'Moe' uses Jordan’s music

• By ROBIN MILLER
• arts writer
• Published: Oct 5, 2008 - UPDATED: 12:05 a.m.

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You know, Louis Jordan is considered the grandfather of rock ’n’ roll.

Jazz, blues, swing, the combination of it all with an added beat — he had it all.

“And who can beat lyrics like, ‘What’s the use of getting sober when you’re gonna get drunk again?’” Greg Williams asked.

He stops to think about those words now, really think about them. They’re funny, you know, in the way that blues songs sometimes are, especially when the main character is down and out.

And when taking into consideration that Nomax’s woman has left him and he’s flat broke, what’s the use of getting sober, right?
Now seems the time for a guitar riff, one of those B.B. King kind, drawn out so long that it hurts. But Nomax gets Big Moe, Four-Eyed Moe, Eat Moe and Little Moe instead.

“He’s been listening to his radio, and they jump out,” Williams said. “And they want him to join them.”

That’s when Nomax becomes the fifth guy named Moe in Clarke Peters’ musical Five Guys Named Moe. Peters wrote the book for this production that uses 1930s bandleader Louis Jordan’s music as its foundation.

“And I’m No Moe,” Williams said. “That’s who Nomax becomes when he joins the Moes.”

Williams also is director of New Venture Theatre’s production of the musical, which opens Thursday, Oct. 9, in Independence Park Theatre. And if serving as star and director isn’t enough, he’s also a co-founder of New Venture, as well as Independence Park Theatre’s managing artistic director.

All to say that leaving work for rehearsal is easy in this case. It’s what happens on this night’s rehearsal where the real work begins, especially when Teresa Whitaker shows up with a stack of new dance steps in hand.

Why go to aerobics class when you can learn the dance steps to “Choo Choo Ch’Boogie”? That’s yet another Jordan favorite, upbeat and lively and recorded by so many jazz greats through the years.

And Whitaker helps the Five Moes get into the beat here, entering the stage in the style of five chugging locomotives, then hopping behind their microphones, feet continuously moving. There are no breaks here; Whitaker starts from the beginning each time she teaches a new section.

She’s used to it. She’s owner of Elite Dance Studio, and she often choreographs shows.