Born On This Day- October 31st... Talented Ethel Waters

When doing research for my posts, I am always struck by the cruelty, hatefulness & challenges that were/are foisted on minority artists & performers in the past century. That their work should be adored & rewarded, but the artist would still need to enter a theatre or hotel by the back door. That these amazing performers persevered & gave us so much is a testament to the power of art.

Ethel Waters rose from stardom from a most-obscure beginning, a whore's alley in Philadelphia where she lived in poverty with her mother and grandmother. She faced unspeakable racism during her rise to fame. Ethel Waters was born on October 31, 1896, as a result of her mother's rape at age 13, Ethel Waters was raised in a violent, impoverished home. She never lived in the same place for more than 15 months. Waters: "I never was a child. I never was cuddled, or liked, or understood by my family." Despite this unpromising start, Waters demonstrated early the love of language that so distinguishes her work. Waters' birth in the North and her vagabond life exposed her to many culture, & gave to her interpretation of southern blues a unique sensibility that pulled in eclectic influences from across all American music. Ethel Waters: singer, dancer, actress, & evangelist, never be confined to a single identity. As a singer, she played with styles, doing what was called- “race music” & doing white standards.

Waters married at the age of 13, but soon left her abusive husband & became a maid in a Philadelphia hotel working for less than $5 a week. On her birthday- Halloween night 1913, she attended a party in costume at a nightclub in Philadelphia. She was persuaded to sing 2 songs, & impressed the audience so much that she was offered professional work at the Lincoln Theatre in Baltimore. She later recalled that she earned $10 a week, but her managers cheated her out of the tips her admirers threw on the stage.


She was a street kid whose highest aspiration was to be a lady's maid. Instead, she found herself in vaudeville. As an actress, in films like The Member of the Wedding, Waters gave the “mammy” roles real edge & depth. Her life was as varied as her singing. She was a Catholic who could swear like a sailor. She was a lesbian whose loud fights with her lovers made more proper lesbians like Alberta Hunter label her a disgrace to their tribe. She joined Billy Graham & toured the country. Her signature song had been Stormy Weather, but once she joined the Graham crusade, she never sang it again. Waters: “My life ain't stormy no more”, which was good for her & bad for her fans. Her best known recording was her version of the spiritual- His Eye is on the Sparrow.



In 1933, Waters made a satirical all-black film entitled Rufus Jones for President. She went on to star at the Cotton Club, where she sang Stormy Weather. Waters: “I sang it from the depths of the private hell in which I was being crushed & suffocated." She took a role in the Broadway musical revue As Thousands Cheer in 1933, where she was the first black woman to appear in an otherwise all white show. In addition to the show, she starred in a national radio program & continued to work in nightclubs. She was the highest paid performer on Broadway, but she was starting to age. MGM hired Lena Horne as the ingénue in the all-Black musical- Cabin in the Sky, & Waters reprised Petunia, her stage role. The film, directed by Vincente Minnelli, was a success, but Waters was offended by the attention given to Horne, & she was feeling her age.


She was nominated for a Best Supporting Actress Oscar in 1949 for Pinky. In 1950, she won the NY Drama Critics Award for her performance opposite Julie Harris in the play- The Member of the Wedding. Waters & Harris repeated their roles in the 1952 film version. In 1950, Waters starred in the TV series- Beulah but quit after complaining that the scripts' portrayal of African-Americans was degrading.


Waters was the second African American ever nominated for an Academy Award. She was voted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1998. Waters' recording of Stormy Weather was honored by the Library of Congress. It was listed in the National Recording Registry in 2004. Waters was approved for a Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 2004. However, the actual Star has not been funded, & as of her birthday in 2010, public fundraising efforts continue.

In Memory Of Ruth Gordon... From Harold & Maude

Maude, played by Gordon, is in her late 70s & befriends a wealthy, suicidal young man (They meet as onlookers at a funeral). Here they walk among flowers at a nursery:


MAUDE: They grow and bloom, and fade, and die, and some change into something else. Ah, life! I should like to change into a sunflower most of all. They are so tall and simple. And you, Harold, what flower would you like to be?


HAROLD: I don’t know. Just one of those. (He gestures toward a field of daisies)


M: Why do you say that?


H: Because they are all the same.


M: Oooh, but they are not. Look. (They bend down together.) See - some are smaller, some are fatter, some grow to the left, some to the right, some even have some petals missing - all kinds of observable differences, and we haven’t even touched the bio-chemical. You see, Harold, they’re like the Japanese. At first you think they all look alike, but after you get to know them you see there is not a repeat in the bunch. Each person is different, never existed before and never to exist again. Just like this daisy - (she picks it) - an individual.


H: Well, we may be individuals all right but- we have to grow up together.


M: Yes, that’s very true. Still I believe much of the world’s sorrow comes from people who know they are this (she holds the daisy) - yet let themselves be treated (she looks out at the field) - as that.

Born On This Day- October 30th... Post Apocalyptic Muse Ruth Gordon

She has been such a major part of my life for so long, it is hard for me to remember a time when she was not busy being my muse. A quote from Ruth Gordon- “Never Face The Facts” has been my motto for much of my life. Her point was, if she had owned up to the fact that she was 5’1’’, not really pretty & that her drama teachers said she had no talent… well, she would never have become Ruth Gordon. I treasure & have read & re-read her 3 volumes of memoirs- Myself Among Others, My Side: The Autobiography Of Ruth Gordon, & Ruth Gordon- An Open Book. I know it started for me with with Inside Daisy Clover, a film that had a very real impact on me at an early age. My adoration for her was cemented with her Oscar winning performance in Rosemary’s Baby. & then Harold & Maude became the most important movie of my youth. I had a friend who was in Harold & Maude as an actor & another friend who was the set decorator on the film. I had heard all these stories about it during the filming, but I was unprepared for how much I would fall in love with this little movie that went on to be a cult favorite.

My life motto, from Ruth Gordon, was posted on a wall of our cottage in Seattle by the husband.

