Yay!!! Even though I haven't seen Wicked yet, I know why Avenue Q beat it out for the Tony!! The show was so utterly charming and delightful and potty-mouthed and FUN that I can hardly express how much I liked it. This is now my favorite comedy musical (hard to compare the dramaticals to the comedicals. I like them differently.) and it only improves upon listening, which I have confirmed after playing the soundtrack eleventy billion times.
It's hard to talk about the songs and the characters without giving away the plot, but it almost doesn't matter. These characters are archetypes, the storylines are familiar, and the songs are jaunty echos of tunes from childhood. The show's brilliance lays in the gusto, the sweetness, the warmth, and hilarity that unfolds as these people WHO ARE US, puppet and puppetmasters alike, are explored.
I can say that the technical skills of the puppeteers are a real treat to behold. Some puppets take multiple people, while some people play multiple puppets. Sometimes the actors voice a puppet as they are acting with OTHER puppets. It's sort of dizzying to think about and artfully deceptive to watch. The human mind is very good at fooling itself and you could almost swear that the puppet's voice was coming out of its mouth, not from all the way across the stage.
The staging is definitely designed to appeal to the Sesame Street generation X to Nexters, with people and puppets and TV screens and lessons abounding. The songs are funny/beautiful because they are true! and ridiculously easy to sing. It's been a couple of weeks (granted, we've been listening to the soundtrack), but some of the songs are still floating around in my subconscious. I often find myself humming or thinking about songs and punchlines.
I can't wait to see it again!
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