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Sharon McNight at the Metropolitan Room
Sharon McNight may well be the funniest woman in
the world! Judging from the gales of laughter emanating from the Metropolitan
Room last night, I think that’s a safe  assumption to make. In a delirious
hour and forty minute show, she generates a cacophony of chuckles, giggles,
guffaws, whoops and downright belly laughs. And that’s not all, folks!
“Gone, But Not Forgotten” is Sharon’s madcap tribute to the
songstress/comediennes who are not longer with us but whose fame lives on and
on. Remember Judy Canova, the Ozark
Nightingale? Well, Sharon McNight
summons her up singing “The Wabash Blues,” complete with yodels. She begins
with “Please Don’t Talk About Me When I’m Gone,” an apt theme for the evening,
and a tribute to the late great Ethel Waters.
Along the way, she manages to channel Madelaine
Kahn channeling Dietrich singing Mel Brooks’ loony “I’m Tired” from “Blazing
Saddles.” And later, hardly exhausted after tributes to Betty Hutton singing
“Rumble, Rumble” and Ethel Merman singing “Some People” (complete with Merman’s
trademark high C), she conjures up “Tired,’ the song which brought fame to
Pearl Bailey.
But there’s nothing tired about Sharon McNight. Blessed
with a pair of saucer eyes and a cupid’s bow mouth that keeps straying to the
side of her face, she is a veritable bundle of electric energy. She knocks off
Patsy Cline’s “Sweet Dreams” and “I Fall To Pieces,” and scats her way through
Martha Raye’s jazz version of “Old Man River.” Now that’s something you won’t
hear anyone else do in a cabaret act these days!
Before the evening is over, we’ve also been
treated to Sophie Tucker belting “The Man I Love,” Hildegarde warbling
“Darling, Je Vous Aime Boucoup” in her fractured French, and a brilliant imitation
of Bette Davis, almost on key, croaking Frank Loesser’s “They’re Either Too
Young Or Too Old” complete with a punch bowl-sized martini glass and garnished
with a gargantuan olive. All of this, of
course, with the right amount of memory-invoking patter and outlandish ad libs.
Think you had enough? Think you’ve already
laughed until your sides are splitting? Get ready! Sharon begins singing the
plaintive verse to “Over The Rainbow” and segues into the entire Munchkin scene
from “The Wizard Of Oz” where she manages to portray Judy Garland, Billie
Burke, Margaret Hamilton and an entire cast of Munchkins, houses falling on
witches, broomsticks flying through the air, waltz clog steps, and side quips
in quick succession. It’s an amazing feat and she still isn’t tired!
Last night she closed with “Bacon,” a zany
homage to her favorite food, but I’m so tempted to return to hear her sing Noel
Coward’s bittersweet “If Love Were All.” Sharon
is California-based so, when you get a chance to see her in The Big Apple, run,
do not walk to wherever she is playing. She is the consummate cabaret
comedienne at the peak of her game.
The wonderful Ian Herman is Sharon's musical director and accompanist
April 26, 2008
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