Category: culture

we have wii, and you can too

~ jamie ~ 2 Comments

i couldn’t stand it any more. i’ve been wanting a wii for months, and my hit-and-miss approach to various nyc stores wasn’t working. and i wasn’t about to pay the ebay premium for a console. so i visited the nintendo store in rockefeller plaza on friday, and asked how to go about getting one.

“show up at 7am on monday morning and get in line,” i was told.

ok then. ok then.

cut to this morning. thinking that the coldest morning of the year, the day after the super bowl, might be a good time to wait in line to get a wii?

maybe a bit foolish. there was some logic. i thought there would be fewer people than usual.

boy was i wrong.

i got there at 7:15am–close enough, right? it was, i think 14 degrees, with a wind chill on top of that. and there were already 10 people in line ahead of me. some of them had been there since 5:30.

in chatting with them, though, i was assured that i was there early enough, and i’d get one.

i’ve waited in lines in freezing weather before, most notably when i bought mets tickets at shea on the first day of ticket sales. my reward that time was meeting former met ed kranepool. cold weather waiting has been good to me.

so i decided to stick it out.

it wasn’t too bad. i’d worn several layers of thermal clothing, so i was pretty warm. i thought two pairs of socks and a thick pair of shoes would be adequate, but my feet damn near froze standing on the cold concrete. i took to standing on one leg at a time, like a frigging flamingo.

and i chatted some more with the other people in line. they were young, of course, and enthusiastic, and had all kinds of advice about which games to buy and which accessories to buy and why to buy a wii and not a playstation or an xbox and all that.

the young woman in front of me was particularly interesting. she used to work in direct action for greenpeace, and so we chatted about greenpeace versus peta and their direct action methods. which ended up in a conversation about the evils of corporate america, and greedy people, and the loss of small business in new york. a pleasant conversation.

several people walking by asked us what we were in line for. her response? we’re waiting for wiis, she said. it shows a level of commitment, she said. it’s like a little community, she said. you enjoy it more when you wait for it, she said.

and then, at about 8:30, a guy walked down the line of people, handing out rolls of cash. he gave a wad to the young woman in front of me, too.

he skipped me.

“i’ll be waiting outside,” he said to them. “bring them right to me when you get them.”

oh.

sometimes, when i think i’m older and jaded and worldly and nothing can surprise me, i get surprised, and i realize that i’m not as clever as i think i am.

the doors to the nintendo store opened at 8:45. an hour and a half wait. not bad.

there were four cashiers inside, waiting to sell the small stack of wiis behind the counter. clearly the majority of the people in line (a line that by that time stretched nearly a block) were going home empty-handed.

three of those four cashiers were taking cash, from all the shills in front of me. the remaining forlorn cashier spoke, quietly, evidently not expecting a reply.

“is anyone paying with a credit card?”

no one in front of me was, so i stepped past them all, got my wii, got an extra controller and an extra nunchuk, bought an extra game called “trauma center” which looked fun, and was out of there.

i’m looking forward to playing my wii. i’ll let you know how it is.

i’m sure that all those wiis bought with cash will be eventually be enjoyed as well, when the profits are made and the premiums are paid.

i’ll bet i enjoy mine a bit more, though.

dreamgirls tickets obtained

~ jamie ~ Leave a comment

i went early to pick up my $25 dreamgirls tickets. i thought maybe if i picked them up early i’d get better seats.

swiped my credit card, the tickets print out. row lll (that’s three l, the letter that comes after k) seats 17 and 19.

i ask the usher where the seats are.

she points to the sign.

row lll–last row.

seats 17 and 19–the last seats in the row.

that’s right. my $25 + $25 + $2 service charge = $52 bought me the worst seats in the biggest movie theater in manhattan. guess going early didn’t help. although the theater is sold out through thursday, i think, so i should be glad i have tickets at all, right?

woo hoo. this movie had better be good.

what’s going on

~ jamie ~ 1 Comment

tis the season, and all that. lots of fun stuff coming up:

» dreamgirls tickets on monday. we got them at the ziegfeld, which is the best movie theater in manhattan. great popcorn, enormous auditorium, huge screen and great sound, red velvet curtains, serious patrons. and, for special engagements like this, reserved seating. the tickets were $25 each, but they are treating it like an old-fashioned road show movie. you get a special program, and they have all the costumes and memorabilia in the lobby for you to look at. plus, it’s one of only three theaters in the country showing the movie, and the only one in new york. so, expensive, but exclusive too. i can hardly wait.

