"If I Read Your Play, Will You Promise To Stop Writing Them?"

This is my third year reviewing submissions for a playwrights' residency program in NY. Every year I wait excitedly for my packet of plays to arrive in a giant manilla envelope. Then, every year my smile slackens upon reading the first line of the first play, wherein I remember that 4,999 out of every 5,000 un-represented (by agent) play submissions are horrendously un-readable. But I must read on, constrained by my commitment (and paycheck) to read every single word on every single unnecessary page. By play number four I remember why I stopped working in theater Literary departments: You thought retail was soul-killing? Try spending day after day reading people's open-hearted, dream-filled, creative offerings and thinking to yourself, "Sir/Madam, you are entirely deluded in thinking you have a career in play-writing; rarely (actually quite frequently) have I encountered a text so devoid of talent or promise."

It's only slightly less depressing than watching SAG-enforced open auditions.

But in the end, I get a little bit of cash, a little boost to my inner-critic-ego, and a nostalgic (is it truly in the past or just on pause?) return to theatre work.

Here's some quotes from my reviews:
(And no, the playwrights do not read these- just the selection committee- I'm not that mean)

"A flat and tired treatment of an unoriginal narrative, this play fails to be believable in either characterization or action."

"[The] themes fail to take shape either in character interaction or in the language/imagery of the piece. The metaphors appear but never take on meaning."

"This play appears more an exercise in dramatic theory than an expression of creative vision."

"The repetition and gestures that are the primary substance of the play appear only as attempts at avant-garde, rather than embodiment of the dramatic tension. "

"A sentimental and melodramatic story spread thin by too many dramatic questions."

"Hackneyed and derivative ex-lover scenario with tinges of detective drama a-la 'Murder She Wrote'."

Time To Say Goodbye (Imagine this in an insipid Sarah Brightman voice)

Ian is moving to New York on Monday morning to start Columbia's MFA prgram for dramaturgy. Ian's parting is significant for me in many ways, not the least of which being that for 3 years, he's been the one person I could really talk shop with here in Seattle as far as theatre/collaboration/avant garde/narrative studies/crazy theatre patrons/crazy actors/and all the other things that marked my life before moving to Seattle. Not that I don't have great conversation partners here, but Ian felt like the place where I didn't have to do any translating about what the last ten years of my life have been about. With him leaving, I almost feel like Im losing my last link to New York. Which is ironic, since he's moving to NY.

But Ian leaving is also- as far as I can remember at all, the first significant time where I am the friend being left, not the friend leaving. All my partings have been me moving on to new adventures, or all of us friends in mass departure from college or something. I've never known Seattle, or Intiman Theatre more specifically, without Ian. I have no idea what it will be like without him. No idea how to prepare for that.

But at least we're doing a pretty good job with the saying goodbye part. Sunday, after the closing matinee of Othello, we raced over to Palomino via the monorail, whilst making a quick stop at the FunForest roller-coaster. As Ian is a crazy theme park fanatic, it felt appropriate that we ride at least one roller-coaster together before he departs. After tasty cocktails and wood-fired pizzas, we still had an hour to kill before revisiting Star Trek at the downtown Regal. Ian still had some GameWorks credits, so we journeyed into the darkened depressing depths of the arcade land to play some shooting/driving/dancing/tossing games. It was hilarious. After the movie, (which is like an amusement park in and of itself) I couldn't believe all the random entertainments we'd encountered in downtown Seattle. Felt more like a day at Six Flags. Love it.

We've been doing more celebrating since Sunday, but I'll do a separate post, otherwise no one will read it. Long posts = inevitable non-readership. But oh, last night was so blog-worthy!

No, We Do Not Make Mojitos...

...but we do come up with clever cocktail tie-ins for every production.

