Director: David Mallet (same as the previous special)
Executive Producers: Roger Davies, Rocky Oldham and Lindsay Scott (Apis Productions)
Original Show Conceived by: Cher and Doriana Sanchez
Written by: Cher
Tour Director, Choreography: Doriana Sanchez
Musical Director: Paul Mirchovich
Cher’s Costumes: Bob Mackie
Costume Designer for Dancers: Hugh Durrant
Lighting Design: Abigail Rosen Holmes
Cher’s Hair/Wigs: Serena Radaelli (first wigs not Renate Leuschner)
Band: Paul Mirchovich (keyboards), David Barry (guitar), Ollie Marland (keyboards), Mark Schulman (drums), Bill Sharpe (bass),
Backup singers: Stacy Campbell, Pattie Darcy Jones
Dancers:  Shannon Beach (new), Bubba Carr, Suzanne Easter (who will go on to sue Cher in 2014), Jamal Story (new), Sal Vassallo (new), Dreya Weber (new), Kevin Wilson (new and who will go on to sue Cher in 2014) and Addie Yungmee
Tour Charge d’Affaires: Cher’s sister Georganne Bartylak
Head of Logistics: Cher’s sister’s husband Ed Bartylak
Cher’s Personal Assistant: Jennifer Ruiz and Deb Paull
Personal Wellness (tour doctor): Dr. Stacey Smith
Video Montages: Dan-O-Rama
Filmed at the American Airlines Arena in Miami, Florida, on November 8, 2002
Aired: NBC, April 8, 2003

This is the special that documents the 2002-2005 Farewell Tour. And this is the last of the tour specials (to date, 2025), the last concert special. The following two tours, D2K (Dressed to Kill) and Here We Go Again were both cancelled midway due to Cher’s acute health issues (D2K) and the outbreak of COVID (Here We Go Again) and were never restarted or filmed for specials.

This tour was a big deal. It broke records (see below) and it came around so many times I was able to see it seven times just within hours of where I lived in Los Angeles.

  1. August 6 2002 in Los Angeles at The Staples Center alone on the floor.
  2. August 7 2002 at Anaheim’s Arrowhead Pond. I almost missed this show confusing it with a dinner I had with my brother-from-another-mother and not realizing I had a single front-row side seat (a row in front of Chas Bono. I actually had better seats than Chas did unbelievably and he left before it was over.) That’s the only time I ever Forest-Gumped my way into front row tickets. Cher mentioned the hard-core fan-love of the song “Heart of Stone” (as she does in the special) and when she started singing it she smiled and pointed at me before I realized I was singing along. (How embarrassing!) I have the bootleg of that show on VHS somewhere, a show I tracked down online just to confirm I really saw that happen.)
  3. December 2 2002 in Los Angeles at The Staples Center with my new work friend Julia where we saw the show from up in the nosebleeds and she got offended by Cher wearing a sari she said because she had once dated an Indian guy (but she was not offended by the Half Breed outfit because I guess she had never dated an American Indian guy). And it was during this show Anna Nicole Smith was in the audience (who Julia and I were into for a hot minute before Halloween in West Hollywood) and Cyndi Lauper sang “It’s Hard to Be Me” and dedicated it to Smith directly. This was my favorite Cher tour with Cyndi Lauper, by the way, because she was supporting her amazing Shine EP and she would make her entrance through the back of the arena walking through the crowd singing the powerhouse title song.
  4. August 30 2003 at Glen Helen Amphitheater (or Glen Hell as we called it because the parking lot was a nightmare to get out of) with my friends Julie and Julia (again…yes, she wanted to go again for some reason) and where it was too windy for the chandelier to drop and where all my swag got stolen from under my seat and then Julia had the audacity to call Cher fans “low rent.”
  5. December 14 2002 at the MGM in Las Vegas with my friend Christopher as part of a concert weekend. It’s my recollection that “Heart of Stone” got dropped from the tour and by this time, as well as “The Way of Love,” because I remember Christopher complaining that the show had no quiet moments, meaning no slow torch numbers (which did make the show feel more manic). This was the first Cher show Christopher would agree to attend after feeling so ripped-off in high school after going to the Heart of Stone tour and it being only an hour long and even more egregiously most of that was eaten-up by Cher’s costume changes. But because I paid for his Cher ticket, (as well as the other show we saw that weekend at the House of Blues), he couldn’t complain too much about this show, which he said was ultimately redeeming for him (and this despite him needing a root canal at the time and being bothered by loud noises all weekend).
  6. January of 2004 at the MGM in Las Vegas in the nosebleeds. I went to this one alone because the rumor was the show was going to be the final show. It wasn’t but I got to see The Village People (meh) and K.C. and the Sunshine Band (very fun) open for her on that leg.
  7. And the truly final show on April 30 2005, at The Hollywood Bowl with my boyfriend at the time, now known as “bad John,” who so distracted me (so typically me worrying that he wasn’t having enough fun, plus we were late getting in due to his picking me up late because of some snafu with his kids) that I didn’t peruse the swag tables carefully enough to discover the special night’s “last show” commemorative poster and ended up having to buy it on eBay later for over 200 bucks.

