A Born Again Diva

thanks

Wow, congrats!

(Space Pussy, great name for a band.)

Thanks, mac.

[If Carolyn Clay happens on this forum, I'd just like to say that I meant she's a "nasty bitch" in the best possible way...ummm. As in, she's a really really tough critic.]

And if she does visit this forum, she won't be the first "really really tough critic" to do so.

yep, and we love them for it. it's their reviews that really count in the end.

Well, by now Carolyn Clay was mentioned so many times that she is bound to happen on this thread if she googles her own name.

...and a review from The Edge:

Ryan Landry's "Cleopatra"
by Theodore Bale
EDGE Entertainment Contributor
Thursday Apr 20, 2006

As I entered the basement theater at Machine to see Ryan Landry's latest effort, Cleopatra: The Musical, a Proustian flood of memories invaded my thinking. It was triggered by music playing in the background, Gil-Scott Heron's 1971 hit Lady Day and John Coltrane:

"Ever feel kinda down and out, you don't know just what to do?
Livin' all of your days in darkness, let the sun shine through
Ever feel that somehow, somewhere you lost your way?
And if you don't get help quick you won't make it through the day.
Or you could call on Lady Day. Could you call on John Coltrane?
Now 'cause they'll, they'll wash your troubles, your troubles away."

The Gold Dust Orphans always play excellent music as the crowd gathers for one of their shows. Heron's song is not only a testament to the ability art has to transform our tedious everyday lives, but also an indictment of the bourgeois, material values that permeated 1970s American culture (in the second verse he sings about "plastic people with plastic minds are on their way to plastic homes"). Of course, such insipid values have hardly disappeared, and I realized only later that Heron's song had foreshadowed the theatrical experience I was about to have. Landry's work is hilarious, certainly, but underneath the laughs there has always been a striking assertion of style and glamour, augmented with a razor-sharp denunciation of social pretense. In this way it is entirely singular. In fact, it is unlike (and often superior to) any other theatrical work available in greater Boston.

And like many theatergoers, I welcomed something that might wash my existential troubles away. I'm not ashamed of my desire for escape; I expect it when I'm sitting in front of any stage. So instead of Lady Day and John Coltrane, on Saturday night I turned to Afrodite, Landry, the Gold Dust Orphans and the "cast of thousands" promised on the program cover. I was hardly disappointed. Cleopatra: The Musical is not only a brilliant entertainment, it's a veritable feast of thought, combining many of the themes, devices, audacities and wit that have given Landry and his Orphans such a loyal following over the years. And with an infinite array of over-the-top costumes from Scott Martino and assistant Lisa Simpson, it is likely Landry's greatest spectacle to date.

It was inevitable that Landry would turn his attention eventually to the story of Cleopatra, and this musical version is far more than a swift adaptation (or cheap imitation) of Joseph L. Mankiewicz' camp 1963 film starring Elizabeth Taylor. Landry had many other sources to investigate, including George Bernard Shaw, Shakespeare, Samuel Barber (whose operatic version, Antony and Cleopatra, is a notorious flop in 20th century music history), the Egyptian characters who appear every so often in television episodes of Batman, as well as early cinematic versions of the story, such as Cecil B. DeMille's starring Claudette Colbert, or J. Gordon Edwards' with Theda Bara. I'm sure that Landry made use of everything he could get his hands on, because he is resourceful and intelligent, and everyone knows that parody never really thrives in the company of ignorance.

The musical began with a few rousing choral numbers, performed by a delightful ensemble of young men and women dressed in turquoise tunics and black and gold Pharaoh hats. Sara Rabidoux's post-modern, gesture-filled choreography allowed for "modeling fits," reminiscent of Divine's pre-Voguing behavior in John Waters' film Female Trouble. Of particular interest was the bodacious beauty Emily Pilowa (billed as Whore/Slut in the program), who really knows how to pack a pair of black fishnets. I couldn't take my eyes off her.

After an emphatic speech, Billy Hough (both composer for the show and the character Fistula) sang a song about new tax rates in Egypt, and then he gave a Ptolemy (the adorable Claudio Pantoja) a quick blow job. Their clandestine pleasure was interrupted by a sudden war protest by the chorus.

It was with a sense of girlish anticipation that I awaited the entrance of Afrodite in the title role. Finally she appeared, stranded in the middle of the desert and sporting an orange silk blindfold, stylish "papyrus" mini-dress with irregular hem, gold platform heels, and bound in fat ropes. Buzzards circled as she implored mighty Isis to save her! Once released from bondage, she sang an anachronistic gospel number, Set Me Free, proving that she is not only Boston's most beautiful drag queen, but a formidable singer as well. "Now I'm just as strong as every queen needs to be," she reminded the audience with a kind of no-nonsense nod.

