Sucking Oxygen

Tonight's program was focused on an all-live, all-drag re-enactment of two classic "Golden Girls" episodes, complete with period-specific advertisements to which we all knew all of the words, and sang along together happily, in the dark.

Then...Dorothy snapped.

"Would you please stop talking?" she commanded across the footlights.

There were some cute guys jostling each other and enjoying the show, perhaps a bit too boisterously, who were shushed by the sound/light guy (bearded, with a silver ring through his nose) only moments before Dorothy's big break.

I was sitting in the very back of the room, so there was nobody behind me to worry about. I had a terrific vantage point to see everything on stage. The lighting was adequate (we could use a special wash dr3 when the boyfriend sticks his head in the door) and the setting conveyed the reliable feeling of the living room, kitchen, and soup kitchen where the sitcom characters sat.

Jordan's "Rose" was vapid and succulent. Where the traditional Rose is unfailingly blind to any sort of innuendo in her phraseology, Jordan's gal has always got the engine idling, just beneath the surface.

Matthew Martin as the mother of the bride - the bride being her beloved baby brother who has finally come out and decided to bring his boyfriend home to meet the family - stole my heart. Every moment of Matthew's performance is as nuanced and delicate as the original, and it would take you more moments than you have remaining in a lifetime to watch all of the originals, so here you have him. He's an original! I guarantee he will be original to you!

Oh, so who did I forget to mention? Only Mike Finn, who has been "in" the show business since he was a small child. The only opportunity I had previously to watch Finn perform was an early audience at "TROG!" Well, I will now say for the record that I am a fan of Mike's work. He absolutely pays attention to what his character is experiencing throughout a scene, and so he works through the character's interaction with the other characters and surroundings to keep each moment fresh and rewarding in its discovery.

While I'm in context, I should feel safe in agreeing that Mike Finn is a lovely guy, and much, MUCH deeper than he lets on, both because I believe these things to be true about Mike Finn but also because Connie says such horrible, hateful things about Mike.

I passed a delivery truck. On the side of the truck was painted "Popkoff's Frozen Foods" and a portrait of a smiling chef, with a broad face and a slim moustache, proffering a tray of hors d'oeuvres. Could it be...Blanche?

Anyway, back to the oxygen being sucked out of the room...

The sound/light guy shushed the cute guys in the middle, and then moments later Heklina turned and made her request of a sweet young couple who, I then realized, must have been commenting to each other back and forth during the performance although from a distance of ten feet directly behind them I hadn't noticed they had been talking until Hek drew my attention to it by asking them to stop talking.

Ouch.