I had this incredible dream last night--it was sort of a variation on the actor's nightmare, but it wasn't really a nightmare at all. I dreamt that I was understudying in the Broadway production of When Harry Met Sally, but I wasn't allowed to go on, since the director (who may or may not have been Rob Reiner) didn't want anyone to do the orgasm scene that he hadn't directed himself, so I never got a chance to go on, instead they would rearrange the show.

But then the show was something else, kind of like Metamorphoses, an ensemble cast playing many roles, and I got to go on in that, and I didn't really know what I was doing, but I wanted to do it so badly that it didn't matter. I was figuring out the show, and I got to sort of go on a little bit, and I was trying to figure it out so that I could do it right.

People were leaving the show, actors who had been in for a long time, and I kept hoping that I would be put into the cast, but I wasn't really right for the show, so I was kept kind of on the outside. I couldn't become real, a real Broadway actor, no matter how hard I tried. I kept hitting snooze when the alarm went off so that I could get back into the dream and get back into the show and get into the permanent cast, but I finally had to wake up without succeeding.

You don't have to be a dream analyst to understand that one.

So yesterday was the tech for the show, which means that I rather needed to find a costume. I figured it was time. Don't want to rush into anything, you know.

Earlier, we had talked about my dressing really straight and making the character's extreme insanity more of a surprise, but it occurred to me that since he has the line about how he doesn't want to dress like me because he doesn't want to be considered insane, perhaps I needed to dress, well, insane.

So I had to find the most insane clothing that I have--and I actually have some fairly insane clothing, I was not too surprised to find. But I promise that I never wear my yellow clown pants with the black spots and the orangey-pink splotchy shirt together.

I wanted to wear my pink and blue Docs, but I could only find one, and ended up actually cleaning up my room a bit looking for the other one. There is some walking room in there now, quite startling!

I decided to wear one Wellie with my Doc, then went outside and asked Jon and the kids whether I looked extremely silly, or only a little silly. They all decided that I did, in fact, look extremely silly. Then I went back inside and found my other boot under the kitchen table, but decided that the different boots really made the outfit.

Tech itself was a complete horror. I came home and announced proudly that I personally would be appearing in the worst evening ever produced by Love Creek!

The other shows are all completely dreadful, we are the only one worth watching. I am in a second piece in a tiny role, and that was just nightmarishly bad, a third play I was changing during, not watching, but it sounded appalling, and the last one, well, I liked one of the actors very much, but another one was so excruciatingly bad that I wanted to flee the theatre.

Lucky, lucky Cynthia, Fran and Tracing, the three people who are forced to see me in every show, no matter the quality! This will be one for the record books.

Thoughts while watching the Drama Desk Awards

Shit, has this ever been televised before? Does anyone at all care about them? It's so New York theatre insider stuff, but of course it's being televised on our local PBS station, it didn't go national, so there kind of isn't any point in doing this recap, but we'll see what happens, shall we?

The difference between the Drama Desks and the Tonys is that the Drama Desks are for Off-Broadway as well as Broadway. Also, the Tonys are broadcast live from a Broadway theatre, and the Drama Desks took place a week ago in the concert hall at the Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Performing Arts. I guess we should be thankful that it's not in the gymnasium.

Hey, apparently the Drama Desks are also for Off-Off Broadway as well! Why have I never been nominated then? Nice to know that I'm eligible, at least. Perhaps they don't nominate for five day runs. I wonder if they ever actually do nominate anything from Off-Off Broadway, or if they just pretend to. Or if they ever do nominate them, they certainly don't win.

Another difference? The Tonys are hosted this year by the great Broadway stars Bernadette Peters and Gregory Hines, the Drama Desks by Rue McClanahan from Golden Girls. That sounds like a joke, but I swear it's not, she's on my screen right now with two firemen, singing "NYC" from Annie. Unless I am having some fevered dream.

She's making way too many sex jokes for a woman soon to celebrate her centennial. It was cute in Golden Girls (you know, or not), but now it's kind of icky. Grandma shouldn't be saying lines like, "It's not the size, it's how you use it. That reminds me, I really have to call that guy in Chicago." Eeyew! Ick ick ick!! I need to scrub out my ears with brillo pads.

Thoroughly Modern Millie wins for Best Director of a Musical. Hmm, it seems that they don't play people off at this show. I always think that playing people off is pretty rude, but you know what? I see now why it happens, as this guy tells his life story.

Oklahoma wins for Best Choreography. It must be hard, choreographing a musical for which the original choreography is so famous. Like re-concepting A Chorus Line or something.

Good stuff about the Drama Desks, no fakey scripted banter. Bad things? Elaine Stritch giving out award after award, never once looking up from the paper from which she is reading. Guess they can't afford TelePrompTers.

Yippee! Something that I care about! Mary Zimmerman won for Best Direction of a Play for my best beloved Metamorphoses! O hurrah!! They showed a clip from Erysichthon and Hunger, starring my crush Chris Kipiniak, (you remember him, The King Who Fucked His Daughter). And the award is being accepted by That Guy, aka my favourite cast member, Erik Lochtefeld! How much better could this get?!

