, much more than just a little, with “Just a Little Hanukkah” – which also has just a little Christmas and Rudolph in it — sung by Jessica Toltzis, joined by its multi-talented songwriter Oliver Richman and Lily Lester (no relation to this reporter, but a cousin of his).   

Only eight songs were included in this mixed bag, noticeably fewer than one expects in standard nightclub shows that run an hour and a bit more.  So, as you might have already guessed, the added/padded content consisted of talk, some of it banal, as gleeful host Michael Kushner asked songwriters what they liked about Hanukkah, what their favorite present was, which of the alternate spellings of the holiday was personally preferred, and the cheery go-to query: “How ARE you?!?” or a version of “Are you having fun?!?” directed to the customers, ordering applause and whoops on room service, and resembling the tone of a summer camp counselor on Sports Day, revving up the kiddies to cheer on the relay-race runners. He also decided to take the time to have the captive audience learn, in repeat-after-me style, several Yiddish expressions his grandmother favored.  But his favorite English word is apparently “AMAZING” – the adjective he used consistently to describe many of the people on stage and the songs.  Like the hyperbole of calling something “incredible!!” or its cousin, “unbelievable,” it soon loses real meaning and impact.  In his brief good-night speech acknowledging everybody, he amazingly used the word “amazing” seven times.  My head was starting to spin like a dreidel. 

Photos of Sally Mayes by Stephen Mosher

Find wonderful shows to see on these club websites:

Pangea HERE

54 Below HERE

The Green Room 42 HERE
 

                        

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