Born On This Day- August 5th... Tom Drake

Alfred Sinclair Alderdice was born on this day- August 5^th, in Brooklyn. At some point in his stage career & after several other name changes, he became Tom Drake. He made films starting in 1940 & continuing until the mid-1970s, & also made many TV appearances. Drake was deeply closeted, easily given to despair, never known to have a serious romance (although he bedded Rock Hudson & James Dean), with a profound drinking problem & lived a life of fear of being found out. Sound familiar?

1942 &1943 were years of tremendous change at MGM. The majority of the great stars groomed by Irving Thalberg during the 1930s departed the studio. Clark Gable, Robert Taylor, Lew Ayres, Mickey Rooney, Robert Montgomery, & James Stewart joined the armed services & were away from Hollywood for the duration of WW2. Greta Garbo & Norma Shearer left the business. Joan Crawford, Rosalind Russell, Jeanette MacDonald, Nelson Eddy, Eleanor Powell, Myrna Loy, Margaret Sullivan, & Robert Young fulfilled their contracts & then left for other studios & other pursuits.

These stars were replaced by young "boy & girl next door" types: June Allyson, Van Johnson, Robert Walker, Esther Williams, &Tom Drake. Drake was enormously popular with a primarily teenage audience for a couple of years, although he was eventually overshadowed by the more ebullient Van Johnson. Tom Drake was excused from serving in WW2 due to health problems.

After a number of films, Drake had his best role as John Truett, the boy next door, in the classic musical- Meet Me In St. Louis (1944) with Judy Garland. He appeared in more than 40 films, including Mrs. Parkington(1944), The Green Years (1946), & Words & Music- MGM’s top budget production of 1948. Ironically, Drake was cast as the very heterosexual composer Richard Rodgers to Micky Rooney’s Lorenz Hart, who was gay in real life). He was good in the part, but the film was over produced & purported to tell the life stories of the famous partners, but the screenplay was entirely fictional.

Words & Music does contain the songwriting partner’s great songs: My Heart Stood Still, Slaughter on Tenth Avenue, Small Hotel, The Lady Is A Tramp, & Where or When taken from their shows: Babes In Arms, I Married An Angel, Pal Joey, & On Your Toes. Guest stars performing the various musical numbers included Judy Garland, Gene Kelly, Lena Horne, Mel Torme, & Cyd Charisse. These greats stars’ take on the musical numbers make this movie worth viewing.

Drake returned to the stage in 1952 appearing briefly on Broadway & he toured in 1953 in a stage version of Stalag 17. His friend, Elizabeth Taylor, persuaded MGM to cast him as her brother in Raintree County in 1957.

Later that year Drake traveled to England to star in a film- Date With Disaster (also the name of a chapter in my memoirs- Jockstraps &Vicodin: The Early Years). He remained in Europe for over a year, living most of the time in Rome. Drake returned to California with his drinking problem out of control. He was also a very heavy cigarette smoker.  But, a determined Drake managed to kick both habits. He continued his career on TV, & with occasional movie roles such as The Sandpiper, with his friend Elizabeth Taylor, The Singing Nun&The Red Tomahawk (by coincidence, a nickname given to me in college).

Never able to fulfill his potential, Drake continued into the 1970s playing small roles in 'A' pictures, the occasional lead in low-budget films, plus guest roles in numerous different TV drama series in almost every year from 1950 onwards.

A classic example of how talented people could fall between the tracks of the studio contract system, Tom Drake spent his final years with a job as a used car salesman. His health began to deteriorate & he was forced to give up work. Tom moved in with his sister & retired from acting. He died alone & mostly forgotten of pneumonia in Torrence, California in 1982.