» kiki and herb christmas show at the bowery ballroom next wednesday. i’ve rattled on before about kiki and herb, and i won’t bore you again. but this is the event of december, if you ask me.

» we saw the radio city christmas show this past wednesday. i never miss this–i’m a sucker for the pageantry, the excess, and the splendor. great new “twelve days of christmas” tap number. plus there’s all your old favorites–the wooden soldiers, the dancing santas, the midgets blurting “christmas” from behind the little doors of the midget house, the kick line, the 3-d movie, mrs. claus singing “man with the bag”, and of course the nativity scene. and of course i get there 45 minutes early, so as not to miss a minute of the mighty wurlitzer. i’m a big pipe organ fanatic.

» finally, there’s kirk in “taming of the shrew”, part of the pied piper children’s theatre’s season. that’s not to be missed, either.

evening of planned excess

~ jamie ~ 1 Comment

it’s not my fault, really. it just worked out this way.

tonight is the first night of beaujolais nouveau. “beaujolais nouveau est arrivé!” as the french say.

and kirk and i will be sampling tonight at le jardin bistro. we got an emailed invite from them–buy dinner and have as much beaujolais nouveau as you want, straight from the barrel.

sold.

it’s among our favorite french bistros in new york, so we like going there anyway. the beaujolais nouveau is just a bonus.

dinner is going to be followed by a late night performance by kiki and herb at joe’s pub. i’ve written a lot about kiki and herb, but my recent viewings have been in broadway and off-broadway theaters. joe’s pub is a tiny (by comparison) performance space seating maybe 200 people. i’m really looking forward to seeing them again in an intimate space, where kiki can again walk on my table and throw matches at me.

nothing like it.

and, best yet, i have the day off work tomorrow. good thing, since kiki and herb don’t even get started until midnight. but i have to be up by 2:00 or so, because we have tickets for the new bond movie, “casino royale”, at the ziegfeld. great place to see a great movie. probably the best moviegoing experience i ever had in my life was seeing “moulin rouge” at the ziegfeld. they have real red velvet curtains that open to reveal the screen, and when they parted, the movie started, and the first thing you saw was red velvet curtains parting, in the movie, to start the film. amazingly cool.

but i digress.

it’ll be a great night. more detail to come, assuming i can remember it.

evil dead, the musical

~ jamie ~ Leave a comment

saw the early show (7:30pm) of “evil dead, the musical” friday night.

i was slightly skeptical, to be honest, as i’m not a fan of horror films. but after reading a ny times review i was a bit intrigued, and we got a deal on tickets, and there you go.

thankfully, our seats were toward the back. the first three rows are splatter central–even though the fake blood washes out, it’s still a pain and i didn’t feel like dealing. plus, the younguns were clamoring to be splattered, so let them have the fun.

and even though i wasn’t splattered with gore, i still had a tremendously good time. the attitude of the book and the music is just right–it’s a complete parody, never takes itself or the genre seriously (and the actors don’t, either). the tunes are especially catchy and hilarious, my favorite being “what the fuck was that”.

went home humming that one. and others, too.

grey gardens-style high art it ain’t, and it’s not supposed to be. it’s just meant to be a lot of gory, bloody, funny, silly fun, and it succeeds at this wildly. we’ll probably go back at some point, and take some friends.

a nice surprise was seeing our old friend kenny working in the box office–he used to work with kirk at the westside. we like kenny quite a bit.

and afterwards we had a few (o.k. then, more than a few) at danny’s. gotta go there every chance we get, before it closes in january. i’ll miss that dump.

eucharist, and a movie

~ jamie ~ 3 Comments

the new york times has a new daily email they call “urbanite”. i like it quite a lot; yesterday, they had a blurb about a presentation of a movie by paul festa at st. bartholomew’s church called apparition of the eternal church that sounded fun. all i knew was that it was named after a strange and rarely-performed classical piece written by messiaen for the pipe organ, and it had justin bond of kiki and herb and john cameron mitchell of hedwig and shortbus. and also that the strange and rarely-performed classical piece would be performed on the church’s pipe organ (the largest in nyc) after the movie.

