Lick My Old Lady Tonight
So new temp job is awesome- everyone's very nice, the work will be super-easy. They gave me the keys so I can open the place next week(!). It's a block from Rockefeller Center, so after work I stopped by to see ceebeegee for an hour or so, and we talked about Theatre and the Civil War.
Then I headed over to The Looking Glass for Glory's reading of Dorian Gray. Saw a bunch of people I haven't seen in ages. There was some confusion as to who I was supposed to read- Glory had sent me an E-mail asking me to read Victor, but when I got there she said I was reading Mr. Erskine again, and Joe was to be reading Victor. When Joe arrived, he said he didn't care, so I read Victor. Joe gave me his script that had the Victor lines highlighted.
Everyone in the cast was pretty great, especially Jesse May as Dorian, Susan Rankus as The Duchess of Monmouth (with an absurd French accent to match my own), Sarah Jebian as Mrs. Vane, and Christine as Lady Henrietta (say what you will about changing the character's sex, Christine tore it up*).
I did fine with my minor role; I felt as if, during one of my longer monologues, I accidentally lapsed briefly into an Irish brogue due to an unfortunate combination of syllables, but everyone said they didn't notice.
Emily and Derrick are planning a Holiday party on the 16th, but I've already said I'm going to Randi's birthday (of course, that's also Hanukkah, so I don't know how much of a “holiday” party it will be).
Glory said for everyone to just introduce themselves, and not to stick in our Measure For Measure or Avalon cliques (or other cliques). I knew most everyone there, anyway.
The show's been cut down to only 2 hours, now! w00t! The second act could still use a little cutting, but it's a manageable length now.
A bunch of people went to Bar Nine afterward- I stopped there with them for about 15 minutes, before heading down to Marie's Crisis for Jim Allen's party.
When I arrived at Marie's, the party had just begun. Jim Allen was resplendent in a sparkling beaded vest that a customer had made for him 10 years previously. Kit had brought him a present of a bag of 17 beef-and-cheese sticks. Kit's having a Game Night on the 2nd. Very excited, since I missed her last party.
I came in, waved to Adam Shapiro, then a bunch of people came up to hug me. Adam was disappointed that he only got a wave and not a hug. Didn't really know what to say to that. He told me the same things about Martin Short: Fame Becomes Me that he told me last time I saw him.
Jim had photographs of him through the years, including a rather arresting picture of him at a prom with a girl in an indescribably 1980s dress.
At one point I sang "O, Vagina, where the wind comes sweeping down the plain" (which jayspec and I came up with ages ago, as a theme song for The Vagina Monologues). We ended up singing the whole song that way: "Oh Vagina: O-K V-A-G-I-N-A, Oh Vagiiiiiiina! Yo!" Then a few bars of "I just met a girl named Vagina", then "Lick My Old Lady Tonight".
Panaat showed up with a straight man from his hip-hop class (they have classes for that now?), and requested that Jim Allen and I do our duet, so Jim launched into his Michael Jackson/Peter Pan medley, with which I usually sing along. Panaat was disgruntled, and requested the actual song, so we did "Our Private World" for him; a drunken old man (who later was going around telling people he was a photographer and asking if he could take pictures of them) came up and started singing notes on random vowels that sort of sounded like the right notes and words but weren't, which kind of threw me off, and I missed my entrance near the end.
Also did "Jacky" rather early in the evening.
Jacqueline was there- it was also her birthday, so she'd brought along her mother and her sister. Big Cop Dave, who's been dating her for a few months now, has not been allowed to meet the mom yet, since she doesn't know her daughter is dating a (very attractive) man some 20 years older. So this wasn't so much a meet-the-parents as it was a make-the-parents-aware-of-his-existence. He had a big tiramisu birthday cake for her, which was delicious. Dave was requesting songs right and left to please The Mother (he's usually less vocal).
I loaned Jim Allen my Vocal Selections of Romance, Romance a while ago, and he said it's been very helpful- tons of people have been requesting it.
Jason was there, and sat with me a lot of the time- he was one of the victims of photographer-man. Jason asked him if he had a business card, and when the man said no, Jason told him to come back when he had one. Good for him.
Jason's still obsessed with On the 20th Century, and was amused when I said I wanted to sing "Veronique" at Marie's because of the "Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité" on the mirror behind the bar.
Chris (Jim's Boyfriend) asked me to sing "I'd Rather be Sailing". I was afraid I was already losing my voice by that point, but I said I'd do it if he wanted. A few minutes later, Jim announced that I would be singing and started playing some arpeggios, so I jumped in with that- it turned out he was actually playing "Frank Mills" (which is odd, since I usually never sing that as a solo). So I sang that; Jim bumped it up into a boy key as we were going.
Later I did sing "I'd Rather be Sailing" (with Jim on counterpoint), and we pulled it off rather well, I think.
Randy arrived after he got off work at 2, which was when I was about ready to go home. I was pretty exhausted from my very long day. Went out on "The Ladies who Lunch", took the subway home, which randomly announced they were going express through Queens**, but I managed to hop on a local G train at Queens Plaza.
Slept till Noon today- I must have been really tired.