(These friends of mine, huh? Seriously, Julie proved to be the best friend to attend Cher shows with. And also, none of us took any pictures of us doing these things. Boo.)

Anyway, by 2005 the tour was hitting b-level cities and venues like Albuquerque’s Tingley Coliseum and venues near where my parents lived in Lititz, Pennsylvania. My mother would begrudgingly send me clippings. (She’s not a fan of the Cher fan thing.)

I did not realize before how simpler the staging was for this show in comparison to the Believe tour, less fleur de lis and gigantic side props. But this show seemed to have many more acrobats and a big-entrance feature.

And another amazing aspect of the tour is that Cher wasn’t even supporting a big hit or product at the time, other than a Greatest Hits CD that came out halfway through the whole run. People went to the show just because.

Beginning Video: The opening video this time starts with the opening bars of “Gypsies, Tramps and Thieves” and then  a very cool mashup of “Different Kind of Love Song and Turn Back Time.” Then video plays of Cher as a tween dancing in front of her house trailed by her mother, parts of her “Alive Again” video, record and single covers, posters, and images from prior specials, commercials, music videos and TV show moments. This song really builds up the anticipation for the big entrance.

The special DVD intercuts the video with fans approaching the arena, voicing their anticipation. Cher arrives in a black car. She’s wearing her bright red short wig and she says, “I’m nervous. I feel like I’ve never done the show before. Actually, I feel like I’ve never been on stage before. I feel like I’ve been a librarian until now.”

After this, we see the cast gather for a pre-show pep-talk and circle prayer.

I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For (cover of U2, 1987)

Okay, this is the second tour with this opening number. It was an excitingly contemporary song to have open the Believe tour, but it’s been done and the whole thing is feeling old by now, especially as this tour went on for so many years. Thankfully, she will change the song to “Woman’s World” for the upcoming Vegas and subsequent national tours. Cher covers are really, really fun. Don’t get me wrong. But how many years should you sing the same cover song? How many tours? I get the whole quest vibe of the song but seriously, if you haven’t found what you’re looking for by now, after all these years, my mother Estelene would say somewhat harshly, “maybe it’s you.”

But then again…why fix it if it aint broke? Everybody loved this show so who am I to kvetch? Well, more people than loved the Believe tour anyway and not because it was really all that different. Times had just changed and more female singers were doing these big extravaganza shows. And either reviewers were skewing younger by this time or they were finally getting those bugs removed from their asses and having a good time with the big, happy multi-generational crowds who were showing up to these shows.

A thin, white parachute curtains opens and Cher is seen suspended above the stage in a big chandelier dressed like a snow queen. The backdrop image is the butterfly hologram. Cher slowly descends singing the song and this was a big exciting moment in the show. The special does not do it justice. When she reaches the stage, her dancers unhook her and de-robe her. They looks like druids. Cher wears a blonde wig. The backdrop of the set is a grid of pink with an entrance in the middle of sparkling stars and two sets of wide stairs.

The special uses split screen to show wider shots and closeups or to show members of the audience or other band members.

This is basically the same band, the same backup singers, Campbell and Darcy Jones. David Barry is back on lead guitar. I like him because he doesn’t make so many clown faces when he plays. Mirchovich is back orchestrating and Schulman on drums. There’s a new bass player and keyboard player. They play from each side of the middle entrance with a black grid behind them that renders them almost invisible, except for the guitarists who steps out.

Cher is pretty much alone on stage at this point, making punches in the air, pointing at the audience. She unbuttons her vest. This outfit is like a base outfit between the snow queen and the ringmaster outfits.