The daughter of a former ship captain, Ruth Gordon knew what she wanted to do with her life after witnessing a performance by stage actress Hazel Dawn in Boston. Over the initial objections of her father, Gordon decided upon a stage career, studying at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. She made her debut in Peter Pan with Maude Adams: "Ruth Gordon was ever so gay as Nibs," wrote influential critic Alexander Woollcott, who became a valued & powerful friend to Gordon, & did what he could to encourage her & promote her career. With such stage hits as Seventeen, Serena Blandish, & Ethan Frome, Gordon was one of Broadway's biggest stars of the 1920s & 30s; privately, however, her life was put into shambles by the premature death of her first husband- actor Gregory Kelly. She was the toast of the West End in London during her successful run in The Country Wife. She created the role of Dolly Levi in Thornton Wilder’s The Matchmaker (1956), a role written for her, & the basis of the musical- Hello, Dolly!. She remarried in 1942 to the brilliant playwright Garson Kanin, 16 years younger than her. It was a union that lasted more than 4 decades.

Combining stage work with appearances in such films as Abe Lincoln in Illinois (1940) , Gordon began to collaborate with Kanin on writing projects, with such delightful results as the Spencer Tracy/Katharine Hepburn comedies Adam's Rib (1949) & Pat and Mike (1952), as well as the Judy Holliday vehicle- The Marrying Kind (1952). Gordon returned to the cameras for Inside Daisy Clover in 1966, before taking on role of an elderly neighbor in Rosemary's Baby (1968). When receiving an Oscar for her performance, the 72 year old Gordon brought down the house by saying, "You have no idea how encouraging a thing like this can be." Gordon was unforgettable in 2 films from my high school years: Where's Poppa? (1970), in which she played the obscenely senile mother of George Segal, & of course, Harold & Maude (1972), as the freewheeling soul mate of a death obsessed teen, played Bud Cort, who remained her lifelong friend in real life. The story of her early life was made into a film- The Actress, directed by George Cukor, with a screenplay by Ruth Gordon. She was portrayed by Jean Simmons & Spencer Tracy played her father. She was born 115 years ago today.

Reflections On Dominick Dunne On His Birthday

I posted about him on the day of his death in the summer of 2009. It was ironic that he died on the very day as his enemy- Edward Kennedy. I was such a big fan of his column in Vanity Fair. I would just eat it up each month.


 As I am thinking about Dominick Dunne on the day of his birth, I am reflecting on the similarities between Dominick Dunne & Truman Capote, one of my life long favorite writers. Both wrote about low acts in high society & they both craved celebrity. Capote labeled his later work- the Nonfiction Novel, & Dunne just called his books novels. Capote spent his last years doing very little writing, addicted to drugs & alcohol, appearing incoherent in public & on talk shows. Dunne was on the same track, but later in life he was sober, clear, & productive, but he was in the closet. Dunne probably wanted the literary attention that Capote received in his career, yet he outsold his writer family: brother John Gregory Dunne & sister-in-law Joan Didion. He must have been disappointed that he never entered the pantheon of literature. At the same time, he didn’t seem bitter. He was inside the fish bowl & yet always remained an outsider.


Capote’s society women rejected him after he published the roman e clef- Answered Prayers. Dunne continued to move in the world he wrote about despite an occasional snub. He did have enemies: the Kennedys, the Safras, & most famously- Congressman Condit. Dunne could get careless with facts, as Capote did, but most readers knew he was telling a larger truth; When you get to the top of society, there isn’t all that much there. This is the deeper secret Capote didn’t see.


I recently watched- After the Party in the Sundance Channel, which chronicles Dunne’s life. Listening to him talk, he seemed obviously gay. Earlier in his career, he was a television & film producer, & was the executive producer of the film version of Boys in the Band. Maybe those bitter queens spoke a truth to him that also drove him deeper into the closet. The documentary & his nonfiction writings make it clear that he cared deeply about his children & his former wife. It seems easy to dismiss a man torn like that, it seemed to be the way most people in Hollywood in the 1950s & 1960s handled such matters- “Oh, he just got married to cover up”, But, in a clever move, Dunne used his last novel to come out when his main character/alter ego reveals that he is gay.


His readers can only know a little bit about Dunne & his sexuality. In his interview with George Stephanopolous, Dominick’s son- Griffin Dunne, uses the terms gay & bisexual to describe his father. A few months before his death, Dominick told the London Times: “I am a celibate closeted bisexual.” It seems tragic when somebody has to deceive & experience shame for most of their life. To live in constant deception & shame distorts your life. Yet Capote, who was out of the closet most of his life, was full of self-loathing & in his last years, he led a miserable existence. Dunne, who speaks about his father mistreating him as a child for being a sissy, stayed in the closet his entire adult life. After success in Hollywood, he also became addicted to drugs & alcohol, but then found sobriety in rural Oregon of all places. He lived a life that he was drawn to & repelled by. For both authors, the shame of sexuality, open or not, propelled the men into a furious chase for recognition, celebrity & acceptance.


If society had been accepting of homosexuality, would both writers have never become successful writers? Was being an outsider what that made them?


It is a fitting irony for Dunne, since so much of his literary career was a reflection of a response to, the life of Truman Capote. The similarities are striking: Dunne's most famous novel The Two Mrs. Grenvilles was based on the notorious Woodward murder scandal that Capote had referred to in his novel Answered Prayers. It was the gossip & innuendo in an excerpt from it in Esquire- La Cote Basque, that got Capote shunned by his celibrity friends & started his decline.


Capote was dropped by his adored society women friends, having allegedly stabbed them in the back by exposing their deepest secrets. Capote career was killed. He never finished the novel. But Dominick Dunne, in a way, did. He wrote the The Two Mrs.Grenvilles novel that picked up where Capote left off. Dunne did it with panache, with a story of high society intrigue, sexual obsession, greed & murder. In The Two Mrs. Grenvilles, which was made a rather good TV movie starring Claudette Colbert & Ann Margret, Dunne paid homage to Capote by creating a narrator named Basil Plant who was more than just a little the author of In Cold Blood. Dunne was also similar to that character. He was the man on the outside looking in, absorbing, documenting, & chronicling. He was the secret sharer. The man everyone trusted.


