They say our sense of smell triggers our memory more than the other four sense, and I believe it. There’s a place in New York where this comes into play very dramatically: The subway.
A magnificent old Central Park West apartment building.
When I go down into the subway each morning to make my way down to Midtown from the northern reaches of Yorkville on the Upper East Side, the weird gumbo funk of smells that hit my nose take me instantly back to 1979, when I first moved here as a 19 year old.
Growing up in a small town in Texas . . . and HATING being in a small town in Texas . . . you can imagine the impact that the City of New York had on my unformed brain and spirit. I was truly in another world. Riding to work and school on an underground train, the crowds, the buildings, the history, the accents, the speed, the energy, the famous landmarks, Broadway . . . . I walked around in a daze for what seemed like months. The post cards I sent my sister (yeah, remember post cards?) almost had her worried, I sounded so entranced.
Most Memorable Sites From My Early Days in New York
Tiny coffee shops that served you a full breakfast for 55 cents
The Statue of Liberty, and how freaking foam green it was
The insides of Broadway theaters (I couldn’t believe how SMALL most of them were)
The Flatiron Building
The Empire State Building’s Observation Deck
Central Park
Madison Square Park
The crumbling mess that was Times Square in 1979
This stupid building now blocks my friend Gerard's view of the Hudson River. It used to stop at the the whiter portion. We hate this building.
This used to be a fantastic view of the Hudson, damnit.
Average Rating: 4.6 out of 5 based on 256 user reviews.
Cute name, meh place. You pays you money and you takes you chances.
Sunday morning Amy and I had breakfast at Hansel and Griddle, which is much less fun than its cute name suggests.
///
On the way back into the city I realized I was beat. I’ve now been on the road for four weeks, and while in New York I’ve done a lot of running around. I decided to just crawl back to my hotel room and recharge for the evening.
And that includes not writing any more!
Empty List
More Shots Taken Around New York
Feels almost Dickensian, doesn't it?
The Flatiron Building, built in 1902, has always been and will always be my personal favorite building in New York. It was the first skyscraper north fo 14th Street.
Average Rating: 5 out of 5 based on 233 user reviews.
With Luci and Derek, who came down from Connecticut to meet me for lunch! Why? Because they are teh awesome!
Very fun Saturday. My friends Luci and Derek, from my World of Warcraft guild (that’s Ritual Noise on Proudmoore, if you must know), came down on the train from Connecticut and I met them at Grand Central. I’d met Luci (and her brother Dave, another guild mate) last year, but hadn’t had the opportunity of meeting Derek in person yet.
We had a lovely breakfast across 42nd Street from GCT and took a walk around Tudor City and the United Nations neighborhood. (We had all agreed that crowded Times Square could do without us that day.) [INSERT PHOTO]
Amy on Broadway in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof with Ashley Judd and Jason Patric.
After saying so long to them, I zoomed back uptown to my hotel, were I threw a couple of things in a bag and made my way down to Penn Station where I caught a New Jersey Transit train to New Brunswick, where my friend Amy is doing a play with Peter Scolari and a bunch of other talented people.
Amy in The Fox on the Fairway (that's Peter Scolari on the right).
The play is The Fox on the Fairway, a new play by Ken Ludwig, the guy who had a hit with Lend Me A Tenor. Like Tenor, the new play is a farce, and it was delightful Amy romping around on stage. Amy is an amazing actress and it’s always great to get a chance to see her work.
Her performance schedule over the weekend is tiring (five shows between Friday and Sunday) so we shared a hotel room across the street from the theater so we had sort of a slumber party.
Memorable Performances by My Ridiculously Talented Friend Amy
Cat on a Hot Ten Roof, Broadway (Mae)
The Fox on the Fairway, George Street Theater, New Brunswick, New Jersey (Mrs. Peabody)[1]
The Women, Old Globe Theater, San Diego (Edith)
The Stand-In, Los Angeles
Amy in The Women at the Old Globe (in the pink, top left).
[1]From the New York Times review:“Ms. Hohn, all dangerous décolletage as the club’s ever-available divorcée, Pamela, is especially delightful when wildly feigning a bout of hysterical blindness.”
Average Rating: 4.4 out of 5 based on 280 user reviews.
Tonight I’m going out with Gail Dennison, one of my oldest friends and one of the first friends I made when I moved to New York in 1979.
That Gail
Gail is a riotously funny actress and comic performer. She also teaches at the American Musical and Drama Academy here in New York.
