Oh my god, you guys. Picture this. There's this woman, okay? And she's totally, like, the worst singer ever. Now, I know what you're thinking: "So what? Lots of people can't sing! Sometimes I sing in the shower and my boyfriend is like, 'Shut up!' and it is so funny." But this one woman—her name is Florence Foster Jenkins—she doesn't know she's bad at singing! In fact, she thinks she's, like, gifted with "purity of tone," and calls herself a "true coloratura," and puts on recitals and stuff! But in reality (are you following me?), the opposite is true!
Well, FFJ's story got made into a play, and about a million sleepy elderlies are literally peeing their pants laughing at her X-treme chutzpah. First, she hires a young piano player, who's totally embarrassed that his new boss is a screechy, delusional kookaburra. There's a lot of sassy banter and moxie and wacky misunderstandings, and every couple of minutes, she treats us to a new, hilarious song.
Hey, what do you think it would sound like if a bad singer sang Schubert's "Ave Maria"? Probably pretty bad! LOL! But wait—what would it sound like if a bad singer sang Mozart's "Queen of the Night"? A lot like a duck getting raped by a trombone! In other words, NOT THAT GOOD!!! And what would it sound like if a bad singer sang one of them newfangled "jazz" tunes? I guess I'll never know. BECAUSE I JUST DIED OF BOREDOM.
The actual story of Florence Foster Jenkins (who eventually sold out Carnegie Hall in 1944) is interesting, weird, and funny. But Souvenir never grows past its premise. It's like if I came over to your house and made a funny noise, and you laughed. And then I continued to make that same funny noise for more than two hours. Not funny. Not fun.