Dunne's parallels to Capote were not just on the literary scene. Dominick Dunne craved the spotlight just as much as Capote, and surrounded himself throughout his wildly checkered life with just as many socialites & celebrities. Dunne even threw his own "Black & White Ball" in Hollywood that rivaled Capote's legendary fête at the Plaza. Dunne always claimed he had the idea first. He celebrated its memory in his coffee table book of photographs- The Way We Lived Then (Recollections of a Well-Known Name Dropper). That was part of Dunne's charm. He never tried to exaggerate his importance,


He did noy shy away from controversy. In the TV movie of A Season in Purgatory with Patrick Dempsey in the lead, there is a rather shocking gay sex scene between the narrator & the Dempsey character who killed the young girl at the start of the story. The book is based on the Martha Moxley case which Dunne had helped to reopen & wrote about at length in Vanity Fair.


Even at the end of his life, when the party was winding down, & Dunne knew he was deathly ill, he never lost his sense of humor or his gratitude for his good fortune. He wrote about his mortality in Vanity Fair. He wrote about the depths to which he had fallen, unlike Capote who fought similar demons but who was ultimately undone by them. Life was an endless party to both men. But Dominick Dunne never overstayed his welcome. Today, on what would have been Dunne's 84th birthday, Hollywood friends & reporter pals gathered at the Chateau Marmont to celebrate Dominick Dunne's life.

Born On This Day- October 28th... Edith Claire Posener

“Good clothes are not a matter of good luck."

EDITH HEAD believed modesty was unbecoming & that you should have anything you wanted in life, but you had to be dressed for it. Edith head knew about dressing. The legendary designer saw all the Hollywood greats stripped down to their underwear or less. As the stars gazed upon themselves in the studio wardrobe mirrors, Head was the woman standing behind them, making them look impossibly glamorous while carefully avoiding glamour herself.


Hollywood's most famous & influential costume designer, as well as its most prolific, Head had a career that lasted 6 decades. She designed clothes for 1,131 films , an average of 35 a year, she dressed virtually every star who shimmered on screen in the golden age of movie making. Head was the last costume designer to be under contract to a major studio, Paramount. She was a woman who succeeded in a world, which in her day, was dominated by men.


Head wrote a pair of books: The Dress Doctor & How to Dress for Success, & played herself, giving a fashion show commentary in the 1955 film- Lucy Gallant, starring Charlton Heston & Jane Wyman.


She could be a bit playful with the truth, taking credit for designs she had not created: Audrey Hepburn's little black dress in Sabrina & the Newman/Redford wardrobe for The Sting, for which she won an Oscar. Always discreet about the size & shape of the stars' bodies, she knew about all the skeletons in their closets, but she was never one to gossip.


Head knew about the intimate secrets of Mae West's vast bosom, Gloria Swanson's wide waist & tiny feet (size 2 1/2), & swan necked Audrey Hepburn's broad shoulders. She often boasted that she was a magician: “I accentuated the positive & camouflaged the rest".


Head would make the stars, with all their flaws, look a million dollars, & she influenced the way millions of women dressed too, as a designer for Vogue patterns at a time when home dressmaking was all the rage, although Head could not sew herself.


Her costume designs for films went global. The sarong she fashioned for Dorothy Lamour in the 1936 film The Jungle Princess, Head had her stitched into it, made the actress a star & was copied by every swimwear manufacturer in the US. It is still copied today.


For Elizabeth Taylor in A Place in the Sun (1951), Head accentuated the teenage star's bosom & tiny waist with a strapless, bouffant-skirted white ballgown, scattered with violets. It became the prom dress for American teenagers when it was copied by all the leading department stores. According to Head, Taylor had the most beautiful shoulders in Hollywood, so she created dresses for her to show them off.


Bette Davis: "Edith Head’s life was all about glamour, 60 years of it, in the most glamorous place in the world- Hollywood," Head designed the brown silk, sable trimmed cocktail dress Davis wore as Margo Channing in All About Eve, warning everyone as she swept down the staircase for the big party scene to fasten their seat belts because it was going to be a bumpy night. Davis tried on the finished gown the bodice & neckline were way too big. Head was horrified, but Davis pulled it off her shoulders & shook one shoulder sexily: “Doesn't it look better like this anyway?" Head won one of her 8 Oscars for that film. Davis later bought the dress for herself, because she loved it so much. Head: "There were 8 important men in my life, & they were all named Oscar."


Head was working as a language teacher at the Hollywood School for Girls in 1932 when she bluffed her way into Paramount's wardrobe department. She already had a B.A. from Berkeley & a master's from Stanford, but then went to study art at the Otis Art Institute & the Chouinard School. She was hired by the studio as a sketch artist, although the fashion drawings.


By 1938, she was head designer, working on every prestigious production the studio made, and left only in 1967, when she joined up with Universal. Head spent the remainder of her career here, thanks to her friendship with Alfred Hitchcock, including Tippi Hendren's smart green suit made of textured tweed that would snag easily during an avian attack.


Head's career was not without controversy. After winning her Oscar for The Sting, she was sued by the illustrator who really designed Redford & Newman's clothes. the truth about her design of Audrey Hepburn's little black dress emerged only after her death, when the Paris couturier Hubert de Givenchy quietly admitted that he'd come up with the frock that was copied everywhere & worn by a generation of women; Head had designed all the other costumes in the film.


Head also adored Grace Kelly & was upset when the actress slighted her by not inviting her to design the wedding dress when she got married to Prince Rainier of Monaco. She did create Princess Grace's grey going-away suit, though.


Head: "I regret never having dressed Marilyn Monroe, never designing uniforms for the Chicago Cubs, & being alone. It is much easier being remembered than trying to remember." It was an open secret in Hollywood that Edith Head was a lesbian.


In the Pixar film- The Incredibles, the personality & mannerisms of the film's fictional superhero costume designer- Edna Mode’s sense of style, round glasses, & assertive no-nonsense character are very are a direct homage to Head's legendary accomplishments & personality.

