enough is enough

Streisand Snipes at Bush in Concert

By Jon Hurdle

Reuters
Thursday, October 5, 2006; 9:44 AM

PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) - Barbra Streisand opened her first U.S. tour in 12 years on Wednesday with a show that ridiculed her political nemesis, President George W. Bush.

Before a capacity crowd of some 16,000 people at South Philadelphia's Wachovia Center, Streisand gave assured renditions of standards from her long career as a singer and actress including "Funny Girl," "Come Rain or Come Shine," "Love Soft as an Easy Chair," and "Somewhere."

The show also featured a skit where an actor playing Bush uttered such lines as, "I'm concerned about the national debt, so I'm selling Canada," and "If I cared about the polls I would have run for president of Poland."

Streisand, 64, a longtime liberal activist, said she was coming out of retirement to raise money for her foundation, which supports a range of causes related to the environment, education, health care and other issues.

Wearing a black sequin outfit with a slit skirt for the first half of the show and a black gown and shawl with gold trim after the interval, Streisand sat at a tall swivel chair at the front of the stage and at different times during the two and a half hour show moved upstage on a series of walkways around the orchestra.

She explained her reliance on a teleprompter by recalling that she had been so traumatized by forgetting the words to three songs at a 1967 concert in New York she had stopped giving live concerts for more than 20 years. She declared six years ago that she would not play live anymore.

Ron Long, 62, of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, said he had been a fan of Streisand's for 45 years and this was the first time he had seen her in concert. "Her voice is just as good as it was in the early '60s. She is godly," said Long, who paid $750 for two tickets and was happy the money was going to the foundation.

Dave Vignola, 55, from Gibbstown, New Jersey, paid $750 apiece for three tickets and called it a unique opportunity to see the singer he had been following for decades.

"She may never come around again," he said.