The Pansy; a Floral Dedication

The “cold-weather” pansies are now for sale and although it’s only nearing the end of March there’s a good chance they will survive well into summer. Unless the temperatures fall precipitously their only enemy is high wind. I’ve been checking the stock of the little nursery in my neighborhood for a couple of weeks now and yesterday I think I was their first pansy customer of ‘07. So now there is fresh, sparkling water in the birdbath and the surrounding brickwork has been swept clean of winters’ debris, so my newly potted urn of pansies is brilliantly central and definitely the first sign that spring has sprung in my backyard (I don’t do crocus). This urn of floral insouciance is dedicated (with love and concern) to my friend Ismael who, as we speak, is suffering his own bout of high winds at Beth Israel Hospital in Boston, Mass. If we agree that bright little flowers can cure the spirit, Mima, I’m symbolically planting a forest of redwoods outside your window.

Personal Cultural Inadequacies, Part 2

Since last September, almost every Monday night, I’ve been bowling in a league at the alleys in the sports complex at Chelsea Piers. During this time I’ve watched a strange new building rise directly across the street at West 18th St., and for the last month the finishing touches have accelerated until it looks, to me, like it might be ready for the new tenant to take up residence, which happens to be the headquarters of IAC (InterActiveCorp.), which is Barry Diller’s media and internet empire. As it was going up I thought it was an interesting and unusual building so I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised (but I was) to learn that it is architect Frank Gehry’s contribution to the skyline, his first in New York (even though he has cut a swathe around the rest of the world). Now comes the hard part. Do I like this building? Like other architectural naifs I really have no idea whether I do or not because I have no background to judge. I think I like it because it’s unusual and, therefore, interesting to look at, especially at night when I can see it in its entirety from the Pier’s exit.

But is it a well designed building and does form follow function which, in my naivety, I’ve always thought was the blueprint, pardon the pun, for good architecture? I have no idea, it doesn’t look very functional to me (wasted space?), but maybe that criterion is no longer part of the equation. In the past, probably in ignorance, I’ve associated a Gehry structure with the all-encompassing word “bizarre,” including his signature design of the museum in Bilbao, Spain. You’ve really got to admire the audacity of that one even if you’re actually there to view the Goyas. The building on 18th is different; it is, after all, an office building, a high-rise to house corporate thinking. And it’s the headquarters for a media empire so maybe it’s visually right, that is, just odd enough to reflect the future but still staid enough to complement the Armani suit culture. Okay, okay, so do I like the building? Waffle, waffle, waffle.

Some Men

I can picture Terrence McNally, perhaps leaning back in his chair with crossed legs, feet up on his writing desk, his hands behind his head, and a cup of lukewarm coffee (ignored) at his side. He’s deep in the middle of whipping off an essay about the history of active social-homosexuality in New York City during his lifetime. Being a playwright, Mr. McNally instinctively shapes this essay into the form of a play but he has gotten stuck in a morass of gay clichés and he doesn’t seem to have a hook to get out of it. So, let’s see (he thinks), reaching for his coffee and his muse, what is the most outrageous cliché I can use to bring this thing down to earth? Ah, ha! (a voila moment), how about a tipsy drag queen in a gay piano bar in the late 60’s singing Over the Rainbow? Hmm…that might work. And you know what? In his new play Some Men, it does! And it’s not just a snippet of the song, Mr. McNally and the director Trip Cullman audaciously has her (the wonderful David Greenspan) sing the entire song, every word, top to bottom, sweetly and to the point, without gesture or grandiosity and just good enough to not only bring down the house in the bar where she’s singing but also the real thing, us, and we recognize the fact that the actor is not trying to do a Garland impression, he’s letting “Roxie” do her best for herself, not for the boys in the bar or even us. It’s a point well made, that is, what stuff like this really meant in “those days,” to have some sort of positive gay anthem to cling to. It was important as a symbol and it’s wonderful McNally has the chutzpah to plunk it down in the middle of his play. It just goes to prove that in context clichés can often work.

Some Men is, admittedly, one huge cliché but McNally lets us in on the joke…it’s deliberate and therefore informative and moving. History, as told through the prism of the silly and mundane, is still history and McNally illustrates this with finesse and a good deal of wise cynicism. Gay marriage and adoption and the inanities and chicaneries of internet cruising and dating (LOL) will no doubt be the clichés of tomorrow and they are also given their due in this play.

Although not a musical Some Men nonetheless has two zowie numbers that, in context, bring down the house. First, the aforementioned Rainbow and then as a second act curtain raiser a fascinating performance by Michael McElroy of an oral history told by a black entertainer at a Cotton Club-like establishment in Harlem, circa 1930, framed by the singing of Ten Cents A Dance. He tells the story of his liaison with the lyricist of the song without naming names. Of course, being Google-literate in spite of myself, when I got home the mystery got solved and Lorenz Hart (of Rodgers and Hart fame) gets outed in the privacy of my bedroom…and in reading his biography it’s clear that this liaison actually could have happened, but I leave it to Mr. McNally to prove it one way or another. Anyway, Mr. McElroy kills with this powerful, sad song and you hate it when it’s over; you could ride that wave forever.

In sum, I thought Some Men was wonderful and every member of the cast was right on. Besides Mr. Greenspan and Mr. McElroy, they are Don Amendolia, Kelly AuCoin, Romain Fruge, Jesse Hooker, Pedro Pascal, Randy Redd and Frederick Weller. These are some fine actors.

