Off With Their Heads

When things don't go as planned, there's always cake.

Mac and I had a date to eat dinner in service of my hired mouth and then get our culture fix with a play. Simple enough.

Except that when we got to the restaurant I was supposed to be reviewing, it wasn't open. Oh, sure, the sign on the door said they were open daily until 10 but it was only 6:30 and the place was locked, closed up tight. The open sign hung dark and unlighted.

Could it have come and gone already?

Rather than ponder what was up, we got right back in the car and made a beeline for old faithful, My Noodle & Bar, and the front treehouse booth, where we both pretended to look at the menu when really, we both knew we'd be ordering the exact same thing we get every time we go. My same old broccoli and chicken and her same old chicken noodle soup.

Mind you, we do it only to make ourselves feel like we're not the creatures of habit that we clearly are. But then, didn't I read somewhere that most people order the exact same thing from their neighborhood Asian restaurant every single time they go?

Perhaps we are not so pathetic as I thought.

When my food arrived, it seemed somehow more meager a portion than it typically is, a fact confirmed when Mac looked across the table and asked, "Isn't that a smaller serving than usual?"

I know, I know, size shouldn't matter, but when you're hungry, it does. And it wasn't just me because once Mac got busy with her meal, she looked up with disappointment. "There's only one fish ball instead of two," she complained and as the resident chicken noodle soup expert, I didn't doubt she was correct.

Rather than focus on the failings of our favorite dishes, I suggested we adjourn to Garnett's to share a piece of cake and make everything better again, an easy sell considering even my sweet tooth takes a backseat to Mac's.

The funny part was, after that she told me that in one of the blogs she follows (besides mine, of course), the woman shared that she she avoids sweets. "And she has the most beautiful skin, I guess from not eating sugar," Mac concluded.

Well, we'll just have to make peace with the skin we have because there's no way either of us could be that disciplined. Or even want to, no matter how magnificent our complexions might get. Next topic.

Naming the dessert choices once we got to Garnett's, our server got only as far as "coconut cake with caramel and chocolate ganache" before we both gave her the look and she asked if she should stop right there. Ladies and germs, we have a winner.

Sharing a massive slice, I told Mac that the only way it could have been better was if it had been chocolate coconut cake with caramel and chocolate ganache. She rolled her eyes, so I'm not sure she agreed with me.

From there, it was back to J-Ward to leave the car and hoof it over to the Basement to see 5th Wall's production of "Lizzie, the Musical." Because nothing makes for good show tunes like the tale of a 19th century axe murderer.

Conceived of as a punk rock opera, the play got high marks from both of us for its all female cast (well, if you don't count the band led by the fabulous Starlet Knight, which allowed a couple of men in) and a lesbian love story subplot.

So. Much. Girlpower.

As for what drives Lizzie, that would be Daddy who visits her bedroom and takes what she shouldn't have to give. As if that isn't awful enough, he also kills her beloved birds and leaves them in a bloody sack. Meanwhile her sister is all riled up by their stepmother who has replaced the daughters in her new husband's will.

Knowing all that helps explain a lot when both parents wind up bloodied and dead like the pigeons.

Using mic stands as props they could throw, kick, flip and, yes, even sing into, the four characters - Lizzie Borden, her sister Emma, her lover Alice and the show's highlight, Bridget the Irish maid - pump their fists, flip their hair and generally convey full-on '80s riot grrrl style.

In fact, when Lizzie comes onstage in a red satin bustier and skirt after wielding her axe, intending to destroy evidence by burning her bloody clothes, the feeling is just this side of a #MeToo moment. Here is a woman who has zero shits to give.

That she's ultimately acquitted of the crime felt particularly satisfying given the years she'd had to suffer in silence. Because the more things change, the more they stay the same. Kudos, 5th Wall, for choosing such a timely topic.

Murder, girls kissing and coconut cake. What more can you ask of a Wednesday night girl date?

Who's on First

Industry is in the eye of the beholder.

Sure, technically I'm not an actor or director and I don't design costumes, sound or light, but that didn't stop me from getting tickets for "Hand to God" at the Basement on Industry night. If anything, I chose this stormy Tuesday evening to see a co-production by TheatreLab and 5th Wall partly because I knew I'd see so many familiar stage faces in the audience.

