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NEW YORK -- Sometimes, you really can get too much of a good thing.
Justin Bond and Kenny Mellman have delighted fans for years with their postmodern cabaret/drag act. Bond plays Kiki, a brassy, blowsy female entertainer of a certain age. Mellman is Herb, Kiki's gay accompanist, who indulges her eclectic and sometimes questionable taste in repertoire.
In Kiki & Herb: Alive on Broadway (** 1/2 out of four), which opened Tuesday at the Helen Hayes Theatre, the duo brings its genre-bending, gender-blending shtick to Manhattan's tourist center. And if you think that shtick is safe for matinee crowds, well, either you don't know Kiki, or you've been drinking some of the same stuff she drinks, in similar quantities.
Bond's chanteuse requires a little liquid refreshment early in her set and by the middle is so plastered that she's slurring observations about Jesus, a stuffed cow and pretty much every maligned minority group you could squeeze into a stand-up routine. Then there's her song selection, which reads like a primer on tragically hip alternative pop with a little Dan Fogelberg thrown in to appease more pedestrian theatergoers.
The resulting program suggests what might happen if Dame Edna's dysfunctional sister showed up as a guest VJ on MTV2 but decided that rather than playing videos, she would sing the tracks herself.
It's a premise that could make for a great comedy skit, and Bond certainly has the timing and dexterity to pull it off, but not for more than two hours.
Much as I enjoyed most of the first half of Alive on Broadway, I had the sinking feeling I might remember the experience more fondly if I left during intermission. I didn't, so I had to watch Bond's repartee with the more subdued Mellman grow thinner, although Mellman showed spurts of comical animation.
In the first act, a few politically incorrect jokes didn't quite work -- not because they were offensive, but because they weren't funny. But Bond delivered them with overwhelming panache. Later, some quips took on a whiff of preaching to the choir, as if to remind the faithful of the social conscience underlying Kiki and Herb's irreverent antics.
As for the musical numbers, no matter how you feel about Bright Eyes, Scissor Sisters or any of the other critical darlings represented here, chances are you could happily live out your life without hearing their tunes crooned by a hybrid of Ethel Merman and Liza Minnelli.
Not that Kiki isn't a swell gal to spend a little time with. But if you want to see a sassy older gal with great legs sing and tell jokes, I'd suggest waiting for Elaine Stritch's next show.
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