Stephen Quint and the ZOMBIE MIKADO

Walt's World

We were in Disney World last week. Four days, three nights. I have a sunburned neck and a Goofy hat to prove it. I was wearing the hat as I walked down a hallway in our hotel. A DRUNK GUY (I am delighted to report that such things can and do exist in Disney World) said to me "Hey, that's a goofy hat. Wait a minute, it's a GOOFY hat!" I thought that was rather clever, for an impaired person.

Disney World is mighty impressive. For a person whose tastes are a little inclined to subversive/reactionary I found it surprisingly delightful and fun. You get used to the non-realism of it almost immediately. What could possibly be more fake than Epcot, which by the way stands for "Experimental Prototype Community Of Tomorrow"!!! -- did you know that? It's the kind of thing you see at a World's Fair. A bunch of countries are given about an acre to give you an "authentic feel" for their personalities. In Disney's case this is done by showing you all the stereotypes, so if you've ever seen Casablanca, or a Sherlock Holmes, or a Godzilla movie, you'll feel quite comfortable, even if you're from Plainfield, Wisconsin, and have never been out of town or seen a non-Caucasian in your life. We had dinner in "France," because Maggie was eager to try escargot (she liked it, I knew she would). Not-too-thick Frrawnch awkcents from the waiters. Accordion music from speakers in the street. Shop attendants in striped turtlenecks and berets. People trying to kiss you with their tongues out. Val bought kimonos for the girls in "Japan" from sweet, smiling, deferential Real Japanese People. In "Germany" I bought a beer from a rigid, blonde Fraulein using Val's Disney Rewards Visa Card. I had been using that card steadily for three days, signing Vals' name. "Germany" was the one and only instance of a cashier refusing to accept the card from me. Veddy eeenteresting, ja? Fortunately Val was standing right beside me and could placate the officious beer dispenser -- "Just following orders" -- by making two squiggly messes that were supposed to be her signature. We didn't check out "Italy" but I imagine that the restaurants are tended by guys just like the ridiculous waiter in Lady and the Tramp.

By the way, did you know that all Disney employees, incredibly good natured people, by and large, are referred to as "cast members"? So was Maggie given her escargot by a French waiter, or somebody playing a role?  In what way is it better to be a "cast member" than an employee? Disney psychology.

Here are "typical" (fat, sweaty, and waiting) Disney World visitors with Goofy hat.

Just one of the reasons why it's maybe not such a bad idea to get married in a church

Ghastly Garfield

I took the kids to "Garfield 2: A Tail of Two Kitties" yesterday and wanted to kill myself as soon as I got home, but Val won't be back until tonight and I couldn't make the girls reponsible for dealing with my corpse. But what do I care? Nothing matters anymore. How can anything matter in a world that contains "Garfield 2"? It was one of those 80-minute movies that go on for 3 hours. Plenty of slapstick and belching and stupid sarcasm from Bill Murray as the voice of the obnoxious cat, the only completely animated computer graphics character in the movie. He was made to look like a walking Garfield doll rather than a real cat OR a cartoon, and it had kind of a frightening "Chucky"- effect as far as I was concerned. In the comic strip, as I recall, Garfield hardly ever moved -- just produced a lot of thought balloons. In this movie he break dances at every opportunity, does judo, and happily scampers up and down long stairways. In short, he does whatever he has to for the plot contrivance at hand, like Snoopy got doing toward the end of Peanuts' greatness, when he turned from a cool dog into a beagle-shaped super-being that could do absolutely anything. Very lazy, Cartoon Network-quality writing. Maggie is 10, her critique was "Stupid." Lucy is 7. Lucy liked it. She laughed all the way through. So? Are you 7? You won't like it.

For the record, it has nothing to do with "Tale of Two Cities." It's "Prince and the Pauper" with Garfield's double and a bunch of lasagna and "Babe"-type talking animals.

Parents, avoid this. If your kids absolutely must see it try to get someone else to take them, you definitely will not be sorry to have missed it. Or better yet, promise they can watch it on DVD when it's available. Then put on headphones and for god's sake avert your eyes. Like go clean the litter box or something.

Bonus Posting

Here are a couple of things I didn't have time to include when I wrote yesterday. Oh, why be coy? I didn't feel like writing more. So here it is now.

First this bit of horror from yesterday's Times:
MISSOURI BREEDER BEATEN WITH DEAD PUPPY
ASSOCIATED PRESS
A St. Peters woman angry that her new puppy had died pushed her way into a dog breeder's home and repeatedly hit the breeder on the head with the dead Chihuahua, the authorities said. The woman, 33, went to the home early Wednesday and tried to get another puppy but the fight ensued, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported. The police said they were considering burglary and assault charges against the woman.

