Jazz Hands

Last night, I (and Michael) went to the theater. Many who know me have heard my mock-shamefaced confession that I don't really like live theater. With music or without. There's people shouting and over-enunciating and I can hear their feet stomping around on stage (involuntary shiver).

I am not totally immune. I LOVED Hedwig and the Angry Inch. I was unable to leave my seat at the end of the show as "Heroes" rang out over the PA, my jaw hanging open and mind reeling. Spring Awakening was shocking, starring Lea Michelle and Jonathan Groff (lately of Glee). It seemed like an impossible trick to pull off, adapting a turn-of-the-last-century German play with a rock score. But it was awesome, and I can say I've seen Michelle and Groff DO IT live onstage. Keep waiting, Gleeks.

Also, I did enjoy The Lion King, and cried three times during the course of the show.

Which brings me to last night's performance of Everyday Rapture. I cried. I cried several times... At a one-woman show... I know.

I do love to read heart-breaking memoirs - Running with Scissors, Liar's Club, David Sedaris when he's serious. So imagine that a gifted memoirist is also a very gifted singer/actress. Weaving in songs that already break your heart. As she illustrates her struggle to reconcile her Kansas Mennonite-lite upbringing with her desire to "live your life in a song" on Broadway and become a "pagan, money-grubbing, showoff whore". It all adds up to me in a red-velvet seat with tears running down my cheeks.

I was especially moved by...well...almost every bit of it, and it was very funny too. Young ladies, do not lose your virginity to a street magician.

Oh, and her name is Sherie Renee Scott. And Mr. Rogers taught her about the possibility of living unashamed and accepted just as you are.

The most perfect song was Nilsson's "I Guess the Lord Must Be In New York City", which puts it all in a tiny nutshell. Just this week I have been listening to that song as well as "Everybody's Talkin'", on the iPod, in my office, trying not to sing out loud while walking the dog, wondering can I pull this off at my next karaoke night. Which I have about once every ten years or so. I have plenty of time to practice.

As a added bonus for suburbanites paying babysitters, it's an imtermissionless 90 minutes, right on 42nd St. You can be back on the 10:15 bus.