By The Plaid Adder

Comments: plaidder@mindspring.com

The United Center is a giant stadium built, essentially, so that the Bulls could make more money off Michael Jordan. It is a fairly new facility, and like most new sports centers was built in a blight-struck part of town where real estate could be cheaply bought and the residents wouldn't be out there protesting the effect it would have on their neighborhood. Now, the rhetoric that usually accompanies this sort of thing has to do with bringing jobs to the community and revitalizing the city, and you could see how people would believe it. That's a big-ass stadium, and it holds a lot of people, and the Bulls, before they lost all their good people and began sucking, were a serious draw. Putting the stadium there meant bringing all kinds of paying customers into a part of town where otherwise they would never in a million years have gone. Golden opportunity, right?

Well, not really. The only discernible evidence we saw that the community was profiting from this was the number of parking lots that have sprung up around the stadium. There's nothing *else* around the stadium--no little restaurants, shops, bars, etc. That's because the stadium is a self-contained universe wherein you can find anything you need, and the whole thing is obviously set up to cater for the individual who wants to attend the Bulls game but is very uncomfortable with its geographical location. You drive to the lot, park your car, get into the United Center, and start paying through the nose for food, drink and merchandise.

And I do mean pay. $4.00 for a "jumbo" hot dog, the word "jumbo" being loosely applied; the cheapest soda going at $2.75. I don't even want to think about the beer prices. We saw signs up at the concessions counter announcing the beer sales cutoff time (7 minutes into the 4th quarter for basketball, earlier I think for hockey) and insisting "Maximum sale 4 beers at one purchase." Because official programs were $15.00, we didn't buy one, so the review will be drawing solely on my razor-sharp memory.

We were dismayed to discover that we were actually in the very last row, as in if you go any higher you hit the roof. But this turned out to be just fine--with the dramatic lighting the skaters were highly visible and very compelling. So I can safely say there's not a bad seat in the house, because if there was one, we were in it. As I observed, when the announcer warned us not to toss teddy bears or flowers onto the ice, "We'd have to fire it from a rocket launcher to get it out there." The people in the row in front of us thought this was funny and repeated it, which made Liza bat her eyelashes at me.

The audience was overwhelmingly female, although there was a wide age distribution--a lot of seniors, a lot of children with their parents. Most of the men we saw appeared to be there as attachments to more interested women. But then this is sort of how I see the world anyway, so moving on...

The show opens with a little number introducing each skater--they all go out on the ice and tool around to some random rock music while the announcer says, "Two-time Olympic silver medalist Elizabeth Maaaaaaaaaaaaanley!" and then she goes out and does a 30-second thing to her own song before fading back into the crowd to let someone else do it. I assume that the skaters have some control over the songs they choose (which seemed to be unrelated to the numbers they then performed). Unfortunately at this distance the only one I remember is that Rudy Galindo came out in a black satin jacket with something written on the back in rhinestones and did his spot to "Time Warp"--which incorporated the choreography, inclusive of the pelvic thrust. Go Rudy.

At the end, there was an attempt to make them all move in some sort of sync. I said, "I wonder how hard it was to get them to work together?" and Liza said, "I don't kn--whoops, I guess it was pretty hard." They just really, really weren't into doing the whole Miss America Chorus of 50 thing; the choreography was simple enough but you could tell their hearts weren't in it.

There were a lot of skaters on the program--you're trying to fill 2 hours with 4-minute segments, you need a lot of people. Here's what I can remember in terms of who was there (again, without the $15.00 program it's tough to be complete and accurate):

MEN: Todd Eldredge, Michael Weiss, Rudy Galindo, Elvis Stojko, Victor Petrenko, Phillippe Candeloro, Laurent Talbert, some eminently forgettable young-gun American guy, Brian Boitano, Alexei Urmanov

WOMEN: Elizabeth Manley, Oksana Baiul, Michelle Kwan, Nicole Bobek, Surya Bonaly

PAIRS: Bereshnaya and Sikarulidsev (spelling), Kasakova and Dmitriev

ICE DANCERS: Punsalan and Swallow, Anisina and Peiserat

Rather than do a blow-by-blow, let me just hand out some awards:

MOST IMPROVED WHEN YOU SEE IT IN PERSON: Anissina and Peiserat.

