Daniel Boys - first American performance
So last night, azewewish and I went to see Daniel Boys perform for the first time on American soil. It was a fun night that felt like a culmination of something.
To put things in context, in late 2008 or early 2009, BBC America started broadcasting a reality show called "Any Dream Will Do," in which wannabe West End performers competed to become Joseph in Andrew Lloyd Webber's revival of "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat," and which I started watching for kicks because John Barrowman was a judge. Now, since the program had aired in Britain about 18 months before it aired in the U.S., I had heard of some of the contestants by the time it reached our shores, Daniel Boys's name being the one I'd heard the most. And after watching an episode or so, I was so impressed with Daniel Boys (and Lee Meade) that I made Brenda watch it as well, and got her hooked (and that NEVER happens, as she avoids reality TV like the plague).
Somewhere along the line, because I'd kept hearing Daniel's name, I'd assumed he'd won the show (and yes, if I'd actually Googled him or something I would have learned differently, but I wasn't that invested in the show). So one night we're watching the show on BBC America, and Daniel ends up in the bottom two along with a twink-looking blonde named Lewis, I think. And in the resulting sing-off, Daniel blew Lewis out of the freaking water, and B and I were all, well, of course, Daniel's the one Andrew will save, there's no contest here - except Mr. Webber must prefer blonde twinks because he saved the guy with the inferior voice and performace, and B and I about fell off our chairs. (The judges appeared to share our WTF reaction.) Our outrage was so great that we made editorzon and sabrinagb watch it later, lol.
Our shock over Daniel's early elimination was so great, in fact, that when B and I ran into John Barrowman at 2009's Comic Con, we were all "screw Torchwood, let's talk about Daniel Boys and how he got robbed on ADWD," and we had a great conversation with John about Daniel. We lobbied hard for John to use his influence to get Daniel a U.S. gig. Actually John and we all thought that Daniel would be fantastic in a musical at the Ahmanson Theater here, to the point that John called over his manager, Gavin, who also manages Daniel, and said they needed to make that happen. (It hasn't happened yet, but who knows what the future holds?)
Fast forward to a few weeks ago, when Daniel tweeted that he was playing a show in L.A. I quickly asked Brenda if she was in for it (yes, duh), and grabbed tickets. So last night found us seated in a tiny club, Show at Barre, in Los Feliz, for a cabaret performance.
Seriously, locals, this club was tinier than Hotel Cafe, even tinier than El Scorpion, and made even smaller by the fact that there was seating at small tables (though only maybe 18, tops, and one third of those only seated two people) throughout the small space. But it was a great spot for this type of performance. Also, the food and drinks were good, even if the kitchen doesn't have a good grasp on what "blackened" mahi mahi is supposed to be (it tasted good, it just wasn't what I expected from that description), and our waiter, Bryce or Price, I couldn't tell, was absolutely gorgeous and as sweet as he could be. He'd moved here from the Pacific Northwest, and we had a delightful conversation with him after the show about the sweet gay boy who wanted to take a picture with him (a novel experience for him), and about New Orleans, which he's never visited yet and we strongly encouraged.
Daniel was a thoroughly delightful performer. He appeared shocked that he got such an enthusiastic response from the American crowd (a nice mix of mostly coupled gay men, straight couples, single straight women out with their friends, and ex pats), and his singing aside, which was delightful, he was wonderfully talkative, sharing stories about his experience on holiday here, including getting stopped by the police for a broken tail light (his friend's car), which he found very exciting, and about an earlier trip to L.A. at which he babbled all night at a high-falutin' Beverly Hills party to a guy that he thought he had met before, but realized later that he'd only been stalking on youtube. He also got progressively flustered after the intermission, because one of his friends had told him to stop saying "um," which of course only made him say it just as often, but catch himself and get embarrassed every time he did.
He sang most of the songs from his 2009 album "So Close," and commented how he is the one who fills out the addresses on the envelopes for each of the ones he mails out - which cracked me up. He started with "So Close" and ended with "Everything" and "Always There," and I was thrilled that he also sang "Better Than I" and "They Don't Make Glass Slippers," (and in telling the story about the re-imagination of Cinderella that "Glass Slippers" comes from, Daniel noted forlornly that rather than the sweet gay boy star, or the dashing Prince, he was cast as the evil step-dad) among other songs. Daniel also mentioned that he had auditioned for the role of Fiyero in "Wicked" and made it to the top 3, but when the American producers saw his tape, they felt he wasn't sexy enough. He used the story to segue into introducing Megan Hilty, who played Glenda in "Wicked," variously on Broadway, in the national touring production, and in the Los Angeles production at the Pantages (so I'm sure I saw her as Glenda and Adam Lambert in the chorus when I saw it back in the day here). She was a hoot! She sang two songs and performed a duet with Daniel. I was also impressed by Daniel's pianist, whose name was Michael, I think, but who also only got the sheet music the day before the concert and knocked it out of the park. All in all, the show was lovely.
