Review from The Province November 10, 2005
I fear I may be turning into a 13-year-old girl.
How else to account for my wanting to scream and whistle when the
four cute boys of the band BoyGroove do their singing, dancing, pouting
thing? How else to account for my wanting to go back and see
this show yet a third time? I just love these boys.
A big hit on the Fringe Festival circuit since its 2003 Edmonton premiere,
BoyGroove has been remounted at the Waterfront as the second show on
a double-bill with the nationalist satire The Canada Show , opening
tonight. What a killer double-bill this will be.
BoyGroove is a "mockumentary" in the vein of This Is Spinal Tap ,
tracing the rise and fall of a boy band something like The Backstreet
Boys, New Kids on the Block or NSYNC. George Michael, Richard
Simmons, a Britney Spears clone, and an Eminem-style rapper named Hypetastic
also make appearances along with a dozen or so other characters, all
played by the four talented and adorable actors who comprise BoyGroove.
There's Andrew, the sensitive one (Andrew Bursey), who prays to John
Lennon to help him use his celebrity to make the world a better place. There's
beautiful, gay Lance (Scott Walters), who prays to Jesus for a bigger
penis "that matches my stature in the world of pop music." John
(Jon Patterson) is the angry one, the bad boy, and really cute Kevin
(Matt Alden) is the great dancer.
We see how the cynical music industry types pick them, "the best our
nation's modeling schools can supply," shape them, choreograph and
orchestrate them, and provide them with a constant supply of songs,
ecstasy, groupies, and banal, pseudo-journalistic, star-making publicity.
Yet we also see how talented these kids actually are, and how catchy
even their insipid material can be when the whole package is put together. When
they perform BoyGroove's mega-hit, "You Make My Hips Buck, Baby," with
lines like "Get close to me, muffin/Cause then we can start stuffin'," they
are dy-no-mite, as we used to say in the generation before boy bands.
When Lance is outed as gay, the band's fortunes collapse. They
even become the subject of a homophobic Hypetastic rap video, "BoyGroove
Sucks Dick." ("No matter what you say/You can never say/That Hypetastic
is gay.")
But things turn around in a great sequence of events involving a fight
between Lance and Hypetastic caught on an MTV video camera. The satire
is both outrageous and utterly credible, and the performances and staging,
the choreography, vocal harmonies and musical arrangements are all
superb.
The mature subject matter and language of BoyGroove make it inappropriate
to bring along your adolescents, although they've seen and heard it
all. My inner 13-year-old girl will just have to stand in for
them when I see this show again.
Jerry Wasserman
Reviews from the 2005 Vancouver Fringe Festival
The Georgia Straight - Publish Date: 8-Sep-2005
BOYGROOVE Where do I sign up for the BoyGroove fan club? This show,
which takes the mickey out of the boy-band phenomenon, is without a
doubt the most entertaining piece I saw at the Victoria Fringe. It’s
updated from its 2003 incarnation and includes new characters, including
a juicy Britney Spears clone (played by a guy). The songs are so catchy
and the choreography is so hot that I was practising them at the ferry
terminal on the way home. All four actors are singin’, dancin’,
witty wonders. Chris Craddock’s script needs to find its story
sooner, but it could easily enjoy success on bigger stages. At Stage
9, Performance Works, on September 10 (3:45 p.m.), 12 (7:30 p.m.),
14 (9:15 p.m.), 15 (3:45 p.m.), 16 (7:30 p.m.), and 18 (12:15 p.m.) > Colin
Thomas
BOY GROOVE
Ribbit Productions
MTC Warehouse (Venue 6), to July 29
5 stars - Kevin Prokosh - The Winnipeg Free Press
The Backstreet Boys are back with a new album just as Boy Groove returns
to the fringe festival. Coincidence? I think not. Given Boy Groove's
success on the North American fringe circuit, it's hard to tell who's
riding whose coattails. These brash boy-band spoofers are as tight
as the real thing, complete with hilariously cheesy stereotypical posings,
impressive four-part harmonizing and catchy pop tunes.
Chris Craddock's tell-all, 90-minute musical, as seen at the Montreal
Fringe Festival, follows the rise and fall of a fictional quartet of
hunks who are the cynical creation of a manager with a can't-miss formula.
Their signature song, You Make My Hips Buck Baby, is a showstopper
sure to make teenyboppers of many in the audience. Their unblemished
public façade is unable to cover the dirt on the band, which
is are imploding due to greed ("I want $20 million and I only
have one"), creative differences ("we're basically a children's
act") and a member who wants some space.
Although the Edmonton-based production has been around for years --
it debuted here at the 2003 fringe -- cast members Matt Alden, Andrew
Bursey, Jon Paterson and newcomer Scott Walters are totally in the
groove. This is adult-only material, and not only because George Michael
gets a mention.
‘Boy Groove'
By Elizabeth Maupin | Sentinel Theater Critic
Posted May 22, 2005
The guys behind Boy Groove may be Canadian, but they know their boy
bands, and nobody in boy-band-happy O-Town can tell them otherwise.
Just watch the auditions for the mythical quartet Boy Groove.
"We need a muscular one and an angry one," the group's creator
says, "and it makes sense to have them both be the same."
Look at the boys' dancing, which combines the moves of a robot with
those of a wet noodle.
And listen to the sounds of their signature song, "You Make My
Hips Buck, Baby," tailor-made to make little girls swoon.
Boy Groove hits all the familiar bases - the gay band member, the
ex-Mousketeer band member, the band member who wants to be shot into
space. Best of all is the crazed rapper, Hypetastic, who advocates
killing Boy Groove in his newest hit: You can be sure there's a showdown
coming on.
Writer Chris Craddock and composer Aaron Macri know what they're about,
and their bawdy, hilarious material is in fine hands (and hips) with
the current cast: Matt Alden, Andrew Bursey, Jon Paterson and Scott
Walters. Boy Groove has wowed audiences in Edmonton, Winnipeg, Vancouver
and Toronto. If Orlando is smart, it will get in line.
Remaining performances: 11:10 p.m. Monday 5/23; 6:10 p.m. Tuesday
5/24; 10:45 p.m. Wednesday 5/25; Fri., 5/27 7:55 p.m.; 10:15 p.m. Saturday
5/28.
Orlando Weekly Review
Published 5/26/2005
Review but
Steve Schneider
I've already heard it opined that Boy Groove will be remembered as
the high point of this year's Fringe, and I'm not inclined to disagree.
A complete and utter killer of a musical comedy, this priceless Canadian
export chronicles the existential misadventures of a teen-pop quartet
that could easily have been incubated in the House of Pearlman. Four
supremely gifted actors in headset mikes play the boys, hoofing it
up hilariously and applying their own live vocals to some insanely
catchy tunes that are all the more commercially viable for being utterly
ridiculous. The play really comes into its own, however, whenever an
individual performer steps away from one of the impeccably choreographed
lineups to momentarily take on the character of a manager, a celebrity
girlfriend or any of the other peripheral personalities who figure
in the group's rise and fall. Don't do the snobbish thing and write
the topic off as superfluous to Orlandoans; just be happy we're uniquely
positioned to get all the jokes, and move on with the important business
of picking out your favorite group member. Mine's Andrew (Andrew Bursey), "the
sensitive one," who looks like a cross between Ryan Adams and
any two given Culkins.
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