Rufus Does Judy at Royal Albert Hall, on Judy Garland’s birthday, performing the iconic 1961 Carnegie Hall concert for the final time in London.
That original Judy at Carnegie Hall album has always carried its own kind of mythology. It captured Garland at full force: fragile, funny, wounded, glamorous, defiant and completely in command. More than sixty years later, Rufus Wainwright took that impossible thing and made it his own, first as a love letter, then as a full-circle piece of theatre, fandom and survival.
Last night felt like the closing of that circle.
Royal Albert Hall was the perfect room for it: grand, emotional, slightly haunted in all the right ways. Rufus sang with all the drama, wit and vulnerability the material demands, but never turned it into imitation. It was reverent, theatrical and deeply personal.
Martha Wainwright was a joy. Nicole Scherzinger’s duet was genuinely stunning. I also spotted Jeremy Irons and Jake Shears in the crowd, which sent my inner fan into a quiet little spiral.
Nothing short of magical.