I recently played the original cast recording of My Fair Lady for the kids (Maggie, 10, Lucy, 7) and they listened all the way through while we prepared and had dinner. They know the movie very well and other than that they've seen a Vermont community theater production that omitted the entire ball scene at the end of Act One! I know that Shaw condoned the deletion of that scene from Pygmalion when a production didn't have the resources, but Shaw thought Pygmalion was about phonetics. You can't have a Cinderella story and not include the ball! Stupid! Anyway, we listened to the original cast. Julie Andrews blew them both away! They're used to Marni Nixon, who dubbed Audrey Hepburn's voice (also Natalie Wood's in West Side Story and Deborah Kerr's in The King and I) and who has a voice the size of a pea. She got hired to dub movie stars because she sounded like they might have (miserably weak but at least on pitch). You should have seen Maggie's face during "I Could Have Danced All Night"! "This is what Eliza ought to sound like! She's strong!" She really heard it. Lucy heard it too.

Several of my singer friends study with Marni Nixon, and they all say she is an excellent teacher.

I got new X-rays taken on Thursday. The bone is filling in just fine and rarely hurts, but I have to keep wearing the strap-on brace. My next appointment is in 4 weeks.

Last week I suggested to Val that we should both get a manicure and pedicure, as I had never had the experience. Why people should pay GOOD MONEY for something you can do in 5 minutes after a shower has always eluded me. I tell you, the work they do on the feet is a darned ticklish business. My pedicurist, a young woman of unspecific ethnic origins, also seemed to be rather tickled to be taking care of such a sensitive man. AND I DON'T MEAN "SENSITIVE" IN THAT WAY, I'M MARRIED. All the scraping and rubbing and anointing with oils
was not easy to tolerate without squirming. The name of the color I chose for my toes was "Mardi Gras." I put my best foot forward and took a picture of it. Guess which one it is (hint: I have two). Click on it to get it LIFE SIZE.

Wolf Trap Pirates 2006

It was a week ago this very night that NYGASP was doing Pirates of Penzance in Virginia at the Filene Center at Wolf Trap. It's an outdoor stage, and GOD DAMN IT, IT WAS HOT. And the humidity must have been about 90%. Rain was looming the entire evening. But it never came. The stage is at the bottom of a hill. There are 3,700 seats, with a roof, and then another large area of ground where picnickers sit. I happened to be at the top of the hill, buying a $4.50 official Wolf Trap concession stand crappy hot dog (their cheapest entree), when they opened the gates and let the picnickers in. People RAN to the bottom of the hill, to get the best viewing area close to where the seats end. It's $10 to watch from the grass. Very reasonable.

This being an outdoor performance there were many microphones across the front of the stage and attached to the heads of the principals. I chose to have mine sticking out of my left sideburn (I was the Major-General). May I just take one moment to inform you that the only really unpleasant thing about playing the Major-General is the number of things you have to glue to your face. The wig, the sideburns, the moustache, and the monocle are all held by spirit gum. I still, a week later, have scars around my right eye from where the monocle was, and we only gave 2 performances. The entire time I'm singing the Major-General song I can feel that moustache and am conscious of how it impedes the activity of my upper lip. And now that I've digressed, and begged your pardon, and you've presumably given it, I will continue.
Body mics are a treat every now and then. Some people, like Ross, the guy who plays the Pirate King, bellow all their lines like they would in a big opera house. But I say if you're wearing a microphone, exploit it. I must have sung at half the volume I'd use in a regular theater, and it greatly enhanced the clarity, admittedly already excellent, with which I was able to sing the patter song. Both nights the Major-General song went particularly well, and the encore even impressed me. But my standards are questionable.   
Ross Crutchlow's Pirate King is actually a bellowy kind of guy, so of course I don't blame him for putting out as much volume as he did. The sound technician kept us all equal anyway.
But what a hot, humid, horrible night it was to be frolicking around under strong stage lights. Even the skinny young dancery people were projectile sweating. ROBIN BARTUNEK (see photo), the Isabel, did some pirouettes that SHOWERED all the people near her. But everybody onstage was wet, and it was hard to breathe as well.
The orchestra pit was one of those hydraulic things, so when the overture started Al had them raise the floor, for a Radio City Music Hall-type tacky but fun effect. Both nights the overture went more than usually well and made the audience cheer. There were about 4,500 of them on Friday. Just a sea of heads, wherever you looked. Prolonged raucous applause and yelling at the end of the evening.   
The Saturday night performance went really well, too, for an audience of 6,000. Big standing ovation, very noisy. Plus the sky cleared in the afternoon and the temperature was comfortable. There was much rejoicing i.e. drinking back at the Comfort Inn after. My sistah Louie commented how handsome my Major-General is. Makeup, you know. And a lot of glued-on hair to cover everything up.

As far as I know there was no review for this one so I can't give you a link. I think this would have been the third time the Washington Post reviewed my Major-General. Here I am in the costume and makeup.

Schlepping to Virginia

Pirates of Penzance at Wolf Trap (Vienna, Virginia) this weekend. The forecast is STEADY THUNDERSTORMS for the next 7 days! Wolf Trap is a beautiful natural amphitheater. Hundreds of seats (3,000?) are under a roof but thousands more sit on the hill behind the seats. We usually get 6,000 in decent weather, which is not what the seers foretell.