A Perfect Charade

Do you play charades? Growing up in a show biz family, I heard stories about legendary “charades” performances from Hollywood’s heyday. Like the time Gene Kelly acted out Mordecai “Three Finger” Brown by running into the room, launching into a baseball slide and simply holding up three fingers.

My family played Relay Charades which differs from normal charades. Essentially, every player is asked to arrive with a themed list of 10 or so topics (Al Pacino films, Coldplay songs, novels with the word “day” in the title, etc.). All players are then assigned to one of two teams, and each team is positioned away from the other in its own room or space. Equidistant from both teams, is a moderator who will relay a list of topics for each team to act out. Play begins when the moderator gives Player 1 from both teams the first topic. They race back to their rooms to act out the topic to their team. Once the team calls out the topic, Player 2 races back to confirm its correctness to the moderator. If correct, the moderator then hands out the second topic. Player 2 then races back to his room and begins to act it out… and so on and so forth until all 10 topics have been answered correctly. The team that finishes first wins that round. During the course of the evening, all players will be given the opportunity to be the moderator and to read from their own list. Still with me?

What makes Relay Charades particularly awesome is that at some point a member of your team will uncover the nature of the theme. All of a sudden the game speeds up tenfold, becoming rapid fire. Using the Al Pacino film theme as an example - Let’s say Player 1 acts out Dog Day Afternoon and Player 2 acts out Scent of a Woman. You can just about guarantee that when Player 3 arrives with the 3^rd topic, he will be greeted by team members screaming out other Pacino films like Godfather, Serpico, Scarface, Scarecrow, and so forth. The secret is in creating themed lists that are initially cryptic but once revealed offer enough awareness to generate some passionate responses.

For instance, what’s the common thread in this assortment of names? George Gershwin, Frank Sinatra, The Cure, John Lennon, Billie Holiday, Carole King, Cole Porter, and the Cardigans.

Give up? Then meet Kat Edmonson, a 25 year old Austin native, who on her debut album has the temerity to cover songs that were made popular by the aforementioned  legends.

With an intriguing voice that recalls Blossom Dearie, Phoebe Snow and Inara George, Edmonson breathes new life into some very familiar songs; Summertime, Night & Day and Angel Eyes. But it’s on lesser known gems like… wait for it… Charade, where Ms. Edmonson really makes you sit up and listen.

Over Kevin Lovejoy’s elegant and sparce arrangement; piano, percussion and Eric Revis’ base line weave a slow, sensuous pulse, Kat stretches out her phrases, embuing each word with significance. Somehow she is able to express wistfuless along with highly extracted lust. If this were wine, it would be made from intense mountain fruit, grown in stressful soil that causes vines to struggle to survive let alone ripen to create a juicy grape crop. Because of its complexity, I'm adding it to the cocktail mix. But should a certain someone linger longingly, beware.

Now click on the clip to your left to compare it with the original, written by Johnny Mercer and Henry Mancini as the title track for the Stanley Donen film starring Cary Grant and Audrey Hepburn. Completely different. With its percussive intro and "Bondish" guitar riff, this screams 60's. While lush, it eschews heat, remaining cool to the touch, framing the main motif of this classic romantic thriller. Side note, the screenplay for Charade, written by Peter Stone, is considered by many to be one of the best scripts ever filmed. Take a look at it here.

A final note. Kat made a really charming and inspirational video called Be The Change during the last presidential campaign. I think she's going to be around for awhile - maybe long enough to be the subject of a Charades' list.