Steamboat Pilot & Today

Steamboat Springs — This year's Cabaret was definitely a little bit on the racy side and apparently raised some eyebrows among audience members. Criticism included too much sex, a skit offensive to Oak Creek and some tasteless songs in the face of an audience that included some teens.

Cabaret organizers brushed it off as part of the show.

"It did get a little bawdy by the last show on Saturday night," director and emcee Doug Lockwood admitted. "But if they thought the other shows were racy, then they are a little sensitive."

This year's show was definitely not PG and included a take on the now-tiresome Elian Gonzales situation, where a small boy rides a tube up the Yampa and is saved by a Steamboat resident, who proclaims he will have a better life here. Elian is claimed by not one, but two fathers.

"We offended a bunch of people," Lockwood said. "Did 'Fargo' offend the people of Minnesota?'"

Other skits that were not so controversial included Kris Hammond's (aka Ricky Martin) version of "La Vida Boata," the evolution of the Steamboat bank family tree, working on the service job mill and a jab at the rolling police car on Lincoln Avenue.

"If we're not offending somebody we're not doing our job," Lockwood said.

Steamboat Springs Arts Council Executive Director Nancy Kramer said the posters clearly state that the material is PG-21 and that the show may include tasteless material. Although that is written tongue-in-cheek, Kramer said that parents need make choices.

"We certainly knew that it was a little racy; people have said that," Kramer said. "But the majority of people I heard said they laughed so hard their sides hurt."