Let me begin by stating the obvious. I love Clay Aiken! I love the VOX. I love how HOT he is.
I love his sense of humor and his compassion. I love how HOT he is.
I love his intelligence. I love the man he is, and the man he has yet to be. Did I say I love how HOT he is.
One thing I also love about Clay is that he is not perfect. From his often times awful hair, to his sometimes questionable taste in clothes, to his all too often ill-chosen words, Clay is flawed and makes mistakes. He is a 27-year old kid who still has a lot to learn, who has made mistakes in judgment and will continue to make mistakes. I love that because that makes him human. That makes him normal. That makes him one of us. He is not otherworldly, despite the fact he seems to be playing that role in this production. Clay is not an angel. As he himself has said, if he had a halo, it would be crooked. I know some in this fandom thinks of him as an angel, as perfect, as someone who never makes any mistakes. I am not one of them. I would never put that kind of pressure on him.
Do I think the JN05 was one of those mistakes? No, I don’t and for one major reason. Despite its many flaws, (IMO) he took a risk. He tried something new. He had an idea and he ran with it. That is something I hope he never stops doing. Some things may work great (ex: the JBT – again IMO), some may not work so well. Some may even flop. But if he wants to continue to grow as both a person and as an artist, he must keep taking risks. He must keep trying new things. And from each failure, and from each success, he will learn something that will help him grow and thrive.
This production, this JN05, I think has been a new experience for him – and I don’t just mean how snake-bit it seems to be. I mean how, for the first time in his professional career, something he has done has
not been met with almost universal love from his core fan base. I do not remember any entire production he has done being met with such a mixed response from the Clay Nation. Some loved it beyond reason. Some hated it. Many are somewhere in between. I think Clay doesn't understand that reaction because he loved it, so why wouldn’t we?
And why didn’t we, those of us who had a mixed response to this production, or who hated it, why didn’t we love it? There are probably as many reasons for that as there are people who hold that opinion. What I am expressing here are my reasons, and mine alone.
Did I hate everything about it? No. I saw it 5 times, and while 2 of those times had more to do with seeing friends than seeing Clay, I would not have seen it that many times if I hated everything about it. I am actually glad I saw it that many times because it enabled me to look at the production as a whole, to see its flaws, and its strengths more objectively and maybe even to appreciate it more than I would have had I only seen it once.
I saw the show is Reading, in NYC on Saturday night, in Providence, at the Tweeter Center in Camden (or Philadelphia as the t-shirts and ornaments say
) and in Baltimore. Each one left its own mark. However, together I see aspects of the show that I like or dislike clearer than I do when remembering a particular show.
So, without further ado, I bring you my thoughts on
JN05 – The Good, the Bad and the HOT. (While the title of this review – or overview perhaps – of the JN05 suggests I start with the good, I am starting with the bad, as I believe you should always end on a positive note!)
The Bad The concept. The play, the vignettes or whatever you want to call them, I just do not think they worked for a show of this type. As Pamela suggested, perhaps it would have worked better had it been for a Christmas special on TV. But in a “concert” type setting, it felt awkward and odd and distracting. To me, that is what the vignettes were – a distraction. I was there to see and hear Clay, and they distracted me from that. I know it has been suggested that Clay didn’t want the attention on himself, that instead he wanted the message of the show to be the center of attention, but that was unrealistic. After all, his name is on the tickets (tm Clay Aiken)
! The fact of the matter is that the vast majority of people there came to see Clay, not Allison and Gregory or the dancers. Clay’s gift is singing. The message he wanted to send would have come through loud and clear, without the vignettes, with his choice of songs and his performance. The whole idea of this production just did not work for me.
The writing. As a first effort, it was fine. But this is the big time and the writing was so full of clichés and Hallmark card prose and “diarrhea of the mouth” (tm Clay Aiken), it was annoying. Someone needed to edit it. Someone needed to tell Clay his audience isn’t stupid and you don’t need to beat someone over the head with something (like the 5 AI-reference jokes!)! Sometimes less is more (and this comes from one very wordy person!