I am so in Junior High School, & I of course think it was fun to write the word- HEAD 24 times.

USA Newspaper Election And Media

The media, especially television, have played a role in the increasing cost of campaigns because candidates spend a large amount of money on advertising. Today individual candidates spend more money on media advertising than ever before. In 1860 the Republicans spent only $100,000 on Abraham Lincoln’s presidential campaign and on those of all Republican House and Senate candidates. In 1988 Republican candidate George H. W. Bush spent $70 million, just on the presidential race. During the 1998 elections, a 60-second spot on prime-time television cost as much as $100,000 every time it ran. As a result, campaigns have become more expensive, forcing candidates to concentrate more on fund-raising and less on presenting issues to voters.

Microsoft ® Encarta ® 2007. © 1993-2006 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

Born On This Day- October 27th... New York City Wit Fran Lebowitz

“Very few people possess true artistic ability. It is therefore both unseemly and unproductive to irritate the situation by making an effort. If you have a burning, restless urge to write or paint, simply eat something sweet and the feeling will pass”.


I always loved & looked forward to Fran Lebowitz's pieces in Interview Magazine, hired by Andy Warhol himself. I will still re-read her books- Social Studies & Metropolitan Life. Cranky, sardonic, witty, & dry; her essays make me think & make me laugh. She was named one most stylish women in Vanity Fair's International Best-Dressed List, & is known to sport tailored suits by the Savile Row tailor Anderson & Sheppard. Lebowitz has a reoccuring role on Law & Order as a judge. She had the best Proust Questionaire, on the back page of Vanity Fair, ever. I think her quips are on a par with Dorothy Parker:



All God's children are not beautiful. Most of God's children are, in fact, barely presentable.

Andy Warhol made fame more famous.

As a teenager you are at the last stage in your life when you will be happy to hear that the phone is for you.


Ask your child what he wants for dinner only if he's buying.


If you are a dog and your owner suggests that you wear a sweater suggest that he wear a tail.


If you are of the opinion that the contemplation of suicide is sufficient evidence of a poetic nature, do not forget that actions speak louder than words.


In real life, I assure you, there is no such thing as algebra.

Polite conversation is rarely either.


Romantic love is mental illness. But it's a pleasurable one. It's a drug. It distorts reality, and that's the point of it. It would be impossible to fall in love with someone that you really saw.

The opposite of talking isn't listening. The opposite of talking is waiting.

Top 10 Richest Indians

Richest Indians in 2010. More after the break...

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Time File

Time file...More images after the break...

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Namitha Latest Images

Namitha latest stills - Attending event held in chennai last week. More images after the break...

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Giant Picture Book

This huge book was made by scientist Michael Hawley and is one of the eleven models available worldwide.
Called “Giant visual odyssey through the Kingdom of Bhutan”, the book has a height of 1.52 meters and a length of 2.13 meters and weighs about 60 kilograms. In its 112 pages, the book offers stunning and high quality images of the Last Himalayan Kingdom, taken on four trips through Bhutan. The entire book requires 1 gallon of ink and 1 day to be printed and the total costs are nearly $2000. The Giant Books sells for $10.000 and all the money is donated to various charity institutions. More images after the break...

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A Natural Root Bridge

A Natural Root Bridge Across a Valley at Cherrapunji, India — Cherrapunjee is a valley in North Eastern part of India, where the rain lashes the entire place 5 months in a year. Due to heavy rains as well as cyclones the locals in this place have developed in genuine way of building a bridge across valleys. The process is that the root of a rare Indian rubber tree is made to grow in a particular direction with the support of the bamboos and a constant watch is kept on the growth. More images after the break...

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Born On This Day- October 25th... Post Apocalyptic Bohemian Favorite- Barbara Cook

The Husband isn’t the musical comedy aficionado that I am, but he does have a theatre background & is a gay man of good taste & a certain age. So, it wasn’t difficult to rope him into my agenda of seeing Hedwig & The Angry Inch downtown & then hightailing to the Upper Eastside to catch a late night session with one of my most favorite performers- Barbara Cook in her cabaret act at The Carlyle. It was our 24th anniversary & we had seen her at the same venue on our 20th. I was hoping for a new tradition. To see one of my idols in that tiny venue, just inches away & listen to that gorgeous, august soprano doing the best music of the past century, & sharing it all with the man that I love… does it get better than that?

To gay fans of musical theater, cabaret, & superb singing, Tony & Grammy winner Barbara Cook has given 2 lifetimes' worth of happiness. In the 1950s she originated the leading roles in the musicals Candide & The Music Man. Today, among many other achievements, she is possibly the greatest interpreter of the music of Stephen Sondheim. Last season she starred, at 82 years old, in Sondheim on Sondheim, a new Broadway musical, along side Vanessa Williams & Tom Wopat. She was nominated for a Tony for her work. What Cook's gay fans may not know is that she is also the mother of an out & proud gay son, 51 year old Los Angeles based actor/ teacher/ vocal coach- Adam LeGrant. She tells of their moving journey together with the same warm heart & openness that she brings to her music.


Cook: "When he told me he was gay, I laughed. I laughed! Because it was the farthest thing from my mind. He said, `Mom, I'm not kidding.' It was like a thunderbolt, & I was very upset. The family & the grandchildren & all that stuff bothered me. But more than that, here was this person whom I thought I knew so well, and here was this enormous part of his life that I knew nothing about. I felt as if I didn't know my own son. I was very upset, not so much at the time, because I was in shock, & I also didn't want to make Adam feel bad. Then I went into a kind of depression, & really, really cried for 5 days & mourned the son I thought I'd had. On about the 5th day of that, I said to myself, What the hell is going on?"


Cook, who has been candid in the past about her struggles with depression, weight & alcohol: "I've always felt that I was not a part of the mainstream of life. I don't know what the hell I mean by that, but it's the only way I know how to put it. When I had a son, that seemed to connect me more to the stream of life. When Adam told me that he was gay, I felt, I'm no longer a part of the mainstream. & then my next thought was, my son is not here to make me feel comfortable. He's here to be the fullest person he can be, & what I have to do is help him fulfill himself as much as I can. & when that came to me, the whole thing lifted. I love him so much. I loved him then, & I love him now. & I like him…that's the thing."


