The Bitch of Living

Last night I caught the opening night of the traveling version of Spring Awakening. Based on an 1896 German play about teenagers "waking up" to the changes in their bodies and their emotions, it tells the story of a group of school kids wrestling with adolescent woes, centered around lovers Malchior and Wendla (pictured above in the original Broadway production).

I'm a tough musical theatre audience member to please. What got me interested in the show was Duncan Sheik's contribution to the music. Although he's now considered somewhat of a one-hit wonder for his 90s radio earworm "Barely Breathing," that first album of his was one of the major soundtracks of my life during college. (The rest of the album really transcends a lot of the pop wizardly of that particular single.)

The show is, overall, really great. The music is rocking, fun, powerful, and well-written both musically and lyrically, and the set design and lighting were unique and fascinating (audience members can sit on the sides of the stage while all the action takes place in a central area, which is so cool). The acting in this touring show was also great. The lead roles were very compellingly rendered, and the supporting players offered a good balance of archetype and individuality to be memorable and unique. The actors also interacted a lot with the on-stage band, with a few characters sitting at the piano and playing along, both diegetically and non-diegetically.

Of course, my favorite part of the show is its use of anachronism. The costumes, much of the dialogue, and the subject matter of the play are all very Victorian in nature, but the set featured bright neon lights. The actors often sang with handheld microphones, or sometimes stood behind microphones on stands like rock stars or American Idol contestants. And the content of the songs themselves, such as the loud, punk-inspired "The Bitch of Living" and "Totally "F***ed" keep the show contemporary. The overall message suggests that perhaps some Victorian values about sexuality and morality are not as outmoded as we like to think.

My only beef with the show was in the brief treatment of a very minor gay subplot. While the heterosexual characters' loves are treated with operatic seriousness, there's a brief sequence in which two of the schoolboys connect romantically, with one even professing he loves the other "more than I've ever loved anything." And yet, the exchange is played comedically--with joy, but still for comedy. It felt a little awkward to sit side-by-side with straight people who laughed riotously at this, and I wondered if the kind of exchange is only okay if it's comedy, or if it's inherently funny, or if they would reject it if it were treated with the same level of seriousness as the rest of the play. Or, I'm being sensitive.

Beau and I are thinking of seeing it again, but sitting on the stage next time!

Six Word Movie Review

Confessions of a Shopaholic

This was my life after college.

Life, v2.0

I spent the holiday weekend turning my living room 90 degrees to the left. Now all the furniture and art are on different walls. It only involved one trip to Best Buy to get a new coaxial cable. And because I no longer live alone, somehow season 1 of Designing Women also found its way back with us. This is how gay people move furniture.



We watched fireworks from the roof of an apartment building in Dupont Circle. During the show, I learned that no building in the District can be built taller than the Capitol dome, which ultimately makes for nice vistas of the city because you can see so far. There's a single building that rises above the rest called The Cairo. When it was built, the government passed a law that restricted building height to about six stories. The Cairo looked like it had 14 floors.

We saw simultaneous fireworks over the Capitol (south), Maryland (east) and Virginia (west).

Today: I go back to reality.

Please spread this around.

The Writer's Center Announces Fellowships for Emerging Writers

The Writer’s Center, metropolitan DC’s community gathering place for writers and readers, is currently accepting submissions for several competitive Emerging Writer Fellowships. Emerging Writer Fellows will be selected from applicants who have published up to 2 book-length works of prose and up to 3 book-length works of poetry. We welcome submissions from writers of any genre, background, or experience.

Emerging Writer Fellows will be featured at The Writer’s Center as part of their Emerging Writers Reading Series. The readings, held on Friday evenings, bring together writers in different genres with a backdrop of live music. The Writer’s Center book store will sell titles by the Emerging Writers throughout the season in which they appear in an effort to promote them and their work to a wide audience.

Selected Fellows are invited to lead a special Saturday workshop at The Writer’s Center, with compensation commensurate with standard Writer’s Center provisions.

Fellows receive an all-inclusive honorarium to help offset their travel costs in the amount of $250 or $500, depending on their place of departure.

Fellows for Fall 2009 include novelist Alexander Chee (Edinburgh), novelist Lisa Selin Davis (Belly), poet Suzanne Frischkorn (Lit Windowpane), poet Aaron Smith (Blue on Blue Ground), Canadian fiction writer Neal Smith (Bang Crunch), poet Srikanth Reddy (Facts for Visitors), and poet Nancy Krygowski (Velocity).

Their events will be held in September, October, and December. See our events calendar for more information.

Spring 2009 events will be held in February, March, and April/May.

