Time Fries!

by Fay Jacobs

  With no let-up in sight, I found a large plastic trash bag, cut neck and arm holes and slipped it on like a mu-mu. A pal grabbed another bag for my head, wrapping me in a Gloria Swanson, Sunset Boulevard turban. I gulped the rest of my vodka and headed out.

  Turbaned and ziplocked, a veritable Glad bag lady, I marched down the street, ignoring mobs of rain-coated tourists staring and laughing. Thanks to my daily walking regimen, my trip in Hefty Bag chic took less time than it might have, eliminating humiliation exposure. I arrived high and dry.

  So this walking thing has its benefits. I’m losing weight, listening to more music and breathing easier. Now that I’ve made deadline with this article, I’m off to walk. Besides, Cruela the Walker will be calling any minute to see how I’ve done today. I can’t wait to tell her I’ve learned to walk and chew gum. Progress.

  June 2013

  THE TONY AWARDS, UP CLOSE AND PERSONAL

  “Cast to your opening positions.”

  The booming voice comes over the sound system at 9:55 a.m. I’m sitting halfway back in the orchestra—which, considering this is the enormous art deco cavern that is Radio City Music Hall, is a considerable distance from the stage.

  Around me hover TV cameras, boom operators, sound engineers, and a two-story revolving crane hoisting a camera to catch celebrities in their seats and winners coming down the aisles. This is dress rehearsal for the 67th Annual Tony Awards, and I’m fascinated by every single thing happening around me.

  I last went to the Tony Awards in 1971 for the 25th Anniversary of the Tonys. I was just out of college, having scored tickets with a friend. Apparently, it hadn’t been a banner year on Broadway because the entire show featured classic performances from the recent Golden Era of musicals. I saw Yul Brynner do a scene from The King and I, Carol Channing sing from Hello, Dolly!, and the highlight for me, Angela Lansbury and Bea Arthur reprise “Bosom Buddies” from Mame.

  Now it’s more than 40 years later, and thanks to a friend who knows the producer, I’m back at the Tonys. Well, the dress rehearsal, which, I know will be even more interesting than the real thing.

  “We will be using all effects, all elevators, everything. This is dress rehearsal. 45 seconds…stand by…”

  And there’s Neil Patrick Harris, launching into one of the most spectacular opening numbers ever, complete with circus performers from Pippin, newspaper boys from Newsies, orphans from Annie, and great big, glorious drag queens from Kinky Boots. There are lyrics about Billy Porter’s ass, drag queens, and Broadway being swarmed by child actors, proving once again, that the Tonys are indeed the gay Super Bowl. Neil Patrick Harris’ opening number last year was “The Tonys—not just for gays anymore!” but frankly who are we kidding? The show is gay, gay, gay.

  All of the nominees and celebrity ticket-holders are still in bed on this Sunday morning in New York, while stand-ins hold their assigned seats so cameras can practice pick-ups. Stand-in actors also play presenters, filling in for the likes of Tom Hanks and Cuba Gooding, Jr.

  “And the winner is—FOR THIS REHEARSAL ONLY…”

  The stand-ins announce random names, and give phony speeches, thanking their mothers, agents, and lovers, some pausing to make a case to the audience for going to Broadway shows early and often. One handsome actor, standing in for a phony Kinky Boots winner (although I sit here hoping Kinky Boots will take it tonight) said, “I’d like to have one of those cute Newsie boys to take home.”

  We all laugh. By all, I mean me and Bonnie and the hundred or so gay men sprinkled throughout the orchestra. There are a smattering of straight couples, obviously in the business, and a few hapless much-older straight men on the arms of well-dressed women who have had lots of “work done.” But seriously, the crowd is overwhelmingly, fantastically gay.

  After suffering though a big number from the musical Matilda, which by the way I hated, although the critics raved, I get to see Jane Lynch gleefully belt out a number from Annie. The big musical number from Pippin shows that the 1970s musical has been re-imagined with acrobats, magic acts, and jugglers. Pippin du Soleil.

  Jessie Tyler Ferguson shows up to rehearse his lines, asking for the correct pronunciation of one of the nominee’s names. “Glad I came to rehearse,” he says.