And in my usual Luddite manner, I went to the see the 2015 Tony award-nominated best new play with absolutely no clue what it was about, nor any sense of how lewdly and furiously funny a dark comedy that includes puppet orgasms could be. Because, really, being a heathen and all, how could I not be sucked in by a play about a demonic puppet at a Lutheran bible school in Texas?

My J-boy and I walked over in a steady rain under a large umbrella, only to be told by artistic director Deejay Gray that he couldn't guarantee that the Basement wouldn't flood during tonight's performance because, "Well, it's a basement."

That's truth talk right there because I'd arrived home from Norfolk just as the second round of thunderstorms hit Jackson Ward and my basement was already under a couple inches of water. Still is.

From the front row, we had such an up close and personal view of the stage - set up to look like a church basement - that I didn't even need my glasses for most of it. Now that's proximity.

Looking at the set before the play began, I focused on the centerpiece of it, a puppet stage labeled "Christcateers," wondering what Jesus and sock puppets could possibly have in common. Meanwhile, the non-Christian next to me commented that the set confirmed every scary thought he'd ever had about church basements, although he guessed it was Catholic and I knew with certainty that it was Protestants of some sort.

I happen to know that Catholic church basements are a different kind of crazy.

And now I've learned that some crazy Protestants actually do use puppets as part of their Christian ministry, which only adds to a friend's religious dating theory (something about avoiding Protestant men because passion isn't their strong suit), and further solidifies my place in the heathen world.

"Hand to God" was riveting from the opening prologue of a green puppet sharing his thoughts on how mankind went from "rutting as we chose, careless in the night" to making rules about doing bad things, which included inventing the concept of the devil.

As a card-carrying heathen, I don't have to worry about that.

The entire cast was strong, none more so than Adam Turck as shy, insecure Jason, the unfortunate teen with Tyrone, the puppet, on his hand, who loudly and stridently voiced the evil puppet by biting off syllables, popping his every "p" and "t" and terrifying everyone around him. What fascinated me was that even though he mouthed Tyrone's words with no attempt to conceal where it was coming from, my eyes were glued to how convincing that puppet was every time he spoke.

That's right, I could have been looking at the actor dramatically saying Tyrone's lines but instead couldn't tear myself from watching a green sock with red hair inches from his face. This really wasn't your Sesame Street kind of puppet, though it was some top notch puppeteering.

What made a play about a demonic puppet so continuously laugh-out-loud funny was the dead serious nature of the topics covered in the story: sexual repression ("I don't want to be good anymore") and religious hypocrisy (a minister talking about his "needs" to a grieving widow), alcoholism and death, depression and repression.

But where it truly resonated was in its peek into the divided soul of Everyman, with its constant battle between good and evil. You don't even have to be a crazy Christian to know what I'm talking about.

Every member of the five person cast shone, from the confused and horny Margery assuredly and hilariously played by Kimberly Jones, to the surprisingly sexual confidence of quiet Jessica as portrayed by Anne Michelle Forbes. Adam Valentine, whose work I'd admired in "Heathers the Musical," again grabbed my attention playing the sullen Timothy with bravado, sardonic humor and in one scene, in his underwear. Fred Iacovo managed to transition from a skeevy minister hitting on Margery to the only one strong enough to stand up to the bastard puppet, no easy shift.

Which is all a long, rambling way of saying that I can't imagine a darker or more clever take on raw family dysfunction and religious hypocrisy, much less one where I was doubled over laughing so much.

As for all the screaming sex scenes - puppets as well as humans - well, bras coming off and skirts being pushed up were just icing on the industry night cake.

Damn, Richmond, your theater game is stellar.

Be Good or Be Gone

I can thank 5th Wall Theatre for teaching me that I don't like moon pies.

Pru might be inclined to point out that our pre-theater dinner at Rogue might have had something to do with it and she'd likely be right. If we hadn't eaten through three courses, we may have had a teensy bit more room to enjoy the southern disks of tastelessness.

Since it was St. Patrick's Day and since we knew there would be all kinds of unpleasant drunken revelry going on all over town, from the moment she picked me up, we resolved to stay in Jackson Ward for the entire evening.

Better safe than face to face with a drunk in a green t-shirt.

Rogue was a bastion of understated cool on a Saturday night, allowing us to score two end bar stools and, once Pru had cooed over the plush new bar stools, complete with backs, glasses of a white Riojas.