Here's the batch from the last two shows at Intiman. The next show, which opens in two weeks, is gonna have cucumber martinis! My idea! (followed by collaboration on the recipe of course)

The Clown Car
Patrón Silver tequila
Rose’s Lime Juice
Splash of Sweet & Sour
Shaken and served up with a lime
(it's kind of a Tequila Gimlet)

The Chippermunkie
Maker’s Mark bourbon
Disaronno amaretto
Dash of bitters
Shaken and served on the rocks
Top with club soda
Garnish with lemon wedge and cherry

The Green-Eyed Monster
Bacardi white rum
Midori melon liquor
Pineapple juice
Shaken and served on the rocks
Garnish with a cherry

The Strawberry Handkerchief
Smirnoff Strawberry Twist vodka
Crème de Cacao
Dash of Campari
Cream
Shaken and served up
Garnish with a white chocolate truffle

This last drink was a victory.
(Side note- I came up with the name for this one before we had a recipe) We've been trying to get rid of Campari for two seasons- it tastes like a combo of grapefruit peel and gasoline- but one bartender had an ingenious thought: Campari is bitter- so is coffee- what do we put in coffee? Cream- why not try Campari and cream?
It was magical. We were already serving the Strawberry Handkerchief with the vodka, liqueur and cream- but when we added Campari, it made the drink not only more subtle and herbal tasting, but it turned the drink pink! Ideal for something named after strawberries.

Feel free to try these at home. The Chippermunkie is quite nice.

I Never Really Blog About Theatre...

...mostly because it's such a small world and one negative comment can easily make it back to the person you're talking about, and I'm not really into that. I've had to spend years working on my ability to speak respectfully of shows I hate, whether its because I'm giving an usher speech, or because someone close to me was involved, or because I need people to come to it so I can keep my job. (Don't get me started on my Bob Saget days...) Now, off the job and in un-influential circles however, you may may find me ranting with vehemence and sometimes, tears. I recently saw a show that was so insulting to my intelligence that I walked out after 40 minutes, and kept my eyes closed for 30 of those minutes...But anyway, my modus operandi with theatre tends to be internet silence rather than critique. It's just too small a world.

But I recently got an email from my friend Garth, about a show he'd just seen. I was so touched by his instinct to tell me about it, not to mention my wish that I could beam back to NY to see it, that I thought I'd repost it here. So, here's a little theatre blog- by proxy.

Email:
I wanted to tell you about a show I saw that I think you would really have loved. It was called "The Success of Failure (Or the Failure of Success)" by Cynthia Hopkins, the third installment of the Accidental Nostalgia trilogy. Maybe you saw one of the first two installments of the trilogy at St. Ann's Warehouse when you lived here. I had seen the second one, which was okay (musically exiciting but theatrically a little thin), but this show was one of the most succesful pieces of theatre I've seen in ages. Act I: a one-woman space opera about a suicidally depressed, alcoholic space pilot who is sent on a mission to save the earth. In the end she has to destroy the earth in order to save allow a race of super-sentient beings to escape the universe, which is collapsing. Act II was Cynthia Hopkins explaining with heartwrenching honesty how her own battles with alcoholism and depression led her to make this trilogy of shows. Normally I'm not a big fan of confessional, one-person shows but she was such a completely frank, engaging performer, with something important to say, and she shared of her spirit so generously that I fell completely in love. The show also included a lot of high-tech multimedia elements, not normally something I'm a fan of in live theatre, but she used them so well, and in a manner so clearly in service of the story she was telling that it worked.

In both the space-opera act and the confessional act, Hopkins portrayed the way depression and despair feed off of stories and ideas both personal and cosmological. In the end, she didn't tie it up with a bow: we're left with the sense that she's hopeful about having found a new way of being in the world, but without a simplistic portrait of a solution or a quick fix for all her problems.

More than anything, I was left wanting keenly to be more alive, inspired to be, to do and to feel more, which is exactly what I want from theatre.

You should google accidental nostalgia trilogy to find the website with some clips from the show.
XO,

Garth

Go To This

Urban Hymnal

And They Spelled My Name Right Too!

Okay, this post is going to be grossly self-aggrandizing (but isn't that what blogs are anyway?), but you see, I was bored and so I plugged my name into Amazon.com's book search and tada! found myself in two published books. Yes- me, actually me. This cracks me up! Admittedly, I knew about one of them and own a copy of it, but the other was quite a surprise.
















While these books are basically just lists of programs, it's still fun to find oneself in print unexpectedly. Now if only I could find myself at the Kennedy Center Honors...unexpectedly. My aspirations are humble.

Crime & Punishment Cocktails

It's a new season at Intiman, which means a new selection of show-themed cocktails. Wasn't hard to guess what we'd name the cocktails for the current production of Crime and Punnishment.

