Escape To Margaritaville, The Musical He and a friend had stopped for lunch at a Mexican restaurant before a flight to Miami and then back home to Key West. They, like all the other patrons were drinking margaritas. “It was a hot day,” the singer recalls, “And they were damn good margaritas.” “And I kind of came up with that idea of this is just like a Margarita-ville,” Buffett continued. “She kind of laughed at that and put me on the plane… ..... And I started working on it.” He got some of it down while on the plane and then while driving to the Keys. As he tells it….. “There was a wreck on the bridge, and we got stopped for about an hour so I finished the song on the Seven Mile Bridge, which I thought was apropos.” Some days later he slipped it into a set among “mostly covers” as he was playing at one of the bars in the Keys “Everybody responded to that song immediately in that little bar,” he says. “I never thought it was gonna do what it did.” ‘Escape to Margaritaville’ Brings the song to life! “It’s pure escapism is all it is,” he says, “I’m not the first one to do it, nor shall I probably be the last. But I think it’s really a part of the human condition that you’ve got to have some fun. You’ve got to get away from whatever you do to make a living or other parts of life that stress you out. I try to make it at least 50/50 fun to work and so far, it’s worked out.” One thing ‘Jimmy’ loves about the musical is bringing Margaritaville to life. “Margaritaville has been a myth for such a long time,” he says. “There was no such place as Margaritaville. It was a made-up place in my mind, basically made up about my experiences in Key West and having to leave Key West and go on the road to work and then come back and spend time by the beach.” “Key West was always kind of mythical and also had a lot of history of great writers who kind of use it as their oasis as well,” Buffett said. Then the reality was that you had to take it out on the road. “Singing (to) people to take them away somewhere mythical for a while until they have to return back to their real lives.” …. Margaritaville! ‘Escape to Margaritaville’: It’s not by accident that’s the name of the play. And escape you will….. The show is light hearted and full of great puns, the scenes and music flow well and the writers did a great job incorporating Jimmy Buffet’s songs creating the story line from the lyrics, even encouraging the audience to sing along. “Escape from Margaritaville” keeps the “will he or won’t he?” suspense between Rachel and Tully going for most of the second half of the show. “Will he or won’t he end up with the girl” that is; the have-sex question, well, that is answered early on. Both Obermark and Lester-Sams are able soloists, but as their romance warms up we get some entrancing duets. There are older characters too, (where the surprising twists come from) who offer sage advice to the young’uns, in sing alongs like “Why Don’t We Get Drunk...” The audience is encouraged to chime in. In this play you’ll hear the phrase “Get your mind on island time”, .... anyone who has escaped for a minute on Fort Myers Beach, Sanibel or Captiva is well aware of “Island time”! In this fun enjoyable musical, you can let your mind escape to ‘island time’ while enjoying yourself in Margaritaville! Playing now through April 2nd, at Broadway Palm DinnerTheater, at: 1380 Colonial Blvd, Fort Myers. For tickets call: (239) 278-4422 or go to: www.broadwaypalm.com Traditional Family? The Sun Bay Paper Page 12 February 25, 2022 - March 3, 2022 Cont. from pg 1 CDC, and 20,642,649 of those babies (or 40.36%) were born to unmarried mothers. This country is not headed in the right direction. A generation will soon be coming of age in which a large percentage of the population will have been denied a traditional family life. What happens when families fall apart or fail to form in the first place? Government, as this column has noted before, gets bigger and takes more control over people's lives. In 1941, Medicaid, which is a form of welfare, did not exist. "Authorized by Title XIX of the Social Security Act, Medicaid was signed into law in 1965 alongside Medicare," says the program's official website. "All states, the District of Columbia, and the U.S. territories have Medicaid programs designed to provide health coverage for low-income people. Although the Federal government establishes certain parameters for all states to follow, each state administers their Medicaid program differently, resulting in variations in Medicaid coverage across the country." By July 2021, according to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, there were 76,705,180 people enrolled in Medicaid. Last fiscal year, according to the Monthly Treasury Statement, the federal government spent $520.58 billion on that program. When Medicaid was created in 1965, 7.7% of American babies were born to unmarried mothers. By 2020, according to the CDC's latest birth report, the percentage of American babies born to unmarried mothers had risen to 40.5%. The percentage born on Medicaid, according to the CDC report, was 42%. As this column has also noted before, Census Bureau data shows that the traditional family and economic well-being are interconnected. In 2020, according to the bureau, only 4.7% of married couple families in this country lived below the poverty level. But at the same time, 38.1% of female householders with children under 18 and no spouse present lived in poverty, as did 46.2% of female householders with no spouse present and children under 6. If America continues on a long-term trend in which 40% or more of the babies born each year are born to unmarried mothers and even more than that are born on Medicaid, it is hard to see how this country will prosper. This nation was built by pioneers who sailed across broad oceans and ventured onto vast prairies, seeking to live their lives self-sufficient and free. They did not want to be dependent on government. They wanted to be independent. We should teach our children and our grandchildren to emulate those pioneers who gave us this great country. Terence P Jefrey Cont. from pg 1
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