Shit, they've been doing the show since 1996, that's as long as I've been doing this journal! That's quite a journey to Broadway.

Someone named Sherre Rene Scott is singing a song from some show called The Last Five Years. I guess I don't get out much, as I have no idea who any of these people are, to say the least. Funny song, though!

"I could have a mansion on a hill,
I could lease a villa in Seville,
But it wouldn't be as nice as a summer in Ohio
With a gay midget named Carl playing Tevye and Porgy!"

And here's Vanessa Williams, not singing a song from Into the Woods, but instead introducing the girl playing Cinderella, who gets to sing. Well, there's another Drama Desk thing, choosing the song rather than the singer. Or the singer rather than the star? Something like that.

O, there's Milky White! I heard it was played by someone in a cow suit this time rather than a plaster cow, and I was very against the idea, but she's actually pretty funny. It's a good costume, but that must be a slightly humiliating role. "Mom, guess what, I'm on Broadway! In a Sondheim show! As the back end of a cow! Hello? Hello? Mom?"

Difference #357 of the Drama Desks v. the Tonys, when Milky White was giving Cinderella her shoe and it was stuck in her mouth, it wasn't a scripted bit, it was a mistake.

Thoroughly Modern Millie wins for Best Orchestrations. Two men won, one of whom died last year, and here's a good reason for not playing people off, as the composer is reading a speech written by the live winner that is entirely a tribute to the dead winner.

And Elaine Stritch and John Lahr win for Best Book of a Musical for Elaine Stritch at Liberty. I totally want to see this show. But I think it just closed, so there you go.

So, Lahr is talking and accepting the award, and then Elaine runs onstage, saying "I was backstage! Nobody told me! This is just thrilling, and I'm sitting back there drinking coffee, and nobody told me! And you came out here and got all the hooha!" And Lahr leans into the microphone and said, "For once!"

O, The Last Five Years wins for Best Lyrics! I'm glad they played that song first, or I'd be yawning, but that song was really good. And he wins again for music. O, he wrote Parade! I love Parade! Of course, this show is closed, too. I should start paying attention, occasionally. Or buying New York Magazine again, because when I let my subscription lapse, that's when I stopped knowing what the hell was going on in this town.

Patrick Wilson from Oklahoma is singing "O What a Beautiful Mornin'". I'm sure he's really good, but I did this show twice in my youth, and have been scarred for life. Not to mention the fact that I'd so much rather see Hugh Jackman doing it. Actually, his voice seems a little light for it, Curly isn't a tenor role, he should be a light baritone. I like my Curlys to be a little more manly.

Another difference, and a nice one, Rue is presenting the award for costuming with her dresser from The Women. Nice to see someone who would normally not get alot of public recognition! Rue said, "He saw me naked every night!" Well, if he wasn't gay before that job...

Isaac Mizrahi won, but wasn't there to get it. They seemed at a loss at what to do. Hell, I've seen enough awards shows that I would immediately turn to the camera and say, "Mr. Mizrahi could not be with us this evening, so we accept the award on his behalf," but Rue was a bit more flustered.

Amusingly, Rue was supposed to give out the next award with an electrician, Joan Griffinkrantz, and the camera pointed at the entrance, and everyone clapped, but no Joan. Then Rue repeated, "Miss Joan Griffinkrantz!" and everyone clapped again, but she did not show. It was like, "The Von Trapp Family Singers!" I expected a Nazi to run from backstage crying, "She's gone!" and the searchlights to start whiffing through the audience.

So Rue starts reading both halves of the script, then Joan wandered out onstage in some sort of coveralls or something and starts mumbling her lines. This is like the best awards show I have ever seen. This is only the second year it has been televised, and it is so far from being anything close to slick that it's a real joy to watch. Let alone recap.

Hey, David Van Tiegham was nominated for Sound Design! I had the biggest crush on him when I was in college. He didn't win, Into the Woods did, but it was nice to hear his name.

Metamorphoses won for Best Lighting Design, and another actor from the show, Anjali Bhimani, (Midas' daughter), picked up the award. Maybe, if it keeps on winning. I'll see all of the actors! I'm going to turn into one of those Rent loonies with this show, ain't I?

Private Lives won for Set Design for a Play. They showed a clip from the show, and that set is stunning. I really want to see that one. And, for the first time this evening that I have said that, it's not closed yet!

Shit, we're an hour into the show, and they haven't given a single thing to a single actor yet. Lets go, guys!

Into the Woods, Best Set Design for a Musical. Let's get on with it! Actors! Nope, more singing first. "The Winner Takes it All" from Mama Mia sung very dramatically indeed. A bit overwrought for an Abba song, ain't? Of course, I haven't seen the show, so there you go.