Cook has long been involved with PFLAG: “What I will never, never be able to understand is how a family or a mother or father could ever be able to turn their backs on a child because of homosexuality, & do that to themselves, much less to their children. I can't understand how anyone could come to that."


As a youngster, I was such a little musical comedy queen. I had every Original Cast album of every musical, with a specialty in the little known shows & the flops. Among the collection were shows with Barbara Cook: Flahooley, Plain & Fancy, The Music Man, Candide, Showboat, The King & I, The Gay Life, & my favorite- She Loves Me!

I was already a fan before Cook resurrected her career with a successful turn to cabaret & concerts. In the summer of 1975, her Barbara Cook At Carnegie Hall Concert album was my most played record. I could not have been more excited when I had my 1st chance to see Cook live. I sent a note backstage at the cabaret at Studio One, a gay disco in West Hollywood. My missive explained that not only was I a huge fan, & a fan of her magical musical director- Wally Harper, but that the concert album was the soundtrack to my life at the moment, & that my date for the evening was not a fan of standards or show tunes, but a rock & roller that had come to love her from my constant playing of her music. I noted that she had won over a Led Zeppelin fan with her resplendent interpretations.


I was more than a little shocked when a clip board holding staff member of Studio One, asked those in line: Stephen? Stephen? Would you come with me? Ms. Cook & Mr. Harper would like to talk to you". I was shown into the tiniest dressing room, where I was treated to the thrill of a meet & greet with one the most splendiferous virtuoso performers of the popular song. She told me that she & Wally had gotten a real chuckle from my note, What could she have made of the young, gushing, saucer eyed fan with big red afro? Thank you for all moments, Barbara Cook. I am still a fan. You continue to look & sing with stunning, sublime style. Happy Birthday!





Just out this month on DRG Records- the 6 disc The Essential Barbara Cook.

My Day With Kevin Kline... A Rememberance On His Birthday

The van came to pick me up first, & I didn’t really even know that I was sharing the ride. The driver stopped in front of the hotel & in slipped a matinee idol handsome man, who turned to me, smiled, extended his hand, & said: “Hello… my name is Kevin Kline”. I retorted: “No kidding”. What is it like when you meet someone that you truly idolize? I had loved, loved, loved, loved Kevin Kline since 1977 when I saw him on Broadway in the Hal Prince Musical- On The 20th Century with John Cullum, Madeline Kahn, & Imogene Coca.

 Kline had just won an Oscar for A Fish Called Wanda & had just had a baby with wife Phoebe Cates. I congratulated him on both. He asked me about the theatre scene in Seattle & kept insisting that we had worked together before: “Shakespeare In The Park in 1978?”. “No, Kevin... I think I would have remembered that”. I kept up my part of the conversation, & while letting him know how much I admired his work, I kept a nonchalant, but engaged demeanor. Yet, my brain was racing a million miles an hour with- “Oh my God, oh my God, It's Kevin Kline. I am sitting right next to him. He has freckles. He has freckles on his arms. His arms are hairy. I think I love him. Kevin Kline! He is talking to me! He thinks he knows me. Can I sneak a peek at his crotch? Will he notice? No, don’t do it! Oh…you did it, you looked at his basket! I’d like to give him an Oscar, right now.”


I finally let him have it & out gushed about how much I loved his work & how much it meant for me to work with him & he said- "I've never felt completely satisfied with what I've done. I tend to see things too critically. I'm trying to get over that. I've got the Jewish guilt & the Irish shame & it's a hell of a job distinguishing which is which."

He was so much fun to work with. The director- Lawrence Kasdan, didn’t know we had traveled to the set together, & introduced us all over again:


Kline was almost Robin Williams-ish manic on the set, joking, playing the piano & singing. Tracey Ullman, who I worship, was shy & stayed in character, even when the cameras were not rolling, but as soon as the director said- “cut”, Kevin was back to his antics. At the end of the day, he touched my shoulder, looked me right in the eye, & said- “That was fun, we need to do it again sometime”. I smiled back & deadpanned (he thought my deadpan was funny during the shoot): “Yes indeed, Mr Kline, lets do it again, real soon.”, but my brain was going- “oh my God, oh my God, it's Kevin Kline! & he is looking at me… It’s Kevin Kline! & he his handsome! & he is talking to me!”   I beamed, but tried to act like it was no big deal: “ …Oh my God, I am doing lines with Kevin Kline. He is like the best American Actor, he is our Olivier & I am acting with him!!! I think he likes me. He keeps smiling & smiling at me. I think I love him!”.

Did I mention that I really love Kevin Kline? My favorite film roles: The Pirates of Penzance, Sophie's Choice, The Big Chill, Silverado, A Fish Called Wanda, Soapdish, Grand Canyon, The Ice Storm, A Midsummer Night's Dream, A Prairie Home Companion, & As You LIke It... & In & Out is not a very good movie, but I loved watching him in the film:

Today Is The Birthday Of Writer Augusten Burroughs

I can be a profoundly awed fan of someone without a nagging drive to meet & greet the object of my adoration. Augusten Burroughs’ Running With Scissors & Dry are 2 of my favorite reads of the past decade & I have continued to assay everything that he has put out. He is a very funny & twisted man.

I met him after he did a reading & Question & Answer session at Powell’s in downtown Portland. He actually addressed me with a question at the end of the session & as always, I balked & was uncharacteristically reticent. We had a short chat about Portland’s love of books & how very cool Powell’s is.


A few years later, I saw him walking with a well known Portland queer writer, who has not always been very nice to me, but who has the loveliest husband. As I passed them, I turned I stated: “Augusten… I treasure your work. I have all your books, in hardback, 2 of them autographed, I LOVE YOU!”  Turning to the Portland puffy, poofy personality, I tossed off: “& you… not so much.”


