By Kati Neiheisel***When Patricia Fitzpatrick relaunched the Provincetown CabaretFest in 2014, it was with fond memories of the festival’s beginning: “In 1999, I was Director of Tourism in Provincetown,” she says. “We started a grant program to promote tourism in the off-season and John O’Neil wanted to start a cabaret festival. I said, ‘What is cabaret?’ 
We gave him a grant, and I went to see it. Oh, my word, I loved it! It breaks the fourth wall, and you’re involved with the audience. You’re not just standing with a big band singing what they wanted you to sing, as I had done as a girl singer at the Detroit Playboy Club. After thirty years, I hadn’t thought of going back to performing, I don’t have the same voice. But I went to a master class taught by Carol O’Shaughnessy, and she saved my life with this one comment, ‘You don’t have to be a great singer. You have to be a great storyteller.’
“When I retired in 2005, John stopped doing the festival. I missed it a lot. The PBG took it up for two or three years and invited me to participate, but then they dropped it. In 2014, I called John and asked permission to bring back CabaretFest. It was originally two or three days, now it’s seven days. What means the most to me 
is Monday through Thursday, we have master classes and workshops. We’ve had the best names in the business here to teach: Steve Ross, Sidney Myer, Sharon McNight, Sally Mayes, Marilyn Maye, Karen Mason, Jeff Harnar and Angela Bacari, who’s the grandmother of Nicolas King, who’s like a son to me. What’s most important in our master classes is we deconstruct the song for the singer, so they get in touch with the lyric, not their voice. It’s just amazing for me to watch the transformation after students complete those classes.
“My vision was to create a bridge to New York and Boston, but also to Palm Springs and Florida and other places that have given us a bright base of performance styles. CabaretFest has never been a business, but I hope it will be a legacy. I have to trust that everything goes forward with David Rhodes, who I’ve selected in my own wisdom to take it over. Even though we haven’t known each other for a long time, and we’re very different, when he showed up these last few years, he had a joy that was contagious. And if I asked 
for someone to volunteer to do something, he was there. David has the time, the energy, the drive and the desire to keep it going.”
David Rhodes says, “I came to cabaret late in my career. I did serious theater, then moved to London to study for three years. When I came back, I did Shakespeare around the country, then film and television. As much as I loved being an actor for hire, I wanted to create my own work, so I started doing solo performances. The first was Rites of Privacy. I played six characters. It was Off-Broadway, then it went to London, then back Off-Broadway. After that, I began to incorporate singing into my shows. For economic reasons, I decided to move from Off-Broadway to cabaret spaces so my next show Rhodes Less Traveled was launched at The Triad. It was a huge success, and it went to London. Then, I had a V8 moment: I could work on my singing and bring a different energy to cabaret, sort of Weimar, Bertolt Brecht. I wanted to elevate the art form to something more theatrical, more avant garde, to incorporate spoken word, theatrical lighting and dance, and whatever the venues might have to offer. Wi
th the economic advantage of not having to rent a theater, I was able to soar. I was welcomed all around the States and in Europe with these shows.
“One day, I Googled and found the CabaretFest. Patricia Fitzpatrick said, ‘Come and see what it’s about.’ So, I went to P-town. By the time I left, I was on a professional panel and performing in their variety show. Patricia invited me back as an acting coach and master class teacher and I became a headliner for four years (2022-25). But there were people in the cabaret community who bristled at what I was doing. It was too theatrical, too much drama, too intimate, too sexual, not as user-friendly as conventional cabaret, but Patricia understood what I was about and I understand ‘the other.’ We have a balance of both in the programming for this summer.
We have Tony Award winners and nominees, but we also have gritty downtown artists. For cabaret to evolve, particularly with what’s going on in the world right now, we need some edge and some youth to get people excited about cabaret. To
me, cabaret is a room. It’s a room where anything can happen. It is an art form, but it’s an art form that must be elastic and flexible. If you go back to the roots of cabaret, drag, beat poetry, breaking down the fourth wall, and the early “in your face” statements people were making in these clubs, there’s room to bring that back. My mission is to preserve what is traditional, beautiful, classic, elegant and light—everybody loves to go to the Café Carlyle and hear a fabulous person they recognize singing their favorite songs, but there’s also what’s playing at Club Cumming, Joe’s Pub, and what is coming out of Europe. There’s room for all!” In addition to stretching the boundaries of the art form, Rhodes says, “My goal is for CabaretFest to expand, for there to be a London CabaretFest, and a New Orleans CabaretFest. A week where people can learn from each other and have amazing shows is very special.”
For detailed information about headliners, performers, master classes, venues, and a whole lot more—and tickets, check out the festival’s new web site here.
Photo key: 1. Patricia Fitzpatrick 2. Patricia Fitzpatrick and Marilyn Maye 3. David Rhodes 4, and 5. Master class with David Rhodes
