Christmas Show

Tonight Mom, A.Vee and I had tickets to “The Magical Spirit of Ireland Featuring the Incredible Irish Tenors” at the Palace Theater in Myrtle Beach. As usual, Mom was behind schedule so since I had the tickets, I went ahead into the theater to save us three seats, thinking I’d just slip out when they arrived and bring them to our places.

I bought these tickets online, and while it made an impression on me when the seating chart came up on the screen and showed we were going to be in 3 of the best seats in the house, despite having bought the tickets only 3 days prior to the show - I didn’t think anything of it except that maybe a large group must have cancelled at the last minute and we got lucky.

So this afternoon I thought I’d beat the rush on Will-Call that was sure to ensue before the evening performance, and picked up the tickets early. The lady behind the counter mentioned that guests start to “line up” at 5:30 to get a seat. I hesitated, but said, “Oh, we already have our seats…right?” She shook her head and said, “Did you purchase your tickets online?” I said yes. She said, “It says it on the website, but a lot of people don’t notice, but it’s a general admission show.” Slightly disappointed, but still OK with this, I said oh well, and called Mom to let her know they should probably leave a little early to get to the theater. Mom doesn’t “do” last minute plans all that great, but with 4 hours notice I thought maybe I could buy 5-10 minutes.

This is the third year we've gone to a show the week of Christmas down here at the beach. Last year we went to Dixie Stampede's Christmas Show, which, at the time, was fun and a unique style of entertainment, but then again, I'm a sucker for anything with horses in it. And I must admit they do a beautiful job with a live nativity scene replete with a-dor-a-ble baby lambs and goats, donkeys and even camels! The year before that, though, was by far the BEST Christmas show we've seen down here - it was the one at the Alabama Theater and it was LOVELY and I remember leaving there filled with all kinds of Christmas spirit!

But I digress. So I arrive at the theater and there are already a good 30-40 people in line. I approach a clean cut guy wearing a very nice suit and say to him, “You look official - the rest of my party isn’t here yet, should I go ahead and get in line anyway?” He steps back and I hear him say something in a nice Irish accent to the affect of “I’m in the show - you’ll need to ask that nice lady over there.” Hmmm… You’re in the show? Then what are you doing out here? OH - I see - there’s a photographer and he’s taking pictures of the folks in line with you and this other guy in an identical suit and tie and I’ll bet he’s Irish too. God! Dollywood Strikes AGAIN! What’s with all this money-grubbing-let’s-make-a-buck-off-every-Joe- Schmoe-rampant-cruise-ship-style-exploitation?!? I go over to the “nice lady” taking tickets and ask her the same thing.

She says I can get in line and go in, and when the rest of my party arrives I can come back out, give her their tickets, and we can all be seated. Whatev.

Inside the theater, there I am, waiting for my party to arrive, already in our seats, surrounded by out-of-towners dressed in jeans and hoodies and pretty much nobody under the age of 60 in sight. I observe that the “theater” is incredibly small. Like, smaller than a movie theater. I text back and forth with Gary a few times, bemoaning my mother’s curse of being late to EVERYTHING, then, at 6:00 on the dot, the lights dim and I panic, because the rows are very narrow and I’m on the inside of 3 elderly people, and I can just imagine what it will be like when Mom and A.Vee get in there, trying to feel for their seats in the dark, taking off their coats, and get situated.

6:01, the show starts. Although I was at least 6-8 rows back, I may have well been on the stage itself we were so close and it was such a small theater. Six girls, probably in their early twenties, appear on stage in VERY short dresses which could easily be taken for bathing suits with skirts, wearing black tights and big, clod-hopper Irish Dancing shoes. They were doing the typical Irish Lord of the Dance number, legs swinging at the knee and ankle as they leap higher and higher in the air... But since there were only 6 of them, and because we were so close to the stage, it was more like watching a small group of cheerleaders. I swear - that’s exactly what I was thinking, then they started shrieking loudly to accent certain moves - and I SWEAR it sounded like they were doing a cheer.

Shortly the two clean cut and nicely dressed Irish guys from outside with the photographer came on stage singing a melo-dramatic “Danny Boy” (when did that become a Christmas song?) and then breaking into a very lame stand-up comedy routine. I could just hear the Grandma’s and Grandpa’s in the audience saying, “Don’t you just love their accents!” It was about to make me puke.

As it turned out, those two guys make up the “Incredible Irish Tenors” of the “Magical Spirit of Ireland”. Those two and the cheerleaders. Then they broke into some Irish drinking song which I could not identify, then one more round of the cheerleaders, and by 6:10 I’d seen enough. I got up from my seat, excused myself past the three elderly folks, and walked out of the room.

I got Mom on the phone, she said they were just parking. I told her I really wasn’t sure they needed to come in, briefly told them what had transpired thus far. Mom reminded me that I had paid $90 for the tickets and she absolutely hated for me to lose my money and suggested I see if I could get a refund for at least one ticket. I hadn’t even thought about trying to get a refund, since it is clearly printed on the tickets “No Refunds/No Exchanges”. But I walked over to the box office anyway, and said in a polite, but firm tone, “I’m really sorry, but this is NOTHING like what I expected for $30 a seat. It’s like a school play in there, and I am wondering if there’s anything you can do to refund my money?” The lady behind the counter jumped to her feet, mentioned something about how a lot of people think they’re coming to see “Lord of the Dance” (which I totally wasn't) but she’d give me my money back anyway. I didn’t want to be ugly, so I pretty much kept my mouth shut since she was, in fact, giving me a full refund. But DAMN! That show was RI.DIC.U.LOUS. And SUCH a rip-off. I’ve known plenty of Irish guys - REAL Irish guys, and I could just hear them laughing their *arses* off at all the hoards of ugly-shorts-and-sandals-wearing American tourists paying $30 bucks a head to see that crap. It really made me kinda sick to my stomach. As I walked out the door, the gentleman manning the information booth calls out to me, “Enjoy the Show!” - completely oblivious to the conversation I’d just had standing directly in front of him, and I just smiled broadly and walked out.

We went across the street and had steaks at T-Bones instead, and no doubt had a MUCH better time than had we stayed for the magic. Next year we're DEFINITELY going back to the Alabama Theater!