  Actually, as the hour gets later, more celebrities show up to try out their presenter speeches, including some casually dressed pros—Sally Field, Patti LuPone, Bernadette Peters, Matthew Morrison, and more. Even the dog from Annie makes an appearance, providing our emcee with a face full of dog slobber.

  The show proceeds in real time, with breaks for commercials where techies scramble to get the scenery ready for the big musical numbers. One or two set pieces slide on stage, but the backgrounds are projections. Clever!

  “Back in five seconds, can we have some applause please?” We obey.

  The boom camera sweeps the gigantic theatre like a graceful giraffe, the base of its neck sporting weights to keep it grounded. Uh-Oh, there’s a glitch! The curtain isn’t in place.

  “Did you wake up this morning and wonder why we have a dress rehearsal? This is why,” quips Neil Patrick Harris. A hundred stagehands come running and fussing and rigging.

  Then comes the most moving part of the rehearsal. The words “In Memoriam” appear on an upstage screen and Cyndi Lauper and her band file on to do a sweet rendition of “True Colors” with photos and names appearing behind them.

  Cyndi’s up for a Tony for best music and lyrics for Kinky Boots. I imagine she’s nervous. But, her performance is poignant and perfect.

  Two last “winners” for this rehearsal only come up on stage, mumble their faux appreciation and the sparkling emcee says, “That’s it folks!!! Goodnight.”

  What? No closing number??? Guess not. And out we go.

  By 6:30 p.m., after a late lunch at Carnegie Deli, a walk through the Village, and checking in at the Chelsea Pines Inn, we go to the owner’s suite at the hotel, where we’ve been invited to watch the Tonys. The hotel owner, if you have not heard this story, is my former high school prom date, now the proprietor of the number two B&B in NYC, according to Trip Advisor. The hotel is gorgeous, his apartment there, magnificent. And he’s still as adorable as ever, I might add.

  From the ceiling comes a huge movie screen projecting the CBS annual Tony Awards presentation. There’s the opening number, compete with close-ups, brought to life by those big boom cameras.

  Nathan Lane, David Hyde Pierce, and Harvey Fierstein sit where their doubles had been; Cuba Gooding, Jr., stumbles over the names of the nominees because he slept in this morning; smooth, professional readings rise from Patti LuPone and Sally Field; Tom Hanks smiles from his seat, held that morning by an exuberant older woman; everything goes like clockwork.

  Jokes which fell flat this morning are gone; a couple of awkward presenter’s comments are MIA, and damn, if that dog from Annie didn’t slobber on cue again for the real show.

  And this time the awards are not for this rehearsal only. Kinky Boots dominates with six Awards, including Cyndi Lauper for her words and music; Matilda doesn’t win for Best Musical (Yay!) and Kinky Boots does. Cecily Tyson is crowned Best Actress; the cast of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolfe does well, and Pippin shines in the revival category.

  But wait! There IS a closing number. Neil Patrick Harris manages to sing enormously clever lyrics about all the winners! They must have written the number featuring every single possibility, frantically crossing out non-winners from the wings. That really IS show business! It was a tongue-twisting triumph of a closing number, adding to the glorious production. I loved every single minute.

  I think I’ll wait less than 40 years to go back.

  June 2013

  I T TOOK THE ENTIRE 65 YEARS OF MY LIFE TO GET HERE

  “You have until 4 o’clock to do a new column. Probably not enough time,” editor Steve Elkins said.

  Not enough time to make this deadline after waiting 65 years to be a full citizen of the United States? Watch m
e.

  Today, Wednesday, June 26, at about 10 a.m., DOMA (the ill-conceived Bill Clinton law banning federal recognition of gay marriage in the U.S.) was overturned by a mostly-conservative U.S. Supreme Court. I watched, spell-bound, in my living room as commentator Rachel Maddow, former Congressman Barney Frank and a parade of others described how this (apparently) straight but apparently not narrow (at least five judges, anyway) court struck down DOMA as unconstitutional and granted full marriage rights to same sex couples in states where gay marriage is legal.

  I never thought I’d see this in my lifetime. In fact, for the first 45 years of my lifetime I never even conceived of it. In the beginning, the very word “gay” made me sick. Was I one? And if so, based on furtive, whispered comments and society’s fear I was certain I’d have an unhappy, miserable life.