An Anecdote: Drake loved to eat garlic. The garlic caused a problem during filming of Faithful in My Fashion, in which he was co-starred with Donna Reed. Tom had eaten a heavily garlic dinner the previous night, & the 1st shot in the morning called for him to romance Reed while dancing &singing softly in her ear. Reed strenuously objected to the strong odor that seemed to exude from Drakes's every pore. It made her physically ill. Production was suspended for the day, & Drake was ordered not to eat garlic while working on a film. Donna forgave Drake & they remained friends during the rest of their lives.

Born On This Day- May 23rd... Betty Garrett

I was living in L.A. in the early 1970s & was fortunate enough to be an acquaintance of actress/singer Betty Garrett. We had met through a mutual friend, a Jesuit priest, who had taught her 2 sons. Her boys were actually my age, but I preferred to hang with the adults. I traveled in this circle for a couple of years, & although we never had a date, just the 2 of us, we saw each other with some frequency at dinners & parties.

We knew each other by name & I found her to be friendly, engaging, warm, & she could spin a delicious tale.

Garrett told me about her husband- Larry Park’s political history, & that because of their past affiliations with the Communist Party, thanks to Parks' involvement with people from the Group Theatre, Garrett & Parks became embroiled with the House Un-American Activities Committee, although only Parks was forced to testify. While Parks willingly admitted he had been a member of the party, he had refused to name others, although it was widely assumed that he had, & he found himself on the Hollywood blacklist.

Garrett also had trouble finding work, although as the mother of 2 young sons, she did not mind being unemployed as much as her husband did. Betty related to me that the only person that would see them socially in Hollywood was Frank Sinatra ( she played a woman in love with him in 2 films), who defied Hollywood convention & was open in his support of the couple with friendship & money.

The occasion was being received back stage by Betty Garrett, after her one-woman show- Betty Garrett & Other Songs at the Westwood Playhouse in Spring 1976. Betty Garrett had been my acquaintance for a while, but we had recently been at a very informal outdoor dinner thrown by mutual friends. Betty & I had a very special conversation that evening that ended with Betty offering house seats to her show the next evening. I took her up on the offer, & the show was terrific, after her last number, but before the curtain call, Betty looked into the house with her hands shielding her eyes & announced while pointing : “Celeste & Stephen… I want to see you both in my dressing room in a few minutes.” I turned to the person next to me & nudged & whispered- “That’s me… I'm that Stephen… I’m not Celeste.”

So, Oscar winner & consummate character actor Celeste Home, & a very young Stephen hung out in the dressing room. While Betty Garrett got out of costume & make up, Celeste Holm & our hero made small talk & loudly praised Ms. Garrett’s show. I declined an offer from the 2 amazing stars of Hollywood’s golden era to move on to the next party. Instead, I would opt for Studio One in West Hollywood, hoping that some hot man would shove that little brown bottle under my nose, the one that makes me feel so sexy & really connect with music… & I will meet a beefy redhead that will take me home, use me for my considerable talents & then make me breakfast.

I came to the fork in the road, & I made the wrong decision. I could have partied away the evening with the fabulous Betty Garrett & with the woman who introduced the world to the showstopper- I Can't Say No (by coincidence, the title of a chapter in my memoir), but I took the fork that got me forked later that evening.

I always glow a bit when I when catch Betty Garrett in an old film or a TV show. She had a 70+ year career in Radio, TV, Film & Stage. Her last public appearance was in summer 2010. Garrett appeared alongside former 2-time co-star- Esther Williams during Turner Classic Movies' first annual Classic Film Festival. Their film Neptune's Daughter was screened at the pool of the Roosevelt Hotel in Hollywood, while a Williams-inspired synchronized swimming troop, The Aqualilies, performed.

Betty Garrett left this life at 91 years old in February 2011. She was surrounded by her family. Thanks for the outstanding performances, the stories, the kindness, & the pleasure of your company, lovely Betty Garrett. You will not be forgotten.

