Majestic Theatre outshines the stars on opening night (w/Ben Lee and Mandy Moore photo gallery)

The real star at the Majestic Theatre grand opening Saturday night wasn’t Mandy Moore or Ben Lee, it was the theatre itself. The new owners, Matt Gerding and Scott Leslie, have transformed the place from flashy and tacky to classy and versatile. Where concrete once cracked under dancing feet, buffed hardwood floors now give the theatre a feeling of warmth. At the backstage doors, where young ruffians once ran out to yak up all-you-can-drink specials, security guards stand at the ready. More importantly, a real backstage and a real green room now actually exist for performers, something sorely lacking before.

Fortunately, most of the crowd was there to check out the building’s new look anyway. Sure, a contingency of diehard Mandy fans came out: a virginal gaggle of West Towne mallrats by the stage and, up in the balcony, a few moms with preteen daughters. Squeals of delight met Ben Lee when he let an F-bomb slip (at which he jokingly apologized for "corrupting minds").

The rest of the audience was a grab bag of curious locals, the owners’ parents and their gray-haired friends, and a smattering of awkward hipsters trying to exude irony.

As for the music, there’s not much to say. It wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t great. It vacillated between innocuous and pleasant, with a few sweet but rare moments of rocked-out abandon.

Opener Chris Stills started out with standard open-mic mediocrity but moved on up to a passionate ending. Ben Lee has more charisma and better songs, but when it comes down to it, he’s no rock star. He’s just the kind of guy you’d want along for a rousing camp fire sing-along.

At 23, Mandy Moore has matured past her tween pop princess phase. She’s got a remarkably sexy, full-bodied voice and a genuinely disarming stage presence. While introducing one of her own songs, she explained that she basically "just wanted to write a song with the word 'adore' in it." She’s also prone to using down-home phrases like "Man alive!" and "that's just the way the cookie crumbles."

Besides a weird reverb mixing on Mandy Moore’s voice during a few songs, the acoustics of the theatre sounded good to me. But her sound guy told me they were actually "pretty rough." Although he said the sound improved when the theatre filled with people, he thought the space still needed some spray-on acoustic plaster or more sound-absorbing panels.

A few other kinks in the theatre’s operation will need some attention:

--The theatre’s asymmetrical, curved shape leaves anyone sitting house left unable to see the stage. Apparently, this dead space was created to increase the theatre’s official capacity, but I’d like to see it used more creatively. Right now it’s just a dark area for making out.

--The alcohol prices are a little out-of-control, by my standards. $5.50 for a Capital brew? $4.50 for a bottle of Leinie’s? Hopefully the wonders of capitalism will either prove me a stingy miser or force the prices down. Incidentally, Saturday night’s opening showed every indication of a well-run security operation: by 10:45 p.m., ten underagers had been kicked out for trying to sneak a drink.

--Both the men’s and women’s downstairs bathrooms didn’t function all night, leading to some important lessons for us all, I think. Basically, none of the toilets would flush -- unfortunate, but understandable considering that the plumbing probably has a few glitches that need ironing out with the opening of the long dormant venue. So, what’s the response? A sign saying "the toilets don’t flush – sorry for the inconvenience" is taped to the bathroom doors. Clear enough. A unisex bathroom is located upstairs. Now, I can only speak for the Ladies’ room, but I saw evidence that the toilets had been used many, many times over and (of course) never flushed. Disgusting. Lesson for the patrons: If a sign says the toilets don’t flush, don’t use the toilets! Someone has to clean up after your thoughtless ass. Lesson for the theatre: If the toilets don’t flush, lock or block off the bathroom!

But these are minor setbacks for an otherwise very promising venue. Owners Gerding and Leslie deserve toasts for injecting new life into an old theatre and working hard to bring their dream to reality.

Now the only question that remains: will the people come?

Photos below courtesy of Phil Ejercito. See more at his website CFUCT.org. Click on pictures to view them larger and unsmushed - for some internet browsers you may have to click on the image a second time to view it in full glory. Photos include Mandy Moore, her band, the audience, Ben Lee, and Chris Stills.