Augusten Burroughs is hideously kinky. This is both his attraction & his detraction. I laughed like crazy as I read Running with Scissors & Dry. The first, an account of his nightmarish childhood:drunk father, crazy mother, adopted by his mother's therapist, introduced us to this quirky voice, which will tell us anything. The other is a frank but campy book about the writer's alcoholism & addiction to crack. I also enjoyed- Magical Thinking, a collection of brief personal essays, in which he amplifies the material, adding glittery edges to one of the edgiest writers of the new century. Burroughs is a fresh & honest voice in a heavily medicated century. He's not angry or wounded, which helps. His essays for have explored his 2 sexual encounters with priests, at age 14 & 26, in which the men of the cloth are no match for his experience & ambivalence. In my favorite essay- Beating Raoul, he hilariously deconstructs a date with a hot & impossibly handsomeType-A gay perfectionist who turns out to suffer from acute under-endowment. If you have not read him, you simply really must.

He was born Christopher Robison 45 years ago today.







"I never watch CNN. I hate news & information & anything that threatens to puncture the bubble of oblivion in which I live."

Born On This Day- October 23rd... Ned Rorem

I am not a real fan of symphonic or “serious” music, & although I appreciate the craft of his work, it is his literary accomplishments that have had me in his orbit for 40+ years. The American composer Ned Rorem has achieved literary prominence by publishing a series of diaries that include candid descriptions of same sex love affairs & relationships.

Words & music are intricately linked for Ned Rorem. Time Magazine has called him "the world's best composer of art songs," yet his musical & literary ventures extend far beyond this specialized field. Rorem has composed symphonies, piano concertos, & other orchestral works, Chamber works, 10 operas, choral works of every description, ballets & other music for the theater, & literally 100s of songs .He has won the Pulitzer Prize for music. He is the author of 17 books, including 5 volumes of diaries & collections of lectures & criticism.


In 1969, at age 14, I came across his Paris Diary, & like his later diaries, he brought with him some degree of notoriety, as he was honest about his & others' sexuality, describing his relationships with Leonard Bernstein, Noel Coward, Samuel Barber & Virgil Thomson, along with outing at least a few famous people.


I have several volumes of his memoirs & they make for a fascinating read. Over the years Rorem has had published very readable self-examinations in his 6 elegant & moving diaries that span 8 decades. Besides the publication of his correspondence between himself & Paul Bowles, he has also published remembrances of the time he shared with a sublime mix of people: Leontyne Price, Virgil Thomson, Angela Lansbury, Judy Collins, & Gore Vidal. In Wings of Friendship, Rorem’s letters to these friends & to more than 40 others are assembled in chronological order & reveal the range of his interests & the depth of his passions.

In 1999, Rorem’s partner of 32 years- James Holmes, died after a long battle with AIDS-related illnesses. Rorem chronicled Holmes’ long decline & his own mortality, as well as his everyday ups & downs, in Lies: A Diary 1986-1999. Released in 2000, it is Rorem’s 6th published diary & his most poignant. Rorem: “The frustration of being nonexistent keeps us awake.”

Born On This Day- October 23rd... Songwriter Ellie Greenwich

I have enjoyed a life long fascination with the workings of the heyday of life at the Brill Building & the advancement of the American Popular Song. The Brill Building is an office building located at Broadway & 49th Street in Manhattan. It is famous for housing music industry offices & studios where some of the most popular American tunes were written.




In the 1960s the Brill Building contained 165 music businesses. A musician could find a publisher, printer, cut a demo, promote the record, & cut a deal with radio promoters, all within the building. The creative culture of the independent music companies of Brill Building gave birth to the influential "Brill Building Sound" & the style of popular music songwriting& recording created by its artists & producers. The songwriters included: Burt Bacharach & Hal David, Neil Diamond , Gerry Goffin, Carole King , Jerry Leiber & Mike Stoller, Barry Mann & Cynthia Weil, Laura Nyro, Neil Sedaka, Paul Simon, Phil Spector.


Carole King: "Every day we squeezed into our respective cubby holes with just enough room for a piano, a bench, & maybe a chair. You'd sit there & write & you could hear someone in the next cubby hole composing a song exactly like yours.”


Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 500 greatest songs of all time included 6 by Ellie Greenwich & her husband/writing partner, Jeff Barry, more than by any other songwriting team. They had 17 singles in the pop charts of 1964, surpassed only by Lennon/McCartney.

Oh, How I loved these tunes. Little Steve singing- Be My Baby in the bathroom mirror, with a shampoo bottle microphone!


In 1962, the songwriter Jerry Leiber discovered Ellie Greenwich, then 21, singing at a piano in the Brill Building in New York. He thought she sounded like Carole King, but looked more like the Judy Holliday. She young lady wearing a college blazer over a prim blouse with a Peter Pan collar, with her hair teased into a platinum helmet. Very Mad Men.


Her first success was the dance song Hanky Panky, which did well for Tommy James & The Shondells & topped the American charts.




Although 1964 was the year the Beatles conquered America, it was also the apex of the Greenwich-Barry hit factory. The Dixie Cups had a #1 hit with her Chapel of Love in the US, & Greenwich had her first British number #1with Do Wah Diddy – a huge hit for Manfred Mann, who soon followed with Da Doo Ron Ron (written in a day).


Ellie Greenwich considered both Da Doo Ron Ron & Do Wah Diddy to be rooted in the tradition of nursery rhyme: "Everybody of every age can sing them because they are so easy to remember."


Eleanor Louise Greenwich was born in Brooklyn, New York, but moved to Long Island when she was 11. At 14 she formed her own group, the Jivettes, singing at schools & hospitals, & while still a schoolgirl, started writing her own songs. Cha-Cha Charming & Silly Isn't It, were recorded by RCA in 1958, but they flopped.


Rejected by the Manhattan School of Music because it did not accept accordion students, Ellie enrolled at Queens College to study piano & after graduating, she briefly taught English at a high school before choosing a career in music.