). It all just sounded very amateurish to me.
The acting. Allison and Gregory could have been in any high school production and still not have been that good. Especially Gregory. Now, I should say that while I do not know as much as many people about this subject, I do know more than some. I used to act. I have also directed and done set design. I was a drama major in college and while it has been a long time since I have been on stage, I have had some experience in this area. IMO, Gregory was terrible. First, someone should tell him to modulate his voice! He doesn’t need to scream – especially when he is wearing a mic! Secondly, his delivery was so exaggerated it was very annoying. Again, often times less is more. Had I been the director of this show and I was giving him notes after rehearsal, I would have emphasized that he needs to tone everything down – his voice in volume, his delivery of his lines, even his movements were often exaggerated. At no time did I forget he was acting. He always seemed like a terribly precocious kid over-acting on stage. That is not good. Maybe he just lacks talent and despite constant notes from the director he still was like this. Maybe the fault lies with the director. Many other parts of this show I didn’t like can be attributed to directorial errors, so that is most definitely a possibility. But whatever the reason, Gregory’s acting was not good, IMO. Allison’s was ok, but neither of them were of professional quality.
The dancing. I am not a dancer so this is just the gut reaction of someone who knows nothing about dancing. I thought the dancers were terrible. Their staging was not good (see below), but the dancing itself seemed bad. I cringed whenever they started flitting about. I think they were totally unnecessary to the integrity of the production and just seemed superfluous. The entire thing would have been better without them. If he needed them for the flashback scene, he could have just had 2 dancers (preferably better ones than he had) to portray young Beverly and her future husband dancing. He didn’t need all those others and the big, distracting dance numbers!
The staging. Even amongst people who loved the show I have heard complaints about the staging, how from many seats the pews blocked views of Clay and the rest of the set. This is inexcusable. Any director and set designer worth their paycheck will make sure this is not a problem. A director should walk the audience to make sure nothing important is blocked by any part of the set. They make sure that the blocking they give their actors can be seen in all areas of the venue. They make adjustments if necessary. Now, I understand this show is on the move and every venue is different, but the set is movable. They can move the pews if they are blocking the sight lines of an area of the audience. The people in the pews are not important. They don’t need to be seen at all, so there are ways they could have set up the pews to eliminate this problem. They didn’t. Then there were the dance numbers. They were staged very poorly. Take “Jingle Bells” for example. Those damn dancers took all the attention away from Clay, and Quiana and Angela, while they were singing. They blocked the audience’s view of them. They just were distracting in the worse possible way. That song was a great number and those dancers just took away from it. I think back to the old variety shows when the guest singer came on. During the singer’s number, the dancers (which they invariably had) danced BEHIND the singer, not in front of the singer! During the instrumental portion of the song, if there was one, the dancers often came forward for that part of the number, but then went back again when the singing started again. That is how it should have been staged during “Jingle Bells”. The dancers should have been in the background, not Clay. Clay was singing. He was the center of attention at that point, not the dancers. There were also other numbers where the dancers were misplaced, IMO. Just bad staging all around.
Then there was the church scene. I already talked about the pew placement, but I always found myself thinking what are these people here to see? Certainly not just Tommy narrating! What is he narrating? The people aren’t really supposed to be seeing Clay, Quiana and Angela, so what
are they seeing? It seems to me that since they had Tommy and the congregation frozen they should have had a choir or players or something else frozen to indicate just what they were supposed to be watching. It just looked as if something was missing.
There were other places I felt the staging was bad, but the reason all this bothered me so much was not just because it often times blocked people’s views and was distracting, but it took away from the complete production. Some have said to me it didn’t bother them because they just watched Clay (assuming they could see him), but that isn’t how this production was intended to be viewed. Apparently, this show was meant to be viewed as a whole, and the staging mistakes made this very hard for me to do.
All the technical elements of this show I found to be “bad” resulted in a show that for the most part came off as quite amateurish. I have seen better high school and college productions. This was supposed to be a professional production. IMO, it didn’t come off that way.
