Bette: Bathhouse to Broadway at the Greater Manchester Fringe 2019

Bette: Bathhouse to Broadway, at the Kings Arms in Salford as part of Manchester Fringe, was a highly entertaining tribute to Bette Midler by Jonathan Booth accompanied by George Skrickland on keyboards. The upstairs theatre was sold out for this one off event, and for an hour we were serenaded by the diva.

Jonathan and George sang and played the ballads well, and one of the sadder songs , Hello in There - an early recording is here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ldqc0_vzfgk – brought a lump to the throat. Obviously we heard Wind Beneath my Wings, and we had some Sophie Tucker jokes that I hadn’t heard before.

The show fell into two halves which allowed a change of costume whereby a very sparkly Bette returned to the stage , and there was a bit of audience participation and singalong. At the end we all called for more but there was another show in the theatre so sadly there were no encores. A pity as we could have stayed a lot longer.

Paul Schofileld for Canal St Online.

Published: 29-Jul-2019 (5501)