Wilkinsonian theatrical sure-bets satisfied the faithful and I admired his gameness, gumption and guile in essaying all kinds of music---from swing to rock. He’d also headed the Toronto cast of "Phantom Of The Opera," so there was a nod to that. But who was that masked man? Despite muchos chat and song, we didn’t get inside his psyche or heart exactly. Some "arrangements" for the nine-piece band and some put-on attitudes were just xeroxed from other artist’s renditions.

He brought along two female singers who were given generous stage time for solos and duets without him. No connection was stressed between the ladies and the star and they were even more by-the-book, though they had professional, more than adequate concert type voices that didn’t personalize the material-nor did they personalize their connection to the star or Broadway material or standards they were singing. It felt more like a variety show with breaks for the star. He also liked to talk and tell stories; much of which the audience ate up like semi-rabid loyal dogs. However, some left the long two-act evening concert before the encore of the anticipated "Bring Him Home" to bring themselves home by car, subway, taxi, or Long Island Railroad or even airplane. Audience members were asked to shout out where they’d come from, and ever-loyal fans had come from far and near-lots of far (other countries).

Appreciative but not surprised, he made self-congratulatory comments like "the CD in the lobby that you’re all buying"-he referred to a song that was on the "new" CD (but it wasn’t on it, and it isn’t new, as loyal Colmheads knew and regretted.) Though I’m allergic to clap-alongs and most sing-alongs - ecch! --- and longish stories that were all very present, I did find plenty of glory and theatrical flair and satisfaction, and liked some of the pop and light stuff, too. In fact, to be fair about the other fare, it was all more than fairly well received and my favorite moments were the lovely tones in the old folk songs that seemed to bring the performer to a more genuine heartfelt and real place than was found amongst the gloss and flash and rock turns.

But no matter who theatre fan and entertaining host Scott Siegel plugs into a slot, Unplugged or not (that’s a "plug" for Unplugged on Monday, I guess) there’s bound to be entertainment with a very good batting average, batting around the Broadway songs and others with a pretty darn good batting average. As they say in literal batting average sports circles (or so I’m told)..."it’s a hit!"