Born On This Day- May 11th... Great American Songwriter, Irving Berlin

He was not gay, & he was a Jew who wrote the best selling Christmas song of all time. His life spanned more than 100 years & he composed over 1000 songs. Irving Berlin was born Israel Beilin in 1988, his exact place of birth is unknown, although his family had been living in Tolochin, Russia, when they immigrated to New York in 1893. When his father died, Berlin, just turned 13, worked the streets in various odd jobs, singing for pennies, then as a singing waiter in a Chinatown Cafe. In 1907 he published his first song, Marie from Sunny Italy, & in 1911 he had his first major international hit - Alexander's Ragtime Band.



For 5 decades, Irving Berlin composed ballads, dance numbers, novelty tunes & love songs that defined American popular song for much of the century. Irving Berlin standards include: How Deep Is the Ocean, Blue Skies, White Christmas, Always, Anything You Can Do I Can Do Better, There's No Business Like Show Business, Cheek to Cheek, Puttin' on the Ritz, A Pretty Girl is Like a Melody, Heat Wave, Easter Parade, Let's Face the Music & Dance, & God Bless America.

He wrote for Broadway & Hollywood. He composed 17 complete scores for Broadway musicals & revues, including the phenomenal score for Annie get Your Gun. Among the Hollywood movie musical classics with scores by Irving Berlin are Top Hat, Follow The Fleet, On The Avenue, Alexander's Rag Time Band, Holiday Inn, This Is The Army, Blue Skies, Easter Parade, White Christmas & There's No Business Like Show Business. His songs have provided memorable moments other films, from The Jazz Singer in 1927 to Home Alone in 1991. Among his many awards are a dozen Grammys, 2 Tony Awards & the Academy Award for White Christmas in 1942.


In 1978, a jaw-droppingly handsome young man with deep blue eyes, stood center stage, straight up & still & with a sweet pure tenor, sang the 1924 Irving Berlin tune- What’ll I Do? for an audition. I was impressed with his looks & his talent. More than a year later this young man would tell me that he was in love with me while Harry Nillson sang What'll I Do on the stereo in the background. This man would eventually become my Husband & I would spend more than half of my life at his side. What’ll I Do remains my favorite Irving Berlin song, although I love them all. I also have quite a soft spot for You Can’t Get A Man With A Gun:

Oh, a man may be hot...
But he's not... 
When he's shot! 
Oh you can't get a man with a gun!

Born On This Day- February 29th... James Mitchell

I always wanted to do a long run, fascinated by the notion of playing a character at different dilemmas & dramas over years or decades. I was happy for the experience & the money the few times I was in a play that lasted a while. I once had a very showy role in a theatre event that ran for 18 months. I would have been deeply grateful for a role in a long-running TV soap operas. James Mitchell was one of them. He enjoyed playing the patriarch- Palmer Cortlandt on All My Children from 1979 to 2008. The role came at the right time in his career. At 59, his dancing days were done & his film acting had not really happened.

From Stars In My Crown with Amanda Blake (who would die from HIV in 1989)

Fans of All My Children were probably not aware that the debonair, silver haired, svelte & handsome, Mitchell had been a leading dancer for many years, particularly associated with the celebrated choreographer Agnes de Mille. De Mille: “Mitchell had probably the strongest arms in the business, & the adagio style developed by him & his partners has become since a valued addition to ballet vocabulary".

Mitchel was born on a fruit farm near Sacramento. He was 3 years old his mother left with his 2 younger siblings. His farmer father, feeling unable to bring up his son alone, gave him up to vaudevillian foster parents. Mitchell appeared on stage as part of their act.

At 17, Mitchell moved to LA, where he studied at City College. At the same time, he was introduced to modern dance at the school of the famed teacher/choreographer Lester Horton. Mitchell soon joined Horton's Dance Theatre of Los Angeles & was one of the Lester Horton Dancers who appeared in a few Hollywood musicals in the early 1940s.

