Katy Perry

California Dreams Tour 2011

Katy Perry started her career began to take off in 2008, even though she had been creating music for many years and had always been interested in music. Her California Dreams Tour was her second concert tour. The tour began in February of 2011 and visited Europe, Australia, Asia, North America, and South America. Her concert begins with a video screen introduction that tells a story about a girl named Katy who lives in a colorless world spending her life cutting mean for a mean butcher. One night she escapes by falling asleep and visits a vibrant candy land in search of her cat, Kitty Purry, and the Baker’s Boy.

She begins by performing “Teenage Dream,” in a white dress with spinning peppermints. Then she performs “Hummingbird Heartbeat” and “Waking Up in Vegas.” There is a human slot machine, showgirls, and an Elvis Presley impersonator. The video shows her taking a shortcut that leads her into a candy cane forest where she meets two mimes who join her on stage to perform “Ur So Gay.” She then takes a bite from their magical brownie. She puts on a peacock outfit to perform the song “Peacock.” She then performs “I Kissed a Girl.”

Next, a video interlude reveals that the mimes’ brownie has transformed her into a cat, a plan executed by the evil butcher all along. “Circle the Drain” gets performed while she battles her dancers who are dressed as butchers before going into “E.T.” where laser beams run across the stage while a futuristic lyrics video is projected on the screens. The show continues with “Who Am I Living For” in which she is strapped up by her dancers with elastic strings and is left on the ground defeated. She is then saved by her two backup singers and moves into “Pearl,” where she wears a large silver gown. After a brief video interlude, she reappears on stage sitting on a swing to perform “Not Like the Movies.” During the performance, Katy is lifted high above the stage. She descends and gets her guitar to perform an acoustic version of “The One That Got Away.” She goes on to perform an acoustic medley of her favorite songs by other artists. A giant pink colored cloud descends to the stage and Perry gets on top of it, she is then elevated above the crowd and performs “Thinking of You.”

The next section begins with another video interlude where Perry finally finds Kitty Purry and is now headed to the Big Bakers City Ball wearing a blue wig to meet her lover, the Baker’s Boy. Undecided on what to wear, Perry starts performing “Hot n Cold”, magically going through seven costume changes bursting immediately into “Last Friday Night (T.G.I.F.).” During this song, photos of fans are displayed on the screens. Katy Perry and her cat, Kitty Purry, invite up to 20 fans onto the stage at the end of the number. After a high-energy and sparkly performance of “Firework,” the encore begins with the final interlude of the show, which reveals that she has been dreaming all along, suddenly the Baker’s Boy enters her room dressed in a gingerbread costume to deliver cupcakes she has ordered for breakfast. She returns to the stage for a performance of “California Gurls” dressed in a silver bra shaped like Hershey’s Kisses, dancing with a line of Gingerbread men, and dousing the crowd with a whip cream bazooka.

This information was found on the Wikipedia page for Katy Perry’s California Dreams Tour, slight changes were made. Jonathan Lethem’s  article “The Ecstasy of Influence: A Plagiarism” on Harper’s Magazine, was an inspiring in the process of writing this online story of Katy Perry, Elvis Presley, and Justin Timberlake. I used information directly from the Wikipedia site because it suited my story, and I changed it slightly to make it a little more my own.

I went to one of Katy Perry’s California Dreams Tour concerts with my friend, Danisleydis. It was at the Prudential Center in Newark and it was on June 19, 2011. She put on a fantastic show, between the previously created video that had a story and her quirky attitude, dancing, and costumes. At the end of the concert, she told specific people from the crowd that they could come up on stage, but a bunch of girls started storming to the stage. To this day, I still wish we got up on the stage to get a picture with her. That would have been a magical experience, although the concert itself was quite a magical experience and I’m so glad I went.

“Peacock” and “California Gurls”

“Hot n Cold” and “Hot n Cold”

“Circle the Drain” and “Firework”

“I Kissed a Girl” and “Thinking of You”

“Pearl” and “Teenage Dream”

These are a few of the pictures I took with my camera at the concert. As you can see, she changes many times throughout the concert. Many of her outfits are very strange; from the spinning peppermint dress, to the shiny silver gown, the leotard with candy-shaped bumps on it, cat outfit, peacock outfit, and the Hershey Kiss shaped bra. You can also tell from many of the pictures that she does some interesting dance moves throughout her concert. These are a few of the reasons I decided to compare her to Elvis Presley. During his concerts, he used to wear many strange outfits and he definitely had some distinct dance moves.

As shown by her music video for her song “Last Friday Night (T.G.I.F),” Katy was interested in acting before she appeared as the voice for Smurfette and as Rikki on “Raising Hope.” 

The Smurfs

A few years after Katy’s singing career took off in 2008, she played a major role as the voice of Smurfette in the movie “The Smurfs” in 2011. Katy was overjoyed to be a part of this movie because she was able to play a role as her sassy, flirty, cute, and sweet self. She shows her excitement by wearing a Smurfette dress along with Smurfette designed nails. The role as Smurfette suited her really well and made way for her in the acting business.

 

Raising Hope

After her appearance in “The Smurfs,” Katy Perry’s friend Shannon Woodward, who plays Sabrina on the show “Raising Hope,” called her up and asked if she wanted to play a guest role on the show. Katy recalls, “I was home, just toasting up a frozen chicken fillet when Shannon called me up and asked if I wanted to do something ‘fun’ for a change and try out a guest role on her TV show. I thought, sure, I have nothing else to do, and I like chillin’ with my best friend.” The episode she took part in was entitled “Single White Female.” Katy played the as Sabrina’s prison guard, Rikki. Although Katy enjoyed playing this role as well, it was much different than her role as Smurfette in the previous year. that she was not used to playing. She played a character that verged from her usual pretty appearance and cartoon personality. She appeared as a crazy-haired, slightly mustached, scary character. Her transition from music to movies is similar to the experience of Justin Timberlake and Elvis Presley. She is also similar to Elvis Presley because of their similar strange dance moves and outfit choices during their concerts.

Do you want to learn more about Katy Perry? Trying reading “Katy Perry: An Unofficial Biography.”