Song for the Lonely (from Living Proof, 2001)

The video above the stage shows a big revolving earth globe and then some abstract blobs, Rorschach/kaleidoscope animation and images from her video. The dancers have come onstage, doing a lot of gymnastics, like backflips. It is more synchronized than I remembered. A lot of times it looks like they’re doing their own thing. They’re wearing furry hats and suits, like they’re Alaskan man-bears. I’ve come to think this choreography is intentionally broader for arenas versus the old 1980s Vegas rooms. Lots of big movements.

Her midriffs are covered now, in this case with sparkly fringe. The stage is full of yellow Chinese-like lanterns which upon seeing them Mr. Cher Scholar said looked like nods back to The Sonny & Cher Comedy Hour stage globes.

A Different Kind of Love Song (from the Living Proof album, 2001)

This segment was captured only as an extra on the DVD and its just Cher lip synching the song for possibly a future music video. In my notes I call the dancer outfits cavemen-fits. The Wikipedia page calls this “rehearsal footage.”

The Ringmaster Speech: Cher says “thank you, thank you” and the dancers assemble Cher into her ringmaster outfit with the coat, hat and whip. She talks about having an outfit for every mood. She makes a joke about her “naturally blonde hair.” “And what’s an outfit without a whip?” (This is the Cher circus, after all.)

The outfit is red here. (for the doll the outfit is purple.)

She asks, “What did you think of my entrance? It was very fabulous wasn’t it?” And she talks about how the chandelier didn’t work in Cleveland, how it came down and she didn’t. She said she was hanging up there “like some transvestite piñata.” She adds, “It was very sad. And a little scary.”

She said she wanted to make the show “really fabulous” because this is the last time she’s doing it. Boos are heard and she seems offput. “Give me a freakin’ break,” she says. “I have been an evil freakin diva for 40 freakin years.”

She talks about all the young girls coming and challenges that they’re not going to take her place, but somebody’s place. (JLo and Britney she names. Taylor wasn’t even a think yet.) And this is where she says, “Follow this, you bitches.”

She plays with her whip and then quips, “But I mean that with humility and love.” She says she wants to to the ringmaster routine “because we’re getting near the fabulousness.” She turns on her carnival barker voice and says, “Ladies and gentlemen and flamboyant gentlemen, boys and girls and children of all ages, welcome to the Cherest Show on Earth. And this is the beginning of the Cher Show right now.”

Another delayed beginning.

Gayatri Mantra/Dancer Interlude: (Hindu Sanskrit mantra approximately 2500 to 3500 years old)

This and “All or Nothing” are my favorite parts of the show. They’re very creative and colorful. It’s my favorite outfit of the show, too. And that beautiful elephant. Audio plays of Cher singing the mantra. The dancers recreate the deity of many arms projected as a shadow on a big screen. The outfits are very colorful and remind me of watching Bollywood films play in Indian restaurants. The dancers run around with colorful flags. The big Elephant stage prop is at the middle stage door just turning his head. Cher is behind the curtain changing.  The dancers are doing their own things, almost meditatively.

The elephant starts to come out with Cher riding it in a Hindu sari. The elephant rolls around the stage. Cher does Hindu hand gestures. The headdress really puts the focus on her eyes.

Elephants are a recurring Cher theme. At one point she said she collected elephant figurines. She has the elephant Margie from Good Times, the elephants she repeatedly tried to save from the LA Zoo (Billy and Tina) and the one she saved in her documentary (Kavaan).

This special has better edits to show all the stage business.

All or Nothing (Cher from Believe , 1998)

This song is a good example of the joyousness of the show. It’s also the most obviously synchronized dancing I could recognize. It’s great when they surround Cher at the end. The special uses split screens to show all the action, showing fans singing along.

The amazing thing about this part (that the special obscures but that was even hard to see live) is how distracting the dancers are to keep you from noticing Cher’s disappearance from the top of the elephant. She just appears singing the song on the stage. Does she come out the butt?

I tend to like the outfits that flow when Cher moves and this one definitely billows out when she struts around. Her big gold earrings also swing.

She exits through the center at the end.

We All Sleep Alone (from Cher’s 1987 album Cher)

This segment was captured only as an extra on the DVD. The Wikipedia page calls this “rehearsal footage.”

