Broadway and the Big Apple-Part 1

Last week I went on a 5 day girl's trip to New York City, a.k.a. the Big Apple. I know, I know, I just got back from Jamaica. But I gotta get all this traveling in before Baby Girl arrives, and ya know, Carpe Diem, right?

This was not my first trip to New York, although I didn't see ANY Broadway shows the first time I went. My traveling companions were Larissa and Megan.

After taking the red-eye, we arrived in New York around 7 a.m. Our first stop after dropping our bags at the hotel was a cute little place called Alice's Teacup.  I saw something called Spicy Hot Chocolate that I wanted to try, but they said it was a seasonal item that they only served during cold weather. Ironically, they still had a full selection of teas that were not seasonal. Megan and I shared a fruity, floral tea that had rose, hibiscus, and apple in it.

The food was amazing! I had a belgian waffle, Larissa had blueberry cornmeal pancakes, and Megan had rasberry Nutella crepes. It was so good, we decided we MUST come back before we left. (As an aside, I'm going to try REALLY hard not to make this post all about the food we ate, but I'm pregnant, so food is my best friend. Everything was GOOD!)

Next we went to the Harry Potter Exhibit. Megan is a HUGE fan, and was totally geeking out over the costumes and wands, particularly of Lucius Malfoy, whom she has a GINORMOUS crush on. 

We then ventured to the Rockafeller Center and the NBC store. Larissa was tickled to see they had a Bayside Tigers sweatshirt. I proceeded to chant the Bayside cheer as done by Jessie. If you don't remember what I'm talking about, see the picture below:

We were offered standby tickets to see the Jimmy Fallon show, with guest Tina Fey, but we would've had to be there at 3:15, and then wait for the show to start at 5:00. We decided after our red-eye flight that we'd much rather take a nap before our Broadway show that night.

That turned out to be a wise decision. Once we got back to the hotel, we set the alarm for 5:00 p.m. so that we wouldn't miss our show that night. The alarm went off twice, and neither me nor Megan even stirred. I didn't even hear it!! So, Larissa reset it for 6 p.m.

The show we saw our first night was called Wonderland. It's an Alice in Wonderland theme, but with a few twists. Alice is a grown woman from Queens. She has a young daughter and is separated from her husband. She would like to be a writer, but is currently making a living as a teacher. She must go through the Rabbit Hole in order to find her inner child, her inner "Wonderment".

The music reminded me a little of Wicked. The set was a bit simplistic, as were the costumes. Instead of the White Rabbit looking like a rabbit, he gave the general impression of being a rabbit. Same for the Catepillar and the Cheshire Cat. Perhaps it is because the audience already knows what the characters are supposed to look like, so your imagination fills in the gaps. The story-line was a little cheesy, but ultimately enjoyable.

In this story, the villian was not the Queen of Hearts, but the Mad Hatter. This Mad Hatter had overthrown the previous Mad Hatter, and was looking to overthrow the Queen. Oh, and by the way, she was a WOMAN with a floor length peacoat and thigh-high, lace-up, stilleto boots! How cool is that? 

Other notable parts were the Hispanic Cheshire Cat, who had John-Leguizamo-characteristics. In this version of the story, he had lost his ability to turn invisible. However, the other characters didn't have the heart to tell him, so whenever he came around, they would say, "Oh no, where did he go?"

I especially liked the characters of the Knights who stole the show with their 90's boy-band dance moves.

You can read a more in-depth review of Wonderland by reading Larissa's full review here.

Don't miss the next installment in the series,  Broadway and the Big Apple--Part Two.