Pert and still adorable, Eileen Fulton is that typical Southern lady of charm who aims to please. And please she does, albeit her vocals are less singing, more monologue/acting. She is as earthy and appealing as ever, looking glamorous in a long black gown. This is a special show – a goodbye to her fifty years as soap queen on As the World Turns, which ends in September.

Leave it to Musical Director Bob Goldstone to give a new twist to the tried and true:  “How Long Has This Been Going On?” in a waltz tempo! Francesca Blumenthal’s “Fireflies” was a smoky monologue, beautifully executed, that included witty patter about husband #3. Fulton likes edgy-silly as in “Say We’re Sweethearts Again” (Earl Brent) and can be remarkably sexy-sleek giving an Academy Award-worthy performance in “Something Cool.”

She is an icon who bestows upon her audience a sense that she wants to tell everything and is being brazenly honest. Her fans eat it up! What was especially poignant was her goodbye tribute to the soap opera, with visual photos from its onset, together with stories of all her eight husbands (on the show), as she gleefully accepted the title of “First Soap Bitch.”

A lover of the art of cabaret, I’m sure Ms. Fulton will remain ever-present. The additional members of her band were Tom Hubbard on bass and Ron Tierno on drums.

Sandi Durell
Cabaret Scenes
April 18, 2010
www.cabaretscenes.org