There’s a scene late in the play where two aggressive and confident (and out) young men are interviewing an older male couple about what happened during “those” years. Clueless when they started the interview and disappointed and still clueless about what they had just learned, the young men rush off, not in pursuit of the truth but for what they perceive should be the truth and, of course, a good grade in their class in “gender studies” at Vassar. My advice to them would be to see this play. They might learn something but I doubt they would ever consider such research as being relevant. You only have to take a look around the audience at this performance. Some fine examples of the subjects of their study were much in evidence, but their own generation had no counterparts.

I’ve made this comment before about theater-going attendance in general. Last night’s audience, on average, was easily sliding into their 40’s and 50’s and older. Luckily we are still young enough to fill the (relatively small) house for a wonderful play like this but, well, you know…oh hell, I’ll stop there…I’m not about to get into a discussion of mortality; either off-Broadway or on. I’m just glad I have the privilege to get in on these current “good old days” before they are gone forever into the abyss of whatever popular entertainment takes its place in about 25 years. I’m not sure if I can ever be a fan of Holograms R Us.

Erin Go Burp

There are just some things that shouldn't be green. Beer is one of them.

Spring Ahead

Traditionally, according to some accepted avian almanac, it’s a robin sighting that heralds the first sign of spring. I’m not sure from whence this bit of old-wives wisdom arises, but around here it’s the brilliant flash of a male cardinal that does the job. Maybe robins are indeed hanging about but they’re too quiet to call attention to themselves whilst the cardinal’s piercing shriek, a mating call for the ages, rends the warming air. Right outside my bedroom window, second floor, on the topmost branch of the leafless weeping cherry, perched a good replica of the above photo. Even the sparrows lined up to stare. Nice!

Animated Shorts

Why, you say, would I attend the New York International Children’s Film Festival? Why, indeed. Well, see, I have this film editor nephew who recently worked on an animated short that was entered in the competition. Sounds simple enough, huh? It was simple enough and pleasurable enough but I probably should have limited myself to half the 17 or 18 films I managed to see. Both animated and live action, their length was anywhere from five or six minutes to maybe 15 or 20. They were an eclectic mix and, as you might imagine, as different from each other as is humanly possible. There were quite a few foreign films and I found it cool that not only were they subtitled, but the subtitles were also read aloud to accommodate the less-literate in the crowd. I would say that 75% of the audience was children with an average age somewhere around 10; with some attention deficit disorder problems in the lower registers. You could certainly tell which films were successful by the roar of the silence or the lack thereof. They also handed out ballots so you could have a hand in determining the best of the best at the awards ceremony at the end of the festival. This is a might touchy I would think because what’s goose for a five year old is gander for a teenager. Some of them were definitely not, in my opinion, kids movies. Just because there are kids in them doesn’t make it so (that little match girl still freezes to death at the end). Anyway, I certainly had my favorites. The one that killed me is called Flatlife (I’d love to see this about five more times because there’s so much going on).
A close second is called Guide Dog and these two films would tie in any Oscar contest in which I decided the winner. They are both animated (in entirely different styles) and really shouldn’t be in competition with live action films, or even each other for that matter. In fact, there shouldn’t even be a competition; they are already juried and deemed worthy so why can’t they just leave it at that? Oh, right, that’s not the American way…ya gotta award a “winner” to make the “good tries” feel bad. It was an interesting afternoon and really does show what we are missing these days at the multiplexes. What’s it take to program in a six-ten minute cartoon anyway?

Seeing Daylight

We spring forward with Daylight Saving Time this weekend? What’s up with that? I dislike DST anyway and now it’s two weeks early. Who should be shot for this idea? We should be trying to get rid of DST, not lengthen it! It’s just a perception adjustment for god’s sake; it’s not like you can manipulate time. I voiced this opinion to a couple of people and both said, “But don’t you want another hour of sunshine in the afternoon?” Really people; there is still the same amount of time during the day; changing your clocks doesn’t buy you more sunshine! This little rant proves I’m getting more like my mother every year. She complained about DST from day one of its adoption in 1942 (this was in California…you do know it’s still a states rights decision, don’t you…check out Arizona and Hawaii). In some years thereafter she sometimes refused to change her clocks and she was still on time for appointments. And in October she didn’t have to lift a finger (the one she gave us in March).

In Praise of the Naked Avocado

I recently read a recipe for deviled eggs that included avocado. What a breakthrough! I’ve always loved deviled eggs anyway and the avocado is the fruit of the gods so what could be more natural? If you have a good recipe for deviled eggs, don’t change anything, just mash up an avocado and mix it in with the yolks (and your other usual embellishments) and prepare for a culinary delight. It even makes them look better! Of course, although I’m not really up on the scientific underpinnings here (the current concern about good and bad fats, you know), you might as well stab yourself in the heart with a stake of pure cholesterol. But, oh well…

Further to the above, you should take the time to behold the avocado all by itself. What ambrosia in a rough and tumble wrapping! I’m not sure about this but I probably, like everybody else, got acquainted with the avocado not by the beast itself but by a byproduct thereof, namely guacamole. Scooped with chips; on burgers and in sandwiches; guacamole soared nearly to the top of my taste preferences. The fresh, pure, meat of the matter itself came later in salads but, even then, its basic perfection was hidden by various oils and dressings. After that, to be vulgar and basic, all it took was a paring knife to cut the Haas in half, a quick flip of the point to eject the seed and a spoon to greedily scoop the yellow-green ambrosia down the gullet. Ahhh, yes…like immersing ones taste buds in the warm waters of the Gulf of…well, any warm, soft gulf will do. Spiky hair and cool shades complete the picture…