My buddy- Professor Walter Kennedy danced with The Bella Lewizky Company for decades, but 40 years earlier, Mitchell was featured in a South Sea Island dance duet with Bella Lewitzky in White Savage (1943), a camp piece starring Maria Montez.

In 1944, Mitchell began his long partnership with De Mille when she cast him as a dancer in the Broadway musical Bloomer Girlstarring my friend- Celeste Holm. He also appeared in the original Broadway productions of Brigadoon (1947) & Paint Your Wagon (1951), choreographed by De Mille.

Mitchell received non-dancing supporting roles in some good movies: In Raoul Walsh's Colorado Territory (1949), he played outlaw Joel McCrea's nasty sidekick; again with McCrea, he was in Stars in My Crown (1950), & in a pair of Anthony Mann dramas, as an indian in Border Incident (1949), & a Mexican in Devil's Doorway (1950).

Mitchell continued in a small roles in a few film musicals in which he could display his dancing skills: The Toast of New Orleans(1950), he has a zany duet with Rita Moreno, & an erotic dance with Cyd Charisse in Deep in My Heart (1954).  The next year, he was reunited with De Mille on the movie version of Oklahoma! for the 20-minute dream ballet sequence.

Ironically, Mitchell did not dance in the best musical in which he appeared- Vincente Minnelli's The Band Wagon (1953), he has the thankless role of Charisse's manager, boyfriend & choreographer, an experience he disliked so much he refused to see the film. In The Band Wagon he abandons Charisse when she chooses Broadway over ballet. Mitchell himself moved to Broadway with roles in Carnival! (1961), & Mack & Mabel (1974). In 1979, Mitchell settled into the long role of Palmer Cortlandt.

Mitchell's partner for 33+ years was costume designer Albert Wolsky. The couple met on the set of The Turning Point, a film set in the ballet world, in1977. Wolosky: “He adored playing mean”. Wolsky is a 2-time Academy Award winning costume designer, for All That Jazz & Bugsy. Most recently he was nominated for his work on the Julie Taymor film- Across the Universe.

Mitchell’s character on All My Children was one of the first to accept Erica Kane's daughter Bianca when she came out as a lesbian. An earlier story line on the show had Cortlandt befriending a gay teen.

My Buddy- Walter knew Mitchell & may wish to weigh in. Mitchell died in 2010, he would have been 23 today, or 92, depending on how you look at it. He had a good run. Let’s toast him today.

Born On This Day- February 28th... 2 Gay Directors

2 talented directors share a birthday. I can't help reflect on what a difference it must have made in one man's life to have been in the closet & the other to have been able to be openly & unmistakenly GAY.

The life of Vincente Minnelli, the director of classic MGM musicals like Meet Me in St. Louis, Gigi & An American in Paris, was as peculiar as the dream ballets that became his trademark. Born Lester Anthony Minnelli in 1903, he grew up the only child in a family of traveling performers in the Midwest. His mother, Mina Mary LaLouche LeBeau, played the ingénue in stock melodramas, while his father, Vincent, conducted the Minnelli Brothers Tent Theater orchestra.


In young adulthood, shy, stammering Lester Minnelli, who had had a penchant for trying on his mother’s clothes, read a biography of the flamboyant painter James McNeill Whistler & decided to reinvent himself as a worldly aesthete, working as a window dresser in Chicago before making his name as a designer of lavish theatrical sets in New York. It was there that he became “Vincente.”

Once he moved to Hollywood as a director in MGM’s stable, Minnelli quickly built a reputation as a fearsome perfectionist, despite his passive, retiring personality. A closeted gay man, Minnelli had been known to sport “light makeup” & yet, he married 4 times , most famously, to Judy Garland & he fathered 2 daughters, including the perpetually re-self-inventing Liza Minnelli.

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There is 6’6’’ & Texan, with the improbable name-Tommy Tune who is an actor/dancer/singer/choreographer/director, & the winner of 9 Tony Awards, the only person in theatrical history to win in 4 different categories & to win the same Tony Award 2 years in a row.

