I wasn’t going to cover this stupidity because it might be considered a bit self-serving. But when describing the silly scenario to a favorite friend, it made her laugh so hard that she insisted I take it to the keyboard
So, here we are.
When we last left off in January of 2023, I’d expressed my vast disdain for what Aurora’s Paramount Theater had become. The great comedic acts and concerts had been “canceled” in favor of a bland Broadway series engineered to offend absolutely no one. To make matters so much more fun, the volunteer staff weren’t welcoming in the least, and though I didn’t declare it outright, you knew I wasn’t going back there.
And I held true to that semi-promise until last weekend, because there I was, right back in those familiar subscription seats waiting to see Beautiful: The Carole King Musical. It was supposed to be the quintessential good deed on my part, too.
You see, my wife’s theater friend bowed out at the last-minute and all the other possibilities had plans, so I grudgingly…I mean valiantly, volunteered to fill in. She would’ve been fine alone, but it was the day before Mother’s Day, and on occasion, we husbands make the kind of chivalrous effort just so we can lord over their heads for years.
Wife: “You never take me anywhere anymore!”
Husband: “Really? ‘Never?’ You seem to have forgotten that I filled in for your friend and took you to the theater back in 2024.”
And it wasn’t as if I was volunteering to make the final death row walk, either. I enjoy Ms. King’s music, her career is quite fascinating, and I surmised that, purely from a law of averages standpoint, there was no way The Paramount could possibly be as bad as they were in 2023.
But I was wrong! They were worse! It was as if some staffer recognized me and said, “Hold my beer.”
The only thing more terrifying than a classic rock band prefacing a song with “Here’s something from our newest album,” is a theater announcer intoning, “The lead role of Carole King will be played by (understudy).” But they didn’t say a word about it Saturday afternoon. Instead, each program contained a small slip of paper advising of the shift, but my wife and most other folks completely missed it.
That certainly belies a consciousness of guilt.
It wasn’t that the young substitute wasn’t talented, because she was, but she had neither the charisma nor the experience to pull off a heavy lead role. And that was particularly disappointing when the star’s performances solicited all sorts of rave reviews. It also didn’t help that the understudy was 50 pounds overweight making it much more difficult to believe she was the storied songwriter.
Had I paid for my ticket, I would’ve sought a refund based solely on the subpar performance.
And speaking of overweight, in yet another example of DEI (diversity, equity, and inclusion) run amok, virtually every female performer – and all of the minority actors – ranged from obese to morbidly obese. I find it difficult to believe that all the best casting possibilities were consistently heavy.
Little Eva wasn’t 60 pounds overweight. The Shirelles weren’t morbidly obese. The drifters didn’t look like the Bears backup defensive line. The “fictional” singer King’s husband/partner Gerry Goffin had an affair with was clearly based on The Cookies’ Earl-Jean McCrea Reavis, who was neither black nor was she overweight.
Imagine the fierce fallout if a fat white actress portrayed a thin black singer.
Even my wife had a difficult time buying the 300-pound high school girl flirting with Goffin at the outset of the show. I’ve never fat-shamed a soul in my entire life and I never will, but to normalize and celebrate a truly unhealthy choice was difficult for me to swallow as were the actors who portrayed those musical legends.
It only served to further detract from an already underwhelming performance. Though oddly enough, the white male leads were all thin, as was the woman who played songwriter Cynthia Weil.
But the whole understudy thing paled in comparison to the tall female usher who insisted on blocking our view for a good ten minutes of the performance.
We were sitting at the intersection of two aisles, and at bout the third number, she came strutting down the aisle with flashlight in hand as she proceeded to “inspect” the two rows of seats in front of us. Then she’d crawl across the aisle to inspect the similar seats there. And she repeated this back-and-forth maneuver feat five times. It was as if an overly friendly stray dog made it into the theater and wanted to sniff all the guests.
When that didn’t bear fruit, she simply stood up right in front of us whispering with some of the patrons for the next three minutes. That’s when I should’ve said something, but I didn’t want to potentially interrupt the show, and I didn’t want to subject my wife to any agida. And after all that BS, nothing changed! Everyone was still seated exactly where they started sitting.
Things calmed down after that mini-drama and we could finally enjoy the show. But as is always the case, The Paramount saved the best for last!
