Kinky Boots at the Eccles

I have wanted to see the musical Kinky Boots for so long!  Every time Broadway in Utah (now Broadway at the Eccles) sent out a survey to season ticket holders, I always voted for this show to come to SLC.  I even contemplated getting a ticket during my theatre trip to NYC but, by that time, I knew it was coming!  I finally got to see it last night and I loved it because it is such a fun musical about having the courage to be yourself and having the courage to accept others for who they are.  Charlie (Curt Hansen) wants nothing to do with Price & Son, his father's shoe factory, so he runs away to London.  When his father dies and leaves him the factory, he soon learns that it has been losing money for years and that he must close it and fire the workers he has known all of his life.  When he meets the drag queen Lola (J. Harrison Ghee), he decides to try and save the business by meeting the needs of an under served niche market: high-heeled boots for transvestites!  There are inevitable complications and Charlie and Lola must learn to accept each other in order for their boots to be successful.  I loved all of the music, written by Cyndi Lauper, and Ghee gives an incredible performance, especially in the songs "Not My Father's Son" and "Hold Me in Your Heart."  (Hansen is endearing but I didn't find his singing to be anything special; it hardly matters because Ghee steals the show).  The ensemble is a lot of fun, particularly Lauren (Rose Hemingway), one of the factory workers, and the transvestites who perform with Lola.  The choreography is clever and the audience cheered out loud when the cast danced on moving conveyor belts during the song "Everybody Say Yeah."  I had a lot of fun watching this show and I highly recommend that you get a ticket (go here) to one of the remaining performances through January 22 at the Eccles Theatre.