Tune danced onto the Broadway scene in the chorus of Baker Street in 1965 & hasn't stopped since. I saw him in Michael Bennetts’s Seesaw in 1973, for which he received raves & his first Tony (Best Featured Actor in a Musical). He directed his first show, the off-Broadway production of The Club in 1976. he directed & choreographed The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas, A Day in the Hollywood/ A Night in the Ukraine (his 2nd Tony- Best Choreography), Caryl Churchill's Cloud 9, Nine (his 3rd Tony-Best Direction of a Musical), My One & Only (his 4th & 5th Tony-Best Choreography, Best Actor in a Musical). Stepping Out, Grand Hotel (Best Choreography, Best Direction of a Musical), & Will Roger's Follies (Best Choreography, Best Musical).


Tune has an art gallery in Tribeca . In his 1997 memoir Footnotes, he writes about what drives him as a performer, choreographer & director, offers stories about being openly gay in the world of theatre, his partners David Wolfe & Michael Stuart, about his days with Twiggy in My One & Only & meeting & working with his many idols.

I find him likable & remarkably talented... & tall. He turns 73 today.

A Boy Like That...Born On This Day-September 16th... George Chakiris

I first took note of George Chakiris as a 7 year old watching the movie version of West Side Story, which I found enthralling. I think my parents must have thought it odd that his character- Bernardo was the one I was fixated on. Chakiris won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for the role. Before his breakout role, he had appeared in many small roles as a dancer in films including: one of Marilyn Monroe’s escorts in her Diamonds Are A Girls Best Friend number & along Rosemary Clooney in White Christmas. If you look close he can be spotted in the Chop Suey production number in Flower Drum Song.


I saw him in the National Tour of Company in 1971 with the rest of the original cast. He was the 3rd actor to play Bobby after Dean Jones & Larry Kurt.. My little 17 year old musical comedy queen self was over the moon with his performance, his singing voice, & his good looks, complete with an award winning “package”. Chakiris has appeared in many stage roles in the US & in London & as guest star on several TV series including Murder She Wrote & Dallas. He is now retired & concentrates his artistic expression on jewelry making. He is gay.

Born On This Day- June 8th... Robert Preston Meservey

I was already a fully formed little musical comedy queen by 8 years old when my parents treated me to the movie version of The Music Man. I couldn’t have been more thrilled by this American classic, & not just for the terrific songs. I had an early crush on leading man- Robert Preston & his virile, charismatic, masculine presence as Professor Harold Hill.

He won a Tony Award for his performance in the original Broadway production of The Music Man in 1957. He appeared on the cover of Time magazine in 1958. In 1965 he was the male half of the 2 person musical, I Do! I Do! with Mary Martin, for which he won his 2nd Tony Award & in 1974, he starred opposite Bernadette Peters in Jerry Herman's tuneful Broadway musical Mack & Mabel as Mack Sennett, the famous silent film director.


In 1982, Robert Preston provided a giant step in the depiction of a gay man, when he co-starred with Julie Andrews & James Garner in the very stylish & enjoyable film musical- Victor/Victoria, directed by Blake Edwards.


The film's unapologetic opening shots are of Preston’s character & another man in bed, letting the audience know that the film is not going to shy away from the gay content. The character- Toddy is unlucky in love & that the young bedmate is just a gold-digger. Robert Preston, was often a song &dance man, but he was also a broad shouldered baritone; he seemed a strange choice to play a flamboyant role, & tghat is why it works so well. Toddy is one of the most out loud, out & proud characters ever seen in a major studio film. Preston does this with none of the stereotypes about gay men as portayed all to often in films. Amazing when you consider that the film was made in an era when positive gay visibility in movies was just beginning.


Toddy's sexuality is discussed openly & frankly when he meets Julie Andrews' Victoria. When she asks him how long he's known that he is gay, he counters: “How long have you known you were a soprano?"