The Crime
Muddled lime and blood orange
Mandarin Orange Vodka
Triple Sec
Spalsh of Sour Mix
Shake and serve up
Drop 1 count of Sloe Gin
garnish with slice of blood orange






The Punishment
Vodka
Gin
Dark Creme de Cacao
Shake and serve up
Drizzle chocaloate syrup into martini glass








Also- "interesting" new marketing tool. Here's a teaser trailer that's being shown in select local movie theatres.

"We Don't Develop Plays. WE DO THEM"

Just got Invivted to THIS. It's days like this that I miss New York.

Welcome Wagon Not Welcome Here

Fellow MHGSer Luke Abernathy posted a review of 'The Welcome Wagon" on The Other Journal's blog roll. Luke is a prolific and acutely discerning music reviewer- and I totally respect his take on the album- but totally disagree. Here's my response to the uber-annoying, soggy saltine of an album: Welcome to the Welcome Wagon.I wish I could agree with you Luke- I found the Sufjanesque-ness painfully pretentiously precious. It's hard to imagine this album having taken eight years. It's sounds mannered and unconvincing- the musical equivalent of frat guys wearing plaid and Buddy Holly glasses to look unkempt and indie. it just feels like it's aping a style. While the fact that hypothetically it isn't fake because of the relationship and collaboration with Sufjan- it's really my whole Mamm Mia dilemma- i love ABBA too much to have it musical theaterized. I love Sufjan Stevens too much to have him poorly duplicated- even if he's a part of the duplication. (Benny and Bjorn from ABBA were part of their own duplication too- doesn't make it okay).

Open Bar

Some blurry pictures of tonight's open bar event. I love tag-teaming with Ian. If it wasn't for these dishes, I'd be THIS much closer to finishing tonight's all nighter. Oh well, mama needs the cash.

My Constant Dilemma Haiku

Bad art makes me so
irritable. More so when
they all think its good.

My Weekend Study Space

I'll be saying goodbye to doing homework between shows (and during act 1) at Intiman as my homework for 2008 is pretty much done and Intiman won't reopen again until half way through Spring term 2009. Now I'll get to resort to my non homework activity at this location: eating a cheeseburger from Dick's Drive In and listening to "This American Life" while waiting for the coffee brewer to rev up before the matinee. I love my various Intiman routines.

Today's bartender special: engaging issues of orality in the gospel of Mark.

And I love my various Intiman people.
I enjoy provoking Chase! (Sorry Ian, no cute pictures of you on hand)

Intermission pre-orders. What a lovely spectrum of artificial coloring a la DeKuyper.

Walking Back into Barnes & Noble

I have for years idetified myself as someone who avoids buying books at Barnes & Noble. I've probably forgotten most of the reasons why I don't "support" them, but its probably that general stuff about how they're ruining the publishing industry and killing local booksellers kind of thing. In true uninformed-hypocritical fashion, however, I purchase all my books and DVDs from Amazon.com. Nonetheless, I try not to pour too much money into the B&N vacuum.

But I found myself the other day killing time at a Barnes & Noble that opened near my house. I have to admit, it was a surprisingly pleasant expereince. First, I perused 2009 calendars, and opted for a poster style calendar of vivd Japenese woodcuts. Runners up were the vintage postcards from Italy and Paris. I failed to buy a 2008 calendar, last year and as a result, have had not one but two 2007 calendars hanging in my room on the December page since, well, December 2007. I want to avoid that next year.

Then i went in search of Sarah Vowell's new release "The Wordy Shipmates," another of her whimsically ironic, rigourously researched examinations in American History, in this case, the Mayflower. On the way, a paperback on a new release display caught my eye. I recognized Edward Hopper's "Rooms By the Sea" wrapping around the front of a book and looked closer to find that it was actually the paperback release of a former professor of mine's memoir. I've had Allen Shawn's Wish I Could Be There: Notes on a Phobic Life on my wishlist for awhile, and was stoked to see the paperback sitting right there, looking engaging and well-marketed. I studied music composition with Allen, and also rank seeing the play he composed and co-wrote with his brother Wallace Shawn as one of my top ten most enjoyable nights in the theatre. Did I grab that book and purchase it? No, I updated my amazon wishlist to have the paperback instead of the hardcover.

What did I buy? Um, well, after six different people offered to let me borrow their copy of Twilight but never remembered to bring it, I caved an just bought a copy. I figure I might have lots of snarky or celebratory comments to write in the margins.

