And, Lastly, Happy Birthday To Mary-Louise Parker!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                     Not to be confused with Mary Louise, played by MERYL on "Big Little Lies," who is a passive aggressive nightmare bitch, Mary-Louise Parker turns 55 today. Now, I can remember turning 55, which will be ten years ago this November, and I cannot recall looking half as good as Miss Parker.  I only wish!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                      Darlings, we are all excited at Mary-Louise Parker's return to Broadway, this October 17, in Adam Rapp's new play,  "The Sound Inside," in which she plays a tenured Ivy League Professor, which I am sure she would qualify to be, in real life.

                                        How does Mary do it?  Mother, actress, activist, party planner for children--I am telling you I don't know how she does it.  And stays gorgeous.

                                           Where do you get your facials, Mary-Louise???????????????  Inquiring minds want to know!

                                              Have a fabulous birthday, dear, with tea, and cakes and dainties!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Oh, Maya! Tell It Like It Is!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                  If "Meshes In The Afternoon" (1943), the first Maya Deren film we saw this past Sunday, is about vaginal power, "At Land" (1944) is about what women have had, and still have to go through, to achieve it, even, maybe especially more so, in this age of Harvey Weinstein and Jeffrey Epstein.

                                   When Maya starts climbing this tree like thing, she is demonstrating the struggle of women everywhere, to reach the top. And when she crawls across the executive board table like some cobra, to the delight of those seated there, she is symbolic of women, like Deborah Norville, and countless still today, who have to get their jobs by administering blow jobs to all the men above them, in order to get hired.

                                      In the corporate world, fellatio gets women the job.

                                      Unless you are ANNA WINTOUR!  Or MERYL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                       But small time careerists haven't it any better than back then.  Hey, I know some workers who had to do worse--men who had to eat out dried, encrusted executive pussy, in order to get their jobs.  I also know some who refused.  They were the ones with integrity.  The ones who don't are so desperate to be acolytes, which is not much of an honor, that they don't realize it, thinking they are being honored, when actually they are subbing for a dom.

                                         This is what "At Land" brings to mind, and its imagery is both Lynchian and Felliniesque.

                                          The perfect companion piece to 'Meshes'.

                                           The two dilemmas of woman.

                                            What a visionary Maya was, darlings!  Where are the Derens today, when needed??????????????????

Here It Is, Girls!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                             Let me start by saying I just did not read "Big Little Lies; " I devoured it.  For years, this will be the gold standard of Bitchfest Books, and deservedly so.

                                              Now, let me clear up some things, fast.  Yes, Renata is in the book, and she shows all evidence of being the firebrand she is, and that I can sometimes be, but here the reader sees what is simmering beneath Renata; it does not come out till Season 2, on TV.

                                                Second, David is worried that, like Rosie on "The Slap," whom I sided with, and which caused me some difficulty back in 2015, I will morph into Renata, and do something.  I will stand up for myself and whomever I care about, if needed, but that is about as far as it goes.

                                                  However, this story, and "The Slap" have a connection.  Both novels are set in Australia, and, when dramatized over here, "The Slap" was relocated to Park Slope, Brooklyn, while "Big Little Lies" has been moved to Monterey, California.

                                                    As for the story--oh, my God--bitching mothers, childhood bullying, twisted secrets culminating in a tragedy I feel was justified, and I agree with the five ladies to lie, and keep the whole thing secret.  If I were a parent, I would be a school administrator's worst nightmare; if my child were not tracked at the very top, and given the honors he is entitled to, I would have words for the administrators, like Renata does for Amabelle.  This is what comes from having to fend for yourself, growing up with bullies, as I did.

                                                      So, "Big Little Lies" is fun and cathartic.  I cannot wait to see the two seasons of the series with that cast.

                                                       We will have to have a coffee klatch about it, when I do, dolls!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Some Cheerfulness For August! Girls, Wouldn't We All Want To Look Like Barbara Parkins, As The "Gilmore Girl," In "Valley Of The Dolls????????????????????"

                                  This montage is stunning, darlings, but the best part, which I was unable to capture for you, follows this, when Barbara, in that hair, gown, and clutching that hairspray bottle is atop a mountain only trick photography could get her on.

                                     Think just how much fun it would be, girls, to see yourselves on television atop a giant mountain.  Not to mention the royalties pouring in, each time it is aired.

                                       This was the only time in the movie I wanted to be Barbara Parkins, because, actually I am Neely.  But who could blame me, or anyone, for this one, weak moment?

                                         I am telling you, the whole thing is a work of camp art, and, after the sadness of yesterday, I decided some much needed cheerfulness was required.

