Adelaide Cabaret Festival. Festival Theatre. 22 Jun 2013.
For the closing night of the 2013 Cabaret Festival, Adelaide’s theatre community turned out in droves to join hundreds of other Idina fans at the sold out Festival Theatre show. Hanging on every word, the audience were treated to a rare and quite unique performance from an ailing singer, as Menzel suffered with a dry throat and niggling cough; a cough that didn’t affect her singing one bit, but which allowed us to get to know her a little better as she chatted between songs in an attempt to rest her voice.
Menzel comes across quite introverted, and her performance had a very personal feel because of it. When she embodies a character she comes out confident and strong, but the real Idina seems much more grounded, down to earth, warm yet quiet. She was clearly moved by many of the songs she sang and the memories of people those songs represented and her honesty was positively endearing.
For fans of the musical Wicked, Menzel had plenty on offer. Opening her show with ‘The Wizard And I’, Idina deferred to the audience straight away to join in and sing along with her; the show stopping number ‘Defying Gravity’ saved until the very end. ‘Don’t Rain On My Parade’ from Funny Girl featured early on as well as a version of ‘I Stand’ from her third studio album of 2008.
Fans of the musical Rent were not left disappointed either; Menzel sang a tribute to the late Jonathan Larson (Rent music and lyrics) which included a very touching rendition of ‘Another Day’. For her famous duet ‘Take Me or Leave Me’, Menzel randomly picked three audience volunteers to help her with the duet and miraculously landed Fiona DeLaine, Mark Stefanoff and Anjali Habel-Orrell, all local performers, who together gave a rousing version of the hit song including harmonies.
Marvin Hamlisch, composer, singer, songwriter and formerly Idina’s conductor, also received a touching tribute from Menzel, when she sang his alleged favourite song ‘At The Ballet’ from his musical, A Chorus Line. Visibly moved, it was clear that the people in her life, including her young son Walker, and her music are incredibly important to her.
Thanking the audience with an un-miked, acapella version of ‘For Good’ from Wicked, there were still three encore songs to come including ‘Defying Gravity’. But even after a full 2 hour show (running 30 minutes longer than scheduled) it was clear that the audience wasn’t ready for Idina to leave yet.
An absolute highlight of this year’s festival, it was one that will be remembered for some time to come. To quote one audience member, Idina is “Better than Beyonce”. And that’s a fact!
Paul Rodda
When: Closed
Where: Adelaide Festival Theatre
Bookings: Closed (Sell out)