To be considered, please send a letter of interest, a resume or CV that details publication history and familiarity facilitating group discussions, and a copy of your most recent book. Self-published or vanity press titles will not be accepted. A committee comprised of The Writer’s Center board members, staff, and members will evaluate submissions on behalf of our community of writers.

The deadline to submit is August 15, 2009.

Applicants are encouraged to call Charles Jensen, Director, for more information at 301-654-8664.

The Writer’s Center, established in 1976, is one of the nation’s oldest and largest literary centers. We provide over 60 free public events and more than 200 writing workshops each year, sell one of the largest selections of literary magazines in our on-site bookstore, and publish Poet Lore, America’s oldest continually published poetry journal.

Trippy

Mileage from Phoenix to DC: 2317
Hours of driving: 34
State lines crossed: 11
Most visited state: West Virginia (in and out twice)

Longest day: Phoenix to Oklahoma City--14 hours with 2 time zone changes.
Best weather: Missouri & Illinois
Worst weather: New Mexico

Worst sight: An accident in which a semi lost its rear axle and crushed a black sports car on the freeway.
Worst drivers: Maryland

Dullest stretch: Oklahoma Turnpike, 100 miles
Prettiest stretch: West Virginia

Number of times the cat freaked out: 0 (yay medication!)

Did we find a White Castle? Yes. Yes we did. And it was amazing. Thank you, Indiana.

Total number of miles I traveled in June: 9515
Equivalent number of trips between NYC and LA: 3.4
Circumference of the earth in miles: 24,900

The Vacuum of Thought

Have not been writing much new poetry, but have been enjoying some revision work and also reading a lot:

Nothing Right, Antonya Nelson
Don't Cry, Mary Gaitskill
Collected Stories, Amy Hemphill
Chapters from an Autobiography, Samuel M. Steward
Sight Map, Brian Teare
National Anthem, Kevin Prufer

National Anthem is a book I wish I'd written. It's strange and satirical and sincere and has odd recurring tropes--snow, parachutes--and is altogether very smart.

I wasn't loving the Teare book...until I got about four or five poems in and then WHAM! Teare does what he does best, using form inventively to surpass all my poetic expectations. It was just a smart first section. I haven't gone further than that yet, biding my time...I'm happy because he's coming to Fall for the Book in VA in September, so hopefully I'll get him to sign that and his other book.

You all know I love Mary Gaitskill like nobody's business. "He had the face of a greyhound." Brilliant. Don't Cry is awesome. I think I enjoyed Veronica more, but it was so great to be in her work again.

In Defense of Irritants

If you haven't heard yet, Perez Hilton got punched in the face.

The story is long and tawdry, but the summary is that will.i.am allegedly asked Hilton to stop poking fun at Black Eyed Peas on his blog, Hilton allegedly called him a "f-----," and then will.i.am's bodyguard allegedly gave him the bruise in this photo. In front of a lot of people.

There's a thoughtful discussion of the fallout that I agree with. Perez Hilton is crude, childish, incorrigible, and unrelenting. Yes. These are all true things you can say about him. His blog is pure, unadulterated ridiculousness, shaming celebrities for innocuous (or even shameful) behavior, sometimes making fun of people he just doesn't like.

And I say, Well, so what?

If anything, this alleged incident hasn't really demonstrated that a large number of Americans would like to see him punched in the face. It's demonstrated that Hilton has power. It might be dubious cultural power, but it is power serious enough to spur a bestselling recording artist to ask for some critical leniency. I might note this is the same band in which Fergie routinely pees her pants on stage, but that's really neither here nor there.

Hilton is a kind of antihero for the gay community. Although we don't all identify with him or the way he very publicly behaves, he's one of the few people speaking up publicly about gay civil rights issues. He put Miss California on the spot on Prop 8 and started the chain reaction that ultimately led to the reversal of her state title. And, although it was ill-advised, perhaps his use of the gay slur "f-word" has revealed something else: that some men still consider being called the "f-word"--even by a childish, crude imp like Hilton--worthy of physical violence.

If you've seen the video, you know the conversation is brief, and that the punch comes immediately following Hilton's beeped-out use of the f-word. And it's not like the paunchy, pink-haired Hilton was so much of a physical threat that the punch was made the preempt other violence.

If you read the link above, there's an interesting discussion of how quickly we can determine whether or not someone "deserved" the violence they received. It was an argument used against Matthew Shepard, that his advances toward the two killers created "gay panic." Don't even get me started on "gay panic." It's only a slight evolutionary step up from "Dan White ate too many twinkies and, in the sugar rush, killed Harvey Milk."

Was this anti-gay violence?