Cher pops up on a riser at the top of the stairs still in her sari outfit without its cape. This does not feel like a good outfit match for this era. The dancers help her down the stairs to the left. You can see the turquoise braided into her wig now. You can see the cool boots better. This is a good performance of this song. And it goes into a funky dance mix at the end which I really like (the remix on the Believe album).

Dancer Interlude: The music introduces the Geffen-era singles. with guitar and piano solos. Male and female aerialists perform. The acrobatics are very moving and imply sexual union. We get more closeups on the woman. This part is very Cirque du Soleil feeling. There’s water imagery on the big screen.

I Found Someone (from Cher’s 1987 album Cher)

Cher is back up at the top of the stage as “We All Sleep Alone” wasn’t aired during the TV special. Very similar to that performance, she sings part of the song from up top but we don’t see her rise up there. This time she walks toward the right of the stage.

Cher does her strut, she skips across the stage, she does a hip rocking move back and forth. She pulls her fist to her chest (in a move I seem to remember from the video). She moves behind the guitarist during the bridge. He does make guitar faces. I just never noticed it before. It must be physically impossible to not do this.

I like the textures and light of this show. Seeing women (and some men) in the audience sing along. Even her wig flows. A long braid extension flips around. This is a great outfit. One of the best.

Dancer Interlude: Lights are flashing and the dancers come out in tattoo bodysuits and mohawk hats. They throw each other in the shadowy air. Two female aerialists perform with red fabric, twirling and tangling. It’s dizzy-making. The video screen shows fire. There’s a screechy guitar solo. Cher is seen in split screen in her red wig telling us this is her favorite part of the show, “a part I’m not actually in.” She says she likes watching everyone in the red silks get whirled around.

Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down) (from Cher’s 1987 album Cher)

Cher hasn’t done this one since the Heart of Stone tour. She comes out from the center entrance. Her maroon outfit is similar to the dancers but with a huge bang-to-butt mohawk wig and leather accents, fringe and boots. She wears a headpiece mic. Cher wears a similar outfit to the Bob Mackie documentary Naked Illusion premiere in 2024. It’s like a spiral-painted jumpsuit. She signs this song well. This was a great re-thinking of her1960s hit reconfigured with Jon Bon Jovi and Richie Sambora from her first Geffen album in 1987. There’s more split screen.

The guitarist does the song’s big solo from the top of the stage. The aerialists are seen twirling down again at the end.

Sonny & Cher Montage:  This is film footage of Sonny & Cher from their variety shows and 60s television appearances, clips from Good Times and their photo stills, all to a recording of “The Beat Goes On,” “Baby Don’t Go,” “I Got You Babe” (from Late Night with David Letterman and The Ed Sullivan Show; they switched sides in the 1970s as you’ll notice). It was so moving at the time to see Sonny up there on the big screen. She seems to be bumping up his profile in every concert since his death. In the following one, D2K, she will start again duetting with him on screen (which was super powerful).

There are shots of fans singing along. I remember in online Cher news groups fans talking about how they were at this show and could pick themselves out of these audience shots.

All I Really Want to Do (from All I Really Want to Do, 1965)

During the transition we see the scene of running at the beginning of the film Chastity. Cher starts at the top again but she walks herself down the stairs wearing a recreation a Cher outfit from the 60s, a purple cotton long sleeve top with a faux fur vest, stripped bell bottoms and a big female symbol necklace. But all more sparkly.

In the middle of the song she says “in the summer of 1965, this was my first hit record.” She means solo hit. The screen shows more photos, videos and album covers of Cher with some images of the 70s added in. There seems to be no order to the photo reel.

This is the first time she’s sung this one live since the 70s (on TV and since the 60s in concert). She sings the song well.

Half Breed, Gypsies, Tramps & Thieves, Dark Lady Medley (From the Cher albums Half Breed, 1973,  Cher, 1971 and Dark Lady, 1974)

Cher sings in the same costume while the video shows the Sonny & Cher Comedy Hour solo spot video, the Bob Mackie sketch and her Half Breed album cover while Cher sings “Half Breed.” They keep showing the gay men singing along to this one. These are part of a medley so she just sings a few verses and a few choruses and we move on.