We’re trying to figure out a movie to go see. I’m not having much luck selling her on Hanna. Evidently Your Highness and the remake of Arthur are both awful, so I’ve just sent her a raft of suggestions. The problem with being my movie buddy is that I go to the movies four times more often than most people. This causes a real problem when you want to go to a movie with me.
The problem? It’s this: Normal movie lovers — I’m talking about those increasingly rare weirdos who, like me, like to see films in the traditional way, that is, in a public movie theater — have a short list of movies in their heads that they’d really like to see. As time passes, and their chance to see these films pass by when the titles leave the first-run theaters, newer titles take their place. It’s a constantly readjusting short list that they almost unconsciously maintain.
I’m the same way, except I’m the on-steroids version. I have twenty titles in my list, and – here’s the kicker – I actually go see the movies on my list. I know, crazy, right? Most of the time, movies leave my list not because it’s too late to see them in a theater, but because I’ve seen them and crosses them off the list.
Central Park West rises behind the lake.
So say you’re my friend, and you like movies and you want to make a movie playdate with me. It’s a drag, because you’re almost guaranteed to have this problem: Any possible title on your list is a movie I’ve crossed off mine weeks ago. I’ve already worked my way down to that hilarious Pakistani soccer comedy and the documentary on the bed bug plague. And you still want to see Inception. It’s a problem. Unless you want to go to a specialty screening, the only way our movie lists can intersect and find a happy match is if we go see a movie that just opened this week. Or, preferably, just opened today.
Oh, dear. Since, let's face it, it's an enema they're talking about, am I justfied in being concerned about what specific "loose weight" they are talking about? Ew?
Sorry about that, everyone. It’s just part of the price you pay for being my friend.
Now: What time shall we meet to see the six-hour director’s cut of Heaven’s Gate?
Great Places in Los Angeles and New York to See A Cool Movie That’s Not Brand-New or Utterly Mainstream
The NuArt
The New Beverly
Film Forum
Cinema Village
The American Cinemateque at the Egyptian and the Aero
The Museum of Modern Art
Los Angeles County Museum of Art
Silent Movie
Average Rating: 5 out of 5 based on 261 user reviews.
Stone and Parker in front of the Neil Simon Theater on Broadway
My friend David and I saw The Book of Mormon last night. It was every bit as good as I hoped it would be. Better, actually. It’s a remarkable instance of the creators of a show having their cake and eating it, too . . . in a big way. Meaning, the show has elements that are utterly profane and offensive, and yet overall it’s sweet and hopeful. It’s not mean spirited at all, which is surprising, considering the ridiculous religion it’s portraying.
The performances are fantastic. The two leads should share the Tony award . . . in fact, I really hope that’s what happens.
I highly recommend this show to anyone whose planning a trip to New York any time soon.
///
For a brief moment, my delirious enjoyment of the show was derailed. In the second act, there’s a wonderful number called “Spooky Mormon Hell Dream, ” depicting the horrors that commonly bedevil (to coin a phrase) worried young Mormons everywhere. Somehow the theme of recurring anxiety triggered my own: Money.
Josh Gad and Andrew Rannells
Yeah, even though I’m in the midst of a wonderfully beefy project, I have no work scheduled when it’s over yet, and I still haven’t gotten over the blind terror of post September 2008 contractor life. It’s not been easy, and I have to continue to work hard to find new opportunities.
The Only Three Things I Worry About
Money
Health
Actually, there isn’t a third thing
Average Rating: 5 out of 5 based on 201 user reviews.
Soapbox Alert: You Have Entered a No Boredom Zone!
Few things get me madder quicker than “boredom.” I enclose that word in quotation marks because, to be specific, it’s when other people use the word to describe their state of mind that I get pig-biting mad.
Bored? Really?
In my mind, being bored more than once or twice a year is unacceptable. The world is too interesting a place. “Boredom” is born of laziness and lack of imagination.
Baby, I'm bored.
Life is too short, and there are too many cool things to do and discover, for boredom to be a regular occurrence in your life.
Of course, there are a few exceptions.
It is Permissible For You to be Bored if . . .
you are blind and deaf
you actually incarcerated (in a facility which does not contain a lending library)
you are ill or severely injured
you are actually dead
Don’t find yourself on the list above? Then you don’t get to be bored, Sparky.
I am lazy and I have no brain!
Perhaps this is a new concept for you. If so, I am thrilled to report that I can help.
