Stories from a man who fails to meet media expectations of what it means to be gay:
white, frivolous, over sexed yet sexless, shrill, single, stylish, a clown, unimportant, et al.

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Christopher Street West, or L.A. Pride as it�s usually known as was this past weekend. I didn�t go, which is perhaps not a big surprise considering I haven�t bothered going in�what, at least ten or eleven years? Inconsistently attending Long Beach Pride seems to more than satisfy my �prideful� needs. Instead of hanging out with half nekked bois n� grls, I was at work, and when I wasn�t there, I was out in the garden, clearing brush and trying to create (on a very small scale) a plant wall (the kind that have been popping up in garden and architecture magazine). If it works, it�ll be cool, if not, well, the garden is sort of odd anyway, one more strange element won�t hurt.

Aside from that, there�s a month or so worth of stuff I haven�t bothered to, and won�t write about, though there were a few plays I might as well mention, despite the fact that at least one of them has already ended its run:

Mr. Punch
If I were say a real reviewer assigned to write about Mr. Punch the pull quote would have been �Thank god I�m not English.�

Which is not to say that there is something wrong per say with being English, I am an admitted Anglophile after all, it�s just that when the play was over, I wasn�t thinking that memories are a dark and confusing thing as much as I was wondering just how between the teletubbies and murderous puppets, anybody actually survives a British childhood. I had a reverse reaction of sorts to the graphic novel the play was based on. Despite being a big Gaiman fan, I don�t own the book. Mainly because the first I leafed through it, I was left with the impression that I�d probably understand it a lot more if I were English and had the Punch & Judy show as part of my cultural heritage. Of course, now I�m definitely glad that ain�t the case.

Anyway, the play was interesting, and well done, if perhaps overly intentionally difficult, with puppets, masks, video, song, fourth wall breaking, and the like.

I saw it was my friend K and considering our sense of humor it may not be surprising that in addition to our usual catching up on each other�s lives type talk, we also played �How many nonwhite folks will there be here tonight,� he answer being roughly 10 or so out of an audience of 60-something folks.

YellowFace
At the Mark Taper there was Yellowface, a somewhat comedic look at race, society, and theater. It was good, though I was distracted a bit by a smelly guy sitting near John and me. You�d think that basic hygiene wouldn�t be too much to ask for with the theater going public, but considering the number of times this has happened, it seems that it is.

Gershwin Alone
The latest thing we�ve seen was Gershwin Alone, a one man piece/celebration of Gershwin�s life and work. Some of the folks I saw it with thought it was exceptional, while others thought it was adequate summer �fluff.� My opinion was more on the it�s good side. The annoying audience story for this play involved the restless �lets leave now and beat the crowd� man who misanticipated the end of the play a couple of times and a plastic rustling woman sitting behind me. Every time I almost got to the point were I could ignore that noise she was making, she�d learn over to the man and comment about the play, such as mentioning that it was sad Gershwin died, or misidentifying Rhapsody in Blue as An American in Paris.

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