She found a place at the Brill Building working with the songwriting partnership of Jerry Leiber & Mike Stoller, selling her songs for $25 a pop. Greenwich played another of her songs to Phil Spector, but the young producer seemed more interested in preening himself in the mirror. Greenwich: "Listen to me, you little prick, did you come to look at yourself or to hear my songs?"


In 1963, after Spector had recorded her doo-wop song Why Do Lovers Break Each Other's Hearts? with The Blue Jeans, Greenwich, hearing her work on the radio for the first time, was so thrilled that she crashed her car into a toll booth. The record reached #38 on the charts, & her follow-up (Today I Met) The Boy I'm Gonna Marry was at #39 that year.

(And) Then He Kissed Me & Da Doo Ron Ron were both recorded by the Crystals, with Spector. Then came- Be My Baby, a huge hit for the Ronettes, reaching #2.


Spector's collaborations with Ellie Greenwich & Jeff Barry were already waning by 1965 & a week-long songwriting session between them produced only 3 songs, but 1 of those songs was a little ditty called River Deep – Mountain High, recorded by Ike & Tina Turner in February 1966, which perhaps more than any other Spector production defined his "Wall of Sound".


Ellie Greenwich had recorded one of her own songs- You Don't Know, & there was talk of launching her as an American Dusty Springfield & touring Britain. But the record flopped, the idea was dropped. She divorced Barry in December 1965.


Although the Greenwich/Barry writing partnership foundered with the marriage, the pair enjoyed continued success as producers of Neil Diamond's early hits. Ellie Greenwich had discovered Diamond & persuaded Leiber & Stoller to give him a songwriting contract. With Diamond & Barry, she formed a company to publish & promote Diamond's songs.  She produced & sang backup on most of Diamond's 1st decade of hits.


In the late 1960s Ellie Greenwich again tried unsuccessfully to launch a solo singing career, but suffered a nervous breakdown & turned to writing & singing commercials & jingles.


Ellie Greenwich died in the summer of 2009. She was a member of the American Songwriters' Hall of Fame. Besides the hits mentioned before, this is the legacy that she left us with: Christmas (Baby Please Come Home), Leader Of The Pack, What A Guy, You Don't Know, I Can Hear Music, Right Track-Wrong Train, Baby Be Mine, A Girl Like That, Baby I Love You, Chapel Of Love, Don't Stop My Heart, I Wonder, Midnight Feeling, Take Me Home Tonight, Going To The Chapel, & countless jingles & commercials. Which one is your favorite?

Happy Birthday, Jesse Tyler Ferguson!

With True Blood over until next summer, & Mad Men concluding last Sunday, I need to thank the TV gods for ABC’s Modern Family. This show is fresh & very, very funny in its 2nd season. Modern Family won Emmys for writing, directing & Best Comedy Series, & Eric Stonestreet has an Emmy for Best Supporting Actor for his mantle.



Eric Stonestreet is the flashy & affectionate Cameron, & his longtime partner is the tightly wound lawyer- Mitchell, perfectly played by Jesse Tyler Ferguson. Together, they make up the most high profile gay couples on prime time.

Jesse Tyler Ferguson graduated from high school in 1994 and attended The American Musical & Dramatic Academy in NYC. He worked mainly in off-Broadway and Broadway shows, including the Tony Award-winning The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, where he originated the role of Leaf Coneybear. Ferguson was also in George C. Wolfe's revival of On the Town & has performed in Off-Broadway productions of The Most Fabulous Story Ever Told, Newyorkers,The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Little Fish & Hair, directed by Tony Award winner Kathleen Marshall. In the summer of 2007, Ferguson was in the Public Theatre's Shakespeare in the Park production of A Midsummer Night's Dream & at the same venue this summer, he costarred opposite Al Pacino in The Merchant of Venice.

Ferguson has spoken out about his terrifying experience as the victim of childhood bullying, insisting he "lived every day in fear." The openly gay actor was tormented by classmates over his sexuality & the teasing was so bad, he was eventually forced to switch to a new school. But Ferguson is proud of how far he has come - his hit TV show was honored at the Gay, Lesbian & Straight Education Network's Respect Awards for positive images of diversity & promoting tolerance.


Ferguson "I think bullying comes from fear & insecurity. I was friends with the more eccentric, granola type kids who got teased, too. But you know what? We're the movers & shakers of the world now. I lived every day in fear. I left school in the 8th grade & I went to a different school. It was hard. It was a horrible, horrible experience. I'm sure a lot of it was rooted in homophobia. I mean, I was an 'artistic' kid, which was AKA gay. I think a lot of people sensed that I was gay &
were terrified of that."

I think he is very talented, & I have a bit of a thing for ginger, so Jesse… have your people call my people. We will do lunch. He turns 35 today.

Born On This Day- October 22nd... Robert Rauschenberg

"The artist's job is to be a witness to his time in history."

He is one of the Husband’s favorite figures of the 20th century & a major inspiration for his own work. Unfortunetley…or maybe fortunatley, I am no Jasper Johns. But as we watched the documentry- Robert Rauschenberg: Man At Work, I was amazed at the similarity in Rauschenberg & my husband’s demeanor & artistic process.



Robert Rauschenberg was an irrepressibly prolific American artist who reshaped art in the 20th century. His work gave new meaning to sculpture. A painter, photographer, printmaker, choreographer, onstage performer, set designer &, in later years, even a composer, Rauschenberg defied the traditional idea that an artist would stick to one medium or style. He pushed, prodded & pndered all the mediums in which he worked.


Following after Marcel Duchamp, & Joseph Cornell he obscured the lines between painting & sculpture, painting & photography, photography & printmaking, sculpture & photography, sculpture & dance, sculpture & technology, technology & performance art, art & life.

John Cage: “Beauty is now underfoot wherever we take the trouble to look.” Through Rauschenberg’s work, people could see that anything, including junk off the street, could be the stuff of art, & that it could be the stuff of art as a kind of poetry in the consumer glut, which Rauschenberg celebrated. Before Andy Warhol, there was Robert Rauschenberg.


Rauschenberg: “I really feel sorry for people who think things like soap dishes or mirrors or Coke bottles are ugly, because they’re surrounded by things like that all day long, & it must make them miserable.”