Afrodite is not "just a drag queen," as the hackneyed saying goes. Like the other Gold Dust Orphans, she is a skilled actor who understands the grand legacy of drag and uses it as yet another theatrical tool. Let it be said for once and for all: the Gold Dust Orphans are pan-disciplinary performance artists; their productions acknowledge everything from Euripides to O'Neill to The Cockettes.

I've always found Afrodite to be one of this ensemble's most alluring stars. She commands attention not by upstaging others or simply Z-snappin' her way across the stage (that would be too predictable, not to mention unsustainable), but rather by exuding a subtle blend of strength, sexiness and vulnerability that becomes irresistible as the show progresses. "Our skin can get so ashy in this desert climate," she complains demurely to Caesar as she invites him to join in a milk bath. "My Jacqueline Susann!" she shouts in horror while running towards a dollhouse representation of her burning library at Alexandria. "Daddy' was my baby's first word," she says with convincing remorse, cradling an African-American doll dressed like King Tutankhamen. At these moments, with her eyes glancing upward to heaven while she balances on her platform heels, Afrodite is so spellbinding that she becomes a sort of beautiful martyr, Saint Afrodite the Redeemer, Grantor of Wishes.

The entrance of a Whore (aptly named Syphilis and played by the stunning Cheryl Singleton) reminded me of how often Landry weaves animal characters into his plays. Toting a cardboard donkey, she exclaims "Ass for sale! Ass for sale!" and then tries to convince Cleopatra to buy her "SUD."

"That stands for sick-ass-mother-fuckin' ugly donkey!" she adds for clarification. In another scene, the official poison-taster for Cleopatra isn't a timid handmaiden, but rather a rubber cat puppet that has surfaced in so many of Landry's shows. When the cat expires after consuming the wine, Cleopatra tells Caesar indifferently "the next time you're downtown, pick me up a new pussy." It's an especially amusing moment when considering that ancient Egyptians revered cats. Later, Caesar and Cleopatra bathe under four active cow udders (supplemented by those glittery milk bath balls one finds at a drugstore, another brilliant anachronism). Landry has always been obsessed with animals. In the early years of his company, the basement theater he had in the South End was usually decorated with stuffed raccoons and other kinds of silly taxidermy. I thought of it as some ironic comment, again, on bourgeois values - the odd desire to control and preserve the natural world. Only recently did I learn that Martha Stewart, the queen of middle-class American taste, is also an avid collector of taxidermy, which sort of confirms my speculation.

Beefcake, an essential element in any production by the Gold Dust Orphans, makes its way into this show in the gorgeous form of both Mark Meehan (Marc Antony) and Gene Dante(Octavian). Both men have stellar, rock-star voices and a charismatic presence that doesn't sag under Afrodite's magical spell. Landry and Hough have given them big, flashy songs to show off their vocal skills. Then there is more beefcake in Landry himself, who rarely portrays male characters in his own shows. There was a quick beat just following his entrance in Act I, evidence that many of his fans didn't quite recognize him dressed in Roman army drag. He is an engaging and somewhat sleepy-eyed Caesar, with a touch of grey in his goatee, and his high cheekbones and immense eyes. Every so often, one could see that he was wearing white Y-front underpants beneath his armor. It's these sorts of little touches, letting a costume be simultaneously sexy, archetypal and anachronistic, that one marvels at. Every element, visual or verbal, is allowed its own irony. And I've always wondered at Landry's debonair vulgarity. In his first musical number (Get It On) he sings, "if I feel like I want to eat, skin it back and let me eat that peach! You gotta' move if you want those juices to flow!" as if he were just a harmless schoolboy.

James P. Byrne's impeccable directing brings all of this into a thrilling, fast-paced whole, and Hough and Landry's original songs are catchy paraphrases of popular forms, from the samba-inspired Divorce! Italian Style to a Marc Antony's brilliant ballad Love Jones. You could call on Afrodite...or you could on Mr. Landry. They're sure to wash your troubles away with Cleopatra: The Musical.


Through May 27 at Machine, 1256 Bolyston Street, Boston, MA. Friday and Saturday at 8 PM. $25.00 Reservations: 617-265-6222. For more info visit the gold dust orphans website.

And here, something from my blog, since it's on the subject. Might as well post it here, too, I suppose...

Memoirs of a hoofer
My eyelids are irreversibly closing. My stomach still hurts. For the past three days I felt as if I was going into labor. That is highly unlikely, unless I was approached by the Holy Spirit that informed me I'll bear the next prophet, just like Mary did (or told Joseph that's how it happened and he bought it... aaanyway). In case that happened, I must have been drunk. If it did not happen, I presume I have some sort of a virus or bacteria. Simply, I'm sick, because I finally have time. I have spent weeks, hours and hours every day, in a dark dungeon, sewing, painting, rehearsing for the soon-to-be-famous musical Cleopatra! (hey, we just opened. Give us a benefit of the doubt, and some time). I keep staring at the walls of my beautiful office, picturing the tired looks on Scott and Oliver's faces, who slaved in the dungeon for some six weeks non-stop day and night. Ollie would break into singing some cheesy non-descript radio songs - he would spontaneaously combust into singing, rather. Scott would jokingly bicker with Roger or Mark who cannot sew for the devil, but to his credit kept trying every single day. Or he would curse at and pray to the sewing machine that authored all the costumes for the show.

