Dusting Off a Definition of Cabaret

Recently, when we were telling a friend what options we’d rounded up as far as shows to see, she was a little incredulous and, shall we say, dismissive when we described something as “cabaret.” The word has associations that really just don’t do it justice in its modern incarnation. Cabaret’s not about women dressed in skimpy, sequined outfits, jazz music of varying quality, and huge cover charges for bad lounge food. Well, OK, there are still performances like that, but there are also, increasingly, ones that take a welcome far step afield, as is the case with the series Julian Fleisher (photo at right) curates at the Starlight. This coming Monday, Larry Krone performs new and old material including his can’t-miss duet with Jim Andralis, “Shopping for Dresses”; then on Dec. 19 Doll Hospital gives a surreal noirish tour of a songwriter’s mind via some of the characters he creates; and on Dec. 26 the Hippy Nuts, regulars in the series, top off the year with their inimitable, hard-to-describe music. Aside from the fact that there’s no cover or minimum, none of these performers has much in common with the cabaret stereotype, and they’re all worth stepping out for.

That goes as well for Escape from Bellevue and Other Stories, which recently opened at the Paradise Factory Theater (where you do have to buy tickets). It’s tough to classify this act – the publicity materials say to “imagine Bill Hicks fronting The Replacements and delivering darkly comical monologues in between songs,” so you see what we mean. Christopher John Campion of the Knockout Drops wrote and performs autobiographical songs (including stories about, as you might have guessed, on Campion’s several stays at Bellevue Hospital, as well as recounting his band’s struggles to make it in the NY music scene); Horton Foote, Jr., directs the show, which also integrates a variety of video and animation segments.

There are tons of other non-traditional musical performances like this that have to call themselves “cabaret” for the purpose of magazine listings and such, but we’ll just mention one more, and in the spirit of the season make it Striking 12, which is briefly at Ars Nova. The band GrooveLily puts a unique spin on Hans Christian Andersen’s The Little Match Girl, a story that’s upbeat in a way but sort of depressing too; this version, coauthored by the band with Rachel Sheinkin of recent 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee fame, sounds even lighter on the heart, with a mix of musical comedy and pop-rock songs. It sounds like a definite winner – even if you’ve vowed, as we have at different times, not to see anything remotely to do with the holidays, you should try to make it to this.

Details: Julian Fleisher’s programs are at the Starlight Bar & Lounge, 167 Ave. A at 9pm Mondays. Escape From Bellevue is on Fridays and Saturdays at 9 at the Paradise Factory Theater, 64 E. 4th St. Tickets via Smarttix. Striking 12 is at Ars Nova, 511 W. 54th St., through Dec. 23 with a possible extension. See the show’s website for a full schedule. Tickets via Smarttix.

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