To set the stage (pun intended), as an inveterate runner and former asthmatic, my wife marvels at the amount of water I can drink. So, when we originally signed up, we picked an aisle seat combo for the easy egress to the bathroom dynamic. You have to get up for other people, but I’d rather be gracious than force anyone to get up for me.
So, my favorite end-of-show strategy has been to wait until the second to last song/scene and dash out to the bathroom so we can avoid that mad rush and dash out of the theater to avoid ridiculously long lone parking garage payment ATM line. You’d think with all the money Richard Irvin spends on his baby mamas the City of Aurora could afford two machines.
Please keep in mind that, given the show’s three-hour duration, I’d just seen ten other patrons dash out to the facilities and return to their seats in the middle of the scene. Not to mention that I’ve employed that tactic for 25 years of Paramount shows without issue – until Saturday afternoon.
But as I tried to get back to my seat, the three old white female volunteers manning the merchandise table, started yelling “Sir, sir, sir, sir!” which could clearly be heard inside the theater. When I finally figured out they were shouting at me, they said I couldn’t go back in until the applause, which meant I’d miss the final act.
When I noted that wasn’t in their pre-show email and it’s never been a problem before, they said it was “Paramount policy.” When I further inquired as to why the other folks walked right back in but this “rule” suddenly applied to me, they had no answer. Apparently my mistake was walking right by their table. Had I chosen another door, it wouldn’t have been a problem, so I ignored them and walked back to my seat.
So now, despite diligently applying my willpower towards an internal calm, I was seething. And as I walked out of the theater those same ladies started up with me again and I gave it right back. I could’ve done better than describing the situation as “Fuckin’ bullshit,” but no one else could hear me in the loud hallway because I never raised my voice.
From there, I asked the stage manager for CEO Tim Rater, but the king of all theater dysfunction wasn’t there, which is par for the course.
Though I’ve been to plenty of Paramount shows featuring profanity, I apologized for dropping the F-bomb, but when I said the whole situation “sucked,” the 35-year-old manager took greater offense than a southern belle suddenly stricken with a case of the vapors. All I can say is, if “sucked” is the word that sets you off at that age, it’s going to be a very long and difficult life.
Then, instead of listening, the manager decided that being combative was the best course of action.
She blamed me for failing to exit the theater and let her know about the misbehaving usher. I explained that would’ve meant missing three songs instead of just 1.5. She told me that waiting for applause to reenter had always been their policy, but when I asked why it wasn’t in the pre-show email with all of the other policies, and asked why the “rule” was randomly enforced, she threw a temper tantrum, shouted “This conversation is over!,” and stormed off.
So much for “customer service.” Had I been aware of the new “rule” I could’ve held out for two more songs.
On the plus side, the actress who played King’s mother stole the show, the gentlemen who did The Righteous Brothers flippin’ nailed it, and the actress portraying Cynthia Weil was so good she should’ve played Ms. King that afternoon.
All I can say is, it was another fun afternoon at The Paramount. As another good friend put it, “Mrs. Lincoln had a better day at the theater than you did.”
As far as the volunteer ushers/staff go, it’s a simple matter of the inability to deal with the power they’ve never had before. They just can’t wait to enforce it and they do so without any concern for how customers might react to their persistent bitchiness. The paid staff simply falls prey to the same dysfunction that starts at the top and filters down through the rest of the organization.
I have a number of friends in the theater world and they tell me they’d NEVER work for The Paramount.
As far as I go, I’ve been to innumerable concerts and performances in my lengthy lifetime and I’ve never experienced the problems I’ve had in Aurora. And it wasn’t a matter of being the lowly Jeff Ward, either. Nobody knew who the fuck I was because no one ever does.
So now I’m making the specific declaration! I will never set foot in that theater again. And when you consider that I was one of the younger faces at 65, as their audience continues to age and the acts that formerly drew a younger crowd become a thing of the distant past, it doesn’t bode well for the theater’s future.
There certainly weren’t many young people interested in a Carole King biography.
Since I’ve already blown well beyond brevity, one final point. Though Beautiful did give a nod to the mental issues that humanized Gerry Goffin, the musical makes King out to be the holy victim of his heinous behavior. What the authors didn’t bother to mention is that King was married four separate times, and it takes a special talent to so casually dispense with that many husbands. Put more simply, she was no prize, either.
But back to the issue at hand. I’m convinced that I’m not nearly the only former patron who’s been treated with this kind of Paramount disdain – twice! If any of you have similar Paramount stories to tell, I’d love to hear them.