Then last of all, at the checkout counter, I was asked if I wanted to purchase a book for a charity book drive. They had three options. One was some generic looking juvenile fantasy novel, one was an Aztec-themed Choose Your Own Adventure, and the other was Oliver Button Is A Sissy by Tomie dePaola. This is one of the best children's books in existence, and I was happy to add $7 to my purchase so that a kid somewhere can have their own copy of it.
Overall, I didn't feel too awful about the money I spent at the Mega Bookstore.

Perfectly Timed for my BDay...

...the arrival of a check from these folks for whom I've had the honor to do some project help the last two years. Having left New York in 2006, I can't help feeling warm and fuzzy to still be depositing Off-Broadway paychecks. All my love to the Public crew! Say hello to the largest Starbucks in Manhattan for me.
Also in the mail, my voting ballot. Here's hoping third times the charm with presidential elections- the last two had address snafus that left my votes uncounted. I could have changed history...

From Script to Cocktail

Every five weeks or so, my 3 fellow Intiman Theatre bartenders and our beloved supervisor set about concocting cocktails to tie-in thematically with whatever play is happening next. It's both a time to cull dramatic themes and important sound bites from scripts, and to think about what liquors we want to get rid of because no one ever buys them (Drambuie anyone?)

So in honor of tonight's Act One efforts at creating a red/white/blue layered drink and the unfotunately awful tasting "Dirty Politician" martini for the upcoming "All the Kings Men," here's the Show Specialty Drinks from the last two seasons. We were proud of many of these, and just plain stumped for some of them. **-indicate where I either came up with the name, the recipe, or both.
In backwards chronological order:

The Little Dog Laughed
"The Golden Boy"**
Brandy
Coconut Rum
Triple Sec
Orange Juice
Shaken and served on the rocks with a sugared lemon wedge

"The Little Pink Lie"
Rasberry Vodka
Triple Sec
Shaken and served up with a splash of Sprite and a maraschino cherry
--tag line we wanted to use since the drink is clear but tastes very fruity- "Looks clear, tastes Queer" I think Doug Carter Beane could appreciate that.

A Streetcar Named Desire
"the Stella!"**
Bourbon
Couintreau
bitters
soda
served on the rocks with a lemon

"the Kindness of Strangers"
Southern Comfort
Chambord
Sour mix
served up with a lime
(Ian, correct me if I'm wrong on this one)

Namaste Man
"The Kathmandu"**
Gin
Amaretto
Peach Schnapps
bitters
Orange Juice
shaken and served on the rocks with a lemon

"The Big Apple"
Vodka
Bourbon
Pucker
Cranberry Juice
served up with a lime

The Diary of Anne Frank
For obvious reasons, we opted to do "spring" themed drinks instead of "the Daiquiri of Anne Frank" as some suggested...
"Sky King"
Tequila
Blue Curacao
Grapefruit Juice
served up with a twist

"Emerald City"
Rum
Midori
Pineapple Juice
Shaken and served on the rocks with a cherry

To Kill a Mockingbird
"Lemon Blossom"
Gin
Triple Sec
Muddled Lemon
confectioner's sugar
bitters
Served up with a lemon

"Tequila Mockingbird"
Tequila
Chambord
Cranberry Juice
Muddled Lime
served on the rocks with a lime

A Prayer For My Enemy
"The Truth"
Vodka
Chambord
soda
served on the rocks with a lime



"The Consequences"
Bourbon
Coinreau
Cranberry Juice
Muddled Lemon
served up with a lemon

Uncle Vanya
"The Forrest"**
Creme de Menthe
Creme de Cacao
creme
shaken and served on the rocks

"The Vanya"
Russian Vodka
Black rasberry liqueur
muddled lime
served up with a lime

The Skin of Our Teeth

"The Muse"
Bourbon
Grand Marnier
Sour Mix
muddled lemon
shaken over ice, topped with Ginger Ale, served with a lemon

"The Flood"
Gin
Blue Curacao
Peach Schnapps
muddled lemon
served up with a twist

And every year for Black Nativity at Christmas, we do the same three things. Egg Nog with brandy, Hot Chocolate with Baileys, and "The Poinsettia" which is some awful combo of cranberry juice, grenadine, and some liquor I can't remember, served up with a sugared rim.



If you want to find out what we choose for All the King's Men, you'll have to stop by. We're just dying to get rid of some Campari!

