Hello Again, a sex-filled romp

The musical offers a series of sex scenes, but lacks plot, unity

Hello Again is like a ride on the Metro; you get on quick, get a glimpse of the surroundings and get off as fast as you can. And that's that.

The play, directed by college senior Scott Hocker, is basically scenes about one-night stands. Out of 10 scenes, eight have, well, sex in them. There's no real plot, other than sex, how to get it, give it and what to do with the outcome after sex. The 10 scenes have singing and dancing and a nice live orchestra and no other connection.

The scenes jump through time, from 1900 through the wonderful 80s, and each little vignette captures the feel of the decade. The whore and the soldier, the first scene, is set in 1900 by the river. Soldier sees whore, seduction takes place where soldier takes whore against lamppost, and soldier walks off content while whore watches, asks him his name and he tells her to "go to hell." And that's the skeleton for almost every scene.

Some sex is more ambiguous than others. But they're all quickies. The characters are what spice up the musical. The whore, played by college sophomore Patricia Comstock, has a beautiful voice, although it was at times drowned out by the orchestra. That was common, though, and not the fault of the actress. She was a good whore; even her eyes sparkled and beckoned.

The college boy, played by first-year Arthur Simon, gets seduced by his nurse. The nurse, college senior Sacha Moss, strips down and ties up Simon, the dominatrix of some men and women's dreams, and exhausts him before leaving. In the next scene Simon meets his lover, a married woman, in the movie theater. She goes down on him but he has trouble getting it up as the rest of the theater, filled with men, all sympathize as Simon sings, "I never worked so hard to keep it hard." The young wife, played by college sophomore Kristen Schultz, gets frustrated and tries again. Schultz's voice is confident, The musical offers a series of sex scenes, but lacks plot, unity and it goes well with her husband's voice - her husband is played by Double-degree sophomore John Bartley - whose singing is strong and smooth.

There is a comic scene set in the 1920s with a silent film star and the director. The actress, College senior Lauren Moffa, has a nice voice as long as she avoids getting shaky and operatic. The 70s scene was also nice as the extras entered dancing and singing the classic "ooh ooh" reminiscent of disco and present-day clubs. There were great bad pick-up lines delivered by the writer, college first-year Andrew Guest, who was smooth and delightfully conceited.

The last scenes are the cleanest, with a little phone sex and a lot of confessions by the senator, played by college first-year Brian Wood, who was cute and a little too sheepish for a senator.

Between almost evey scene there was a sort of peanut gallery song while the simple stage got moved around for the next act. The melodies were nice, but it was difficult to hear the words over the orchestra. Overall, the acting and singing were good, but even though it was a musical they weren't the main focus. When there's as much sex as there is in Hello Again and not much in the way of movement or plot, even the good talent gets overlooked. There is an equal amount of fucking over done by both men and women, and in that sense it's pretty p.c., but the routine gets stale.