Gewirz's Java Hut 2012

Photo by Austin Tice. Dan Weiss takes his ukulele and runs away with the show.

Friday night’s Gewirz Java Hut talent showcase was fun from start to finish, and not just because of the free food. Although, if your classmates already intimidate you, you may want to stop reading now; they’re more impressive than you knew.

Host for the evening Brendan Parent displayed his usual flair for the dramatic, keeping the proceedings lively with everything from knock-knock jokes to enactments of random casebook pages.

Emily Gouillart sang a haunting ballad accompanied by Ridgeway Addison on piano. David Wadley, aka NMN, aka your friendly neighborhood UPS guy, put on a sultry R & B performance. His smooth vocal stylings and easy stage demeanor won him a number of fans.

Jordan Rothman lightened the mood with his high-energy stand-up routine. He jumped around the stage for the full allotted five minutes, often forgetting to speak into the microphone, but speaking loudly enough that it didn’t matter anyway. Most of the jokes came at the expense of Rothman’s 6’9” frame (“I think the Gewirz beds are Georgetown’s way of imposing their Catholic morality on me”), or the law school experience (Rothman forgot to remove the fake name he used for grading in LRW when he used his papers for writing samples, and had to explain in interviews why his papers were signed “Albus Dumbledore”).

Oedipus and the Momma’s Boys (1Ls Louis Dilorenzo, Will Munoz, and Kevin Scura) kept the energy high, playing uptempo versions of crowd-pleasing songs. They started off with Mumford & Sons’ “Little Lion Man” and segued straight into Johnny B.Goode, which gave the trio a chance to show off some blues licks.

Photo by Austin Tice. Mark Doss serves up some funny spoken word.Mark Doss performed a mix of spoken-word and stand-up comedy which was impressive for both its excellent standard of writing and the courage required to deliver it.

Kristina Goodwin didn’t need a microphone to display her beautiful voice and its mind-blowing vibrato, ably accompanied by Daniel Woofter on piano.

Burak Bekiroglu did double duty, serving as the sound manager and performing, weaving loops of his own singing with crazy sound effects to create a tapestry of electronica.

Photo by Austin Tice. Sharmistha Das: Better than Bollywood.Sharmistha Das, 1L, closed the show with a self-choreographed presentation of traditional Indian dance. Her stomping steps were augmented by tambourine-anklets, and her tai-chi-like arm movements flowed elegantly. Perhaps most impressive, however, was her ability to smile broadly throughout the entire performance and make something that must be both difficult and tiring look easy.

But the night belonged to Dan Weiss. Armed with nothing but a ukulele and ‘90s pop radio, he had the crowd singing along and eating out of his hand well past the proscribed 5-minute time limit. Performing Alannis Morisettes’s “You Oughta Know” and Four Non-Blondes’ “What’s Up” in a manner reminiscent of Israel Kamakawiwo’ole’s version of “Somewhere Over the Rainbow,” Weiss won us all over by being both shamelessly nostalgic and quite talented.

Photo by Austin Tice. Kukui Clayton serenades the crowd.Apologies to all the other brilliant acts and thanks to the resident fellows, Bon Appetit, and everyone else who helped put on the event. Excellent job to all!