Earlier this year I had asked my husband what he wanted for his birthday and he told me he wanted to go see the Broadway musical called Once which was playing at the Orpheum Theatre in Minneapolis.
“Once” features actors who are also musicians and play their own instruments.
So, we waited until the “day” and headed to downtown Minneapolis to get a bite to eat before we went to see the musical. There are a lot of parking lots around the Orpheum Theatre although you have to pay for parking. Â Once parked, we walked around to find a place to eat.
We were surprised when we tried to get into a restaurant about 1 block from the Orpheum only to be asked “Do you have reservations?” We, unfortunately, did not have reservations so we walked across the hallway from that restaurant and headed into the American Burger Bar.  No reservations were needed here (although about a half hour after we arrived it got quite busy).
The food was pretty good. Â I had the Philly Cheesesteak with skinny fries and my husband had the Meatloaf which he said was really good.
After dinner we walked around the downtown area and found that they had a lot of skywalks that connected all the buildings so we went sightseeing to get out of the cold until it was time to head to the theatre.
When we finally arrived at the theatre, I was immediately disappointed for a couple of reasons — 1) there is no picture taking, not even before the show or in the lobby and 2) the seats are crammed together. Â The Orpheum is an older theatre so perhaps that’s the reason while the seats are so crammed but they should have looked at that when it was renovated in 1993.
The theatre seats 1500 on the main floor and 1100 on the three level balcony.
Prior to the show and during intermission, audience members were able to go onstage and talk with the actors/actresses. Now, that was a nice touch!
The musical “Once” is about a Dublin street musician who is just about ready to give up on his dream of being a musician when a beautiful young woman takes an interest in him. There is a musical romantic connection between them although she is married and he has a girlfriend in States. Eventually they realize it will not work between them and they go their separate ways.
The singing is very nice along with the playing that the musicians do. I was a little disappointed towards the end when a couple of curse words were thrown out as it was not needed and didn’t add to the storyline in a good way.
Overall, the musical was very nice.
