• Aluminum has been called LOUD, but it isn’t heavy metal.
• A new star has risen in the elements. Tipping the scales at trim atomic weight of 26.98, “Al” is the first Periodic Table alum to headline at Trump Plaza (July-August 2008) and now the first to launch a national tour, with stops in New York, North Carolina, Florida, Kansas, Missouri, Wisconsin, and Ohio through March 21.
• A lot of aluminum is used in this show. Six Israeli dancers often enter completely encased in aluminum ducting. At one point the ducting is dropped from the fly loft, and they shimmy into it. They all wear a dizzying array of aluminum costumes, ranging from mushrooms to Carmen Miranda. Repeatedly, the audience is showered, pulverized, or inundated with the stuff.
• What happens when two lolling aluminized dancers, heads and appendages drooping to the floor like Slinky® toys, converge in a torrid mating dance? Offspring! Sure enough, a miniature puppet duct is born from the union – manipulated somehow from the wings or beneath the stage, I couldn’t tell.
• Be prepared. Kids go wild at this show.
• One kid was so intoxicated by the glittering excitement on opening night that he narrowly escaped serious harm. Four ninjas are dispatched into the house to manage the flow of materiel disgorged from the stage. While one of these ninjas was rushing up the aisle, shepherding the ductwork as it snaked over the audience, this pre-schooler squirted out into the aisle, running down toward the stage to snag a souvenir. The ninja’s elbow couldn’t have missed the kid’s eye by more than two inches when they crossed paths.
• With its ceiling festooned in inflated aluminum, the 1000-seat Knight Theater is ideally sized for this show.
• Kids of all ages could be seen after the performance sporting aluminum capes and ginormous bowties, or posing with one of the troupers for photos in the lobby. Wherever I saw a face peeping out of an aluminum duct, there was a smile on it.
• My review of The Aluminum Show was posted on Tuesday at TheaterMania.com.