i love me some pipe organ. it’s the only reason i go to the radio city christmas show every year–to listen to the dual duelling pipe organists before the show.

good enough for me. i got tickets.

so i buy my tickets, and in the process i discover that st. bart’s is an episcopal church. who knew, and me episcopal and all. and we had time to kill before the 7:30 movie start time, and they had a 6:00 eucharist.

hence, eucharist and a movie. actually it was quick dinner at lou’s cafe, eucharist, and a movie.

this is what my life has come to. big night on the town for jamie. woo-hoo. it’s a blowout. church, followed by church.

anyway.

the movie itself was fascinating. various people, famous and not famous (infamous?), put on headphones and listened to the piece. and described in words what they heard, and felt. you couldn’t hear the piece yourself, only the words of description.

and only at the end of the movie did you get to hear the piece itself. it was a brilliant setup–a perfect way to get at the meaning of a piece of music without being intrusive on the piece itself.

and the stories were funny, moving, stirring, wistful, frightening, hopeful–the gamut from a to z, or a to at least q or r.

i bought a great t-shirt with the movie info and a picture of miss kiki du rane on it, along with the dvd of the movie. it’s not likely to play in your town–it’s a small movie without any real distribution–but if you can get a copy it’s well worth the trouble and expense.

the performance afterwards? a bit disappointing, to be honest. the people in the movie, who were wearing headphones, kept talking about how loud it was, and how they could feel the notes in their spine, and all. and while the organ was powerful, i kept wanting the volume to be louder. i didn’t get blown away.

i love the piece, though. it’s all sustained notes and harmonics that build on each other in a fascinating and disturbing way.

i’ll definitely be getting a messiaen cd, and putting on the headphones.

steve reich’s “the cave”

~ jamie ~ Leave a comment

i saw a performance of this work on saturday–the ny times had a great review (free registration required). according to reich, it’s a “documentary video opera”. sounds dense, you say?

it’s not. and it was surprisingly engaging and enjoyable.

kirk was the assistant stage manager for touring “cave” performances for a while, so he was familiar with the piece (though until saturday, he’d never seen it from an audience perspective). he’s been going on about it for a while, so when it came to nyc as part of steve reich’s 70th birthday celebration, we got tickets.

the three-part “opera” asks (in turn) jews, muslims, and americans/christians five questions: who is abraham? who is sarah? who is isaac, who is ishmael? who is hagar? the answers go a long way toward explaining why there’s still so much tension in the middle east.

there are five video screens showing snips and clips of interviewees’ responses, and there’s an orchestra, singers, and a performer “playing” a computer keyboard that puts relevant bits of scripture (the torah, the koran, and the bible) up on the screen, underpinning the answers. the answers aren’t linear–the responses are edited down to one or two words–and the meaning comes from the repetition, and your assemblage of the clips, the chanting, the scripture, and the music into a narrative thread in your mind.

i admit to a large degree of complete ignorance on this subject. i barely even knew the basic story, so i learned quite a bit of fascinating info from this piece. i won’t bore you with vast detail, but here are some very salient points:

abraham’s first wife was sarah, and his first-born son ishmael was born not of sarah, but of her handmaid (sarah couldn’t conceive). isaac, abraham’s son with sarah, came later (guess she could after all). this is oversimplifying matters, but jews descend from isaac and muslims from ishmael. four thousand years later, jews and muslims are still fighting battles over holy sites (such as the site of the cave where abraham, isaac, sarah et al. are buried) because of the complications that ensue. jews claim primacy because sarah was the first (and legitimate) wife. muslims claim primacy because ishmael was the first born son.

reich’s piece underscores how immediate this still is for jews and muslims–for them, the four thousand years might as well be yesterday. most westerners can’t imagine this concept, a point which the third act makes.

and to complicate matters, there’s the story in scripture of abraham’s abortive sacrifice of his son on an altar at god’s bidding. the torah says that this son was isaac. the koran says that this son was ishmael.

it’s no wonder there’s so much conflict. but “the cave” itself makes you really understand how sticky and intractable this situation really is.

i can’t stop thinking about it. “the cave” is presented intermittently, and is well worth seeing if you get the chance.

grey gardens: a fresh triumph

~ jamie ~ 1 Comment

the old grey gardens? the best show i saw last year.

the new grey gardens? one of the best shows i have ever seen.

many people thought (and i did too, on reflection) that the first act needed tightening. they’ve done it with fairly extensive changes, while plumping up everything thematic and dramatic. the second act is largely untouched, but the staging is much improved, and the ending is better.

below, i’ve scanned the old & new playbill covers, and the old & new song lists:

« click on thumbnails to view pictures »

grey
gardens
old cover

grey
gardens
new cover

grey
gardens
old songs

grey
gardens
new songs

changes?