However, perhaps the biggest negative for me was the fact I missed Clay. Where was he? I know, he was supposed to be in “character” and it was a scripted show, but there are still ways for his extraordinary stage presence and charisma to come through. There are still ways for him to "touch" the audience. I know this because I saw it once. In Providence. I had seen him in Reading where he seemed flat and blah – and this was before the flashers. I saw him in NY where his voice was magnificent, but I still left depressed and dreading going to any more shows. I was so down after NY it wasn’t funny. I missed Clay! Then I went to Providence and something was different and he did interact with the audience more. He came forward on the stage quite often and looked into the audience (I am sure making eye contact with some lucky people
) and his whole demeanor was more open and more, well, more Clay. I left there feeling great because I had seen Clay again!
Unfortunately, that was the only show I saw where that happened, but it proved to me it could be done. The fact he didn’t do it more often was a definite negative.
The GoodYes, after all my complaints, there were some things I did like about the show.
Let’s start with the obvious.
THE VOX! Clay sounded magnificent most every time I saw him. The one exception was in Reading. I don’t know what it was about that show, but it is the closest I ever came to feeling as if Clay was phoning it in. Overall his voice has been magnificent on this tour. There have been shows where it seemed a bit rough, others where it seemed he was really struggling, and others where it was near perfection. For me, it was near perfection in NY, but I think where I appreciated it the most, where it most amazed me was in Baltimore. During the second half, he seemed to really be struggling during the first three songs. I truly wondered if he would make it through the rest of the songs. Then came “Emmanuel”. He seemed to reach down to some unseen place and find something extra and the result was an “Emmanuel” that never sounded better (despite his brown nose!
) followed by the most sublime MDYK I have ever heard. Amazing. Just amazing.
The other good thing – maybe the best thing – about this show for me was that Clay took a risk. He had an idea. He got his creative juices flwoing. He created something new and different (for him). I didn’t particularly like it over all, although I did enjoy going to the concerts and anytime I can see and hear Clay it can’t be all bad. But I applaud his effort. If I had had a chance to meet him and he asked me how I liked the show, I would have told him the truth (just not in as much detail as this review!
), but I would also tell him that despite the fact that I was one of his fandom who wasn’t in love with this production, I was in love with the fact he took the risk, that he experimented, that he wanted to do something different and fresh and take the chance. I would have told him not to be discouraged by the fact some didn’t like it. That was ok. It was ok because he created something and he should take the good and the not so good from the show and learn from both. It is the only way he can continue to grow as an artist. I do not ever want him to only take the safe road. Sometimes you have to risk failure to be able to learn and grow. And if you do learn and you use what you learn to better yourself, then you never really fail.
I am not saying I consider this show a failure. I don’t – not on any level. For Clay, however, it has been less than a rousing success. The only way it will be a failure is if he just ignores all those who didn’t like it – for whatever reason. When all is said and done he needs to look at what worked and what didn’t. He is a smart man. He seems to do just that when faced with criticism. He did it during AI. I think he has done it after MOAM. I think he will do it here too.
The HotClay. Black suit. Need I say more?????????
In conclusion
(Stop cheering!!! 
), I hope Clay does not do another Christmas show like this one. A televised Christmas special (if he is ever given another chance after last year’s ACAC!
) based on this, as Pamela suggested, maybe. But not a tour. I would love to see him do a Christmas tour done sort of like the JBT, with popular Christmas songs from the various decades. He could include a section for the timeless Christmas songs where he could sing the religious ones he loves so much. Not that he cares what I think, but it’s a thought! JN05 just didn’t work for me. I do agree, however, that if he does make Joyful Noise an annual event he needs it to be different every year. He tried something different this year. Next year, he’ll hopefully try something different yet again. And when next Christmas rolls around, I will be there scrutinizing it and salivating over him and letting his magical voice transport me.
Merry Christmas, Clay! Never stop experimenting. Never be afraid of failure. Never stop growing. And please, never stop singing!
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