Nope, still no acting awards, instead they are giving the astoundingly dull award of Best Music in a Play. Wait, except for the fact that Metamorphoses won, and Chris Kipiniak is accepting! No longer a dull award, but the best award in the whole wide world! Far too short a speech, but he looked really cute in his glasses.

Mos Def and Jeffrey Wright are having massive difficulty with their banter. They are presenting Best Solo Performance, which every actor in New York but me was apparently nominated for. I don't know why, of course Elaine Stritch won!

Man, I'm never going to get to go to bed, am I?

"Currently delighting audiences as that titan of the tabloids in Sweet Smell of Success, please welcome John Lithgow!" Delighting? That's not what I've heard, I think that that might be the first time the word "delight" has been said anywhere near the words Sweet Smell of Success, unless they were talking about the movie. As Melissa said when we walked by the poster, "Poor Brian d'Arcy James."

Wow, this song really does suck.

Best Featured Actress in a Play, Katie Finneran for Noises Off. There's another one I'd like to see, I saw the original production in London a million and twelve years ago. This can't be as good, but it's such a fun show that I'd really like to see it.

Best Featured Actor in a Play, Frank Langella for Fortune's Fool, of course! Who else? Gotta see this show, Cynthia and Fran say that it kicks ass. He said, "I'm afraid that it is necessary for me to take this opportunity to address a rumour floating around Orso's and Joe Allen's that Alan Bates and I are having an affair. We are. And it's happening every night at the Music Box Theatre, and I defy anyone to play opposite this wonderful man and not fall in love with him."

Now that they have finally gotten to the actors, they are barreling through them as though they are doing the dull ones rather than the interesting ones! Silly Drama Desk Awards.

Lindsay Duncan wins for Private Lives, Best Actress in a Play. Alright already, I'll see it, get off my back!

Alan Bates, Best Actor in a Play for Fortune's Fool. He said, about Frank Langella, "He and I feed each other, yes, I think it's true, I think we might as well get on with it!" And then, "I think that our producers, when they decided to take a hundred and fifty year old Russian play that absolutely nobody had heard of, and cast two actors in their mid-sixties, and bring back a director from semi-retirement, I think they must have been trying to get into Mel Brooks' The Producers, it doesn't sound like it has a chance!"

And so far, Metamorphoses has won the most awards! And well deserved.

Sutton Foster, the current toast of Broadway, is singing something from Thoroughly Modern Millie. Lovely voice, certainly. She looks like a young Mary Tyler Moore. That camera shot straight up her nose does her no favours, but it is clear from both the lighting and the camera work that this is being staged for the audience that is there, not for the TV audience at home.

Best Featured Actress in a Musical, Harriet Harris for Thoroughly Modern Millie. O, she's Frasier's agent, I knew she looked familiar. I'm not gagging to see this one, everything I've heard is pretty much summed up here, where it says that it "isn't anywhere near as light, tuneful, and amusingly madcap as it wants and pretends to be."

Shuler Hensley, Best Featured Actor in a Musical for Oklahoma. He looks so funny, all dressed up in his beautiful suit coupled with his wild hair and scruffy beard stubble, but he plays Pore Jud, so how else could he look?

Let's go, let's go, it's a quarter to two and I want to go to bed. But I want to see Metamorphoses win Best Play first! The problem with having this show being on PBS is that just about every second of the two and a half hours that it is broadcast is the actual awards show and there is nothing to fast forward through.

And Sutton Foster wins for Thoroughly Modern Millie, who else? She was plucked from the chorus and thrust into the spotlight, she went out there a youngster but she came back a star, no-one else could possibly win.

John Lithgow wins for Sweet Smell of Success, aka the show that will close immediately after the Tonys if it doesn't win Best Musical, which it won't, one has no doubt.

Best Revival of a Play, Private Lives. I'm pretty certain that this guy won't say anything earthshattering, I can fast forward through it. Although it took me long enough to type that sentence that I did not have the chance.

Okay, Best Play, this is it. And it's a tie! The Goat and, of course, Metamorphoses! Yay! The Goat is hogging all of the time, but who can complain about Edward Albee giving a speech?

Best Revival of a Musical, Into the Woods. There were only two nominees, that and Oklahoma. Man, that must be depressing to have a 50% shot and then losing.

Why are both Bill Pullman and Mercedes Ruehl up there when she hasn't let him say a word, practically? She reads all the nominees and also the winner. Maybe he's just there to look pretty.

And Thoroughly Modern Millie is Best Musical. And I'm going to bed.

Lenten entries missed:

Helene showed pictures of Clayzilla, learned to love chard (blech), noticed that she had turned into a Mommy, and proved it by squirting milk out of every orifice. Okay, not every orifice, but I like that sentence and will leave it lie.

Today's horoscope:
Life feels serious, earnest, "heavy." You are taking on too much. Release some responsibilities; share the load.

One year ago today:
Am I ashamed of myself for being so many days behind? Well, yee-eesss...but that isn't actually making me write any faster.

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Last Updated Mon 3 Jun3 21:46:09 2002