» “toyland” out, “the girl who has everything” in. to be honest, i don’t remember toyland, but “the girl who has everything” works perfectly as a recurring theme; playful with a dark undertone at the beginning, devastating and haunting at the end. verdict: improvement.

» “body beautiful beale” out. great song, but the message is communicated in the book. verdict: no great loss.

» “better fall out of love” out, “goin’ places” in. the new song does a better job of foreshadowing joe kennedy’s eventual departure, and is more believable overall. verdict: improvement.

» “being bouvier” out, “marry well” in. it seems like a lot of major bouvier’s first act part was cut, or at least that’s my impression. that’s probably ultimately good, as it focuses attention on the beales. the new song gets a lot of the points across that formerly were in the book, or were not part of the original song. verdict: there’s no such thing as too much john mcmartin, but on the balance a slight plus.

» novelty numbers trimmed. “hominy grits” and the oriental featured number with the young bouvier girls have been considerably shortened. they don’t need to be any longer. you could cut them further if you wanted. in fact, you could lose “hominy grits” altogether if you ask me, although it does add to the character development somewhat. verdict: huge improvement.

» “tomorrow’s woman” gone. don’t remember it. didn’t miss it. verdict: improvement.

» horrible anachronistic lyric about howard hughes and the spruce goose gone. my complaint with this in the original was that the action took place in 1941, and the spruce goose flew in 1947. it’s gone. verdict: enormous improvement. the details count.

» sara gettelfinger out, erin davie in. i liked sara gettelfinger, the original young little edie, but erin davie does a great job. there’s a moment when she’s singing “daddy’s girl” when the tone shifts. the lyrics have to be delivered perfectly to avoid a false note, and davie does it wonderfully. verdict: a wash.

» moppets out, moppets in. sorry to be rude or crass, but the kids (jackie and lee bouvier) are largely background. the new moppets didn’t pull my focus, which is a good thing. the old ones didn’t either. verdict: no verdict necessary.

all these are first act changes which have helped things immensely. there’s a more even flow, the character development has improved, and there are lighter moments which contrast well with the darker ones.

the second act songs are the same, with the exception of the end:

» “peas in a pod” out, “the girl who has everything” in. i realize now it’s now a much, much better ending. “peas in a pod” was ironic, but lacked a certain gravitas. the new ending doesn’t sell out a bit. it’s relentlessly consistent with the action that immediately precedes it. verdict: improvement.

they’ve also echoed christine ebersole’s first act big edie in her show-ending turn as little edie, and that’s a good thing. they’ve done a marvelous job–changing the staging at the end and adding lines and the new song really reinforces the way that the edies are so much alike. and the end is so haunting–christine ebersole is such a presence, and you really could hear the proverbial pin drop.

the rest of the cast remains excellent. mary louise wilson was good in the original, but is more focused here, it seems. she’s settled in to a great interplay with christine ebersole–their time together on stage really crackles.

kirk says i tend to speak in superlatives. it’s a fair statement. i cheerlead a bit for the things i like. but i mostly don’t blather on about the things that stink, because they aren’t worth my time. and i don’t even mention a lot of the things i like a lot. i saw “the prestige” this week, and liked it a lot, but it ain’t “shortbus”, so i’m not going on about it.

usually my opinion settles out, and i’ve had a year to digest the old version of this musical, to give me a basis to compare it to the new version. and while my opinion might change over time, right now i’d say that this is one of the top five theatrical events i’ve seen in my lifetime. i haven’t been this completely thrilled in an audience since i saw elaine stritch at the public theater. it’s that level of engagement, and that level of amazement.

grey gardens tonight

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tonight is the night of my return to the splendor of grey gardens. i can hardly wait.