                                          Here's to looking your best, dolls!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Deep In The White Trash Heart Of Texas!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                          Now, girls, don't go attacking me again.  Not that I can't take it--I can, and dish it back!!!!!!!!--but let's face it, Texas is a White Trash State, and behavior like this can only be called White Trash. Not to mention the look!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                            This is Samantha Grace Vaughn.  A real tramp!  She is 26 years old, and she is the winner of this week's Raving Queen Bitch Of The Week Awards.

                                               What this bitch did was to leave her 1-year-old daughter, Reiley Jo, in a running car, while she and hubby were inside the Trackside Night Club, outside of Copperas Cove, Texas, lapping up booze, like a couple of wild alley cats!

                                                 Trash!!!!!!!!!!!!!  Sadists!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                                  This is getting to be too much this Summer.  Smack all these bitches in the face!

                                                    When she was finally arrested, she invoked the "n" word, saying. "You will not take my child, and place her with a f***ing n****r!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

                                                      Can you believe this?  And the temperature was 80 degrees in the car?  Cool for Texas, granted, but hot enough to harm a confined infant!  This was at 1:45 AM, this past Sunday morning. Which begs the question--what is a kid that age doing out at that hour of the night?

                                                       Hopefully, the child will be removed from these pieces of trash!

                                                        Like that guy, in the Bronx last week.  What gives???????????

                                                         So, go ahead and say I have no right to call someone White
Trash!

                                                          Like hell, I don't!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Goodbye, Hal Prince!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                                    "If only angels could prevail,
                                                     We'd be the way we were."--
                                                      Stephen Sondheim, "Johanna,"
                                                      from "Sweeney Todd" (1979)



                                         For my entire life--actually several months before, as Prince's first endeavor, "The Pajama Game," opened at the St. James Theatre, on May 13, 1954, five days and six months before my
birth, on November 18, 1954--Harold Prince was part of my Broadway.  He was already there, when I came into the world, and I had no reason to expect he would ever leave it.  I mean, what would Broadway be, without him?????????????

                                         Well, now, with the passing of him, yesterday, at the age of 91--and in Iceland, yet!!!!-- there will be a chance to find out, and I am not particularly hopeful.  While he was alive, Michael Bennett aroused hope in many that he would be Prince's successor.  But with his death, there went that prospect.  Now, who is left? Nobody.

                                             But what a legacy Prince left.  Too much to mention here, but
these are my personal favorites--

                             Arguably, the greatest musical ever written--whose contrasts of darkness and color, with that score, aided by the legendary cast album, taught me much about how expansive musical theater could actually be.  At the time, it was called "Proustian," and only Prince could have brought an idea like that to the stage!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Amazingly, this blend of opera and theatrics blew me away, at one of the worst times in my life. When it opened, my mother was terminally ill in the hospital, and the quote used in this post's opening still brings me to tears, whenever I see it.  I have seen 'Sweeney' at least a dozen times, but those seven times at the original production are seared in my memory forever.

"Merrily We Roll Along" was probably the most personal of all my Prince experiences.  I was pretty much the same age as the cast members, so I wondered how I would age.  Now, that I have aged, and look back, "Our Time" reduces me to tears.  I met David Semonin, a friend of 29 years, at my initial viewing, and over the years I have met and worked with some of the cast members.  It reminds me how I thought the world was mine, when young, and now, those last fifteen minutes break my heart, because the realization sinks in that the past can never be rewritten.  For a "certified flop," it is one of the musical theater's frequently revisited vehicles.  And that is due to Prince, and Sondhiem.

Not to say I did not love "On The Twentieth Century," "Evita," "Grind," "A Little Night Music," "Pacific Overtures," "Candide.' and God knows how many other Prince shows I saw, but his guiding force was always there, and I thought always would be.

Last night, Broadway dimmed the lights for Harold Prince.

But, in a sadder sense, it dimmed the lights on itself.

Rest In Peace, and Thank You, Harold Prince!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And Now It Is August!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                 Since I live on coffee while writing this blog, I thought it better than a sultry summer scene.  Something about August has always saddened me. It is the last full month of Summer, and then comes September, which I still of as Back To School month.  The Summer slowly dies, and we slip into the cooler, but darker seasons.  So, August is the last celebratory month.  I always wish that Julys would never end.

                                  Whether or not there is a genuine Woodstock 50--and I hear it has been cancelled--this month, I will have one of my own, on here.  You can count on that, dolls!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                    I really have no idea what August will bring.  I know I have to go to the dentist, which I am not looking forward to.  And I have to check up on the hives, which have improved with meds, but not vanished.

                                     My hope for the month is a higher number of posts.  July was pretty quiet, and low!

                                     So, here we are in August!  Have a blast, girls!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!