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| - The first and last time I saw Bette Midler perform live was ...brace yourself...34 years ago when she was touring to plug one of her early albums. I was a pimply-faced teen who just got my driver's license and borrowed my dad's aquamarine '68 Pontiac Catalina to drive to the Berkeley Community Center with a gaggle of like-minded pubescents. I remember not only her repertoire of mostly retro-songs but also her hilarious impersonation of Shelley Winters in "The Poseidon Adventure" (it requires placing your belly on a barstool).
She's 64 now and looking pretty great all things considered. Her show this past Sunday, cheekily dubbed "The Showgirl Must Go On", is not only a tribute to her storied career but also a fresh take on her legendary status amid the recycling of familiar characters from days of yore such as Delores DeLago, the wheelchair-riding mermaid lounge mainstay, and aged chorine Soph, Bette's tribute to burlesque comedienne Sophie Tucker. The show starts with a CGI-generated twister on a big screen that segues into Bette singing her big-band number, "Big Noise from Winnetka". The energy never flags, least of all Bette, who goes through the mandatory costume changes in record time.
Unlike Cher's more contemporary, Cirque-inspired show, Bette's is pure vintage Vegas with twenty beautiful showgirls, the Caesar Salad girls, to go along with her back-up trio, the Staggering Harlettes (her term, not mine). The ever-changing sets are elaborate and sumptuous, but nothing overshadows the diminutive Midler. Her voice is the best I've heard it in a long time despite a lost crescendo note on "When a Man Loves a Woman". All the hits are here from the kitschy "Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy of Company B" (backed by a video of her as the Andrews Sisters circa 1973) to "The Rose" (performed as a duet with surprise guest Pink) to her vocal high point, a haunting rendition of John Prine's "Hello in There".
But Bette is also a first-class comic providing risque zingers about Celine Dion, Sarah Palin, Rush Limbaugh and Tiger Woods to make even this fan blush between hysterical fits of laughter ("I guess his wife didn't know what he meant when he said he was playing 18 holes."). The woman just knows how to deliver a punchline. She even sets up her last song with sincere gravity and starts to sing the opening bars of Celine's "My Heart Goes On" before taking things more seriously with "Wind Beneath My Wings". Jamie W. and I had great seats in the rear orchestra section which cost us $145 a piece the day before. Well worth it given that Bette proved to be both a diva and a trouper throughout the ninety-minute set. My one regret in sharing this review now is that she finishes her two-year run at the Colosseum at the end of the month, but I'm sure Bette is not one to avoid another encore.
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