After the show, B and I took our time wrapping up our bill and taking with our waiter, to give the line of people chatting with Daniel time to die down. We got so wrapped up chatting that we ended up being the last fans to greet him, but that meant we had time to have a great conversation with him. Daniel thanked us both for coming, and he said he was so shocked that anyone in America knows who he is - he commented in amazement that he'd seen me singing along to the songs (which indirectly confirmed for me that when I thought that he had thrown me a pretty blinding grin during "Everything" when he saw me singing along, he probably had actually done so, lol). We asked how he'd ended up playing here, and he said that when he told one of his friends (the one he'd been stalking on youtube but later developed a friendship with) he was going on holiday to Los Angeles, the friend said that his flatmate ran Show at Barre, and maybe they could set up a show. (Yay, friend!) We also told him about being gobsmacked by his elimination on ADWD. Brenda told him point blank that Webber must have had a thang for the blonde twink (or words to that effect, I focused on the blonde twink part, lol), at which point I chimed in that we were sure Lewis was a lovely guy, with which Daniel agreed, amused if a bit overwhelmed. We also told him about our chat about him with John, and he thought that was hysterical. He also filled us in on what he's done since ADWD ended, and he's done very well. We also chatted about twitter and our differing views on it (B doesn't have one, I follow on it but don't post much, Daniel never knows what to say on it). And when Brenda inadvertently disclosed that I followed Daniel on twitter, and I was all, yikes, now I feel creepy, he won my favorite person award by being all, hey, I stalked my now-friend on youtube! Poor guy, though, he was heading back to England today and he had an early morning flight. We chatted about the viability of just staying up all night, since we had just done that in New Orleans, an idea that I don't think had quite occurred to Daniel previously but which he greeted with interest. He took pictures with us and asked after us, and we wished him safe travels and a nice evening before leaving so he could join his friends and enjoy the rest of his last evening in L.A. undisturbed.
Anyway it was a lovely evening, and I hope we get more of Daniel performing over here.
To put things in context, in late 2008 or early 2009, BBC America started broadcasting a reality show called "Any Dream Will Do," in which wannabe West End performers competed to become Joseph in Andrew Lloyd Webber's revival of "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat," and which I started watching for kicks because John Barrowman was a judge. Now, since the program had aired in Britain about 18 months before it aired in the U.S., I had heard of some of the contestants by the time it reached our shores, Daniel Boys's name being the one I'd heard the most. And after watching an episode or so, I was so impressed with Daniel Boys (and Lee Meade) that I made Brenda watch it as well, and got her hooked (and that NEVER happens, as she avoids reality TV like the plague).
Somewhere along the line, because I'd kept hearing Daniel's name, I'd assumed he'd won the show (and yes, if I'd actually Googled him or something I would have learned differently, but I wasn't that invested in the show). So one night we're watching the show on BBC America, and Daniel ends up in the bottom two along with a twink-looking blonde named Lewis, I think. And in the resulting sing-off, Daniel blew Lewis out of the freaking water, and B and I were all, well, of course, Daniel's the one Andrew will save, there's no contest here - except Mr. Webber must prefer blonde twinks because he saved the guy with the inferior voice and performace, and B and I about fell off our chairs. (The judges appeared to share our WTF reaction.) Our outrage was so great that we made editorzon and sabrinagb watch it later, lol.
Our shock over Daniel's early elimination was so great, in fact, that when B and I ran into John Barrowman at 2009's Comic Con, we were all "screw Torchwood, let's talk about Daniel Boys and how he got robbed on ADWD," and we had a great conversation with John about Daniel. We lobbied hard for John to use his influence to get Daniel a U.S. gig. Actually John and we all thought that Daniel would be fantastic in a musical at the Ahmanson Theater here, to the point that John called over his manager, Gavin, who also manages Daniel, and said they needed to make that happen. (It hasn't happened yet, but who knows what the future holds?)
Fast forward to a few weeks ago, when Daniel tweeted that he was playing a show in L.A. I quickly asked Brenda if she was in for it (yes, duh), and grabbed tickets. So last night found us seated in a tiny club, Show at Barre, in Los Feliz, for a cabaret performance.
