A Time for Queens, Hawkes, and Poe

I have to start this edition by promoting the new issue of Time Out New York, because, well, it's promoting the best borough in NYC, which happens to be where I live (I'm not biased.......no, really).

Thanks Time Out New York!

It seems like Queens started this upward trajectory soon after I moved here...........I'm just saying.....

One more thing about this issue, then I'll move on.  They have a section called "Word on the Street," which contains quotes the writers overhear regular New Yorkers saying as they pass by.  I thought I would highlight a few, because they're just too funny not to share:

• "I can de-lint my own boobs, thank you."

• "This morning, I took my bra off and confetti poured out."  Now, this situation I'm familiar with.  No, I don't wear a bra, but I've been to enough raves to have confetti and glitter pour out of various garments I've been wearing.

• "Would you rather lose the Internet or your foot?"

• This has to be the best one, though.  "I thought Ariana Grande was a font until yesterday."

Okay, enough free advertising for Time Out New York.  But seriously, if you're planning a visit, it's a good resource for what's happening in music, events, shows, and restaurants.

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Next up is a play I saw a couple months ago with Von, called Lost Lake.  It starred Tracie Thoms and John Hawkes, both of whose work I have greatly appreciated and enjoyed over the last few years.  It was a play about two people who come together because he wants to rent his lakeside house for the Summer and she is the willing guest who agrees to take it for a couple weeks.  They aren't fast friends, by any means.  In fact, he's constantly dropping in and making her uncomfortable, while also not making repairs to the largely dilapidated house, much to her frustration.

What brings their connection, as the story unfolds, is that they're both harboring secrets that will ultimately alter the trajectory of their lives and they find they can each be a confidante to the other, which is highly unexpected for Tracie's character.

There was no huge revelation made during the show, it was more a character study of two people who are having a difficult time with no real happy ending to look forward to, much like real life can be.

The biggest takeaway I received was in understanding that with all the crap and challenges we experience, what we need are people we can talk to and commiserate with; they won't make our problems go away, but they can help us through our trials by not allowing us to go through it alone.  There's nothing worse than having bad things happen and be unable to reach out to someone for comfort or solace.  Even if it's through a phone call or an encouraging text, we all need someone we can unload on, who will understand us.  I know there are times when I've needed that for sure; I don't often seek advice, what I'm most interested in is just having someone hear me.  In many ways, this play reminded me that as much as I enjoy my "alone time," I shouldn't use my independence to hold people at arms' length.

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Finally, there was the play Faith and I saw just this week, called Nevermore.  It's described as "the imaginary life and mysterious death of Edgar Allen Poe."  Their website also calls it a theatrical experience and it definitely fits that bill.  Most of the dialogue is sung, but to call it a musical doesn't do justice to what the show is trying to achieve in its telling of Poe's life.

Poe's mother and father

The story is that Poe comes across a group of theatre performers on a steamer and they share with Poe stories from his life that he has forgotten.  It comes across, at first, as a kind of farce, but as the show goes on, it becomes darker and darker, with tragedy upon tragedy occurring in his life.  Throughout, we see tidbits from Poe's writing and the whole thing has a strong dreamlike quality.  By intermission, Faith and I were both exhilarated by the experience and we couldn't wait to see what happened next.  I won't give away too much of the ending, but suffice it to say, he dies, and we're left to wonder how much of this was real and how much was imagined, much like Poe's character in the play.

Poe and one of the loves of his life, Eliza

It's funny, before the show, Faith and I were talking about how there are so many revivals of plays and musicals, and we don't hear about truly original work as much (the same can be said of movies, too).  This was wholly original and the actors involved (a small cast of seven) took on their roles and performances with abandon, not holding back an ounce of emotion.

What we were left with was an intriguing story about a complex man, and we were drawn into his world of macabre imagery, where we couldn't trust what we were seeing, but nonetheless didn't want to look away for fear of missing something vital to help us understand Poe evermore (see what I did there?).

The dreamy feeling lingered on as we left the theatre and I don't know if it was that or the lateness of the hour, but we certainly had a challenge getting to the right subway to get us home afterward.  When we went underground, it seemed that everywhere we looked, every sign led to trains headed downtown, when all we wanted was the train going uptown.  It's a good thing Faith was around, because at one point I almost threw my arms up in desperation, thinking we would just have to live in the subway station from then on.  It would have been comical had we not wanted to get home to bed so badly.  Fortunately, we made it to the right train and finally got back to our apartment, where I had the weirdest Tim Burton-esque dreams of my life.  Poe's influence on Mr. Burton is quite clear when you experience it in dreams, let me tell you.

Until next time........