Blue Man Theatrical Group By Matt Goldman

Blue Man is a theatrical group organized by Matt Goldman, Chris Wink and Phil Stanton in 1988. It was conceptualized when the three friends were serving as caterers for Glorious Food in Manhattan. This is a unique concept in the genre of theatre that revolves around three mute performers clad in blue grease pant with latex bald caps and black clothing. The theatrical group brings an ambit of items like bizarre paraphernalia, papers, sophisticated lighting, the popular rock music and above all active audience participation.

In its embryonic form, the blue men performed street shows like The Funeral for the 80s, The Alien Comic etc with a view to entertain the pedestrians. The Blue Man group received flak from The New York Times critic Stephen Holden who denounced the shows as antic pieces of clowning, painting, and music. However it was Meryl Vladimir, the artistic director of The Club who enjoyed the shows immensely and subsequently requested Mr. Holden to review it. This is how the theatrical shot earned immense popularity and it was crowned with popular awards like the Obie Award in 1991and the Lucille Lortel Award in 1992.

The Blue Man group also encapsulates a poncho section of the audience. Plastic ponchos are provided to the audience sitting in the front rows as an armor to protect themselves from paints, food stuff and the like that are thrown and sprayed by actors. The shows are offered by the group with humorous and lively elements of dark comedy, satire and dialogues uttered by actors serve incisive comments on various aspects of modern life with rising popularity and shows have now gone off Broadway.

As a concept, the Blue Man verges with homologue with character resemblance as a real human being with it is marked static appearance, speechlessness, meaningful clothing, bright blue head and an expressionless face. The concept is indeed an original one because unlike other theatrical shows with the characters communicate through speech and body language. The communication is done through eye contact and simple gestures and all these attributes of performers make them easily distinct as an audience.

Popular shows performed by the Blue Man group in the past include Live at Luxor in Las Vegas, in Berlin at the Potsdamer Platz theatre etc. The current theatrical performances of the Blue Man group include, Tubes/Rewired performed in the Astor Place Theatre in New York, Charles Playhouse in Boston, Briar Street Theatre in Chicago and Bluephoria/Live at the Venetian in Las Vegas at The Venetian Resort Hotel and Casino. The group is widening its horizon on February 28, 2008 and it is going to open branches in Stuttgart, Germany and the starting point of the international Tour over to Switzerland, Spain, Austria, and France. Blue Man Group