Life is a Cabaret, Old Chum

It’s Music Thursday here on ye olde blogge, and today I’m going to give a shout out to all my ladies (both regular and drag-type) who will be performing this weekend at Jungle Club. Seriously, when you’re putting on the risqué hit musical Cabaret in a fabulous Atlanta gay club featuring local drag celebutantes, how can you go wrong?

“Leave your troubles outside!
So life is disappointing? Forget it!
We have no troubles here! Here, life is beautiful...
The girls are beautiful...
Even the orchestra is beautiful!”

Cabaret is set in early 1930s Berlin in the seedy Kit Kat Klub, where patrons come to distract themselves from the increasingly tumultuous outside world with drink and bawdy vaudeville humor. The show follows the stories of several people: young cabaret singer Sally Bowles and her roommate and eventual lover Cliff Bradshaw, as well as her landlady Fräulein Schneider and the Fräulein’s Jewish paramour Herr Schultz. Unlike a more traditional musical, not all of the characters express their emotions through song. Rather, several of the songs are performed within the construct of the cabaret to complement or provide contrast for the dramatic action. For example, after Sally convinces Cliff to let her move in, the Kit Kat Klub’s Emcee and two chorus girls sing “Two Ladies”, as if in parody of the pair’s strange living arrangement.

“Two Ladies” from the 1998 Broadway revival starring Alan Cumming and Natasha Richardson.

The show is funny and dramatic, and I feel like it symbolically depicts how surreal it must have been to live in Germany during the rise of the Nazi party. In previous productions I’ve seen, the show has been disturbing but profoundly moving, and I have a feeling tomorrow night’s performance will prove just as powerful. To entice you to see the show, I’ll leave you with my favorite song from show (and a popular standard among belters), “Maybe This Time”.

Cabaret will be performed this weekend and next, Fridays and Saturdays at 8 p.m. and Sundays at 2 p.m. at Jungle Club in Atlanta.