One Night With Janis Joplin, Portland Center Stage (Grade B)

created and written by Randy Johnson
Musical Director & Arrangers Len Rhodes

cast:
Janis Joplin   .....   Moriah Angeline
Blues SInger   .....  Sabrina Elayne Carten
Background vocalist   .....  Marisha Wallace

sez says:  hummm what are we to make of this--what exactly should we call it?  It is not really theater, and it is not really a concert, and it is neither great nor awful. It is a form of entertainment--but a funny kind of entertainment.   I guess I'd say it is neither Fair Nor Foul. Not fair--because it is usurious of Joplin and her name and her music while pretending to duplicate it --but it is not entirely Foul--because it is, in parts, an entertaining homage to Ms Joplin.  Joplin was a somewhat tortured woman and you'd never know that by watching this..and as good as the singers were--they are NOT Joplin.  And, a personal beef, while the imported black singers were very good--what's up with not using local talent?  We DO have some amazingly great Black women singers in PDX..why are they never hired at PCS?

mjc says:  musicians were great, the woman who did the Joplin singing hit the right spirit on a couple of songs, and the blues singer could have been more powerful in the play--and in her presentation of the music,