Things to Try if You are Bored
1. Pick up a book.
Books. You remember them? They’re everywhere, thanks to Mr. Gutenberg. And Amazon. I don’t even care what kind of book you read. I’m not a snob. Read Danielle Steele, for all I care. That chick must be able to tell a good story, considering all the units she’s moved. Read Stephen King. Read trash. I don’t care. I’ll bet you don’t even have a library card. Why don’t you? Libraries are great. They let you borrow books for free, it’s crazy. Or for that matter, it doesn’t even have to be a book. Read a magazine. Check out all those fabled “good articles” in Playboy. Or Cosmo. Or National Geographic. Or, hell, Maxim (which, of course, could have the added benefit of learning how to please her in bed three ways at the same time!‼). I don’t care if you’re reading the back of a cereal box. Just read something. And if you can’t find anything you like to read, you’ve got bigger problems than boredom, pal.
2. Do a chore.
One of the main reasons you don’t want to clean your apartment, or work on your taxes, or wash your dog, is that there’s something else you’d rather do. If you’re bored, then, by definition, there’s nothing particular that you feel like doing. Perfect time to clean the underside of your platform bed! [PS I learned this one from my wise grandmother, whose now an even wiser 98 years old.]
3. Get out of your comfort zone.
Maybe you need to try something you don’t usually do. Take a samba class. Watch a sport you don’t think you like. Sleep with someone who’s a different age/race/sex/religion than you usually hook up with. Try a food you don’t think you like. Take a drive to a part of town you never go to.
4. Volunteer.
If you’re not doing anything, you might has well stuff envelopes, right?
5. Play a video game.
Seriously. If you have never tried them, you don’t know what you’re missing. Find a genre of game you like, and boredom will be a thing of the past.
Finally, if you feel seriously bored frequently, it could be a sign that you suffer from clinical depression, in which case you need to seek help.
But if you’re healthy, and reasonably mobile, and aren’t in solitary confinement: I don’t want to hear about how bored you are.
Average Rating: 4.8 out of 5 based on 228 user reviews.
I’ve been interested in microloans for some time. Are you familiar with the concept? You make loans in tiny amounts to people across the globe that you’ve never met.
I finally decided to take the plunge. I joined Kiva, an organization I highly recommend (www.kiva.org). The site is well-organized, which makes it easy to zero in on what kind of loan you’d like to make.
My client Sugar in his grocery store in Ulan Bator, Mongolia. He is bringing computer gaming to his community.
I skipped over the boring stuff like farming and manufacturing and went straight to Entertainment. Hey, just because I’m being altruistic doesn’t mean I have to stop being shallow.
After only a couple of minutes of searching I found my guy: Sugar Ayush, a married father of one, wants to raise money to expand one room of his small grocery store to make a PC gaming center. Well, that’s an idea I can get behind! Just because a kid lives in Mongolia shouldn’t mean he can’t get his Gears of War on, right?
At first I was worried, because I was the very first person to loan Sugar a chunk of the amount he was trying to raise. But in just a week, other wise lenders had followed my lead and I was delighted to see that his loan amount had been met! I’m actually quite proud that my name is listed as the first lender right on his page. The smug feeling of righteousness I feel when I think about Sugar’s PC game room is well worth the $25 I lent him to expand his business.
So. The next time you’re in Ulan Bator and you have a hankerin’ for some Halo, go see my client Sugar and tell him Ray sent you.
Other Microloans I Should Make
Help open a bodybuilding gym
Help pay for World of Warcraft subscriptions in a developing country
No Child Left Behind (Without Her Own GameBoy)
Open a Mrs. Fields in a developing country
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Here are some more photos I’ve taken while in New York.
I lived in this building for the summer of 1983. While living there, my sister and I were at The Witte Museum in San Antonio and we came across a painting that included this building. It made me feel even more important than I normally do.
You'd have to agree that, when it came time to name this church, they pretty much hit the nail on the head.
I’m still learning both my Nikon D90 and Lightroom 3.
Pretty good band in the Times Square subway station.
Average Rating: 4.8 out of 5 based on 153 user reviews.
All you have to do to appreciate the wonder of American food is to travel abroad. No, I’m not kidding.
Don’t get me wrong. I adored the food in Italy. Who wouldn’t? The eats in Japan were wondrous. And don’t get me started on Mexico.
Food of the Gods
But. There’s one thing factor that makes food in America consistently fun: The fact that we’re mongrels. Mutts. We’re from everywhere and we’ve interbred like crazy. This leads toall sorts of innovations, not the least of which can be found in our cuisine.
Best. Sandwich. Evar.