The reindentation of “Gypsys, Tramps & Thieves” always feels too fast. While she sings that they also show the old Comedy Hour segment with her singing at the gypsy wagon in the yellow fringe dress, chart positions (which we can see the song sitting on top of the “Theme from Shaft,” Rod Stewart’s “Maggie May” and John Lennon’s “Imagine”) and other gypsy-like photo stills from the 1970s. (The Gypsy outfit will become a great costume in future Vegas and live shows.) We get most of this song, up through the knock-up and birth anyway.

The album cover and the Comedy Hour animation for “Dark Lady” and the later solo spot plays while she sings it. Some fans have taken to clapping during the chorus but this never fully took off in a good Jimmy Buffett style of audience participation in the way that I was hoping it would. This song is abbreviated too. We miss the whole murder!

TV Video Montage: Video is shown from Cher’s variety specials: Carol Burnett spoofing Cher in the red dress, Cher with Janet Jackson, The Jackson 5 (doing the robot which gets big claps), with Tina (“Shame, Shame, Shame”), with Liberace, The Muppets (“Something”), Elton John (“Bennie and the Jets”), David Bowie (“Young Americans”). And while Cher sings “Friends,” he dress reveals are shown in a montage along with clips of guest stars like Lily Tomlin, Nancy Walker, Jerry Lewis, George Burns, Burt Reynolds, Andy Kaufman, Tim Conway, Steve Martin, Lucille Ball, Raquel Welch, Phillis Diller.

The Cher show’s illustrative intro graphics are shown in-between scenes. All this is intercut with audience reactions.

Dance Interlude: Video is shown of Cher walking down a wet sidewalk. This is from the Secretary at the Disco segment of Cher…Special in 1978. The dancers come out in red suits (waving white flags) and dresses (the girls with big red wigs). They do disco moves.

Take Me Home (Cher from Take Me Home, 1979)

In the special, there’s a break here where Cher talks about her favorite part of the tour, being on the dancers’ bus and playing games (Taboo, The Mafia and The Sherriff)

The stars in the middle entrance sparkle. The curtains part and Cher comes through in a red Take Me Home fit that goes back to a silver version she wore in her 1979 Take Me Home tour. It looks like shreds of glitter. There’s coordinated dancing, Cher sits in a dancer’s lap and she gives us a sexy look at the end. The song is very abbreviated considering this is the only song for this outfit.

Dance Interlude: The men take off their shirts and dance with the girls who have taken off their outer jackets. The girls dance together, the boys dance together, sometimes they’re in ménage à trois combinations. This is after-the-disco sex. There are lifts, twirls and quite a few ass shots. The big screen shows geometrics.

The Way of Love (from Cher’s 1971 album Cher)

This song was cut by the time I saw it in Las Vegas. Cher wears face jewels and a long, black wig swept over to her left side (which she said once was her favorite wig). She wears a purple gown and big hoop earrings. She sings sings “way of woah” now. She starts at the top of the stage and walks down by herself (this seems dangerous). She runs her hair through the wig but she doesn’t flip it You wonder if she really wants to flip it. She does no hair flips anymore. The makeup reveals her big, brown eyes.

This is also a one-outfit song.

Film Video Montage: This starts with the Cher…Special intro to Cher doing all the parts of West Side Story and highlights of that segment. Mr. Cher Scholar oversees this part of the special and says this is one of his favorite Cher things, that he’s still amazed she was able to sell the network on it and that they actually did it, which shows how much faith the network had in her. He calls it brilliant, so fun and out-there but it works. Who else could pull that off? The green screen, the editing, the production…that was a lot of work back then.”

This is split screen that has a purpose, I think then. And also I feel that Cher was never seen as being experimental but this proves she was and it reinforces Sonny’s ideas about her flexibility in singing. As I’ve said she may not go very deep very often but she goes very wide. The looks alone in this segment.

This is followed by scenes from Come Back to the Five and Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean (the skating scene: “a matter of balancing form”), Silkwood (with Craig T. Nelson: “I am really not interested” and the porch scene), Mask (the school hallways scene, the letter writing scene which is one of her best scenes ever, the Sam Elliot look), Tea with Mussolini (“Smoke Gets in Your Eyes”), Witches of Eastwick (the tennis match, her speech to Jack in bed), Suspect (“I’m due for a vacation,” running down a hall and, spoiler alert, the final reveal), Mermaids (posing as a mermaid, making dinner appetizers, singing “It’s In His Kiss”), Moonstruck (“You’ve got a love bit on your neck! and “Snap out of it!”) and then Mermaids again (the lamp in the bedroom scene).