In Memory

I came home to find an email in my inbox tonight announcing that Priscilla Allen had died. Most of you won't recognize her name (but once explained, might recognize her face). Priscilla was an important and beloved actor in the San Diego theater community. It didn't matter which of the major theaters you subscribed to, you would eventually see Priscilla onstage, and when you saw Priscilla, you never forgot her.

But Priscilla (or Ms. Allen as I knew her) was also a teacher. In fact, when I left elementary school and headed to the San Diego School of Performing Arts back in 1993, it was Ms Allen who, for some reason, let little seventh grade me into her Technical Theater class, which was suppposed to be for sophemores and up. It seems funny when I think about it, that my main school experience with Priscilla was a tech theater class, since neither she (nor I) are known for our set designs or lighting plots. But the chance to be in that class, with people who seemed 20 years older than me (but were actually only 4 grades apart), reading plays by Athol Fugard and having assignments that let my imagination run wild in tangible ways, rooted me in a sense of my own creative expression that I think few people get to give voice to by the age of thirteen. Many of the ideas generated in that class became foundational for how I think about storytelling, symbolism, metaphor and the social contexts of art.

But more than all those big words, I believe that Ms Allen letting little Kj into that class, gave Then, Now and Future Kj the freedom (and propensity) to follow my own inclinations and intuitions regarding my education and passions. I never do things in the right order, and my interdisciplinary DNA always leads me to the strangest combination of things, that when left to a standard course rotation, might never emerge. Meaning? Ms. Allen bent the rules for me, and I've been bending them for myself ever since. I'm grateful for mark she put on me and how i think about learning and art. I was honored to learn from her, and always felt giddy with pride when seeing her perform locally. (She might be the first actor I ever waited by a green room door to greet after a show- a very big deal at the time).

Priscilla passed away with her family with her, and she leaves behind a community of friends, co-workers, artists, students and audiences that loved her bawdy, sonorous, witty and passionate presence in our lives. Since to the rest of the world, Priscilla Allen is known as the "Fat Lady" in Total Recall who is actually Arnold Schwarzenegger in disguise. I don't know if her name will pop up in any random blogs as sometimes happens when "That Guy From..." or "The Lady Who..." passes away, but as much fun as she had with her odd and memorable stand outs both in film and onstage, I'm glad that she always had audiences to play for, scenery to chew, and a community that truly valued her.

Thanks Ms. Allen

What I Carry Around With Me

I'm headed out to replace my last pair of jeans which died last night. here's what I pulled out of my back pocket before trashing them.

1) Seattle International Film Festival voting ballot
2) Movie Stub from "Mysteries of Pittsburgh" SIFF
3) Movie Stub from "Iron Man" AMC
4) Movie Stub from "Forgetting Sarah Marshall" The Big Picture
5) Movie Stub from "Indian Jones..." Majestic Bay
6) Play Stub from "Namaste Man" Intiman Theatre
7) Receipt from Mcdonanlds where I finished my gift card from Niegel on which he wrote:

8) A fortune cookie fortune that reads

Pick Axes, Film Reviews and the Taste of Skittles; OR: Another Post That's So Long No One Will Read It

Like Marcel Proust and his madeleine cookie, I often find myself winding down a crazy stairwell of thought sparked from one brief flash of a memory. But before I track one of my recent brainswrirls, I wanted to post my teeny tiny review of the film that initiated the trail. I rarely put anything resembling film reviews on my blog even though I can hardly breathe without spouting an opinion on the strengths or weaknesses of at least eight films. I think putting my praise or criticism into writing on something even as casual as my blog, just seems too inviting to being held accountable for my opinions. Though I've always been a critic of sorts, I've never wanted to be in a position where what I write could have an effect on someone's career. I've spent too long working in theaters where one bad review would mean not only the actors playing to half-filled houses, but all the rest of us losing weeks of work when the show closed early, whether or not the play was bad. So, even though I know neither I nor my blog have enough influence to alter box office sales based on a bad review, it's still pretty ingrained in me to keep a civil tongue when it comes to specific critiques of some things in the public sphere.