Revisit this film & see if it doesn’t stand the test of time. I saw it this winter & it seemed as fresh, funny, & fantastic as when I saw it in its original run. I give a lot of the credit to Robert Preston’s work in his Oscar nominated role (Victor/Victoria was nominated for 7 Oscars: The movie won the Academy Award for Best Music, Original Song Score & Best Adaptation Score. It was nominated for Best Actor in a Supporting Role (Robert Preston), Best Actress in a Leading Role (Julie Andrews), Best Actress in a Supporting Role (Lesley Ann Warren), Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Best Costume Design & Best Screenplay).


Robert Preston died of lung cancer in 1987 at 68 years old. He would have been 92 on this day. I really love him.

Born On This Day- May 11th... Songwriting Great Irving Berlin

He was not gay, & he was a Jew who wrote the best selling Christmas song of all time. His life spanned more than 100 years & he composed over 1000 songs. Irving Berlin was born Israel Beilin in 1988, his exact place of birth is unknown, although his family had been living in Tolochin, Russia, when they immigrated to New York in 1893. When his father died, Berlin, just turned 13, worked the streets in various odd jobs, singing for pennies, then as a singing waiter in a Chinatown Cafe. In 1907 he published his first song, Marie from Sunny Italy, & in 1911 he had his first major international hit - Alexander's Ragtime Band.



For 5 decades, Irving Berlin composed ballads, dance numbers, novelty tunes & love songs that defined American popular song for much of the century. Irving Berlin standards include: How Deep Is the Ocean, Blue Skies, White Christmas, Always, Anything You Can Do I Can Do Better, There's No Business Like Show Business, Cheek to Cheek, Puttin' on the Ritz, A Pretty Girl is Like a Melody, Heat Wave, Easter Parade, Let's Face the Music & Dance, & God Bless America.

He wrote for Broadway & Hollywood. He composed 17 complete scores for Broadway musicals & revues, including the phenomenal score for ANNIE GET YOUR GUN. Among the Hollywood movie musical classics with scores by Irving Berlin are TOP HAT, FOLLOW THE FLEET, ON THE AVENUE, ALEXANDER'S RAGTIME BAND, HOLIDAY INN, THIS IS THE ARMY, BLUE SKIES, EASTER PARADE, WHITE CHRISTMAS & THERE'S NO BUSINESS LIKE SHOW BUSINESS. His songs have provided memorable moments other films, from THE JAZZ SINGER in 1927 to HOME ALONE in 1991. Among his many awards are Grammy's,  2 Tony Award & the Academy Award for "White Christmas" in 1942.




In 1978, a jaw-droppingly handsome young man with deep blue eyes, stood straight up & still & with a sweet pure tenor, sang the 1924 Irving Berlin tune- What’ll I Do? for an audition. I was impressed with his looks & his talent. More than a year later this young man would tell me that he was in love with me while Harry Nillson sang What'll I Do on the stereo in the background. This handsome man would eventually become my Husband & I would spend more than half of my life at his side. What’ll I Do remains my favorite Irving Berlin song, although I love them all. I also have quite a soft spot for You Can’t Get A Man With A Gun:

Oh, a man may be hot...
But he's not...
When he's shot!
Oh you can't get a man with a gun!

Eat Italian!