Back to Italy. Yep, the pasta Bolognese I ate there was heaven. Ditto the homeade ravioli. However, as perfect these classic dishes were, they was the same in every ristorante that I went to. The recipes had been canonized long ago, polished to a high sheen like pebbles polished in one of those tumblers we had as kids.
Not in the good ol’ U.S. of A. Here were not afraid to toss things together. Things that, at first glance, would seem to not go together at all.
Buffalo chicken meatloaf yay!
Case in point: Barbeque Chicken Pizza. Now a staple in restaurants and pizzerias here, this is a dish that could never have been invente in Europe. No way, no how. Same with fajitas. Buffalo wings. The bread bowl. Potato chips.
And the lunchtime wonder I had yesterday. Ladies and gentlemen, I present: Buffalo Chicken Meatloaf. What a great fucking idea. What a great way to freshen up a venerable, but tired, traditional dish. This is something I’m going to try making as soon as I’m back in my kitchen.
Other Notable American-Born Dishes
Smores
Peanut butter
Graham Crackers
Pumpkin pie
Corn bread
Corn Dogs
Toll House Cookies
Cobb Salad
The Reuben
Cookie Dough Ice Cream
Chinese Chicken Salad
Peanut Butter Smores!
Average Rating: 4.7 out of 5 based on 285 user reviews.
My hotel, the Courtyard Upper East Side, is nice, but a bit remote. The room is very comfortable, but like most hotel rooms in this town, a bit on the wee side.
Central Park in the Spring is definitely a big check in the PLUS column for America. I had a lovely walk across the Upper East Side, the Park, and then the Upper West Side on the way to Gerard’s.
Gerard lives in this great building on West End Avenue. His 13-floor living room windows face the Hudson River. Between him and the river is a school. “This is great, ” I would always tell him. “That school isn’t going anywhere, so your view will be here forever!”
So naturally a few years ago the damn school added several stories, just enough to sit right smack in front of Gerard’s beautiful view. Oh, the humanity.
Gerard's snow has played in various incarnations around the world since 1981!
Gerard has been my friend since 1988 or so, and it’s always great to see him. Like my late friend Ken, we can talk about movies until we collapse.
“So what else besides The Book of Mormon should I try to see while I’m here?” I knew Gerard would have his finger on the pulse of the New York theater scene. Without hesitation he said, “War Horse.” Funny, I had just seen an article on TED about this show that had these amazing horse puppets. My time in New York was limited, and the show had a lot of buzz on it, so we actually scooted down to Lincoln Center and I nabbed the last remaining good seat for the evening performance.
The show was dazzling. The play basically puts you through World War I, with trench warfare, barbed wire, tanks, and full-size horses. It was one of the coolest things I’ve ever seen.
Places I Have Seen Productions of Gerard’s Shows Since 1981
New York, of course
Boston
Los Angeles
Orange County
Honolulu
The guy in brown is one of three performers operating Joey the horse.
Average Rating: 4.5 out of 5 based on 283 user reviews.
Jose Quintero, a Panamanian, became known as one of the most important directors of American playwrights like Eugene O’Neil and Tennessee Williams. He also pretty much invented off-Broadway theater when he co-founded The Circle in the Square Theater in New York in 1951. He was largely responsible for the careers of Geraldine Page and Jason Robards, Jr.
He was also a colorful figure, with a lyrical, humanistic sensibility.
The handsome Mr. Quintero. This is pretty close to how I remember him looking in 1978.
For some inexplicable reason, he agreed to teach a series of master classes at North Texas State University in 1978. Or, hell, it might have been early 1979. Actually, I imagine the reason he agreed to do it was the check cleared.
I was lucky enough to be a student at NTSU that year, and while I wasn’t a drama major, I was still exposed to this remarkable man.
On his last evening with us, everyone took him out for an evening of merriment. Near the end of the evening, we went up to a fellow student, who I’ll call, oh, let’s just call him Rick Higginbotham. Rick had mightily impressed Mr. Quintero with his rendition of Cyrano de Bergerac. The old master slipped a piece of paper with a phone number on it into Rick’s hand. “Call me when you’re ready, ” he whispered.
Well. As you can imagine, there was an electrical fire in poor Rick’s brain. This was every actor’s dream. For anyone who is foolish enough to aspire to work in the theater, one of the main obstacles is the simple fact that there doesn’t seem to be a direct and logical path to success, unlike most professions. You move to New York or Los Angeles, get some pictures, take some classes, stumble around town and try to get an audition. It really sucks, and it’s really intimidating.
But here was a famous director handing Rick his very own Golden Ticket! The heavens parted and the angels sang!
