OC METRO - REVIEW
BUSINESS LIFESTYLE MAGAZINE

"Superb Song and Dance - TIBBIES Great American Cabaret
is putting on the Ritz in downtown Santa Ana."
By Steve Thomas

Run, don't walk, dash, don't dally, to catch one of the remaining performances of TIBBIES "Silver Screen Spectacular," playing through the end of April. The song and dance review of music from classic Hollywood movies is great entertainment - a delight overall.

Technically, TIBBIES is dinner theater - patrons enjoy a choice of well-prepared entrees along with coffee, tea and alcoholic beverages - but the show is distinctly better than most in that category. Likewise the setting. Located in the plush upper cabaret-themed showroom of the newly restored Santa Ana Performing Arts & Events Center in the heart of Santa Ana's thriving downtown Art's District, TIBBIES is reminiscent of a 1920s or '30s supper club, the kind of place portrayed in Fred Astaire movies where elegant performers sing and dance their way into the hearts of a sophisticated, martini drinking crowd.

The fun of a trip to TIBBIES begins before you actually arrive. Riding up to TIBBIES theater in an antique elevator, walking through old mahogany doorways down hallways lit with alabaster chandeliers, is a trip back through the decades to a time that perfectly suits the classy music TIBBIES talented six-person troupe currently is performing.

The show started with a medley of Irving Berlin songs beautifully sung and accompanied with some fun, half-campy, yet still elegant dancing. Live music comes from a top-notch sound system and a three-piece combo in the back of the room - piano, bass and drums.

Watching "Top Hat" and "Holiday Inn" repeatedly over the years, I have always been slightly bemused by the night club settings. Did people really get dressed up and make a night of going out to see two people dancing with each other in a floor show or onstage?

Watching hosts Jennifer and Todd Vigiletti and their fellow performers singing, and dancing to, "Easter Parade," "Dancing Cheek to Cheek" and half-a dozen other tunes - the very songs that Berlin wrote for the Astaire movies I mentioned - I suddenly understood the attraction of the club environment Hollywood recreated or imagined in those exhilarating films. It is a very swanky form of entertainment.
A medley of love songs by various composers followed Berlin and, again, the songs were wonderfully sung. There is not a bad voice among the six entertainers and all of them achieved moments of real grace and beauty as they traded off the solos-those moments when sound somehow reaches its delicate fingers into the listener's heart and opens the floodgates of emotion.

The show closes with a set of songs taken from the great animated musicals of the 1990s - "Pocahontas," "The Lion King," "Toy Story" and others - and there were moving moments in that medley as well.

In between the opening and closing sets, the cast members serve salads, dinner and dessert, and perform a variety of other musical numbers, including a set of Western songs and several celebrity impersonations. The dancing - a couple of tap numbers and many small-scale Ziegfeld-type pieces of choreography - go off without a hitch. Several are quite intricate and very well done. Jennifer, in particular, is a fine dancer. Jimmy Fisher, Jennifer's partner in the main tap number, is distinctly less light on his feet than Astaire - but then who isn't? Fisher's enthusiasm and heart make him a pleasure to watch.

The costumes are good - varied and quite elegant. Jennifer, Todd, Jimmy and the other cast members are warm, friendly people. They greet audience members on the way out, inviting everyone to return for the next show - "Forever Fifties" - which opens May 10. I'd be willing to bet that most people will in fact be back.
TIBBIES is highly recommended.

TIBBIES Great American Cabaret, 505 N. Sycamore Street, Santa Ana;
1-888-4TIBBIES

• TIBBIES REVIEW •
(TIBBIES at the Queen Mary, Long Beach)

"Classy Setting for Feel-Good Show!"

Well, it’s true the Queen Mary no longer cruises. It’s also true
that the new TIBBIES At The Queen Mary is a mix of dinner theater and lounge act, with the entertainers serving the salad. But you get the picture. TIBBIES has been a part of the entertainment scene in the Southland for a decade. Creators Todd and Jennifer Vigiletti took the time-honored dinner theater format and twisted it to fit into performances of musical reviews. The opening salvo at the Queen Mary is something called “Those
Fabulous Forties.”

It’s hard to beat the Queen Mary when it comes to the dinner
portion of the evening. And the room, a transformed Queen Elizabeth Room on the deck above the Observation Bar, was class personified. Black booths, white tablecloths, intimate service.

Sean Sooter is the star as the emcee with the cruise director
patter. He worked the crowd of international visitors with polish and provided a polished version of the challenging “Minnie the Moocher.” Everyone else in the ensemble got the chance for a solo number in the spotlight. But the group really shined when they were a group. The precision choreography on the miniscule 10’x10’ stage was something to behold, and the harmonies were sweet — particularly the ladies as the Andrews Sisters.

Special mention must be made of the three-man band. The
musicianship of Jeff Linder (piano), Clayton Ives (drums) and Chris Booke (bass) ratcheted up the quality of the evening, and the high tech sound system worked perfectly in the small room.

Most of the TIBBIES crew counts cruise ship time, Disneyland tours and Knott’s Berry Farm gigs prominently in their credits. There’s certainly nothing wrong with that. They are there to provide a good time, and that’s exactly what they do.

The staff at the Queen Mary is to be commended in its efforts to
draw people down with entertainment — Jazz Thursdays, gospel brunch on Saturdays, a comedy club several nights a week and now TIBBIES on Fridays and Saturdays.

Seating for TIBBIES begins at 7 p.m., with the show starting at 8
p.m. For more information or to make reservations, go to
www.tibbiescabaret.com or call 1-562-499-1757.