I have posted about it in the past; I was a berserk little musical theatre queen as a child, a youth & even as a young man. I got off the musical theatre boat about the time of Cats & Miss Saigon (the exception being the brilliant & always enjoyable Little Shop Of Horrors), but I climbed back on S.S. Musical with the movies- Moulin Rouge, Chicago, & Dreamgirls. Throw me a life preserver, because I fell overboard after spending 2 hours with something called Nine. I give director/choreographer Rob Marshall most of the credit (along with screenwriter Bill Condon) for making Chicago work as a film. That show is one of my favorite musicals. When I lived in NYC in the mid-1970s, I was a Chicago groupie, seeing the original at least 5 times. The stage classic seemed to be unadaptable to the screen & it was amazing to see it not just work, but to watch as Chicago-The Film, garnered awards, Oscar nominations, & reintroduce the pleasures of the Musical Movie to a new generation & those of us that gave up on the form. Why didn’t Nine work for me? Chicago has 1 of the great scores of all time, with not a wasted musical moment. Nine has a 3rd rate score of forgettable & sometimes laughable musical numbers (My Husband Makes Movies). The entire enterprise is very odd to me: a musical movie, based on a stage musical, based on a film about not being able to make a movie. So many odd moments: Fergie plays some sort of Sea Whore & performs Mein Herr, Dame Judi Dench portrays Sally Bowles in her 70s, who is now a British costume designer. Dame Judi suddenly has a French accent for her musical number, which seems like it was cut from the original production of Cabaret. Nicole Kidman (who I love) has the best song – the lovely A Very Unusual Way, but her character could have been played by anyone. It was as if the producers put the actresses names in a hat & just threw out 1 number per woman (well, Marion Cotillard gets 2 songs, but they are so awful, they add up to 1). Penelope Cruz wears some very fancy underwear & has my favorite line- “I will wait for you with my legs spread”). Sophia Loren wanders in from the film version of Man Of La Mancha, after 38 years of looking for Craft Services. Only Goldie Hawn comes off really well, with a hullabaloo number, looking really great for 65 years old! I don’t know the source material, but the film is a movie version of a stage musical (which seems to have won 5 Tony Awards & has even been revived). The big musical number had me confused. I thought they were singing- Eat Italian!, & somehow the filmmakers had snuck in an Olive Garden commercial, but the Husband insists the lyrics were- Be Italian!. I didn’t notice. I was daydreaming about the Cell Block Tango from some long ago musical film that really did give me a thrill. The Husband- “well, that is 2 hours of my life that I will never get back”. I give Nine a C+ (for Daniel Day- Lewis’s abs & lats, looking excellent with his shirt off at 52 years old). Eat Italian! Love to!

Gay Pride, Musical Comedy Queens... & Howard Ashman, born on this day- May 17th 1950

One of my favorite things about Gay Pride Parades are all the sub-sets in Gaydom: Bears, Twinks, Leather Daddies, Dykes On Bikes, Gay Parents of Gifted Children, Gay Presbyterians, Gay AA, Gay AAA, Transgendered Employees of The Gas Company, The Polyamorous V-8 Club, Lesbian Librarians, Radical Faires & The Sprites That Love Them, Butches & Fems, Leather Men That Like To Knit, Faggot Cheerleaders, Bisexual Small People, Senior Lesbian Couples That Raise Chickens, Gay Male Interior Designers With Jack Russell Terriers, Silver Foxes, Gays Who Watch Fox News, Tweakers Who Twitter, Gay Mayors In A Heap O' Trouble, & Middle Aged Recovering Musical Comedy Queens.... all marching together in pride.

I was a berserk MUSICAL COMEDY QUEEN from the very beginning. When I was 10 years old, I was fascinated, entranced & obsessed with my parents' Original Cast Album of My Fair Lady. It had a Hirshfeld drawing of George Bernard Shaw as- God, the puppeteer in the clouds, with Julie Andrews & Rex Harrison as marionettes. To this day my image of God is George Bernard Shaw pulling the strings. I loved the music so much & would come home every day from school, put the album on the stereo & sing all the parts of this amazing musical. I was very effective as Alfred Doolittle, even at 10 years old (a character actor from the start). As a child, I would go to Woolworth's & scour the cut-out bin for obscure Original Cast Albums like Goldilocks, Salad Days, Greenwillow, Cindy, Henry, Sweet Henry, & the cast albums of the Finnish & Japanese companies of Hello, Dolly!.