i’ve blathered on extensively about this show, and about how much i loved it when i saw it at playwrights horizons last year.

and now it’s on broadway. and, instead of hearing myself sing “la da da da da” in that perfect five-note sequence that cracks me up every time i think of it, i get to hear christine ebersole sing it. it’s part of the first song (“revolutionary costume for today”) of act two, or at least it was, and it’s the first time you see ebersole as little edie instead of big edie, the character she plays in the first act. she’s describing her inimitable clothing choices–it’s the most memorable performance of a song i’ve seen on broadway in years.

you gotta see it.

like me, tonight.

and, as a side note, we’re seeing a preview performance of the little dog laughed on friday, which we’re really looking forward to. kirk knows the playwright from back in the day in hometown pennsylvania, and we’ve heard good things about it. we’re looking forward to it.

but not like i’m looking forward to tonight.

elbow through the picasso

~ jamie ~ Leave a comment

it’s an old joke in our family. whenever we got together for a holiday dinner, someone inevitably would put their elbow in the butter, because there were so many people crowded around a table overflowing with food. and the butter would end up near someone’s elbow, and there you have it.

it was me a couple of times. it was my mother quite a bit, and i recall my grandfather with his elbow in the butter as well. he might have done it on purpose, though, just to have a good story. he was quite a provocateur, that one.

i have managed thus far in life, however, to keep my elbow only in various messy things, and out of valuable objects.

steve wynn, however, has not been so lucky. it seems that he recently stuck his elbow through his picasso (via kottke). and not just any picasso, but Le Rêve, which had just been sold, by wynn, for $139 million. the highest price ever paid for a painting.

by the way, the link is via kottke, not the elbow. i’m pretty sure kottke didn’t have anything to do with steve wynn’s elbow.

nora ephron was there when it happened, and writes about it memorably.

it should be said that steve wynn has a definite excuse–he’s nearly blind from retinitis pigmentosa. so i’m definitely not making fun of him, which of course would be my normal modus operandi. i can’t even imagine how badly he must have felt at that moment. here’s how he described it to the new yorker:

“So then I made a gesture with my right hand,” Wynn said, “and my right elbow hit the picture. It punctured the picture.” There was a distinct ripping sound. Wynn turned around and saw, on Marie-Thérèse Walter’s left forearm, in the lower-right quadrant of the painting, “a slight puncture, a two-inch tear. We all just stopped. I said, ‘I can’t believe I just did that. Oh, shit. Oh, man.’ ”

oh shit, indeed. the painting is being restored, but wynn is keeping it because the sale was cancelled by the buyer.

fascinating story. one reason why, when i’m in an art gallery, i always try to walk with my hands clasped behind my back.

and i’ll never again feel bad for putting my elbow in anyone’s butter.

odds and ends

~ jamie ~ Leave a comment

finally someone actually gets the importance and quality of the movie “shortbus”. the movie had a $21,000+ average per screen in its first weekend, so i have a feeling that the ride on the shortbus is just beginning.

the folks who run the website for grey gardens, the musical were kind enough to link to my original post about the play, when it ran at playwrights horizons. i’ve written a lot subsequently as well–this is a must-see if you are in the city.

i finally get to see “the cave”, steve reich’s piece that

explores the sacred locations of the burial plots of Abraham and Sarah from the perspectives of Arabs, Israelis, and Americans.

kirk worked on this show when it toured jerusalem, and i’ve always wanted to see it. it’s at lincoln center as part of the composer’s 70th birthday celebration. we’re seeing it on saturday, november 4, when there’s a post-show discussion with reich himself. should be fascinating.

i had my very first “i want my apple itv moment when watching the first episode of the new show ugly betty. it’s amazingly good, and i didn’t have the second show on the dvr. if i had an itv, i could just watch it on my tv. as it is, i’ll have to watch on the computer, which isn’t nearly as satisfying. hurry up apple.

kirk and i have booked our flight to paris next january–we’ll be in strasbourg from the 12th to the 14th, and in paris after that until the 21st. and kirk, knowing how i love cheese, found the restaurant with the world’s largest cheeseboard in strasbourg. i am so there. and i’ve posted a list of possible paris dining destinations on egullet. it’s the new post, at the end of the thread. if you have any suggestions, let me know. we have our favorites, but there’s always room for exploration.