I've seen their "Man in the Iron Mask" routine on TV, and although it looks neat it struck me as sort of overly cheesy and not that gripping. Seen live it's a whole different story. I guess there is something to this whole human-drama thing--with real people in front of you it's for some reason much more engaging, even if you are up in the nosebleed seats. In general, I have to say that it is definitely worth the expense and effort to see skating live--for one thing you control your own perspective, so you can see how the skaters really use the rink space, and you look at what you want to look at. For another, you don't have Dick Button in your ear saying, "Skaters just don't point their toes any more." The routines themselves are more exciting, plus you get to cheer for your favorites. We did a lot of yelling, especially for Rudy and for Oksana (poor Oksana...see below). The skaters all seemed to follow an applause convention whereby they did one bow to each quadrant of the stadium, giving the different sections the opportunity to try to out-scream the others. Victor Petrenko was particularly adroit at milking this for all it was worth...more on him later. But anyhow, when you see them live one thing you have a better sense for is how fast ice dancing moves, and that helps with the intensity and the appreciation. We love Anissina and Peiserat. They rock.

First Runner-Up: Bereshnaya and her long-named partner.

We found that the pairs were a lot more exciting in person than on TV, partly I guess because the throws are just so damn impressive when you can actually see the speed and distance involved. B&S did a lovely number to "Impossible Dream" with a lot of really interesting positioning and use of her flexibility, and they did it really well. They rock too.

Second Runner-Up: The Charlotte.

This is a move that Michelle Kwan found in the archives, and Peggy Fleming made a big deal about it when she put one into her free skate for the nationals. You put your hand on the ice and do sort of a one-person death spiral. On TV we felt that too much was being made of this move. In person, though, I have to say, it's damn cool.

How do I know this? Not because Michelle Kwan did one (she didn't skate her competition program), but because everyone else watched that program and went, "Hey…that's cool. I want me one of those." I think at least 4 other skaters had charlottes in their programs. I guess if Michelle Kwan jumped off a bridge they'd all do it too. 

FRANK SINATRA MEMORIAL I DID IT MY WAY AWARD: Surya Bonaly.

The judges turned up their noses at her for her entire amateur career, but Surya's out here now doing back-flips to her heart's content wearing orange spangly stuff and having, it looks like, a great time. And just as she never let the judges tell her where to get off, she has not catered to the American crowd, unless you count her selection of Bananarama's "Venus" as her snippet for the opening group number. Her routine was to a German song--no English lyrics, no Broadway cheese--and she did a great job with it. Of all the women from past eras, she's probably the one whose technical ability is best preserved.

KRAFT INDIVIDUALLY-WRAPPED SLICE OF AMERICAN CHEESE AWARD: Todd Eldredge.

That Colm Wilkinson piece of treacle he skates to is not doing anything for him, I tell you. It's a nice program, but the music is just too...pukeworthy.

FINE CHEESE AWARD: Brian Boitano.

His Frank Sinatra medley had cheese, but it also had class.

BABE MAGNET AWARD: Phillippe Candeloro.

I swear the ushers were sweeping up the fallen bodies of swooning women in the aisles after his number. He's still doing the 3 Musketeers routine he used I think in the last winter Olympics--but he does it well, and with a sword. I have to admit that as much as we're annoyed by his whole "Regardez-moi, les femmes, je suis francais, aimez-moi" attitude, the man's still got it in terms of both technical ability (he was the only man who was still doing his competition number and doing it clean) and star power. He looks pretty good in the boots, I have to say. At least the thousands of screaming female fans sure thought so.

SCOTT HAMILTON SHOWMANSHIP AWARD: Victor Petrenko.