He had generosity of spirit, uninhibited & mostly good-natured. When he became rich, he gave millions of dollars to charities for women, children, medical research, other artists & Democratic politicians.

In the mid-1950s, Rauscheberg began a passionate affair with the artists- Cy Twombly, They traveled together to Africa & Europe. Rauschenberg began to collect & assemble objects: bits of rope, stones, sticks, bones, which he showed to a dealer in Rome who exhibited them under the title “scatole contemplative,” or Thought Boxes. They were shown in Florence, where an outraged critic suggested that Mr. Rauschenberg toss them in the river. He thought that sounded like a good idea. After saving a few pieces for himself & friends, he found a secluded spot on the River Arno. Rauschenberg wrote to the critic: “I took your advice.”


Around that time Rauschenberg met Jasper Johns, then unknown, who had a studio in the same building in Lower Manhattan where Mr. Rauschenberg had a loft. Their love affair over the next years went hand in hand with the creation, by both artists, of some of the most groundbreaking works of postwar art.

Rauschenberg: “We gave each other permission to do what we wanted.” Living together in a series of lofts in Lower Manhattan until the 1960s, they exchanged ideas & supported themselves designing window displays for Tiffany & Company & Bonwit Teller.


His association with theater & dance had already begun by the 1950s, when he began designing sets & costumes for Merce Cunningham & composer John Cage. In 1963 he choreographed “Pelican,” which he performed on roller skates while wearing a parachute & helmet of his design to the accompaniment of a taped collage of sound.


I was sad to learn of his passing in the spring of 2008. He is one of my favorite figures of the 20th century, & I loved reading about his circle. Every famous gay man comes out eventually, even if it only happens when he dies. His obituary may be the first chance to know the truth about a gay man's life, but sadly this is not always the case. Even people who were out & proud can find themselves pushed back in the closet after they die. Lovers are suddenly out of the picture, & longtime relationships are refered to as “companions”, in a way that would never happen straight people. Some publications still use the euphemism: “never married."

When Rauschenberg died 2 years ago there was little mention of his long time same sex realtionships. He did marry, but was divorced more than 50 years ago.There is a Portland connection; his son from that marriage- Christopher is a talented photographer who lives & exhibits here. Rauschenberg had relationships with Cy Twombly & Jasper Johns among others, & he was part of a group of gay men working in different disciplines, but all bouncing off ideas & inspiring each other: John Cage, Merce Cunningham & Jasper Johns. “He is survived... by his longtime companion- Darryl Pottorf” claimed the NY Times.” Nice. Maybe when I go, my obit will state: “He lived with his roomate of 50 years”.


I feel an artist’s sexuality is almost always instrumental to their work. Art Critic- Robert Hughes: “Rauscheberg’s art contained some of the few great icons of male homosexual love in modern culture". Other critics have argued that his earlier work was about the artist not revealing himself, how could a gay man in the 1950s? But ignoring Rauschenberg's gayness at the time of his passing was just offensive. How an artist's sexuality has influenced their work & shaped their life should not be a secret that they take to their graves.

The Gay Birthday Roll Call For October 22nd... 3 Talented Men Of Show Biz

Openly gay Bill Condon would be on the birthday roll call just for writing & directing one of my top 10 movies of all time- Gods & Monsters. To me this is a nearly perfect film, without a wasted scene or line of dialogue & amazing Oscar worthy performances from Sir Ian McKellen, Brendan Fraser & Lynn Redgrave. Gods & Monsters is the story of the last days of James Whale, the gay director of Frankenstein, Bride of Frankenstein, The Invisible Man & Showboat. Condon was nominated for Best Director & won the award for Best Screenplay Adaptation (from Christopher Bram’s book). On top of this accomplishment, he wrote the brilliant screenplay for the film of Chicago, a stage musical that seemed to me, to be impossible to bring to the screen (another Oscar nom), he wrote & directed the under-rated Kinsey, & wrote & directed the over-hyped, but very engaging film version of Dreamgirls. Bill Condon has been chosen to direct the last installment of the The Twilight Saga franchise- Breaking Dawn… & I he is cute.

When Marc Shaiman kissed his fellow Tony winner & partner Scott on the televised award show, it made quite a stir. He’s won a Tony (for Hairspray), a Grammy, & an Emmy, He has had 5 Oscar nominations, including one for Blame Canada. He has been with Scott Whitman, his creative partner & life partner for 31 years, since they met when he was 20 in 1979 (the same year that I matched up with the Husband). His film credits include Broadcast News, Beaches, When Harry Met Sally, City Slickers, The Addams Family, Sister Act, Sleepless in Seattle, A Few Good Men, The American President, The First Wives Club, George of the Jungle, In & Out, South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut, Team America: World Police & HBO's From the Earth to the Moon. He frequently works on films by Billy Crystal, Rob Reiner, & Trey Parker He has also appeared in many of these films. Shaiman started his career as a theatre/cabaret musical director. He then became vocal arranger for Bette Midler, eventually becoming her musical director & co-producer of many of her recordings, including The Wind Beneath My Wings & From a Distance. He helped create the material for her performance on the penultimate Tonight Show with Johnny Carson. This season he had the musical-The Addams Family on Broadway. He auditioned for & but lost the role of himself on Bette’s short lived TV sitcom,… & I think he is cute.

Derek Jacobi was invited by Lawrence Olivier to become 1 of the 8 founding members of The National Theatre, soon after graduating from Cambridge. An extremely successful film & theatre actor, he is probably best known for his performance in the ground breaking BBC TV series I, Claudius (1976) & his Shakespearean roles around the world, including what many feel was the best Hamlet of the 20th century.He also appeared as Alan Turing in the stage & film versions of Breaking The Code. His other appearances have been diverse & ranged from major classical roles to an appearance in Frasier as the world’s worst Shakespearian actor & one of my favorite films- Robert Altman’s GosfordPark. Jacobi is married to Richard Clifford, his partner of 31 years (again, all these 31 year anniversaries!)...& think he is cute.