“”After All” (Cher, from Heart of Stone, 1989)

The montage continues and Paul Mirchovich starts the duet. We see footage of the Moonstruck moon in the bedroom scene, Cher strutting in Tea with Mussolini, the car driving/smoking scene and the doctor’s office scene in Silkwood, the hospital scene in Mermaids, the Cher stare in the tennis match of Witches of Eastwick, lying on the jukebox in Jimmy Dean, Cher and Sam Eliot in the funhouse in Mask.

Cher comes out in jeans and an off-the-shoulder white blouse with two turquoise necklaces, a peace necklace, a big silver concho belt and a blonde shoulder wig. She also has a big turquoise ring on. This is this show’s version of the casual spot (which always comes at this part of the show). Cher also always gets to sing from a stool.

As they sing more scenes show including the Mask graveyard, the car wreck of Silkwood, crying on Liam Neeson’s shoulder in Suspect and the balloon scene in Witches and many others ending with Cher winning the Oscar, all scenes split screened with fans singing along and Cher singing.

Just Like Jesse James (Cher, from Heart of Stone, 1989)

Cher says thank you to Paulk Mirchovich and he gives a casual salute. She sits on the stool. Cher then says, “Ok, here is my one cowboy song.” (Does she forget “Bang Bang” and “A Cowboy’s Work Is Never Done”?)  “I never really liked this song,” she admits. “I did it and went away and didn’t do a video and then I came back and it was a huge hit…” (It did better than I thought considering there was no video for it.) “,,,and I thought Jesus Christ, this song is kinda crap but it’s a big hit. So then I didn’t sing it and didn’t sing it…and oh gosh, this my last time around, I’d better sing it…it’s not really crap.” (She makes a face.) “but it’s not my favorite but I’m getting better at it cos there are just an awful lot of words.” Then she kids herself about this long ramble, “when you get old you just ramble and ramble and ramble. So let’s just do the fing song.” She licks her lips. I have to admit she has to bravado to sing this song well and I like it best when she sings it live. The gay men in the audience seem to like the song, which tracks.

You can catch some long turquoise earrings but they’re hidden in her wig. She gives a big whooh at the end and the special captures some great closeups.

Heart of Stone (Cher, from Heart of Stone, 1989)

This song was dropped later in the tour.

Cher says, “this next song was not a hit” but that “dyed-in-the wool fans will know it.” She says, “it’s one of my all time favorite songs I’ve done and I think it’s the song that most typifies me, if there cab be such a thing. I guess in depends upon what hair color I’m in.”

She plays with her stray wig hairs. She then jokes about how hard it is to be a blonde versus being “dark and mysterious.” And she says “people give you directions very slowly when you’re blonde.” And then she talks about the importance of costume changes and beads, lots of them, or the drag queens will thinks she’s lost the will to live. And she then says proudly, “no, I haven’t.”  Then she points to an elderly gentleman dancing in the aisles and says she likes funky, old guys. He blows her a kiss and claps at her. She talks  when her hair will get white, “fifteen minutes from now” she wants to be rocking still.

She says her mother looks great and her grandmother (both still alive at this point). “It’s in the genes,” she says then she struts her jeans. Audience members have signs, one says “Cher rocks Miami.”

She dispenses more advise. “I’ve been doing this for 40 frickin years. Do everything you can do now, okay? I wish I had been the baddest ass girl and I was pretty bad, too. But I wish I was worse…I went ‘Should I do this?’ The hell with it, do it. You can always look back and say, ‘shit, I shouldn’t have done that'” and she laughs. Her advise to young kids, just do it.

“Now I’m gonna get to this goddamn song. Hit it!”

The big screen shows the clips the song’s video while she sings. At the end of the song she holds up praying hands to her head.

The Shoop Shoop Song (It’s In His Kiss) (Cover of Betty Everett, 1964)

Because Cher sings this song with Stacy Campbell and Pattie Darcy Jones, it’s hard to forget that Darcy Jones died suddenly of a brain aneurysm (although researching it here I see that there was no official death ever given). It was on the Las Vegas stop for this show that my friend Christopher and I were sitting to rest in a somewhat abandoned corridor of the MGM casino before heading back to the hotel where we were staying that we saw Darcy Jones walk by alone in full costume and makeup.