Victor is approaching his skating-dowager status with a sense of humor, as evidenced by his selection of "When I'm Sixty-Four" as his intro number. He's no longer throwing gratuitous triple axels into his routine just because he can. But he still did a great routine to a Michael Jackson medley, which incorporated much of the choreography we remember so fondly from "Beat It" and "Billie Jean." Unfortunately the medley also drew on the Gloved One's more recent oeuvre. Victor was clearly playing to the crowd from the first second to the last, and really tried to goad the audience into out-applauding itself at the end. He's still compelling to watch, with a personality that projects even up to the last row in the United Center.

DAN QUAYLE MEMORIAL LET ME TELL YOU, YOU ARE NO VICTOR PETRENKO AWARD: Alexei Urmanov.

Alexei may have technical proficiency out the wazoo, but he's still cruising Aisle 9 at the Wal-Mart shopping for a personality. Skating to "I Put A Spell On You," he failed to put a spell on anyone or anything. He's trying to do the whole sex-symbol swiveling-pelvis thing, but he is not sexy enough for his shirt, or for that big white flappy jacket he was waving around I guess as if it were a magician's cape.

SADDEST STORY: Oksana Baiul.

Oksana's trying, she really is. But it's just gotta hurt for her to be out there doing programs that are so much less demanding than what she used to do and still struggling with them. She was actually not the only one to be a little shaky--Elizabeth Manley fell out of a couple jumps and so did some of the men--but she obviously takes everything so hard, it's sad to watch. Liza is very impressed with her artistry and thinks she's much more interesting to watch than most of the other skaters, and I agree with that; but it's also sort of draining to be on the edge of your seat going, "Land the jump! Land the jump! Land the--OK, you two footed it, but that's good! Now land this one!" She made it all the way to the end, and then fell on her last jump, which was very sad. She looked sad during her curtesys, and forgot to do the calling-the-quarters thing. When Victor Petrenko then came out to do his number, and everyone was clapping and screaming for him as the announcer read his credentials, you could still see poor Oksana trailing off the ice toward the exit in the dark, bent over with her hands on her knees. I wonder if they speak to each other now...

MOST ENCOURAGING: Nicole Bobek.

Nicole has a history of choking in competition, but she does great when she's not under all that pressure. She skated to a Blondie medley ("Heart of Glass," "One Way Or Another," and something else I don't remember) and she did a great job. One of the children in the vicintiy observed, "Her dress is really shiny."

MOST GRATUITOUS DISPLAY OF BAD TASTE: Laurent Talbert.

Laurent is evidently the French national champion. I hadn't heard of him before, but I was prepared to give him the benefit of the doubt. Until his routine, that is. We had a hard time figuring out at first what was going on--he was obviously in uniform, with a big comedy potbelly, a large mustache, and a bottle of what looked like it was supposed to be vodka. Then the routine got started, and it became clearer: for some reason, Laurent had chosen to do a Drunken Soviet Soldier shtick as his routine. As my students say, "Drunk people are funny," and I guess if a drunk person is funny then a drunk Russian is even funnier, if you're French. However, we found the whole thing rather bewildering, to say nothing of tasteless. Given the fact that he's on a program with a number of Russians, at least one of whom is recovering from a well-publicized battle with alcoholism, I thought maybe he would have been safer with an Edith Piaf medley or something.

MOST DISAPPOINTING FAILURE IN TERMS OF AUDIENCE PARTICIPATION: The mass refusal to do the "YMCA" thing during Rudy Galindo's Village People medley.

I mean, come on guys. There was one person down by the front whose arms I saw in the air; the rest of them were just sort of chuckling and saying, "That young man sure is hamming it up, isn't he, Mildred?" Camp is a joke that most of the Midwest is ill-equipped to appreciate, but we tried to clap a little extra-loud for encouragement.

BIGGEST MISTAKE: The closing group number.

There were a couple interesting novelty moments--Rudy and Elizabeth Manley becoming pairs skaters for about 30 seconds, the two Russian pairs teaming up to do a double death spiral—but mostly they were sort of embarrassed to be out ther edoing their trained-seals routine. The only one who was at all trying to make the choreography work was Nicole Bobek; the rest of them were just going, "OK, just bring me my check as soon as I get off the ice."

So there you have it. All in all, it was a great time, and I wholeheartedly recommend the experience.