BUT! For some reason, Facebook has made it easy for me to write quick little movie blurbs, and I've found that very helpful. I want to be able to better integrate how I talk about things with how I express myself in writing. After all, when it all comes down to it, I just want to get paid to watch movies and theater, then write creatively about them. So why not practice it a bit? And I guess that's the difference. My interest in writing about entertainment and performing art isn't to tell people to go or not go see something, but rather, to engage the ideas expressed and look at the art in a larger cultural context. That said, I didn't exactly do that with my little review of Paul Thomas Anderson's new film "There Will Be Blood" based on Upton Sinclair's "Oil!", but I wanted to stick it on here anyway, so here it is:

"Hard to know what to make of this impressively intense but (purposefully?) disorienting film: if you've seen the trailer- you've basically seen the movie- just extend it to 3 hours. This isn't necessarily a critique- the trailer shows in one minute all the chaos, avarice, blood lust and frenetic personalities that populate this hitchcockianly claustrophobic film about Money and competition. But though there should be some obvious contemporary correlation with this turn of the century tale of Oil and Blood, the character portraits are so heavily drawn that it's hard to find themes or people to identify with. The artistry is bold and bracing, (as is Day-Lewis) but overall, this might be one of those films that takes a few viewings over a few years to ripen into understandable and enjoyable film-making. A definite departure from Anderson's previous emotionally wrought films about broken people in a dysfunctional world. Hard to find the heart in this one. Maybe it's just too Upton Sinclair..."

So there's that. But the small and random thing I actually wanted to post about was a weird revelation I had during the movie. The first minutes of the film show Daniel Day Lewis mining, or at least digging, for quartz of something. It's a stressful scene where any moment, you're expecting wood beams to crack or dynamite to cause a cave in. That had me musing briefly on the horrible reality of a miner's life and how I recently found out that a large chunk of my ancestors were Pennsylvania coal miners which made me think of Johnny Cash's live Folsom prison rendition of "Dark as a Dungeon", which then suddenly brought the taste of skittles and pretzels to mind and triggered the memory of working in my strange little cubicle in NY's East Village at the Worldwide Orphans Foundation where I would enter donor information all day while listening to Johnny Cash with my headphones and eating skittles and sourdough pretzels that I would buy at the Astor Place K-Mart. So I'm now faced with the strange reality that Johnny Cash songs taste like skittles, and I might not have cognated that without the help of P.T. Anderson.

And that's really all I wanted to say.

How Paul Simon Taught Me To Sing My Future...

I, like many of you post-Gen-Xers, grew up listening to Paul Simon's "Graceland" album. It's an album (perhaps the album) that I recall as a constant in memories from various parts of my life, from being a kindergartner singing along to it with my brother while being driven to our grandparent's trailer on a Minnesota lake, to the nerdy kid on my bus in fifth grade who brought a boombox everyday so that all of us could listen to it on the forty-five minute bus ride to our magnet school, to singing along on a walkman in high school, to a friend in college requesting that we not listen to it on the drive to New York city. No matter how far back I go, "Graceland" is there, and I'm singing along.

Well, that's what made it all the more shocking the other week when someone explained a lyric to me that I had never connected the dots to. In the song "That Was Your Mother" which is a zydeco hybrid, I'd always assumed every street and building reference in the song was about New Orleans. This was in a no way a stretch of the mind, since the second refrain says "I'm standing on the corner of Lafayette, state of Louisiana..."

As I was standing with Garth, in NY, around Astor Place across the street from the building we'd worked in together over a year ago, which sits next door to The Public Theatre, he quoted the first verse of the song (which I've known the words to since I was at least six) where it says:

"Well I'm standing on the corner of Lafayette, across the street from the Public, headed down to the Lonestar Cafe..."

It was like footlights exploded in front of me or something. There we were, standing on the corner of Lafayette, across the street from the Public, a few blocks up from what was once the Lonestar cafe. How many times had I stood on that corner, coming back from Staples, passing Philip Seymour Hoffman and Liev Schreiber taking smoke breaks in front of the Public Theater, then lugging bags up the fourth floor to our wacky non-profit cubicle? How many millions of times had I sung that lyric, without ever considering that the song was partially about New York? It was spooky and freaky and surprising and awesome. It may not seem like that big of a deal, but at that moment, it was this realization that I'd spent my childhood unknowingly singing about a place I would spend a large chunk of my life. And not just the city, but singing about a specific spot on a specific sidewalk of a specific street in a specific city. That is just too crazy. And I only learned of the connection once I had moved away from New York. I'm just glad the revelation came while I was standing there on Lafayette at least. (You know, where the Walgreens is now that used to be the Astor Wines & Spirits that's now across the street by the Public...)

Somebody please agree with me that this realization is cool.