shortbus: instant classic

~ jamie ~ 1 Comment

kirk and i saw shortbus last night, and loved it. the times has a great review (registration required).

i’ve written about it earlier–it’s the new movie from john cameron mitchell, the creator of hedwig. he wanted to make a movie that celebrates sex, and depicts it graphically and honestly in the context of story, plot, and art.

and wow, did he succeed.

the characters are all on a journey to reorder their lives for a variety of reasons. and through sex, they embark on a voyage of self-discovery that is honestly and beautifully depicted–more so than in any film in recent memory. it’s the movie that robert altman should have the guts to make, but probably doesn’t.

and the sex is real, human, hysterically funny, tender, shocking, outrageous, and occasionally degrading–just like sex in real life, and most unlike most cinematic sex.

but ultimately, the movie for me wasn’t so much about sex as it was about control. self-control, the difficulty with reclaiming control ceded to others, and the difficulty in knowing when to cede it yourself. sex is the vehicle that’s used to flesh out the concepts (so to speak), but to say this is a movie exclusively about sex is to miss the point entirely, i think.

and, oddly enough, it’s the feel-good date movie of the year, a movie with its heart on its sleeve, with the happiest of happy endings that sends you from the theater on an emotional high, more appreciative than ever of the relationships in your life. after seeing the process that the characters collectively go through, and where they collectively are at movie’s end, you know that, with someone you love at your side, there’s nothing you can’t work out, together, ever.

the movie is clever, honest, beautifully filmed, riotously funny, tender and tragic, and above all, real. really really real. and a poignant love letter to new york city as well–through the content, the characters (the faux ed koch is perhaps the best character in the movie) and through the device mitchell uses for scene transitions (i won’t spoil it for you, but it’s stunningly gorgeous).

in these times where so much is repressed that we no longer have the perspective to determine the extent of our represssion, this movie is the perfect reset button. go see it, get some perspective back, and be reminded of just how wonderful life is.

oh, and how wonderful sex is, too.

a chorus line, and ted’s, and danny’s

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kirk and i saw the new broadway production of a chorus line last night.

and we are impressed.

kirk had seen the original production, with the original cast.

twice. sometimes i just get so jealous of him.

anyway, he thought that it compared favorably with the original. i’d never seen it live (only the movie and the soundtrack), so i was a tabula rasa in regards to my experience. standout performances for me were deidre goodwin (sheila), mara davi (maggie), jessica lee goldyn (val), but especially jason tam (paul) who gave a devastating performance that brought tears to my eyes.

it’s a bit unfair to single out people, though, because everyone in the chorus line gave outstanding performances–some ever so slightly better than others, but no one was weak or ineffective. i’m not so much impressed with michael berresse (zach) who was so great in “light in the piazza” but here is far too sensitive with his character. zach, to my mind, needs to be a svengali-ish dictatorial force of nature. and that’s not conveyed at all. maybe it was a conscious choice, but i didn’t like it. his disembodied voice was not evocative of much emotion at all, let alone the right emotion.

everything else though? magnificent. you know all the songs and most of the dialogue, but it doesn’t matter. the production sweeps you away and effectively takes you back to a specific period of time. i didn’t find the show to be dated in the least, any more than a good production of any period piece would be.

if you’ve never seen the show, it’s a must see. and if you saw the original, you won’t feel that your memory is being trampled on. it stands on its own, i think.

dinner was at the new manhattan outpost of ted’s montana grill. to paraphrase a famous lyric from “a chorus line”:

food? 10. service? 3.

well, maybe in reality it’s food: 8 service: -1. i had a new york strip bison steak, kirk had a delmonico bison steak, and we shared. both were perfectly cooked and flavorful, tender and juicy and hot off the grill. the sides were good as well–i had a squash cassserole that was particularly good.

the problem? in-your-face, overtrained, upsell-happy, corporate-approved servers and workers. i felt like i was in a tgi fridays that was on steroids. the waiter was way way too chatty; kept at us to get a bottle of wine instead of two glasses; kept asking if we wanted appetizers and sides; didn’t give us time to peruse the menu; asked less than halfway through dinner if we wanted dessert, then brought the check immediately saying that “his manager liked it that way”.