I miss seeing exhausted Nana (Ryan) stumble around with his skeptical look and appearance that awoke every last inch of motherly instincts in me and made me go fetch vitamins, beer, or cigarettes - whatever keeps Nana alive. He'd come alive at 7 pm alright, when he'd start guilting and harassing us into better performance, or throwing chairs when he deemed it necessary...

I love my job, mind you. But there is simply not enough purple glitter, not enough earpiercing wood saw noise, not enough cursing, in fact there is not enough alive-ness at all. It is the computer and I. The daily quest to resist the calling of the mop to clean the floor although it's thoroughly unnecessary, the calling of the peacefully sleeping dog to be taken outside again, almost against her will, or the calling of the rubber band ball to add more rubber bands to it...

If life is nasty, brutish, solitary, and short, just like Hobbes suggested, then the Machine club environs are perfect for living it to the fullest. See for yourself when you come to see Cleopatra!
I'm sure I'll be restored to full health by Friday, in time for another show, and then start feeling lousy on Sunday again, hit with a severe Machine withdrawal syndrome. First week off I had a bad sinusitis, second week I had the stomach inferno, I can't wait to see what my organism has in store for me next week. Wish we still had rehearsals every night. It was much healthier, I swear.

Another great review! And another great blog!

Dag, it's like you're living in two parallel universes at the same time.
Wow!

Good work, dag.

We, as a community, are surging with pride.

I noticed the surging.
I just wasn't sure what it was.

Isn't Surge some sort of a soda? I think I used to like it back in 1994.

You may be confusing it with Serge Sodak, who had the hots for you in 1994.

You're accusing ME of not knowing what I'm talking about, George? Phffffpbt!

There is also a heartbreaking story about the end of Surge I would like to share with you:

Eric R. Built a SURGE Stockpile
Eric wrote in to share the memories of his favorite soda. From the time he first tasted that sweet citrus nectar, until he built a mighty stockpile once SURGE began to disappear. As he looks back on what was, he is also looking forward to trying Vault in hopes that it will help him feed the rush:

Dear Savesurge.org,

My first encounter with Surge was in summer 1998, when I was only 7. I was at my friend's house playing Nintendo 64 and I asked him if he had anything to drink. He ran into his kitchen and got me, and himself a Surge. As he walked into the room he passed it to me. I caught it and stared at it before saying "What's this? Some Mountain Dew rip-off?". He told me it was better and to drink it. I was skeptical at first but when I tried it, I immediately was hooked.

The next day I made my Mom drive me to the nearest gas station and I loaded up! I bought 3 12 packs. I drank two just on the drive back and my Mom scolded me that if I drank that much I would get rotten teeth. I didn't care than because I was in love. Over the years it became my drink of choice. I would buy a 12 pack every Sunday. But all good things come to an end.

Then one day in late 2001, I came in on my usual Sunday and I was shocked. NO SURGE! I nearly fell to my knees but I quickly composed myself and asked the guy at the counter if he missed a shipment or something. He looked at me solemnly and told me they weren't receiving it anymore. I thought "Ok. Maybe it's just here." I wish I would have been right. I went from store to store, looking but could find little. Finally my Mom said we had to go home. So as soon as we got home I hopped on my bike and rode to every place I knew that sold beverages with all the money I had saved up over the summer. I finally found a place and bought 4 12 packs. I began to stockpile and by the time I couldn't find it anymore, I had 30 12 packs and 10 2 liters left. I decided I would limit myself. Drinking only once a day, then once every two days, and then only on special occasions. I had one bottle left on New Years 2005. My friend who introduced me to Surge shared a toast as the bottle emptied and drank our last Surges.

Now another friend has ordered me a 12 pack of Vault as an early Christmas gift off eBay. It will be at my doorstep tomorrow. As I'm anxiously waiting for perhaps the closest thing I'll ever have to Surge again I tell you my story of Surge, and how I won't ever forget it.

Sincerely,
Eric R.
Roseville, MN

I'm gonna have a speaking part today. One of our guys has a very sick father.

My famous lines will be: "We're losing. Losing! The Romans are approaching the Palace gates! Oh, is there noone who will save us?!"

"Cleopatra! You musn't. It is too dangerous!"

"But you're a woman! How do you hope to conquer the Romans?"

I am very proud of them. I have been practicing in front of Bootsie. She is not the most receptive audience, but hey. I can tell I'm not doing my job right when she falls asleep.

Are you going to use a "Natasha" accent?

I would love to, but it would not fit in. I'm supposed to be one of Cleopatra's people. Maybe she did employ Eastern Europeans, well... those would be Kelts back then...

Heehee..... hope friday's performance went well!