javasaurus | A Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

Well, we went to see this year's Revels...

In short, it was not a good evening. The show was wonderful, however. Almost made the rest of the night worth it.

blueeowyn and I were off to see the Christmas Revels at Lisner Auditorium in DC. We needed to leave by 6 to catch the metro in Largo. We were out of the house by 6:05, and got on the train at 6:15. As it sat in the station, awaiting its 6:30 departure time (Largo is a terminus, and during non-rush, trains leave every 15 minutes -- we missed the 6:15).

For most of our trip into the city, we were accompanied by a group of about 8 teens, basically having a party on the train, including noise, running about, and eating very fragrant garlic-based food. There was another group, loud cursing, confrontational sitting several rows behind us, often drawing the attention of the first group. It was mostly a 30-minute trip of sit still and try not to be noticed.

We get to Lisner in reasonable time, and get in the will-call line for our tickets. I'll mention this again shortly. Revels was a last-minute decision for us this year, due to various personal scheduling issues, so we were in the last row, which were still pretty good seats. The show looked fabulous, and the sound was gorgeous. Acoustically, the back row was a little muffled, so lyrics got muddy at times, but still sounded full, well-blended, rich. I loved the lighting effects, the set, the costumes -- very much a pageant of Christmas spirit. The tale of Will Kemp's 9-day morris and the Queen's dream and the mummers and the children and audience participation. Sword dances, Morris dances, St. George and the Dragon. It's a magical, inspirational vacation away from reality. Or at least it would have been...

Unfortunately, a woman and her grandchildren(?) were in front of us, and chatted all through the first half. Also, after the artistic director introduced the show, she came to the back row and sat nearby, and chatted with a friend for the first couple of pieces, then disappeared. A small child (maybe 2 years old) was in the aisle behind us talking pretty much constantly. We noted at intermission that the group in front of us seemed to know the AD. For the second half, the older woman in front of us moved to a different seat and another woman sat with the kids. She was less chatty, but the kids whispered amongst themselves until I finally asked them to please stop talking. (I suspect they could feel my subtext, because they did, mostly, stop).

Regarding Lisner Auditorium. It is a wonderful stage, and a very nice house. But the front-of-house has many severe problems. It cannot adequately handle the number of people that it can seat. The lines for bathrooms (even the men's!) were akin to the worst I've seen at a football game, the lobby was packed at intermission so you couldn't move. Sodas were more expensive (per ounce) than any theater or stadium. And the line for the will-call tickets blocked the entire entrance area, so much confusion was had by all.

After the show, we stopped at the TGIF near the metro stop, to get a dessert and (for me) coffee. The bathrooms were the most disgusting I've ever seen. The service was all but missing -- our drinks came quickly, but before taking our dessert order the waiter left, only to come back about 10 minutes later. It was at least that long again before we got our dessert (a chocolate pecan brownie ice-cream thing that was missing its pecans). Our waiter didn't return again until long after I finished my first cuppa, when we stopped another waiter to ask for him. When he brought the bill, it had an extra drink on it that we didn't order, so I found the hostess, asked for the manager, made a number of complaints. The manager was gracious and comped the entire bill. Still, I don't think I'll go there again. Then we go to the metro, and my "smartcard" doesn't work. It had worked ealier! The station manager tries it, and decides to let me through the gate, and to talk to the manager at the other end of our trip. So I spend the trip seething over rude audiences, bad restaurant service, and waiting for a confrontation wherein a metro worker will charge me maximum price to get out of the gate. As it turned out, the manager at Largo was very nice, checked my card, and told me I'd probably need to take the card to Metro Center during business hours to get it replaced, if I didn't want to buy a new one. He didn't charge me to leave the station though.

Did I mention that through most of this I had a steadily growing headache?