i haven’t felt so rushed, discomfited, and unrelaxed in a restaurant in ages. maybe it’s just opening week jitters, but somehow i doubt it. i think that’s just their style–everyone chatted with us constantly, from the waiter to the hostess to the busperson. i don’t care to hear that you had salad for lunch and are jealous of my dinner. i don’t care to hear that you just moved to new york, and how cool is it that you live on a street that’s the same name as the city you came from. and so on.

i want to eat my dinner at my own relaxed pace, in a relaxed atmosphere.

maybe i’ll give it another try–the food was great and the prices weren’t bad. but if that service is endemic, i’m outta there.

the end of the evening, post-theater, was spent at danny’s, our favorite piano bar/watering hole. kirk sang (expressively and beautifully, of course) and we laughed with our friend stephen until the wee hours.

what a great night.

overall.

shortbus in the ny times

~ jamie ~ Leave a comment

frank bruni did a long piece about “shortbus” in the ny times this weekend.

i’ve written about “shortbus” before–it’s the new movie from john cameron mitchell of hedwig fame.

bruni’s article is not to be missed–it’s a great explanation and a great exploration. very very well done.

and of course, the movie is not to be missed either. it starts october 4 at the landmark sunshine cinema in nyc, rolls out to la and san francisco two days later, and opens wide (so to speak) beginning october 13.

track down a showing of this movie. i have a feeling you won’t regret it.

tickets, i get tickets

~ jamie ~ Leave a comment

new york is a great place to live, because there are nearly no limits to the fun and cool things you can do.

new york is a horrible place to live, because there are nearly no limits to the fun and cool things you can do.

both are true, of course. i usually resist the temptation to do everything i want to do in this city, because you would go seriously broke doing so.

but today i broke down and got two pairs of tickets to upcoming events.

the first is tomorrow night–the charles aznavour concert at radio city music hall. the guy’s 82, so this will undoubtedly be the last chance anyone ever has to see him, and who could pass that up? i went to get a pair of the cheapest tickets i could find, and the very helpful woman in the ticket booth clued me in to a pair of obstructed view tickets–front row, second mezzanine. very nice tickets, and the only obstruction is that you are next to the sound board, so you can’t see the people on the other side of the sound board.

big deal–i’m pretty sure i wouldn’t have liked those people anyway. thanks, cool ticket booth woman, for hooking me up.

the second set of tickets was for grey gardens, which i’ve written about many times before. i saw it off broadway and didn’t want to miss it when it moved to broadway–it was my favorite musical last year, and christine ebersole gives one of the most amazing performances you will ever see.

i’d gotten ticket offers but neglected to follow up, and then they expired and i thought i would have to (shudder) pay full price. i would have, though.

and then today the ny times had an article about the nederlanders’ new venture, audiencerewards.com, which is supposed to be a ticket buying hub that gives you points for buying tickets, much like frequent flyer miles or whatever. and since i’m a big fan of double and triple dipping my points/miles, i checked it out.

and lo and behold, they had an exclusive deal on grey gardens tickets.

sold. nice seats, center orchestra row h, nearly half price. good for them, and good for me. except that the website was a bit balky, and there’s no mention anywhere of any points that i got for buying tickets, and the whole thing ended up being a front end for telecharge.

oh well. at least i got my tickets.

i’ll let you know how charles aznavour (tickets: tomorrow night) was.

i know how grey gardens (tickets: end of october) is going to be.

“shortbus” is rolling

~ jamie ~ 1 Comment

“shortbus” is the new film from john cameron mitchell, of hedwig fame, and it’s coming to new york.

it’s been a long wait, and i’m psyched as all hell to finally see it. it’s jcm’s attempt to reclaim sex in film from the clutches of pornography. here’s an interview with john about the film.

