ON WITH THE SHOW
Every block had one and I was it: the queer. I grew up in the early sixties in Flatbush, Brooklyn long before queer had any sort of positive, ACT-UP connotation. It was merely one of the epitaphs hurled at me along with the usual fag, sissy, pansy and homo. These were the words that supposedly wouldn’t break my bones.
Naturally, I was excluded from all the block sport. I couldn’t catch a ball to save my life and to this day I still throw like a girl. But quite honestly, I was one, thrilled outcast. Being gay made me feel special, different from the Brooklyn thugs who lived on my block, and the kids who would be stuck in Brooklyn for an eternity while I would make my fame and fortune in Manhattan. For an occasional nanosecond, I did miss the camaraderie of playing on a team. Although having a real friend instead of Lucille Ball and Wally Cleaver might have been nice, I had my world and they had theres; I was fine with the uncrossable rubicund between us.
The big game on Marlborough Road was stoop-ball. Most of the houses had two sets of steps leading up to the front doors. After buying a new Pensy-Pinky or a Spaulding at Lamston’s around the corner, the boys would spend hours throwing the ball against the upper set of stairs, each step having a higher point value, the lowest being 5 and the highest 50. If you were able to throw the ball so that it didn’t bounce on the way back to the street the points doubled. Occasionally, I was recruited to help with the math when my friends couldn’t figure out what came after 1,999. I assured them it was a trillion.
Who needed to play ball outside, anyway? I was quite content to stay in my room and play at something I seemed to have an innate talent for: big Broadway musicals.
These were not just any run-of-the-mill productions. These were extravaganzas complete with (homemade) costumes, an orchestra (my scratchy 78s on a little red, portable record player), and a cast of thousands (the three girls on the block I could recruit)—each and every production directed, choreographed and starring me.
The only cast albums around were my mother’s old 78 recordings of Rodgers and Hammerstein shows. So my Broadway reviews consisted of the four of us lip-syncing to Mary Martin as she Washed That Man Right Out of Her Hair or Cockeyed Optimist (although I was certain that the title was Cockeyed Optometrist and consequently had the entire cast in cardboard cut-out glasses). We would usually end with the Grand Finale: Oklahoma! complete with trenches.
Where I picked this up is anybody’s guess. I hadn’t seen a Broadway musical yet, so it must have been the occasional movie musical on TV. Perhaps it was the perennial running of Wizard of OZ, or Peter Pan. Maybe it’s just in the genes. However this form of entertainment seeped into my consciousness, it filled my mind at a very, very early age. I’m sure my parents’ friends never forgot my definitive version of “People Will Say We’re In Love” sung to my sister’s Chatty Cathy.
For those who are already shaking their heads in horror about the little-gay-boy-putting-on-shows-in-his-bedroom, I fear it gets worse. My parents took me to Balanchine’s Nutcracker at the New York City Ballet and my life changed.
Not that I became a ballet dancer, but I saw how magnificent professional theatre could be. By a happy coincidence, the most celebrated, commercially successful Christmas show in NYC was also produced by the great titan of twentieth Century ballet. I venture to say any kid with artistic ambitions who had the momentous fortune to see this ballet at an early age was forever changed. I still vividly remember the ballet’s two children peeping though the key-hole trying to see the great Christmas tree. And then there was the theatrical coup as the painted scrim of the door dissolved through and we could see the guests actually trimming the tree. Amazing!
When I returned to my rehearsal room—bedroom--I knew I had to move on. Out were the tacky, under-rehearsed Broadway numbers with the amateurs from the block. Sorry Denise, sorry, Suzie. I needed professionals. Luckily, Elise Brodsky, a girl in my first grade class was already taking ballet lessons and when I suggested a full-length production of the Nutcracker with a cast of two, she jeteéd at the chance.
Unfortunately, this production never came off and I learned a valuable lesson that would hold me in good stead over the years. Stars are different. Stars are temperamental. Stars want things. Elise and I easily divided up the solos in the ballet: she would be the Sugar Plum Fairy, I would be the Mouse King, she would be Marie, I would be Fritz. But when it came to the Candy Cane dance, we reached an impasse. She wanted it and I wanted it too. In fact, I had already cut my hula-hoop in half so I could do the jumpy bit over the multi-striped candy cane.
No matter what I did or how I pleaded, Elise wanted to dance that Variation. I offered more money, better billing, the final curtain call, all the things that you learn to do early in the game. Still no movement. Negotiations collapsed. So, I did what any budding entrepreneur had to do: I cancelled the production. Artistic differences.
It was back to Broadway for me. Back to Mary Martin and the toilet paper wigs for Washing That Man Out Of My Hair. Back to real show business. And when my parents bought me a 60’s style tree-lamp reading light with three adjustable lights for studying, I knew I was right where I belonged. If I took a white sheet off my bed and painted a doorway on it, and if the tree light was positioned just right, we almost had a bleed-through effect. This wasn’t a game. This was theatre.
