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Ronnie Spector's Beyond the Beehive review – 'A good chunk of the show qualifies as pure joy' Ronnie Spector's Beyond the Beehive review – 'A good chunk of the show qualifies as pure joy'
(about 5 hours later)
The one thing Beyond the Beehive doesn't offer is the hairdo Ronnie Spector made famous: the beehive of 1964 was long ago replaced by a tousled rock-star haystack. But then the point of this audiovisual show is that the Spector of 50 years ago was a very different person. She was Ronnie Bennett then – "the rose of Spanish Harlem", which doesn't do justice to her punky sensuality – and her Ronettes had just met the producer Phil Spector. What happened from there is related through music, video and anecdote, all of it bleakly dominated by the spectre of her ex-husband.The one thing Beyond the Beehive doesn't offer is the hairdo Ronnie Spector made famous: the beehive of 1964 was long ago replaced by a tousled rock-star haystack. But then the point of this audiovisual show is that the Spector of 50 years ago was a very different person. She was Ronnie Bennett then – "the rose of Spanish Harlem", which doesn't do justice to her punky sensuality – and her Ronettes had just met the producer Phil Spector. What happened from there is related through music, video and anecdote, all of it bleakly dominated by the spectre of her ex-husband.
First, though, a good chunk of the show qualifies as pure joy. Spector is a drily witty narrator, and has astonishing stories, with photographs to back them up. Here are the Ronettes with Dusty Springfield, who borrowed their strong-hold hairspray; there they are dancing in skin-tight dresses, posing a threat to the Beatles' morals (there was an encounter with John Lennon, but she "stayed loyal to Phil", as she regretfully puts it). Her singing, once the embodiment of street-urchin heartbreak, is raspier, but her versions of Walking in the Rain and (The Best Part of) Breakin' Up are serviceably sassy. So this is where Amy Winehouse – whose mother is in the audience – got her groove. First, though, a good chunk of the show qualifies as pure joy. Spector is a drily witty narrator, and has astonishing stories, with images to back them up. Here are the Ronettes with Dusty Springfield, who borrowed their strong-hold hairspray; there they are dancing in skin-tight dresses, posing a threat to the Beatles' morals (there was an encounter with John Lennon, but she "stayed loyal to Phil", as she regretfully puts it). Her singing, once the embodiment of street-urchin heartbreak, is raspier, but her versions of Walking in the Rain and (The Best Part of) Breakin' Up are serviceably sassy. So this is where Amy Winehouse – whose mother is in the audience – got her groove.
But she can't sing the Ronettes' signature hits, Be My Baby and Baby, I Love You – Phil, she tells us balefully, has withheld permission. And it's their ongoing mutual rancour that forms the meat of the show. The first photo we see of him is his prison mugshot; henceforth, Ronnie doesn't miss a chance to malign him. His attempts to control her even extended to trying to keep the Ronettes from being inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2007 ("You'd think he'd have been more worried about his murder trial"), and she's never forgiven him. The stories of him imprisoning her in his mansion and her escaping barefoot are well known, but hearing them directly from her is mesmerising.But she can't sing the Ronettes' signature hits, Be My Baby and Baby, I Love You – Phil, she tells us balefully, has withheld permission. And it's their ongoing mutual rancour that forms the meat of the show. The first photo we see of him is his prison mugshot; henceforth, Ronnie doesn't miss a chance to malign him. His attempts to control her even extended to trying to keep the Ronettes from being inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2007 ("You'd think he'd have been more worried about his murder trial"), and she's never forgiven him. The stories of him imprisoning her in his mansion and her escaping barefoot are well known, but hearing them directly from her is mesmerising.
Spector teeters between justifiable wrath and a depressing inability to move on, but the show is meant to be taken as a survivor's guide. "You can go through hell and still survive," she says, just before clearing the stage and returning for Be My Baby. She's allowed to perform it outside the "theatrical" part of the show, and rips into it as if she's tearing off a certain someone's head.Spector teeters between justifiable wrath and a depressing inability to move on, but the show is meant to be taken as a survivor's guide. "You can go through hell and still survive," she says, just before clearing the stage and returning for Be My Baby. She's allowed to perform it outside the "theatrical" part of the show, and rips into it as if she's tearing off a certain someone's head.
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