* she told me later that she'd never done a British accent onstage before- I was shocked; she was great. She'd done her homework. I love that.
** Hi, we're the MTA, etc...
Then I headed over to The Looking Glass for Glory's reading of Dorian Gray. Saw a bunch of people I haven't seen in ages. There was some confusion as to who I was supposed to read- Glory had sent me an E-mail asking me to read Victor, but when I got there she said I was reading Mr. Erskine again, and Joe was to be reading Victor. When Joe arrived, he said he didn't care, so I read Victor. Joe gave me his script that had the Victor lines highlighted.
Everyone in the cast was pretty great, especially Jesse May as Dorian, Susan Rankus as The Duchess of Monmouth (with an absurd French accent to match my own), Sarah Jebian as Mrs. Vane, and Christine as Lady Henrietta (say what you will about changing the character's sex, Christine tore it up*).
I did fine with my minor role; I felt as if, during one of my longer monologues, I accidentally lapsed briefly into an Irish brogue due to an unfortunate combination of syllables, but everyone said they didn't notice.
Emily and Derrick are planning a Holiday party on the 16th, but I've already said I'm going to Randi's birthday (of course, that's also Hanukkah, so I don't know how much of a “holiday” party it will be).
Glory said for everyone to just introduce themselves, and not to stick in our Measure For Measure or Avalon cliques (or other cliques). I knew most everyone there, anyway.
The show's been cut down to only 2 hours, now! w00t! The second act could still use a little cutting, but it's a manageable length now.
A bunch of people went to Bar Nine afterward- I stopped there with them for about 15 minutes, before heading down to Marie's Crisis for Jim Allen's party.
When I arrived at Marie's, the party had just begun. Jim Allen was resplendent in a sparkling beaded vest that a customer had made for him 10 years previously. Kit had brought him a present of a bag of 17 beef-and-cheese sticks. Kit's having a Game Night on the 2nd. Very excited, since I missed her last party.
I came in, waved to Adam Shapiro, then a bunch of people came up to hug me. Adam was disappointed that he only got a wave and not a hug. Didn't really know what to say to that. He told me the same things about Martin Short: Fame Becomes Me that he told me last time I saw him.
Jim had photographs of him through the years, including a rather arresting picture of him at a prom with a girl in an indescribably 1980s dress.
At one point I sang "O, Vagina, where the wind comes sweeping down the plain" (which jayspec and I came up with ages ago, as a theme song for The Vagina Monologues). We ended up singing the whole song that way: "Oh Vagina: O-K V-A-G-I-N-A, Oh Vagiiiiiiina! Yo!" Then a few bars of "I just met a girl named Vagina", then "Lick My Old Lady Tonight".
Panaat showed up with a straight man from his hip-hop class (they have classes for that now?), and requested that Jim Allen and I do our duet, so Jim launched into his Michael Jackson/Peter Pan medley, with which I usually sing along. Panaat was disgruntled, and requested the actual song, so we did "Our Private World" for him; a drunken old man (who later was going around telling people he was a photographer and asking if he could take pictures of them) came up and started singing notes on random vowels that sort of sounded like the right notes and words but weren't, which kind of threw me off, and I missed my entrance near the end.
Also did "Jacky" rather early in the evening.
Jacqueline was there- it was also her birthday, so she'd brought along her mother and her sister. Big Cop Dave, who's been dating her for a few months now, has not been allowed to meet the mom yet, since she doesn't know her daughter is dating a (very attractive) man some 20 years older. So this wasn't so much a meet-the-parents as it was a make-the-parents-aware-of-his-existence. He had a big tiramisu birthday cake for her, which was delicious. Dave was requesting songs right and left to please The Mother (he's usually less vocal).
I loaned Jim Allen my Vocal Selections of Romance, Romance a while ago, and he said it's been very helpful- tons of people have been requesting it.
Jason was there, and sat with me a lot of the time- he was one of the victims of photographer-man. Jason asked him if he had a business card, and when the man said no, Jason told him to come back when he had one. Good for him.
Jason's still obsessed with On the 20th Century, and was amused when I said I wanted to sing "Veronique" at Marie's because of the "Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité" on the mirror behind the bar.
Chris (Jim's Boyfriend) asked me to sing "I'd Rather be Sailing". I was afraid I was already losing my voice by that point, but I said I'd do it if he wanted. A few minutes later, Jim announced that I would be singing and started playing some arpeggios, so I jumped in with that- it turned out he was actually playing "Frank Mills" (which is odd, since I usually never sing that as a solo). So I sang that; Jim bumped it up into a boy key as we were going.
Later I did sing "I'd Rather be Sailing" (with Jim on counterpoint), and we pulled it off rather well, I think.
Randy arrived after he got off work at 2, which was when I was about ready to go home. I was pretty exhausted from my very long day. Went out on "The Ladies who Lunch", took the subway home, which randomly announced they were going express through Queens**, but I managed to hop on a local G train at Queens Plaza.
Slept till Noon today- I must have been really tired.
* she told me later that she'd never done a British accent onstage before- I was shocked; she was great. She'd done her homework. I love that.
** Hi, we're the MTA, etc...