Some people would be ashamed to admit that they ordered two of the same dishes as they'd had on their last visit, but I'm not one of them. That first time had been with Beau and not Pru, so why wouldn't I want to introduce her to a couple of dishes we'd fallen for on our maiden voyage?

If I were ever to meet a person who purported to hate carrots (thankfully, I have not), I would take them immediately to  Rogue and order the charred carrots. Then I would sit there to watch the revelation on their face as they learned what carrots' potential can be in the right hands. Cooked to al dente perfection, these multi-colored beauties are bathed in citrus, ginger and soy, with peanuts added for crunch. Cue angels singing.

Fact: I will no doubt have them the next time I go to Rogue, too. No shame.

Beets topped with greens and chevre was every bit as solid as last time and for something new, we tried the russet potato gnocchi in bolognese sauce, the rich meat sauce aided and abetted by the runny egg  and bits of Parmesan on top.

This leads to a discussion because I'm of the opinion that gnocchi is better than pasta and Pru tried to make a case for pasta. But when I point out that if you want pasta and they don't have it, you'll probably eat gnocchi instead and be happy. But if you're looking forward to gnocchi? Pasta probably isn't going to do the trick. At least that's how we saw it.

How we saw "Pump Boys and Dinettes" was from the front row (there were only two) of the Basement, arriving as the two dinettes (servers in a diner) were offering coffee and Moon Pies to those in the front row. A woman two seats down scored a cup of coffee and later was offered a slice of actual pie. For the record, she ate every bite, but only after feeding her husband the first one. Ain't love grand?

What I got offered was a Moon Pie and naturally I accepted it since it looked chocolate to me. Heaven knows, it only took one bite to determine that it tasted like what I imagined the wrapper it came in would have tasted like. Plastic-tasting chocolate, stale, almost chewy marshmallow and bone-dry graham crackers ensured that my first bite would be my last.

Happily, "Pump Boys and Dinettes" was far more pleasurable, with a litany of feel-good songs dealing with the problems that come with being a garage or diner worker: love, food and jobs, not to mention drinking. Who doesn't put on their drinking shoes occasionally?

The waitresses uniforms were perfection: orange, blue and white, right down to the buttons, with an apron for good measure, just like a proper HoJo server would have on so she'd have a place to stash her order book.

A lot of the fun of the musical was that the four actors playing the pump boys played their own instruments, although watching the Dinettes play pots, pans and the counter was pretty darn impressive, too.

During the moving song "Mamaw," I spotted a guy in the second row mouthing every single word to the song. He was part of a large group who'd come in, all in blue blazers and khakis, and while I'd resorted to making rich white people jokes, Pru had pegged them for a men's glee club. She's brilliant like that.

It was the kind of play where you walked out, not feeling like your worldview had been changed in any way, but confident that you'd been solidly entertained by talented people for a couple of hours.

As for the green beer squad, we never so much as laid eyes on them. As usual, J-Ward for the win.

Branded By Love

Love: because that's what friends discuss for hours whilst sitting on a screened porch on a 50-degree November night.

And it wasn't just that it was comfortable enough out there, what with heaters and wraps, it was the 99% humidity under a soft-focus moon that sealed the deal. In fact, it had been noted that the clouds were hanging at street level when we'd left Club Infusion and its disco ball for a porch party conversation.

Nothing deep, just acknowledging the nature of attraction and defining quality in a relationship, an impossible task because it varies so much from person to person, even within a relationship, much less among a trio of playgoers sprawled on a porch sipping Rose while listening to the steady drip of a nearby gutter.

Communication necessarily came up and Pru posited that, "Men don't want the banana all the way in," which is in no way a quixotic euphemism and instead refers to guys who are able to tune out what their partner is saying, sometimes even while appearing to listen.

We saw that when a man is paying attention, he may participate using laments, such as Beau vainly trying to convince us that before he met Pru, he was the funny one.

"No," she said firmly and with utter disdain, followed quickly by disbelief. "I don't know why you'd think that?" But what do we know? Pru's an only child and I have five sisters, so perhaps we just never learned that all men think they're funny whether their humor supports that or not.

Tonight's topic - and its tangents - had presented itself via 5th Wall's engaging production of "Murder Ballad," which had three big things going for it: major talent, a story that was entirely sung with no dialog, and that it unfolded in an actual bar. Since we went into the play knowing there'd be a murder, one of the most compelling aspects was the ever-building tension around who would die.