  I never thought I’d see this day when I was hiding in the closet through high school and college; when homosexual conduct itself was still illegal; when I was guiltily sneaking around bad neighborhoods and seedy bars to meet others like myself; when I was ashamed and terrified to be outed at work.

  Could I see this day coming when I sweated bullets about admitting I was gay to my parents? Did I think this possible when Bonnie couldn’t use her VA benefit to buy a house because we weren’t married? When doctors dismissed me as a mere “friend” when Bonnie was in the hospital? When I had to pay thousands and thousands of dollars extra for my own catastrophic individual health insurance because I wasn’t considered a spouse by Bonnie’s employer?

  I never pictured this happening when I started writing for the Washington Blade (under a pen name so I would not lose my job) in the 1980s; when I marched on Washington in ’87, ’93, and 2000; when I began writing for Letters (under my |own byline) in 1996; as I wrote columns about protecting our relationships with the proper paperwork, railing against discrimination for AIDS patients, attacking conservative politicians as they attacked and denigrated us.

  But in the last ten years, as gay marriage became more and more of a possibility in Bright Blue states, I still never dreamed our federal government would recognize me and my wife (married in Canada in 2003) as full married citizens.

  I never dreamed this would happen as I went to Dover to support CAMP Rehoboth and Equality Delaware in their successful fight for gay marriage in Delaware; when our amazing Speaker of the House Pete Schwartzkopf led the charge for anti-discrimination and equality; when our legislators did the right and just thing; when Equality Delaware’s Lisa Goodman and Mark Purpura engineered the words and spirit behind this momentous action. And when our amazingly supportive Governor Jack Markell instantly signed the bill so “you won’t have to wait one minute longer!”

  But today? This conservative court striking down DOMA? This is the big one. I am recognized as a full, proud citizen by the U.S. government. The hell with what Justice Scalia, the Family Research Council and millions of ignorant or bigoted people think. Today, in Delaware, as it relates to the federal government, we have achieved marriage equality.

  You know, when I was about eight years old, I was flipping through a copy of The New Yorker on my parents’ coffee table, looking at the cartoons. Most of them I didn’t understand. But one drawing wasn’t a cartoon really, but an illustration with a story. It showed an African American man, slouched down, driving a horse-drawn wagon. In the second panel of the drawing, the wagon passed the Mason-Dixon line into the Northern part of the country. The wagon driver was proudly sitting up, head held high.

  My mother, with her ever-present progressive and liberal views, explained the drawing to me. I got it.

  But I get it so much more today. Damn. It really does get better.

  June 2013

  PRIDE WITHOUT PREJUDICE

  We knew this was the year to be at the New York City Gay Pride Parade. Let’s face it, with the DOMA ruling having come down days before, and Edie Windsor set to be parade Grand Marshal, we had lots to celebrate.

  As soon as we hit Manhattan we knew it was going to be something special. Rainbow flags flew everywhere, even in the most unlikely places, like corner falafel trucks. Entire buildings had been draped in rainbow colors, as banks, and drugs stores and retailers all celebrated with the LGBT community. Pretty amazing, actually.

  After a weekend of wine, women, and song we lined up Sunday morning for the parade at 33rd Street and 5th Avenue, the starting point. Once launched, the parade would wind downtown for hours to the Village and Christopher Street where the night would be capped with celebrations, street gatherings, and ultimately fireworks over the river at 11 p.m. Pretty good public celebration for a community still considered criminal in the 60s. Makes ya think, doesn’t it?

  We’d gotten there early enough to be in the front, along the police barricades, for a perfect view of our heroine Edie Windsor when she passed by. With the sun beating down and huge crowds jockeying for position, it was hot and a hoot. Spectators seemed made up of equal parts gays, straights, tourists, children, and pets. Vendors sold rainbow flags, rainbow roses, rainbow crap of all kinds.

  Does anybody remember Rollerena? In the 70s, this tall, thin drag queen used to roller skate around Manhattan, always making a festive appearance at pride parades. We found ourselves standing next to this disco-era celebrity by the barricades. She may have given up her skates, but she still looked like a million bucks as she and her gaudily dressed friends waited to step into the parade as it passed by.

  First we heard motorcycles revving—ah, the dykes on bikes, love them! Gone are the days when they’d lead the parade in pants and vests, breasts flapping in the wind. This posse was fully dressed, cheering us as we cheered them, and heady with celebration.

