On the Shortbus to Sin City (October Travelogue)

Ah no, unfortunately, I have not yet moved down to NYC, although I do hope to be down there permanently by the spring. But I do get down thataway once or twice a month to see mi amour, so here is a little catalog of events we've attended/participated in recently:

• Hedwig and the Angry Inch shadowcast: last show we put on (yep, I am now officially part of the performing shadowcast troupe, The Midnight Checkout Queens) was in September and the next one is slated for the first weekend in December. It's a total blast to see and even better to participate in! Hedwig rules the fucking universe!

• Shortbus: John Cameron Mitchell's new movie is simply majestic. It's heartfelt and earnest and smart and funny and revolutionary all at the same time. And the fact that it's frank and honest depictions of sex and relationships piss off the tight-assed religious wing-nuts puts it in even higher regard in my eyes.

• Evil Dead: The Musical: simply the funniest, bloodiest musical I have ever witnessed! My trusty sidekick and beautiful love, The Culinary Assassin, despite her morbid moniker is more of a theater traditionalist and did not enjoy it as much as me. She hadn't seen the movies, so that didn't help things and was made worse when a spout of blood was aimed directly at her during one scene. I got a good amount of gore on me as well. It;s a sign of the superior quality of a play when they hand out ponchos to those of us sitting in the "splash zone" of the 1st 3 rows. It goes without saying that I refused such a shameful shield against truly experiencing the extravaganza...

• Green-Wood Cemetery - Jenn and I visited this historic Brooklyn cemetery and park in search of the soul of Leonard Bernstein. Instead, we found the goddess Minerva, and ancient pyramid, and the grave of vice-president and killer of Alexander Hamilton, Aaron Burr. It was weird being amongst all these decaying but still grandiose tombstones and crypts and yet still see the Statue of Liberty off in the distance. We took lots of pics, which you can see on The Assassin link above and even more here on my Flickr page.

• Halloween parties: Jenn went as the luxurious transvestite alien Columbia from Rocky Horror and I went as either a dead crack whore or else a dead Courtney Love - take your pick. The party was at the luxurious studio of a friend of one of her roommates, a new transplant from Buffalo who obviously has some moola. They had access to a roof with a sublime view of the city. It was too cold to stay up there long, but I'd be living up there come summer if that was my place. Jenn and I were the most extravagantly costumed and were the recipients of many compliments on those as well as our usual sickingly lovey-dovey way of acting in public. I'd post some pics, but my photographer/gf has yet to send me any we took with her camera. We also held a costume party up here on Tuesday at The Bridge, the local LGBT community center I'm involved with. It was lots of fun, and I do have a pic from that showing myself and the center's director, Andrea:

• Cabaret Macabre: I was really excited about this dinner theater and cabaret/dance event, but was mostly let down. The meal was pedestrian, the drinks were outrageously priced ($24 for a glass of cheap chardonnay and a cosmo?!!!) and the venue was horribly arranged. It was sit-down, and so we couldn't see anything below the waist of the performers. From what I could tell the dancers were excellent, but this seating arrangement was a poor excuse for seeing an artistic performance. It wasn't helped by the woman sitting in front of us who insisted on wearing this ridiculously tall white furry hat with ears on it! If I didn't have on my ankle-length hobble-skirt that only allows half steps when walking, I would have shoved my motorcycle boot up her ass...

• Hedwig and the Angry Inch - stage production! - this was my first ever time seeing the original stage version rather than the movie version. It featured the wonderfully talented (and based on what I saw in the spandex tights scenes, hung) David Colbert as Hedwig/Tommy Gnosis and the equally great Petra as Yitzhak). We had front row, aisle seats for the show and it was spectacular. The venue was small and intimate and so we got to experience every little nuance of the virtually flawless performances and music. It should also be mentioned that Mr. Colbert also served as the original Hedwig in the first ever performance of the Midnight Checkout Queens. Needless to say, this show more than made up for the disappointment of the previous night's cabaret fiasco. The show was on monday night so afterwards I had to head back up to Saratoga, get 3 fitful hours of sleep at my parents and then head back to work.