November 26, 1999 GAY PEOPLE'S CHRONICLE

eveningsout

Midler shows how she got 'divine' nickname

Bette Midler

"The Divine Miss Millennium" Schottenstein Center, Nov. 9

Reviewed by Kaizaad Kotwal

Columbus-When they made the Divine Miss M, they broke the mold. Nope, they shattered it. Midler strutted her fabulousness at the Schottenstein Center on November 9 for three solid hours and she took her audience on a journey of emotions so fantastic and powerful that few experiences can compare.

Midler's energy is explosive, and approaching her mid-fifties her vocal and physical bravado is getting Bette-r and Bette-r. Her small size and short stature are no indication of the dynamic way in which she commands a stage and an audience of over 12,000. Midler, in her trademark humor and caustic wit, made innuendoes about her live performance as compared to the other divas.

During the intro numbers, Midler, talking about her live show said, "And we don't have teleprompters like those other bitches!" After the audience had finished roaring with laughter, she added with a demure smile and girlish voice, "And Cher says hi!" Midler has no problem taking stabs at her fellow divas, referring obviously to Cher's most recent concert tour aided by teleprompters, and even Streisand's past shows.

The theme of Midler's tour was the ubiquitous millennium. And her thoughts and ideas about the millennium ranged from the irreverent to the profound. As big a superstar as Midler is, she hasn't lost her ability to commiserate intimately with her audiences, and every move she makes, from the bawdy to the touching, is always genuine.

Midler performed tunes from her vast repertoire and three decades of making music. The show starts with Midler singing

"From a Distance" perched atop a large globe, which explodes as Midler comes down to capture her audiences' hearts and imaginations. Her entire concert is geared towards making her audience feel on top of the world.

The stage design, dazzlingly beautiful, was centered largely around cosmic images from the moon and the stars to the sun and celestial entities. The most brilliant and heavenly was of course, Miss M. Early in the show, Midler talked about how, every once in a while, all the heavenly bodies are in perfect alignment.

"This was one of those moments for me," she said as she began to mesmerize her audiences with her classic "The Rose." Sitting at the edge of the stage, bathed in a warm rosy light, Midler brought tears to eyes and brought the audience to its feet. It was one of the show's most beautiful moments and one of the many deserved standing ovations she would get that night.

The other religious experience of the show was when Midler did a song titled "Mary." In her usual style, Midler segued into some jokes about religion and the Bible. She said that the Bible is "full of great stories and characters, in between all that begatting and smiting." Then, after a beat she continued, "fucking and fighting! Fucking and fighting! That's what it's always been about."

Midler said that we live in a world today where people are still discriminated against by religion and "that's just so medieval. Let's get over it!" After she had made the audience laugh, she socked it to them with an amazingly divine and heart breaking song about the mother of Jesus, which emphasized not only the exalted state of motherhood but also the path to true beliefs and convictions.

Act II of "The Divine Miss Millennium" show started with a very burlesque and vaudeville segment about politics in America.

Midler, dressed as a mermaid, was Dolores,

A Denver surprise leads to birth of the Toledo chorus

by Jeff Woodard

Toledo -Keith Pilkinton still refers to the summer of 1996 as "the time when I lost my sanity and started up a GALA Chorus." If so, his loss has been Toledo's gain.

The founder of the group that was to become Sing Out Toledo! was so moved by attending and, to his surprise, participating in a concert in Denver in 1996 that "even thinking about it now, I get goosebumps. It was then that I first thought: Why can't Toledo do this?"

"This" was a Pride festival performance by Denver's mixed chorus, Harmony: A Colorado Chorale.

Pilkinton's sister, Jan, was a member of that chorus, which was to sing the national anthem during opening ceremonies. What Pilkinton didn't know was that Sis was pulling strings with the assistant director to get her brother onstage.

"We took the stage in front of an estimated crowd of about 30,000 people," recalls Pilkinton. "As we began to sing, I looked out to the crowd, and pride swelled my chest close to bursting. Once again, I wondered if a gay and lesbian chorus would work in Toledo. When we finished singing, the applause was thunderous. We left the stage, taking with us the warmth and acceptance of thousands. What a feeling!"

That mile-high moment was reprised a month later when Pilkinton witnessed the final few days of GALA Choruses Festival V in Tampa, Fla.

"Imagine 5,000 gay, lesbian and

transgendered persons and friends all gathered together in one place. As each chorus came onto the stage, whether ten or 200 members, they were greeted with a standing ovation by their peers, just for being there." By the time Pilkinton returned to the Land of Klinger, his mission was well defined.

"When I got back to Toledo, I started making phone calls to friends and acquaintances that I thought might be interested in helping out. The Toledo Chorus board -we didn't have a name until months later-met a few weeks after the festival and began the arduous process of laying the groundwork for a chorus.

"At the same time, we started trying to spark interest by putting up flyers, contacting friends and generally making a nuisance of ourselves. In September we held a meeting, and a week later we started rehearsals for our first concert, which was a special appearance at the Detroit Together Men's Chorus 'Holidays Together' concert."

Citing an increase in professional obligations and scheduling conflicts in his personal life, Pilkinton is currently on hiatus from active chorus participation.

"But I try to keep tabs on what's going on and still stay in touch as much as possible.

After all, I owe the people in the chorus a huge debt-they helped me realize my dream."

And he, theirs.

Jeff Woodard is a Chronicle contributing writer living in Cleveland.

1

Bette Midler at her Cleveland show November 21.

a candidate for president. The whole segment was entirely over the top as she parodied the entire election system.

One of her fund raising events was a "We Are the World" parody where her contributors include Demagogues for Dolores and Degenerates for Dolores and even one of her dancers in Barbara Streisand drag. Nothing is sacred in Miss M's universe. And this political satire allows Midler to poke fun at Ken "Starfish" and Celine Dion's syrupy "My Heart Will Go On" from Titanic.

During the segment Midler also paid homage to Columbus's gay and lesbian audiences who had come out in droves to see her. Mockingly she asked her Harlettes if she had covered all her constituencies in her election campaign and after her Harlettes had whispered in her ear, she broke out into a Judy Garland imitation of "Over the Rainbow."

Midler and her writers had done their homework and she made many jokes with a Columbus edge. She started her show with an obvious reference to the defeat of the Republican mayoral candidate.

PAT HUGHES

"Welcome to our show or in other words, Dorothy Teater's worst nightmare," Midler joked.

"

During the curtain call, as she urged her famed Harlettes to take a bow she said, "here are my Harlettes, hotter than the rugby team,' alluding to the Ohio State University's women's rugby team which had made national headlines by posing topless at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C.

The show spares no expenses and the effects and spectacle are superb. Midler's dancers are great and it's nice to see dancers who are not all a size zero. Midler's dancers represent the spectrum of womanhood just as Midler herself does.

Midler's concert is simply fabulous. It is a once in a millennium opportunity. Cleveland audiences should not miss her appearance at the Gund Arena on November 21.

Midler will make you laugh, she'll make you weep and you'll walk away basking in the inimitable aura of the truly divine. ✔

Kaizaad Kotwal is a Chronicle contributing writer in Columbus.

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