At issue in "Murder Ballad" was whether or not a person can live with a simply comfortable relationship after leaving one that involved true passion. If the love of Sara's life is Tom, could she ever be truly happy with Michael? Discuss.

Perhaps most importantly, if two people who truly love each other break up, do they ever stop loving each other or trying to get back together? This was Sara and Tom's problem.

Don't ask how long
We're built for longing
Don't ask how long
Cause every answer's wrong
You and me
Are made for wanting

According to Pru, it was all a moot point because, as she pointed out, not everyone is interested in love, herself included.

From there we tried to parse the elements of attraction, discussing whether love and passion are part of a whole or separate components of a relationship. Beau made a case for the passion of an early relationship being impossible to sustain and, thus, why bother attempting love at all?

On a porch or at a restaurant - we'd begun at Peter Chang's with dinner and a bottle of the divine Domaine Paul Cherrier Sancerre Rose - the three of us make good sparring partners on the topic of romance because of our composition: two who don't believe in love and one who does. It makes for lively discussion since at this stage of life, no one's opinion is going to be changed, no matter how compelling the argument.

Someone made a case for the sentiment seen expressed on a middle-aged woman's tramp stamp at a bar: "Ain't Nobody's Old Lady," naturally tattooed in Old English script for effect and raising an eternal question. Why in 2017 do women still want to be thought of as somebody's partner?

Don't look to me for answers. If I knew, I wouldn't wake up at 4 a.m. so often to mull it over.

We hadn't gone into the well-acted "Murder Ballad" expecting it to shape the post-play porch conversation, and yet there we were making our individual cases for what constitutes love and why people behave the way they do within and without the context of relationships. I could buy into "a kiss like a mouth tattoo" reference, while they couldn't. But we didn't have to understand each other's feelings, just accept them.

"I think I've been elevated to consort," Beau observed by the end of the long evening, seemingly pleased with his new status. "You still do the dishes," Pru reminded him, tarnishing his consort crown slightly. It's amazing it even stays on with that banana coming out of his ear.

Some people won't call it love, even when it is. And this from nobody's old lady...minus the tattoo.

A Burden Every Woman Shares

Are all men freaks? Discuss.

Before that became the evening's theme, I played chauffeur and picked Pru up from her manse in Church Hill, where we promptly drove to the Roosevelt for dinner before the heat wilted our enthusiasm.

When asked to pick our poison, we both chose Early Mountain Vineyards Rose (bartender T: "Because it's Summer!") while I regaled Pru and the barkeep with tales from my recent outing to King Family Winery.

Wine on wheels, what's not to like?

Dinner was putty in Summer's hands, with a mixed melon salad with blueberries, bacon and basil under a blanket of burrata, a yellow tomato gazpacho with lump crabmeat, mussels with grilled bread and a special of octopus salad with tomatoes and white anchovies.

The only way it could have been better is if we'd eaten it on a seaside patio and, as far as we knew, no one was offering us that tonight.

When we weren't stuffing our faces (or ruing the continuous stream of people allowing the air conditioning to escape by leaving the door open), Pru and I were waist-deep in girltalk, which is to say I was sharing the glorious improvements in my personal life while she was reminding me how long she's been waiting for me to get a clue.

"I never had your patience," she told me, stating the obvious. It's not a virtue I'm proud of.

We passed on dessert for more Rose before heading down the hill and back up it to the Basement's cool depths for a play about that magical place between heaven and hell: New Jersey.

That's right, tonight was a night for livin' on a prayer.

Taking seats in the second row, we were soon joined by a favorite actor and his companion for the evening and the conversation flowed like we were old friends. And perhaps all theater lovers are. Discussion immediately followed on who'd seen the original 1984 movie "The Toxic Avenger," on which tonight's musical was based.

Well, certainly not me, but naturally Pru (the film omnivore) had, although she couldn't recall a lot about it. As we discussed, that has a lot to do with her coming of age in the '80s and having been a bit too busy living life to make many mental notes.

Once we noticed that it was all '80s music playing, the actor's friend shared that she'd seen REM for $5 at the Metro back in 1982 (the best I could do was REM at the Mosque in '87), as well as the Ramones, although that ticket price escaped her now.