Cher, saddened by her friends death, said she could not perform the song again for years.  But she did include the song again in her Las Vegas residency in 2008-2011.

In this song Pattie, Stacy and Cher form a trio and sing the sing with some dancing. Cher calls them out as she sings, “that’s not the way, Pattie…that’s not the way Stacy.” Not one of my favorite segments, but it’s cute. The dancers, who have been gone during this casual part of the show, return down the staircases in flower-power outfits to do the 60s dance moves. Long, big flower string-looking things are now hanging from each side of the stage.

Strong Enough (Cher, from Believe, 1998)

They play the video on the big screen. The dancers are in black outfits. Cher is in the newest incarnation of the Hole Fit (or as Mackie calls it Swiss Cheese) she’s been wearing since 1979. The curly 80s wig, leather jacket (hot pink inside) and tall boots go with it. The holes keep getting smaller. Cher does her strut across the stage and a kind of backwards strut with her arms out. She does hand punching and looks good and joyful. She does a muscle curl at the end.

Save Up All Your Tears (from Love Hurts, 1989)
This segment was captured only as an extra on the DVD. The Wikipedia page calls this “rehearsal footage.” Cher had not included this song since the limited Love Hurt tour (1991-92) which I did not catch (and which is only available to see on bootlegs), She does more pointing, more fist to chest. I love this song, one of my favorites of this Geffen era. It’s great to see her do it live. Her video for the song plays on the big screen. She sings alone for the next two songs.

“You’ll be cryin, you’ll be dyin over me.”

Turn Back Time (Cher, from Heart of Stone, 1989)

This is the tour where everyone went crazy throwing bedazzled sailor hats up on the stage and Cher would pick one. This stopped happening as Cher started tripping on them. There’s an I heart Cher sign in the crowd. Cher talks about the “gaggle of hats…a plethora…here’s the one…here’s the winner.”

She says she learned to kneel down and pick up things at Playbook school where she was a Bunny for a night. She dips demurely and picks up a hat. She placed is tipped to the side on her big wig. Even her wig is beaded. She does a lot of skipping and seems very joyful. The audience sings along and her famous music video plays on the big screen. She throws the hat back out into the audience halfway through the song. She does more air punching and skipping.

The guitarist really plays to the crowd. At the end she makes the peace sign,  the praying hands, blows kisses and waves goodbye and then walks off through the middle entrance.

Encore: Believe (Cher, from Believe, 1998)

There is an extended guitar solo while Cher is offstage. The backup singers rally the crowd. This is really an exciting part of the show (any show really). The encore is a gift, something that feels like gratitude for the audience and the time together. Cher seems to have always tried to make her latter-day encores very big and happy (“Believe”) or very moving (“I Hope You Find It”).

So this whole show the chandelier has been lifted back up. When Cher returns she is back on the chandelier as it sits maybe halfway up. She’s in her red wig and the silver Believe outfit with the red heart over her heart. The bellbottoms are fringy and she has one monster left sleeve.  A big silver medallion is behind her. The intro of the song seems a lip sync. But the rest is live. (This was controversial at the time. She sings live enough over 50 years. People need to keep their pants on.)  When she gets off, the chandelier lifts off behind her. The dancers are in silver suits and caps too and the whole thing feels space age. The dancers do flips and acrobatics. They get some height, these dancers. There’s even a closeup on her silver boot. The aerialists come back (six of them!) twirling on silver hoops. There’s a sing-along. This was all very exciting live.

She finishes with the praying hands and exits. The music goes on for a minute or so more with confetti and Cher bucks (which feels very Evita).

 

Special Features

According to the special credits there were riggers, carpenters, techs, sound crew, lighting crew, video crew and wardrobe crew, 10 bus drivers and 12 truck drivers. Cher comments in the extras that they travel with over 100 people and the venues each provided about “80 people to help our riggers” for each show.

The special DVD also came with extra behind-the-scenes interviews. Doriana Sanchez talks about wanting to make a better show than Believe a very fabulous, Chery show.

Cher is interviewed in her red wig. She says she saw a picture of a Gaudí church and that inspiring the design and concepts. She says you build a show like puzzle pieces and fit them all into place to start making a picture. She says it takes 13 hours to assemble and perform the show (approx. 8 am to 11 pm).