After a few decades, I seemed to loose interest in musicals, as my tastes moved to Rock n' Roll & Pop & I opted out of the entire Miss Saigon, Sunset Boulevard, Le Miz, Cats era of musicals. I still loved performing in musicals, but I no longer spent an afternoon playing & singing along to Original Cast Albums.... until Little Shop of Horrors in 1982. This musical sent me over the edge again & I spent the summer of 1983 in our apartment on Capitol Hill in Seattle, singing Suddenly, Seymour.

Howard Ashman was director, lyricist & book writer for the 1980 Broadway musical, Smile (music by Marvin Hamlisch). Along with Alan Menken, Ashman was the co-recipient of two Grammy Awards, two Golden Globes & two Oscars. His second Academy Award in 1992 was awarded posthumously for Best Song & was accepted by his partner, Bill Lauch.

The song writing team of lyricist Howard Ashman & composer Alan Menken earned their greatest fame scoring animated classics The Little Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast. Born in Baltimore on this day- May 17th 1950, he studied at Boston University before earning his master's degree from Indiana University in 1974. He then relocated to New York City, accepting a publishing job while moonlighting as a playwright. Dreamstuff, his musical adaptation of Shakespeare's The Tempest, was soon produced at the WPA Theatre, where Ashman served as artistic director from 1976 to 1982. For 1979's musical adaptation of Kurt Vonnegut's God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater he first teamed with Alan Menken, also his collaborator on 1982's Little Shop of Horrors. Based on the 1960 Roger Corman B-movie cult classic, Little Shop of Horrors was an unprecedented success; the highest-grossing production in off-Broadway history, it earned the New York Drama Critics Award & the Drama Desk Award. The 1986 film version also earned Ashman & Menken an Academy Award nomination for the newly added song Mean Green Mother From Outer Space. With the Disney release of The Little Mermaid, they scored an Oscar for Under the Sea, & won again, two years later with the title song Beauty and the Beast. Beauty & The Beast remains the only animated film to receive an Oscar nomination for Best Film. It was produced by, screenplay by & lyrics by Howard Ashman. Sadly, Ashman died of complications from AIDS on March 14, 1991; prior to his death, he & Menken completed three songs for the 1992 Disney feature Aladdin, receiving their final joint Academy Award nomination for A Friend Like Me.


MY FAVORITE ASHMAN LYRIC is Somewhere That's Green:
Seymour's the greatest
But I'm dating a semi-sadist
So I've got a black eye
& my arm's in a cast.
Still, that Seymour's a cutie
Well, if not, he's got inner beauty & I dream of a place
Where we could be together at last

A matchbox of our own
A fence of real chain link,
A grill out on the patio
Disposal in the sink
A washer & a dryer & an ironing machine
In a tract house that we share
Somewhere that's green.
He rakes & trims the grass
He loves to mow & weed
I cook like Betty Crocker & I look like Donna Reed
There's plastic on the furniture
To keep it neat & clean
In the Pine-Sol scented air
Somewhere that's green
Between our frozen dinner & our bedtime, nine-fifteen
We snuggle watchin' Lucy
On our big, enormous twelve-inch screen
I'm his December Bride
He's Father, he Knows Best
Our kids watch Howdy Doody
As the sun sets in the west
A picture out of Better Homes & Gardens magazine...
Far from Skid Row
I dream we'll go
Somewhere that's green.

Gayest Post Ever: Wake Me Up Before You Go Go

This blog is about me, my life, my thoughts, ideas & opinions...
I want to start the weekend off with something uber-gay (my friend Tad told me last night- "there is such a thing as TOO gay") & take a moment to reflect, not just on MOVIE MUSICALS, but even gayer- CHOREOGRAPHY! This one goes out to my friend Walter Kennedy, Professor of Dance at the University of Oregon:



This clip is by blogger: And Your Little Blog, Too.