Seriously, locals, this club was tinier than Hotel Cafe, even tinier than El Scorpion, and made even smaller by the fact that there was seating at small tables (though only maybe 18, tops, and one third of those only seated two people) throughout the small space. But it was a great spot for this type of performance. Also, the food and drinks were good, even if the kitchen doesn't have a good grasp on what "blackened" mahi mahi is supposed to be (it tasted good, it just wasn't what I expected from that description), and our waiter, Bryce or Price, I couldn't tell, was absolutely gorgeous and as sweet as he could be. He'd moved here from the Pacific Northwest, and we had a delightful conversation with him after the show about the sweet gay boy who wanted to take a picture with him (a novel experience for him), and about New Orleans, which he's never visited yet and we strongly encouraged.
Daniel was a thoroughly delightful performer. He appeared shocked that he got such an enthusiastic response from the American crowd (a nice mix of mostly coupled gay men, straight couples, single straight women out with their friends, and ex pats), and his singing aside, which was delightful, he was wonderfully talkative, sharing stories about his experience on holiday here, including getting stopped by the police for a broken tail light (his friend's car), which he found very exciting, and about an earlier trip to L.A. at which he babbled all night at a high-falutin' Beverly Hills party to a guy that he thought he had met before, but realized later that he'd only been stalking on youtube. He also got progressively flustered after the intermission, because one of his friends had told him to stop saying "um," which of course only made him say it just as often, but catch himself and get embarrassed every time he did.
He sang most of the songs from his 2009 album "So Close," and commented how he is the one who fills out the addresses on the envelopes for each of the ones he mails out - which cracked me up. He started with "So Close" and ended with "Everything" and "Always There," and I was thrilled that he also sang "Better Than I" and "They Don't Make Glass Slippers," (and in telling the story about the re-imagination of Cinderella that "Glass Slippers" comes from, Daniel noted forlornly that rather than the sweet gay boy star, or the dashing Prince, he was cast as the evil step-dad) among other songs. Daniel also mentioned that he had auditioned for the role of Fiyero in "Wicked" and made it to the top 3, but when the American producers saw his tape, they felt he wasn't sexy enough. He used the story to segue into introducing Megan Hilty, who played Glenda in "Wicked," variously on Broadway, in the national touring production, and in the Los Angeles production at the Pantages (so I'm sure I saw her as Glenda and Adam Lambert in the chorus when I saw it back in the day here). She was a hoot! She sang two songs and performed a duet with Daniel. I was also impressed by Daniel's pianist, whose name was Michael, I think, but who also only got the sheet music the day before the concert and knocked it out of the park. All in all, the show was lovely.
After the show, B and I took our time wrapping up our bill and taking with our waiter, to give the line of people chatting with Daniel time to die down. We got so wrapped up chatting that we ended up being the last fans to greet him, but that meant we had time to have a great conversation with him. Daniel thanked us both for coming, and he said he was so shocked that anyone in America knows who he is - he commented in amazement that he'd seen me singing along to the songs (which indirectly confirmed for me that when I thought that he had thrown me a pretty blinding grin during "Everything" when he saw me singing along, he probably had actually done so, lol). We asked how he'd ended up playing here, and he said that when he told one of his friends (the one he'd been stalking on youtube but later developed a friendship with) he was going on holiday to Los Angeles, the friend said that his flatmate ran Show at Barre, and maybe they could set up a show. (Yay, friend!) We also told him about being gobsmacked by his elimination on ADWD. Brenda told him point blank that Webber must have had a thang for the blonde twink (or words to that effect, I focused on the blonde twink part, lol), at which point I chimed in that we were sure Lewis was a lovely guy, with which Daniel agreed, amused if a bit overwhelmed. We also told him about our chat about him with John, and he thought that was hysterical. He also filled us in on what he's done since ADWD ended, and he's done very well. We also chatted about twitter and our differing views on it (B doesn't have one, I follow on it but don't post much, Daniel never knows what to say on it). And when Brenda inadvertently disclosed that I followed Daniel on twitter, and I was all, yikes, now I feel creepy, he won my favorite person award by being all, hey, I stalked my now-friend on youtube! Poor guy, though, he was heading back to England today and he had an early morning flight. We chatted about the viability of just staying up all night, since we had just done that in New Orleans, an idea that I don't think had quite occurred to Daniel previously but which he greeted with interest. He took pictures with us and asked after us, and we wished him safe travels and a nice evening before leaving so he could join his friends and enjoy the rest of his last evening in L.A. undisturbed.
Anyway it was a lovely evening, and I hope we get more of Daniel performing over here.