Well, dear readers, yesterday’s topic of discussion proved to be most popular with the populace and I loved reading all your posts and seeing how many of you go all the way back to the Bay Cities days of yore. Not the Bay Cities days or your, mind you, no, the Bay Cities days of yore.
Last night, if I recall correctly (IIRC, in Internet lingo) was that show that dear reader, Robert Armin directed, that Musicals of 1964 thing. I was reading some very nice posts about it elsewhere – in fact, one person, who is also a “reviewer” of theater music for that particular site, praised just about everything and mentioned just about everyone except our very own Robert Armin. I think this gentleman needs to be bitch-slapped, don’t you? I hereby elect our very own dear reader, Mr. Craig Brockman, to go over and bitch-slap that “reviewer” from here to eternity.
Last night I attended a little show myself, over at the Jazz Bakery. I like the Jazz Bakery because it is located in what used to be Helms Bakery. You will know what that means when you read my very own novel. If you do not read my very own novel you will not know what it means, hence you will not be in the know, you will not be with it, you will not be in the loop, you will not be cool, man, cool, and a hep cat, you will not be hip, you will not be in with the in crowd, you will not be in the scene, man. In any case, performing last night was Mr. Bill Dana, who’d appeared in our Tourette’s Syndrome benefit. I find him most amusing, and he did Jose Jimenez (unfortunately, his straight men were the band, not a good thing – these boys should not go into comedy). The first half of the evening was a singer named Patty Clark, I think. I knew for sure, but then these fershluganah gardeners started mowing in front of the window and I can no longer think and I can no longer remember if “Clark” is her last name. I did not know Miss Patty Whatever-her-last-name-is, but I liked her voice quite a bit. She apparently was a band singer in days of yore and even had her own radio show. I’d venture to say she is in her seventies now, but her voice retains it’s silky sexiness and she can still belt them out when needed. She’s very tall. This was a tall woman. And she is very animated, which made me nervous as there were wires on the stage and rugs and she almost tripped several times (she dances all over the stage like mad). She has several weird things she does, like closing her eyes for most of the songs (she keeps her eyes closed when she’s bowing, too) and she has a habit of telling the audience what the lyrics are before she actually sings the song. But it’s the voice that counts, and the voice is excellent.
Pre show, I supped at Kate Mantelini’s on Wilshire Boulevard. I had the shrimp and crab salad with Louie dressing. I wish Louie had dressed before I ate the salad, because frankly who wants to watch Louie dress while they’re eating? The salad was quite tasty with the exception of the mutant olives. The olives were tiny shriveled up wizened little nubs and clearly mutants. I think maybe they’re called Greek olives, but that’s just trying to slap a name on something and make it seem normal. These tiny shriveled up wizened little nubs were mutants I’m telling you, and in days of yore such things would never have been in a salad – no, a salad of yore would have had nice big juicy olives with holes in them so you could put them on your fingers.
The singing bird is outside, singing songs from 1964 Broadway musicals – of course, the singing bird gave due credit to Robert Armin.
Perhaps we should simply all click on the Unseemly Button below or I shall have nothing whatsoever to write in the next section. Wouldn’t that be a fine kettle of cheese slices and ham chunks if we were all to go to the next section and it was blank? That would be unseemly, so let us all click right this very minute before such a thing can happen.
Well, you see, I’ve gone and written everything I had to write in the first section and now I am without thought, without a clue as to what to write in this section. This section will now be entirely off-the-cuff. I was going to do it off-the-collar or even off-the-sleeve, but off-the-cuff seems best. I’m trying to remember if I’ve ever written this section on-the-cuff, although I don’t see how it would have fit on-the-cuff, the cuff being a small thing. Has anyone noticed how small a thing a cuff is? Why can’t we have bigger cuffs? Although if we have bigger cuffs then we will need bigger links and where does it all stop? And have you ever thought of this: the cuffs on our shirts are entirely different from the cuffs on our pants, and the cuffs on our pants are entirely different from the cuffs on our hands. For example, only the cuffs on our hands need a key. One does not need a key for the cuffs on a shirt or pant. Isn’t that interesting? Where else would you find an entire paragraph on various and sundried cuffs, that’s what I’d like to know? Perhaps in the next paragraph we’ll talk about pockets.
Have I mentioned that I wrote everything I had to write in the first section? Holy cow, why did I do that? “Holy cow”? What is a holy cow anyway? A born-again cow? A cow that likes Billy Graham? A cow that prays? A cow that goes to church every Sunday? What in tarnation is a holy cow? Perhaps it is a cow that recounts the story of Baby Jesus? Perhaps it is a cow who is a rabbi? Do Jewish holy cows eat borscht? Are Catholic holy cows baptized? Do they eat wafers? I shall have to ponder this holy cow business further.
Oh, I know what I haven’t written about. I haven’t written about our Unseemly Trivia Contest winners. We have three count them three High Winners in Mr. William F. Orr’s guest contest. And, of course, our handy-dandy electronic hat has chosen the Highest Winner, who will, of course, receive a sparkling prize. First the question:
A 60’s musical had among its principle players a Howdy Doody host and a friend of a horse. Name the musical, the host, and the horse.
And the answer is:
The musical: Camelot
The principle player who was a Howdy Doody host (on a Canadian version of the show): Robert Goulet
The horse: Flicka from My Friend Flicka (starring Roddy MacDowell)
Our High Winners are Jeffrey Kauffman, freedunit and Michael Shayne. Our randomly selected Highest Winner is freedunit. And, of course, Mr. William F. Orr will receive a sparkling prize for having his contest used. If both gentlemen will send their handy-dandy addresses I will send them their handy-dandy sparkling prizes.
Holy cow, don’t forget that tomorrow is Ask BK Day, so get your excellent questions ready.
Well, dear readers, I’m afraid this entire section has been entirely too too off-the-cuff. Perhaps tomorrow this section will be off-the-shoulder, which is ever so much nicer and quite stylish, too. In the meantime, I must do the things I do. Today’s topic of discussion: What is the most annoying thing that has happened whilst in a legit theater? I’ll start: During Prelude to a Kiss an elderly Jewish couple started arguing. It started softly, and people were telling them to be quiet, but the argument soon escalated and soon they were practically yelling at each other. Poor Timothy Hutton was in the middle of one of his monologues and he didn’t know what to do. He just finally stopped and glared at the area where the yelling was coming from. Everyone was shushing these people, but they would not stop. They were finally escorted from the theater, and the audience applauded and Mr. Hutton went on with the play. The other awful thing was at Tru, with Mr. Robert Morse. The play had just begun, perhaps five minutes had gone by, and someone in the first row took a flash picture. Mr. Morse stopped, looked at this person in annoyance, and then went on a five minute diatribe to much applause. He then immediately got back into character and went on with the play. During the play, there was something about being hounded by the paparazzi photographers, which he played directly to the front row person, which brought the house down. Your turn.