The Third Story

Charles Busch's new play, "The Third Story", opened last night. Here is the poster for the show:



That's Charles over there on the right, brandishing the gun. Yes, he's in drag. Great drag. Drag that would make Barbara Stanwyck proud. Drag that would make Bette Davis eat her frickin' heart out.

My college roomie and I saw the play on Saturday. I thought it was wonderful. Ben Brantley, in today's NYTimes, didn't quite agree with me. He thought Mr. Busch's co-star, Kathleen Turner:



didn't have enough to do. "Hey", I said to myself when I read that, "She's an old broad. What the frig did he expect her to do? Cartwheels, ferchrissakes?" He also bitched that it was overwritten and could use some judicious weed-whacking.

Okay, so it's a couple of movies within a play. It's complicated. It's fun. If you can't keep up, stay the frig outta the theater. TV is for the brain-dead. Theater is for those of us with a few brain cells left.

The cast is terrific. The audience obviously adored Kathleen and Charles (myself included). And unlike at those overpriced Disney-fied productions you see uptown, the audience did NOT instantly leap to it's feet upon the final curtain to lavish unwarranted praise upon a bunch of class-B performers in a class-C production. The audience I saw it with applauded (and "bravaed") lustily, but respectfully kept it's seats until the cast had left the stage.

It's playing at the Lucille Lortel Theater, down on Christopher Street (deep in the heart of Greenwich Village). If you're in town and looking for a fun way to spend a couple of hours for about sixty bucks, go see it.

And if, like me, you're of a "certain age" it will undoubtedly stir up memories of your childhood, which you spent hiding out on Saturdays in movie palaces of yore, while golden goddesses of the silver screen stirred your fevered imaginations and who, decades later, still make us feel all warm and cozy inside. Even while brandishing a gun.

TiVo

The guys from Verizon showed up on Wednesday morning to install the Super-Secret Decoder Cards in my new TiVo.

Thank God one of them had actually "seen" a TiVo before Wednesday. Between the 2 of them it took less than 2 hours to do what a qualified technician should've been able to do in 1 hour. This is known as "job security." In all fairness to them, they are "phone company" employees which, in the past, meant hours of boredom hanging off of telephone poles, or down in freezing cold manholes, splicing miles of copper cable together in order to form "The Bell System." These days, though, it's just as likely to mean "the cable company" or "the computer guys." They don't know what the hell their job descriptions are any more. I feel for them.

This is what my TiVo looks like from the front:



This is what it does: It's a digital video recorder. It has an onscreen program guide that puts Verizon's to shame. All you have to do is "point and click" to record any show on the schedule. You can even tell it to record an entire season for you with just a few clicks. It holds up to 180 hours of regular programming (or 20 hours of HD programming). I can stick another (external) hard drive on the thing to up the recordable ante to nearly 200 hours of HD programming and nearly 1,000 hours of regular.

It does all kinds of other "tricks" with time and space (it's nearly as good as an episode of "Lost"). My favorite trick so far is, if I'm watching a show in "real time" and the phone rings all I have to do is hit the "Pause" button on the remote. The picture will instantly freeze. I take the call and after I hang up, 20 minutes later, hit the "Play" button and it will continue playing, as though I had been playing back a tape or a DVD.

It also learns and makes suggestions about things I might enjoy based on my past viewing patterns. This is both good news and bad news.

I am very excited about my TiVo. I'll be even more excited when the TiVo company issues me a refund for the defective unit they originally sold me.

Meanwhile, though, I'm a happy camper.

p.s.

Tomorrow I'm seeing the new Charles Busch play "The Third Story" also starring Kathleen Turner ("Body Heat", "War of the Roses", voice of Jessica Rabbit in "Who Killed Roger Rabbit?")

Full review to follow.

Crossdressing for Fun and Profit!

Somebody said that the photo I posted yesterday of Rudy Giuliani, in full drag, reminded them of Dame Edna Everage (Barry Humphries - red-blooded Australian heterosexual, just like Hugh Jackman).

Well, damned if he doesn't! It's the eyeglasses... and the makeup... and that gown ... AND THOSE SHOES!!! UGH.

Speaking of drag queens, Joe, over at JoeMyGod, went to the theater last night to see a live production of Charles Busch's silver-screen triumph, "Die, Mommy, Die!" As Joe himself finally admitted, he's well on his way to becoming a Show Queen (I think he's already there).

Joe mentioned seeing CB in "Lesbian Vampires of Sodom" when he first moved to NYC back in the 80's. My ex and I caught that one, too. I don't remember too much about it, but I do remember an over-the-top performance by Busch who seemed hell bent on bringing out his inner-Norma Desmond at every opportunity.

But for my cross-dressing money, nothing could ever beat the late, great Charles Ludlum in a succession of wildly insane farces at the Ridiculous Theatrical Company's world headquarters on Sheridan Square.

One of the first plays I saw when I landed in NY in 1978 was their production of "Camille... a Tear Jerker." I, and the rest of the audience, was in stitches from the time Charles first (literally) flounced onstage in an empire gown whose hem was coquettishly held aloft by a circle of helium filled balloons, revealing a lovely set of pantalettes beneath, until he drew (one of many) last breaths in a death scene that just wouldn't quit. ("Nonette... I'm cold. Throw another faggot on the fire." "I'm sorry madame, but there isn't another faggot in the house!!!" "Not another faggot in the house??? TELL ME ANOTHER ONE, NONETTE!!!") His plays were loaded with cultural references from life, art, opera, theater, books, street talk and ballet. The zingers, sarcasm and puns flew. To see Charles and his company of fellow lunatics perform was exhilirating and inspiring.

But their crowning glory, in 1984, was a 2-man production of "Irma Vep" a gothic horror story and cross-dressers delight. The two people in the cast were Charles and his lover Everett Quinton. It was a tour de force and my ex and I saw it several times, and dragged out-of-towners to see it whenever we could.

Charles passed away from AIDS 20 years ago this past spring, but I have never forgotten this brilliant man of the theater.