Burbank 2008 - Lucy Lawless in Concert

ROXY THEATRE - SUNSET BOULEVARD - L.A. - CALIFORNIA

25 January 2008

The first time I wxas going to attend to a Xena-con (that is the expression for a Xena convention amongs Xenafans), and I even got tickets for the concert of Lucy at the Roxy Theatre at Sunset Boulevard. Yes, there where the Chinese Theatre and the Walk of Fame is.
Doors opened and everybody rushed in. Had to, cause there were no numbered places, not even for the VIP seats. We experienced that there is a world of difference when it comes to the term of VIP tickets and VIP places. The only difference is that you pay double of a standroom place. The ones taht got in first for the standingroom where even closer to the stage then us, with a VIP seat.
European standards are a lot different. Standingroom is behind the seat and that means far behind the VIP seats.
Anyhow we got ourselves 2 nice places on the 3rd row, at the corner of a small row and right in the middle of the stage. All other Xena fans, which already attended several concerts and conventions in the past, where already very excited..
We, for our first Lucy Concert and even our first encounter with her in real life, didn't know what to expect. That was also some kind of excitement. We were enormously curious about the woman whom we until now only knew from the TV-screen. We still couldn't believe that we finally would see her in real life. That is something we in Europe can't imagine as that doesn't exist such kind of encounters. It is even almost impossible to obtain a picture, even a signature of a leading singer. And here you simply can meet, see a big TV-Movie celebrity. So imagine our feeling, able to experience this for the first time. During our wait for the start of the concert we were nicely surprise by Renée O'Connor who simply pasted millimeters beside my wife Karin (and she is a ROC-fan) and took place in the lounge just behind us. Indeed, celebrities just go sit amongs all other people. Ain't that great! And what was really remarkable is the fact that everybody does keep their distance and don't disturb them at any time. Xena-fans do have discipline which needs to be said.You really need to experience this kind of ''close-encounters" of the Stars.
After our adventure in New Zealand - Auckland - Bethells Beach visiting the xena film locations and going into the footsteps of Lucy (as we named it ourselves) we were ready for this.
The last seconds fade away, the music started, the crowd became crazy!!! Curtains up and Lucy started to sing and came onto stage!!!!
THE MOMENT!!!
There she was, Lucy Lawless aka Xena! Singing the medley Do You Really Want To Hurt me? Heartache Tonight. Woaw!! I couldn't believe I saw her just in front of me. Just a approx 2 meters in front of me. OMG!!! Here she was, Xena from TV, right her singing. I took about 300 pictures (Hallelujah, the 4GB memory cards do exist).

What a voice! I do love her singing with her natural soft tembre. Then you are drifting away. And then you can enjoy that wonderfull soft voice of her. She is a marvelous performer. She brings you joy, peace and you get oh so relaxed. She takes you away in another universe. The Kiwi accent is a special topic. I truly hope she never loses that. That is the special touch of her. Love that accent. Smooth and soft spoken english on a slow tempo and so simply to understand.

Right! Back to the concert, yes, indeed. Lucy knows perfectly how to communicate with the audiance and vice versa. There is such a nice direct channel. Unbelievable but true, I admire the way she recognizes her fans, especially the ones who do follow her everywhere. I was told by John Bethell at Auckland (who was her private driver during 2 seasons on the job), that she is such a lovely, down to earth woman with a remarkable memory for names, faces and persons. Well, it is true. There are even fans who she knows by name!!!!! And then we have the mutual respect.

Lucy continued surprising us with a nice palet of songs. Sometimes we sang along. At a certain moment she sang a nice, slow, romantic song. Everybody got so quiet (oh so quiet - oops, that's another song!). Karin (my lovely wife) and I got sitting closer to eachother, head to head (romantic ain't it?) and got charmed away by Lucy's performances. It was as we were gone off the world. Suddenly .................... EYE CONTACT.................All of a sudden those beautiful eyes got deep into mine. I stared and stared and stared back. I captured and kept that moment. What a moment! Back to reality I grabbed my camera and captured that moment. Almost 1 year later I still can recall that beautifull moment. Later on, our 2 friends Lisa and Susan, told us that it was no imagination of us. Lucy can see clearly people about 5 rows far in the audience. When she captures a nice view she takes it. So this time we were truly blessed. And that for a first time.
The show went on in 1 part. No change of outfit. In stead the break was animated by a small quiz. A Q&A competition between a Xenafan and Lucy's friend Melissa. The winner was promised to get a lunch with Lucy. Lucy known for her humour and jokes we were already playing with what that lunch would contain exactly. The quiz started and Lucy did put up banners in the air with the answer so everybody could check if the answer of the candidates were correct or not. Ofcourse the Xena fan won. Handing over the price went immediately. Lucy asked for a supporting person for the winner. And here comes Lucy's joke. The supporting person became the table by kneeling on knees and hands. Table covered with a table-cloth and 2 cocktails were served. There was the tête-à-tête reward for the winner. Only Lucy could come up with such funny thing. Lunch over and concert continues.
In the second part Renée O'Connor appeared on stage aswell. Just before that a Xenafan returned a joke to Lucy by throwing a string to her. So when Roc came onto stage that attribute went into the pants. Together singing they got everybody wild. Although Roc is no singer, she did a very well job. Therefore Lucy had choosen a song that matched Renée's little singing talent..

It was a perfect, great, cool evening! I saw Lucy for the first time in real life which was an exciting, unforgetable and marvelous experience.

She is a perfect performer with a perfect voice. I will treasure this for always

Martine De Grauw 28/12/2008