A few months later I auditioned for and was accepted to The American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York. Perhaps not a Golden Ticket, but a Silver one, at least, or so I thought at the time. My father convinced of the soundness of my plan, I cancelled plans to do my junior year at the university and made my plans to move to New York.
The first apartment I ever lived in was in this building at 86th and Central Park West in 1979.
The idea of moving to New York was scary, of course, but made a little bit less so because Rick Higginbotham announced that he and a friend of his were going with me. Well, fantastic! I’d start school while Rick got started on permitting Jose Quintero to turn him into the next Geraldine Page. Yay!
Of course, even at this point I considered Rick’s game plan a bit shaky. “So. What exactly are you going to do in New York?” I asked him, trying not to sound as dubious as I really felt.
Rick rolled his eyes at my foolish question. “I’m going to work in the theater.”
Yep. That was his whole plan. He was going to get off the plane, call the famous director, and on Monday begin rehearsals for some major Broadway production. As young and stupid as I was, this sounded a bit too much like a house of straw to me, but held my counsel.
We got to New York, found an apartment in this building:
I started school, and it was magical almost from the very first day, it was all almost unbearably exciting.
Rick called Mr. Quintero. Left a message.
I got my stupid, humiliating dance class stuff (a Texas boy, even a closeted gay Texas boy, does not naturally fit comfortably into a dance belt and tights).
Rick called Mr. Quintero again. Left another message.
I began to make friends. I started to enjoy my classes. Even movement class, thanks to the dynamic instructor, Liz Milwe.
Rick called Mr. Quintero again. Left multiple message. (I have no idea what his friend, whose name was Huckabee, was doing during this time.)
Young, stupid, scared, and abandoned by my roommates, I stood on the roof of this building and contemplated my future.
One night after three weeks, Rick and Huckabee sat me down back at the apartment. “This city sucks. We’re leaving.”
Poor Rick. He’d finally figured out what most of us knew but didn’t have the heart to tell him: That the scrap of paper with the phone number was not an actual invitation to come have a brilliant career, but simply a drunken gesture of a horny old man who’d been besotted by the charms of an intense young actor. Mr. Quintero had sobered up. He would not be returning Rick’s calls.
I, of course, freaked out. Being in New York with two friends helped tether me to the real world. Plus, I’d signed a lease! How would I pay the enormous ($600) rent myself? What if I couldn’t find new roommates? I vividly remember standing on the roof of the Brewster and looking south from 86th Street and Central Park West at the glittering, beautiful, yet forbidding city of my dreams. I felt truly alone.
I’m also not proud to report that my thought bubble when Rick told me the news of his departure was smug and self-righteous. “Wow, three weeks, that’s all your dream is worth?, ” I remember thinking.
Rick and Huck went home and I never heard from them, or even about them. Well, I might have heard that Rick became a radio DJ, which sounded like a good idea (he had a terrific voice for radio).
North Texas State University became The University of North Texas in 1988. Jose Quintero died in 1999. And while I have a very impressive Associates Degree of Occupational Studies from the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, I have never acquired a Bachelor’s Degree.
Looking back on it, I find I’m quite sympathetic to Rick and the mistake he made. Being young and full of dreams doesn’t do much for your default IQ. Plus I’m one to talk; I had my own mistaken illusions. I thought I was going to a swanky acting school, and while I did have some great teachers there, and make great friends, by the late 1970s the AADA was no longer a school whose reputation helped you get ahead in show business. Not like Julliard or Yale, or even for that matter SMU, which was just down the damn road a bit from where I was in college in the first place.
But at least I had more resilience than Rick, right?. I stayed in school and graduated. I did the struggling actor boogie for years. I moved to Los Angeles and did a commercial and walk-ons on soaps, and the odd play. After that, as everyone knows, my multifacetless career had an utter lack of any impact whatsoever on the world of theater in any way.
So you could argue that Rick was smarter, cutting his losses early and getting on with his life. I hope you have had a good one, Rick, wherever you are.
The last thing I remember Huck saying to me was a breezy, “You’ll be alright.” Which I thought was pretty callous of him at the time. But of course, he was right.
Notable Productions Directed by Jose Quintero
Summer and Smoke (Tennessee Williams) starring Geraldine Page, 1952
The Iceman Cometh (Eugene O’Neill) starring Jason Robards, 1956
Long Day’s Journey Into Night (O’Neill), 1957
Strange Interlude (O’Neill), 1963
Average Rating: 4.5 out of 5 based on 158 user reviews.
