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Tantallon’s USO Christmas a Nice Christmas Gift to Veterans

By • Dec 3rd, 2006 • Category: Reviews

Listen to our review of A USO Christmas performed by the Tantallon Community Players [MP3 2:59 .8MB].

Laura: Tonight we saw A USO Christmas performed by the Tantallon Community Players in Fort Washington, Maryland.

Mike: A USO Christmas is a radio program written by Charla Rowe. It takes place at a canteen in Paris, France in 1944. The show is broadcast over the radio to the United States and to all the fighting men over in Europe. The show includes personalities such as Bob Hope, Lena Horn, The Andrew Sisters, Ella Fitzgerald, Carmen Miranda, Pearl Bailey, Elizabeth Taylor, Judy Garland, Mae West, Rita Hayworth, and President Roosevelt. Each of the performers sings a song. Some of them tell a little story. They interact with the Bob Hope character and have a good time comforting the men who are out fighting and their families back home.

Mike: A USO Christmas was directed by Jo Rake. The music direction was by Charla Rowe and was produced by Germaine Donnelly and Jo Rake.

Laura: I liked it. Everyone seemed to have a good time. The performers seemed to enjoy it very much as well as the audience. The songs had a real Christmas feel to them and was a nice beginning of the holiday season.

Mike: It was a fun show. There were a lot of Christmas songs of course, but there were also a lot of songs from the 40’s that you’ve heard and some you may not have heard. But they were really well done. The actors I’m sure had a good time dressing up. Some of the costumes were very elaborate. It seemed like everyone was having a really fun time. It was a really large cast. At the closing song everybody was on stage. From where I was sitting I couldn’t see everyone, but I counted 48 people.

Laura: This was a radio program so it was a simple set. You had an orchestra on one side of the stage and a canteen area on the other side of the stage. And then the performers and the people at the canteen kind of in the middle to sing the songs when it was their turn to sing.

Mike: There were some sound issues with the show. Some of the microphones didn’t click on or weren’t set up correctly. But that got better as the show went on. There were a couple minor lighting cues that got messed up. It seemed like the music was really really loud. We asked the director about that afterwards. She said that the theatre is actually designed for doing concerts, it’s a concert hall. The hall was doing it’s job in making the music really loud for everybody to be able to hear. It was a good show.

Laura: A USO Christmas in playing at the Harmony Hall Regional Center on Sunday the third and Sunday the tenth at 2 PM and Friday the eighth and Saturday the ninth at 8 PM. Veterans get into the show for free.

Mike: And now, on with the show.

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