“Sex,” says john in the article, “has been cheapened by porn.” i think this is a great idea for a film, and i think it’s going to push all the right buttons (so to speak), just when some damn buttons really need to be pushed.

and in addition, it looks like a lot of fun. see the trailer for yourself, either censored or uncensored.

kirk is still on john’s mailing list from back in hedwig days, so we’ve gotten updates on this project from the beginning. i remember him soliciting stories from people, with the promise that the most interesting people and stories would be worked into the film. it looks like he kept his promise–a quick check of imdb turns up justin bond (from kiki and herb) along with lots of first-time performers. looks like he kept his promise to search out the best people and performances, bar none.

good for him.

here’s the schedule of dates, from john’s email:

Sept 10 – North American Premiere, Toronto Film Festival, followed by a big concert party (see our site for tickets).
Oct. 4 – New York release at the Landmark Sunshine
Oct 6 – LA and SF release
Oct. 13 through Nov – we expand across N. America

as he says, plan on going for opening weekend–lots of people for opening weekend means the movie will stay around, and expand.

people in ny, la, and sf need to show up in numbers, so that this movie moves as much as possible into the heartland. they need this movie out there!

i’ll be recruiting. you should, too!

snakes on a plane, baby

~ jamie ~ Leave a comment

i’ll be brief.

i had the most fun i’ve ever had in a movie theater, watching this movie just now. and that includes over a hundred viewings of the rocky horror picture show. it’s the most perfect summer movie imaginable–the tone and the script are dead on target.

it’s the quintessential example of a movie as entertainment. as such, there’s not a reason in the world why it shouldn’t get a best picture oscar nod.

i’m serious. it’s that good. go see it. get rowdy, yell at the screen, go bonkers, have a blast.

update: so much for hype. number one, but with a paltry $15 million at the box office. oh well. maybe it will have legs.

i was hoping for more, and so was our stock price.

liza, and snakes on a plane, and kiki and herb

~ jamie ~ Leave a comment

saw liza minnelli performing at coney island last night…incredible show.

it was a free concert, but the organizers had set up seats in the center of the field in front of the stage, and were selling them for $10 which went to charity. so for $10 i got a nice comfortable seat about twenty feet from the stage, in the center.

i did get there a bit early, to get a seat that good. by showtime, the place was a madhouse. i’m not good at estimating crowd size, but it had to be in the tens of thousands. and liza was great–very natural, unplanned, and spontaneous (for liza, anyway). she sang “cabaret” and “new york new york” at the end, of course, but preceded that with an atypical selection of interesting and well-chosen material, all of which brought the house down. standing wild cheering ovations after each song, and sometimes halfway through the songs.

and she was onstage for a good hour and a half. i think. maybe more–i didn’t have a watch.

it’s the second year she’s done this at coney island, and the last thing she said as she left the stage was “see you next year.”

i am so there. kirk stayed home and worked on the show he’s directing. his loss. he’ll be there next year. i’ll make him go.

and tonight, “snakes on a plane”, baby. i fandangoed tickets for 5:00. can’t wait to see those motherfucking snakes on that motherfucking plane. go on with your badass self, samuel l.

and sunday, a return trip for kiki and herb on broadway. we found another ticket deal.

i have a feeling we’ll probably go a third time before it’s all over. they are that good.

god, i love living in new york.

getting caught up

~ jamie ~ Leave a comment

i’m back at it. camping was fantastic. i’d forgotten how much i liked it. and kirk can build a good fire, so we had all our food cooked on the open wood flame. yum, yum.

i didn’t forget to go to kiki and herb this time, and the show was, as always, phenomenal. don’t miss it. it was the last show before opening night tonight, and they were up for it. i’m going to go back again, assuming i can get a ticket deal of some kind.

the fake steve jobs blog, which i’ve written about several times, is back in operation. check it out–hysterically funny writing.

and, although kansans are once again supporting evolution in schools, it appears that the united states is ranked next to last among countries of the world in acceptance of this scientific theory. the chart depicting the results is truly depressing. only 40% of americans accept evolution as true, with 60% stating either that it is false, or that they are not sure. at least we are smarter than the turks in this regard.

kansans regain common sense

~ jamie ~ Leave a comment

opponents of evolution have lost their majority on the kansas state board of education.

well, thank god. who, no doubt, also believes in evolution, because she let it evolve after she set the big bang in motion, or whatever. so now schoolchildren in kansas will hopefully at least have a clue about what the scientific method entails.

and the subhead of this post is “but kentuckians lose theirs”. their common sense, that is.

it’s in kentucky, you know. the new creation museum. where you can see exhibits depicting dinosaurs co-existing with adam and eve, and other anachronistic anomalies.

thanks to this article and the efforts of this museum, i now know that all fossils on earth are a result of the great flood described in genesis.

who knew? screw that carbon dating stuff, right?