  And then we heard it. Whoops and hollers and cheers spreading toward us like a stadium wave, as the convertible with Edie Windsor came into view. Slowly the car rolled down the block, Ms. Windsor, all in white, draped in a rainbow sash, wide-brimmed hat on her head, smiling, waving, standing up to greet the community. People screamed and waved. Men bowed in reverence, drag queens squealed. And as this victorious plaintiff moved along, thousands of people blew Dinah Shore “mwah!” kisses in her direction. I will never forget the moment.

  Next came all kinds of corporate sponsors, their employees marching along, tossing products to the crowd: rainbow lip gloss, packets of sunscreen, key chains, vitamin water, the works. Between the banks, airlines, and phone companies, it was hard to believe it was a gay pride parade, not the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. Although make no mistake. We were giving thanks to Edie and the Supremes.

  And pretty soon, the LGBT organizations, bars, and businesses, with their fancy floats, disco beats, and scantily clad revelers rolled by, reminding us just what kind of happy parade this was. After about an hour schvitzing in the hot sun, we moved along, walking uptown, and taking in a whole city bathed in gay pride.

  We spent the rest of the day uptown, dining with friends and shaking our heads in wonder at the sea of rainbow decorations, festive LGBT folks clogging the streets, and a feeling of victory, freedom, and renewed patriotism as we faced the July 4th weekend.

  By evening, we hopped a cab back downtown, as I felt the need to be at the Stonewall Inn on this historic night. Yeah, me and 100,000 other people. The cab got mired in traffic six blocks away so we bailed and trudged through the masses, getting glitter-bombed en route. Standing on the street in front of the Stonewall had to suffice, as it was packed and hemorrhaging pierced, tattooed, young people, of every ethnicity, and mode of dress. Or undress. Everyone’s mood identical—unfettered joy.

  At that point, my previously imbibed Cosmos caught up with me. Crisis. I had to pee. Bonnie and I fought our way through the crush of bodies, almost all of them 30 to omigod 40 years younger than we, and across the street to a Starbucks. Inside, a long bathroom line formed with an employee checking receipts to make certain only customers used the facilities.

  I cast no blame. Made perfect sense given the teeming humanity outside. But I hadda
pee! Me, to the 18-year old employee: “I swear I will buy an iced coffee after I pee, but this is an old-lady emergency. Please take pity on us.”

  He did, and let us pre-pee. We bought iced decaf and headed out through the madness and back uptown. Of course, I never thought I’d see federal recognition of gay marriage in my lifetime; never thought I’d see all of New York City celebrating the rainbow nation; never thought I’d be able to walk from Christopher Street through the throngs to the hotel at 14th Street. But we did, with fireworks exploding in the sky behind us. With every blast we turned to watch, grinning and then walking on air up the street, shedding glitter and glee with every step. We’re queer, we’re still here, jeez, they got used to it.

  July 2013

  TESTING WHETHER THIS NATION, OR ANY NATION CAN LONG ENDURE

  If you think summer traffic at the beach is bad, think again. Yes, I know. It often seems you can gestate a baby in the time it takes to creep down Route One to Rehoboth Avenue, but it’s nothing compared to my recent Battle of Bull Run on Route 66 in Virginia.

  The world will little note, nor long remember what I say here, but oy, it was a mess! I went to visit an ailing friend one day, leaving Rehoboth at 3 p.m. on a Thursday, heading for that cradle of Civil War history, Manassas, VA. It was remarkably clear sailing to the Bay Bridge, then DC, oddly traffic-free through the Nation’s Capital, despite it being 5:30 p.m. on a work day.

  Then, picture this. Aggravation strikes in a caravan of brake lights at the start of Route 66 in Arlington. With 18 miles to go, I’m now rolling at between two and four mph, timed perfectly to arrive for tomorrow’s breakfast. Robert E. Lee’s whole Bull Run campaign didn’t take this long.

  It’s agonizingly slow, but even the high occupancy lanes are wretchedly inert. Hah! Many drivers, determined to qualify for the HOV lane, pick up commuting strangers. It’s bad enough cursing to myself in the car, but imagine enduring this motionless migration with a stranger making small talk. Torture!