Watching The Addams Family At the Mahalia Jackson

This year we decided to buy tickets to the Broadway Across America series at the Mahalia Jackson Theater. The first play on slate was the Addams Family. I have to admit that I didn’t expect much. I have never really been a fan of either the television show nor the movies. In fact, I warned Cristina to wake me up once I started to snore. To me, it was just going to be something to put in our NOLA section of our blog.

And then something unexpected happened. I found that I was enjoying myself.

Now, West Side Story this is not. But unlike, say, Cats, this show has a plot. And the music, while not truly as memorable as Wicked, moved the plot along more than Wicked’s did. It was also something I didn’t expect it to be…funny.

The production was as good as any I’ve seen live (granted that is the aforementioned musicals in New Orleans as well as a horrible production of Footloose on Broadway). The timing of the actors was nearly perfect, and they camped it up for maximum laughs.

Would I spend a lot of money on the Addams Family? No. However, the cheap seats (around $15-20) at the Mahalia Jackson Theater are actually good seats. Having cheap seats means that maybe we can do Ralph’s on the Park pre-theater dinner menu for our next play.

Speaking of the next play, I hear it is a representative of the horror genre. How else could you explain a play that features the music of Journey?