Laughing with the Legends

We were amongst the few people who attended the last show of the season at the Old Opera House in Hawkinsville a week ago. Of all the great performances this past year, this one had to be near the top with all around good fun, especially for those of us who lived through that period.
Oh sure! Most of us men are crowned with gray hair or none at all, but we still feel the rhythm, and the women for the most part are still beautiful in a wonderful, mature way. Sometimes I wonder who coined that phrase, “The Fabulous Fifties.” As most of us remember those days, we smile at those treasured memories—sometimes we even joke about them now. Ahh! We were so young!
A man and his wife—entertainers for sure—put on quite a show on that old historic stage that night. With the unlikely last name of Gurl, his Brian and hers Joey, they sang, danced, did comedy sketches, and, boy oh boy, did he play the piano! He began with a medley of 1950s songs, beginning with some from the “Sound of Music” and going all the way to Little Richard with some of his “Tuti Fruiti” and “Long Tall Sally” which showed us right away his diversity with the piano.

His wife, Joey came on stage and did a great old Lucy rendition of advertisement of a vitamin type drink loaded with 25% alcohol and wound up with a side-splitting skit for those of us in the audience. The two of them teamed up to show us their version of The Hit Parade with Joey in a big box representing Old Gold Cigarettes. Afterwards, Brian hit the stage again with a special on Elvis, while Joey played the role of an awe-struck teeny bopper.
There was a smattering of kids in the audience, but by and large it was the over the hill group who laughed the longest and the loudest at ourselves as they performed what much of the world viewed us as in the 1950s.
In the second act after a short intermission for them to catch their breath, and why wouldn’t they need to do that? After all, they were imitating us, a very energetic bunch in those days.
Perhaps, Brian Gurl’s most enthusiastic act was when he began as Liberace with his famous suits and a candelabra for the piano. By the time he was through with the “smiley one,” he literally flew into a Jerry Lee Lewis aka “The Killer” playing the piano from head to toe, frontwards to backwards, fingers and feet, all flying across the keyboard. That act reminded me so much of one day in our World History class when the teacher was late getting to the room. Most of the boys and some of the girls literally forced Billy (last name withheld to protect the innocent) to play his lively rendition of “Lady of Spain” on the upright antique piano. When she came in, everyone else was quiet and he was playing hard. The teacher grabbed him by the nap of the neck and practically flung him in the direction of his desk.
Tell me the fifties weren’t fabulous!