Thursday night Greg and I went to see Margaret Cho in her Sensuous Womanvariety show. It was wonderfully raunchy and has deepened my fascination of the burlesque. Lots of nudity and pasties and subversive behavior (the rap “I’m not a homo-sexual, I’m a sexual homo” will stick in your head all night). Loved Dirty Martini’s America performance: justice corrupted by money and greed, stuffing dollar bills down her throat and pulling a long strand of cash out of her ass, giving the middle finger to the world at the end much like the country has done to the world and its own citizens. Finally got to see My Puss performed live. And Cho’s new jokes continued her political commentary and frankness about sex and sexuality. I’m looking forward to Cho’s new one woman show in 2008.
Friday Greg and I saw The Pied Pipers of the Lower East Side. It was actually quite good. The character parts seemed to be written for the actors, so it would be difficult imagining other actors playing those roles, but it was refreshing to see an actual debate of ideas go on without the performance feeling pedantic or preachy or one-sided. Every character’s worldview was correct and true in the bubble of their own world and no one came out sounding more right than anyone else. I think this had the first on-stage erection I’ve ever seen and it actually worked without being gratuitous, having the same effect on the little brother character as it did on the audience. I had some issues with the mystical conversion in the third act but the other transformations the characters undergo in the space of a week are quite believable and make for good drama: those break points in human lives where suddenly the status quo ends and a new life begins.
And Saturday Greg and I rented the classic Elvira: Mistress of the Night. We forgot how campy and fun Cassandra Peters is and had our love rekindled during October when we stumbled upon the Hunt for the Next Elvira reality show on a late night all-reality tv channel. My favorite quote, in regards to her magic ring: “This? The only thing I can do now is make it look cheap.” The final scene where she makes it to Vegas bookended my weekend with pasties and tassels. Yay for smutty, witty humor and debauchery.