They take us through the assembly starting with the wardrobe crew arriving at 8 am to set up the work area, sew repairs and do washing (6-8 loads of it). There are five racks of wardrobe, wig tables, shoe tables. They put up the fan signs on the wall (that’s nice!) and the wardrobe wrangler shows us how the outfits are organized by segments of the show. There’s a typo on the title card for 12:58 pm.

By 1 pm wardrobe is doing fittings with the dancer. We see Jamal Story stretching. He calls Cher “legendary, a living legend.” By 4 pm the crew is doing aerial checks. Dreya Webber is the aerial choreographer and dancer.  She says these venues are good for aerial circus activities. She says you need a lot of hand strength, that the fabric is thin and you have to be strong to hold your body weight, lots of arm muscle. She says it takes a lot of strength to make it look like nothing. (Aint that the truth.)

Doriana Sanchez says it takes “a lot of work to make this show happen.” She talks about how difficult it is to be on the road, moving constantly and that they are like a band of gypsies. I think its Webber who says you have to make sure you’re wrapped correctly in the air, “You can’t play with this.”

Then the sound check. Paul Mirchovich says he’s been in Cher’s band for 13 years. We watch the band warming up and quipping backstage. The backup singers are walking around in different stages of makeup. They do the vocals for the soundcheck. One hour before showtime Cher arrives. She says she does her makeup listening to a tape of a movie. Tonight it was “Analyze This.” The makeup room is full of portable makeup mirrors. The dancers are all stretching. Cher says she wears about 20 sparkles.

Security speaks into something, “clear that area, we’re ready to walk” before escorting Cher backstage. Cher vocalizes and signs autographs and meets people on the way, takes pictures. A little kid is wearing one of the show’s outfits.

Doriana Sanchez says she and Cher are very close. that Cher is an incredible collaborator. She said Cher saw her in the movie Dirty Dancing and called to ask for dance lessons. She says she’s learned so much about life and show biz from Cher. And about having fun.

Right before the show everyone gathers in a circle and Cher talks about energy and being “one huge unit, larger than live.” She says they rev up like a football team. Cher says, “I hope I remember everything” and that they give everyone a “fabulous time…that’s always our main objective” and to “be grateful.”

Then Cher gets her harness put on and it’s rechecked by someone else (so they don’t have the Cleveland snafu). They show her getting loaded into the chandelier (which is cool). Cher has some superstitious things she does. She gets her outfit coat put on. When the music starts Cher and Doriana say a silent prayer together. You can hear the audience and their excitement. Cher gets one last something to drink. “Then I go up in the air.” She says she spends every show beginning hoping the silk curtain rising doesn’t catch in the chandelier. You hear the cheer go up when the audience sees Cher. Cher says, “The show is the great part. Everything that goes around it is work.”

They also show Cher coming off stage and going into the portable changing room behind the center entrance. She has less than a minute, Doriana Sanchez says, and “every hand is moving” to get her clothes, hair, lipstick, jewelry done in time. They show sweaty dancers drinking from bottles.  Cher says her favorite costume to wear is the Hole Fit “because I’m very sassy” and I do think this outfit brings out her best live performances. Her favorite songs to sing are “Song for the Lonely” and “Strong Enough.”

Fans talk about Cher after leaving the show. They like how “human” she seemed, her costumes and hair. She was amazing, great, she rocks. Her body is better than ever, the best concert ever, awesome, stunning, they liked seeing Sonny again. (The next tour there will be more of that.)

As Cher leaves she said it was a great audience. “We rocked. I’m tired now. That’s good.” Cher is asked why she doesn’t want to do this anymore and she says she wants to stop while she’s still doing it well. She doesn’t want anyone to say, but the last show was better. She says, “too de loo” and the limo drives off.

Lowlights: Not many. The show had no band intro. And I could have sworn “Walking in Memphis” was in it, but it wasn’t. I know my friend Julie loves Cher’s Elvis-y version of that song and I know we discussed it after the Glen Hell show (the one show she saw). But maybe she just said, “I wish she had done ‘Walking in Memphis.”” By the time I went with her to the Las Vegas residencies at Caesars and The Park Theater and the opening show of Dressed to Kill in Pheonix, she would be doing the song as part of the casual sequence.

Highlights:

This was a monster tour; it dominated. The critics came around, too. It was a fun show to attend. And it was an achievement of endurance. Some of its accolades: