The Last Night of Summer

Just as my first Hollywood Bowl event of the season marks the official opening of my summer, so, too, does my last Bowl outing signify the end of my hot weather season. Such was the case last Saturday when my Bowl ticket was wanded for the last time in 2007. The Bowl does go on for a few more weeks, but with nothing that even slightly molests my attention.

I have to admit that I entered into Bowl attendance this year with a soupcon of trepidation. It would be the first year without the gifted John Mauceri at the helm. I really thought his departure would leave a huge creative crevice. Well, shut my mouth. That was not the case. My mix of Bowl fun this year ran the gamut from my amazing discovery of a talent I never knew existed (Jamie Cullum) to a truly superb staging of "South Pacific" with Reba McIntire and Brian Stokes Mitchell. There was another night of Gladys...Knight, that is, which was great fun and the superlative 40th anniversary tribute to the Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's album, which provided a great snapshot of the mostly former-hippie audience reconnecting with their drug-hazed past.

The last Bowl event certainly wasn't the most solid musically, but it sure was a major giddy producer. Watching the audience was probably more fun than listening to the tunes. The musical performers offered up was a deliciously improbable pairing of the 60s/70s soul act, The Spinners, and the 80s hitmakers, Daryl Hall and John Oates. As a result, the age composition of the audience was undoubtedly the widest I ever seen anywhere. There were twentysomethings and sixtysomethings. There were baby strollers and senior citizen walkers. It was a marketer's absolute nightmare. But, truly, the focus was on the oldsters. Before every Bowl concert, they announce the name of the sponsor of the event. We speculated that we would not have been surprised if they told us that this show was "generously provided for by the AARP."

The opening salvo was fired by the Spinners, or, by whoever is passing themselves off as the Spinners these days. We're not even talking that these folks are the sons of the originals. For all I know, they could have been day laborers that were picked up a half hour before showtime from the corner of Franklin and Cahuenga. If you closed your eyes, the music sounded like the real thing. But, if you watched these knuckleheads moving on stage, you would probably guess they had basically just met and rehearsed for the first time in the mens room. They kept yelling out "Hello, Holly-WOOD." By emphasizing the last "wood," they were looking to turn this into their "hood." Frankly, you really can't mess up the Spinners' songbook of hits too much. But, these guys could just have easily been doing a gig at my goddaughter's senior prom as well as playing the Bowl venue. While the crowd screamed wildly, the Spinners sashayed off after 30 minutes and said goodbye to Holly-WOOD! When we were driving home, I am convinced we saw two of these guys in line at a check cashing place on Fountain.

Intermission allowed me to survey the kooks in attendance. Somehow, the older folks had rolled down the hill to the concession stands. I saw more men in the bathroom trying to adjust their combovers. The previous generation's penchant for nicotine was clearly evident in the smoking area which looked like a backroom at the Democratic Convention in 1932.

Because I had added this concert to my Bowl calendar at a later date, I did not score the usual premium seating I am always accorded. Instead, we were a little farther up in the "cheap seats." The difference in behavior is astounding. The cheaper the price of the ticket, the more uncouth the crowd. I was apparently checking in at Riff Raff Headquarters. This was probably the worst behaved concert crowd I have ever seen. There was constant conversation, especially during the music. There were two blonde magpies down the row, who might as well have been enjoying a latte and a muffin at Starbucks. There was a Mexican bunch behind us who inexplicably brought two five year-olds to the concert, and not even glowsticks could give them from screaming. I was dying to know the Spanish word for "babysitter." After intermission, I turned around to find them gone, so I can only assume that INS had shown up. There was a couple two rows ahead who couldn't keep their hands off each other and we essentially watched them take the sexual journey from foreplay to cuddling.

While they were immensely entertaining, I am not sure what to make of Hall and Oates. I was aghast at how many of their hits I had forgotten. But, they both have certainly seen better days. Let's face it, "Will and Grace" did do an episode where they were the talent at a wedding reception. I know that Daryl Hall had a long but ultimately successful battle against lyme disease. John Oates, however, looks like what I would imagine Howard Stern's Baba Booey would look like if he was eighty. There's a very strange thing going on with his head. Oates looked like he had been in the makeup chair for "Planet of the Apes" but they didn't quite finish the job.

Appearances aside, the audience didn't care. Most of them adjusted their knee replacements and were in the aisles rocking and rolling. There had to be a whole bunch of broken hips x-rayed at Cedars by the following morning. A bunch of ladies from the Pasadena bridge club started this frantic chant for them to play "Rich Girl" and they finally compiled. I was personally waiting for "Private Eyes," which, somehow, missed the night's playlist altogether. Instead, they closed the last encore with a rendition of Billy Paul's "Me and Missus Jones." That moved one grand dame in front of me to start wild gyrations, which led me to think that she was either swallowing her tongue or that, perhaps, she was indeed the real Missus Jones.

As the crowd creaked to their cars, I took one final look at the Hollywood Bowl. See ya in 2008!

Dinner last night: Honey Chipotle Chicken Crispers at Chili's.