| Cinematic Titanic in York, PA [message #184188] |
Sat, 21 January 2012 00:03  |
eichlerSPAMBGONE2
Messages: 26
Registered: November 2012
Karma:
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Junior Member |
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I just got back from the Cinematic Titanic show in York, PA, and
it was great. My first time seeing a live MST3K-style show, so
I wasn't sure what to expect, but it turned out to be even better
than I was hoping for.
It was just a 45 minute or so drive to the theater, so I'm glad I
happened to see a commercial for it on TV about a week ago or I
wouldn't have even known about it. The show was actually really
well promoted - I saw the TV commercial a few times, and they had
a cover story about CT in the local freebie entertainment newspaper.
Tickets were almost sold out by the time I found out about the
show, but I managed to snag 3 pretty good seats up in the second
row of the balcony. The theater seemed filled to capacity by
showtime - if it wasn't a sell out, it was close.
The evening started with a comedian coming out and telling a bunch
of jokes about York. So I figured it must be a local guy, but he
looked so familiar...eventually one of the CT crew identified him
as Gruber from the old Comedy Central show The Higgins Boys and
Gruber. An unexpected bonus.
I also didn't know that each of the Cinematic Titanic folks was
going to come out and do a solo bit before the show. Mary Jo read
a few excerpts from her new book (literally a word from this page,
a word from that page, etc). Frank came out and did stand-up for
a while, and then Gruber came out and joined him for a bunch of
jokes about the Vietnamese new year or something like that. It
kind of bombed, but just watching TV's Frank kind of force his
way through it while simultaneously acknowledging that it wasn't
working was funny.
Josh had a bass guitar set up on stage and would come out and
play a little music behind each of the other performers, with
the highlight being a solo performance of the MST3K theme song.
He also played a duet of "Year of the Cat" with Gruber,
who changed the lyrics around and made comments about them.
Trace read a couple poems from a new illustrated book of poems
for children that he's written. Finally Joel came out and did
a magic trick where he tore up a newspaper and then restored it
to one piece right before our eyes. Even though I know how the
trick is done, he's so smooth with it that it caught me by
surprise.
After that the lights went down, the CT crew took their spots
at the sides of the stage and we were treated to first class
riffing of a really lame 70s "horror" movie called Rattlers.
I was laughing almost non-stop for an hour and a half, but I'm
having trouble remembering very many specific riffs. I know
at one point a couple boys go out to play and as their
fathers watch them run off someone said "You kids stay away
from the Sandusky place!", which was risky (this being Penn
State territory and all) but got lots of laughs.
The movie was about a bunch of snakes that get driven into a
homicidal frenzy by a chemical weapon dumped in the desert by
the military. During a scene where the main characters were
wandering in the desert, someone (I'm thinking it was Josh)
yelled "Watch out for snakes!", prompting one of the others
to say "How did you know about that?"
My only complaint is that it's often hard to tell who is
saying what on stage. It seemed like Frank and Josh hardly
talked at all, but I'm sure they did and I just didn't
recognize their voices and attributed their lines to Joel
and Trace. On the other hand, it was easy to tell Mary Jo's
lines (as the only female voice), and Joel sounded like Joel
and Trace often sounded like Crow, so they weren't hard to
pick out. And really, it didn't really matter who was
saying the lines most of the time - it was still funny.
After the movie the members of CT all came out to the lobby
to sign autographs and shake hands. I was kind of surprised
that about half of the crowd left right away, but the line
to meet the cast still snaked all around the lobby. While
waiting half an hour or so in line, I thought of witty things
to say to each one of them, but then when my time came and
I'm suddenly standing in front of Joel, I got so star-struck
that all I could do was hand him my Amazing Colossal Episode
Guide and mumbled something stupid like "good show". At
least I got to shake hands with Joel, Mary Jo, Josh, Frank
and Trace and got all their autographs on the book to go
along with the Mike and Kevin autographs I got at Exoticon
in New Orleans 13 years ago (wow, it hardly seems possible
that it was so long ago).
Oh, and when Josh came out for his bit at the beginning of
the show, he introduced himself as "Everyone's least favorite
Tom Servo...I read the internet, I know." So I really wanted
to tell him in person that I've always preferred his Servo
to Kevin's (of course they're both great, but for some
reason I just like Josh's droll take on the character more
than Kevin's somewhat manic in-your-face style). But when
I was actually standing across the table from him, it
completely slipped my mind. So Josh, if you really do read
the internet - hope you see this.
Anyway, if the show comes anywhere near you, make every
effort to go see it. I dragged my wife and daughter along,
and they both loved it too even though they're not big
MST3K geeks like me. After I came out of the handshake
line, my daughter commented that she's never seen a bigger
goofy grin on my face.
Oh, and take lots of money. I dropped $40 at the merchandise
table and was wishing I had brought more cash.
-- Bob "Bice" Eichler, ex-r.a.t.m.m poster and long-time lurker
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