Don't sweat it, honey, a lot about the '80s escapes those of us who lived through those days.

I suppose it's possible that I could have enjoyed "The Toxic Avenger" more than I did, although it would probably have required someone rubbing my neck and shoulders throughout the entire play - including intermission -  to do so. It was that well executed and that much fun.

You're like Mother Theresa, if she was blind and hot.

Although I knew not a thing about the film, I was proud to say I'd seen several Troma films during last year's Troma series at Gallery 5, so I knew to expect the Troma tropes: nudity, horror, severed body parts, high camp and hilarity.

He's gonna jump my bones tomorrow at brunch.

The five-actor cast had the acting and singing skills of ten, whether it was Alexander Sapp as the lovesick environmentalist Melvin (or Toxie himself, with one eyeball perpetually dangling from its socket) or the incomparable Debra Waogoner as both mayor and Melvin's Mom, belting out songs to the rafters, oozing evil or baring her beautiful breasts.

When your face looks deranged, it's hard to get laid.

And don't get me started on the sheer range of Chris Hester as White Dude and William Anderson as Black Dude, who had more costume (and shoe!) changes than Cher. The two of them managed to convey menacing, coy, fey, simple-minded and just about every other type known to wo/man through a string of wig-wearing characters that left the audience in stitches.

So. Much. Cross-dressing.

Love isn't loud at all, it's soft and kind.

Rachel Rose Gilmour won everyone over when she arrived onstage as the stereotypical (and shallow) Jersey girl, complete with low-cut blouse, overly short skirt and a red glitter nail file. Oh, yes, and a probing cane because she was blind, always staring off into the middle distance, a feat unto itself.

If blind people can't love ugly people, who will?

The cast even tossed a bone to theater nerds in attendance when Toxie opened his mouth to roar and the sound didn't match his open mouth. "You ruined it, Joey Luck!" Toxie cried, referencing the much-awarded sound designer in the booth.

The roar that came up instead was laughter from every theater regular in the room.

The beauty of the play was that besides intestines, spleens and ripped off legs, "The Toxic Avenger" was a love story even if it did take place in New Jersey and, as with all good love stories, there were older, wiser women sharing their hard-earned lessons with young Sarah, the blind librarian.

It's been true since the dawn of time
From the Romans to the Greeks
Honey, face it, all mean are freaks, 
Sweetheart, face it, all men are freaks

Find kindness in your female heart
No need to act superior
Men need lots of therapy
Cause they were born inferior

That's wisdom for the ages right there. That it was sung by a mother, a blind girl and two cross-dressing men only proves its universality.

This wise woman is here to tell you that there's nothing wrong with finding kindness in your heart and offering a little therapy.

Let's just say what happens at brunch should stay at brunch.

Faithless and Phoneless

Today's first priority was representing the 5%.

VCU's Real Life Film Series was showing "Mobilize," a documentary about the dangers of cell phone radiation and the difficulty politicians face in trying to pass cautionary legislation to address it. That's how I discovered that 95% of US residents have a cell phone.

Hell, 33% of 11-year olds had their own cell phone and that was in 2010. I'm the last of my breed, I know.

What was fascinating to me was listening to scientists, concerned legislators and researchers explaining that the WHO has put cell phones on their list of carcinogens, that phones must be kept away from the bellies of pregnant women, that men who carry their phones in their front pockets have reduced sperm counts and that the younger children begin playing with a phone the greater their hyperactivity and likelihood of decreased memory.

What was tragic was hearing from people diagnosed with brain cancer linked directly to cell phone usage.

Yet somehow, I was the one considered weird during the post-film discussion (the look on the face of the electrical engineer prof who led the discussion was priceless when I copped to no phone), not the people who can ignore all that. Go figure.

It was the event, not me, that was the oddball when I headed to Southside for "Grouped: Art Show," staged in a recently renovated 1955 house that's about to go on the market. But instead of staging it with furniture, it was staged entirely with art which will stay up for the open house this weekend. Clever, right?

You read right, 86 pieces of art - everything from sculpture to paintings to prints to neon to photographs to bird feeders - were on display in this 3-bedroom house, nearly filling the 8' walls and they were all for sale.

Adding to the vibe was DJ Marty spinning funk, soul and R & B 45s on a vintage '70s portable double turntable. I could have lingered all night listening to that stuff.

It was all very cool. Also gratifying, since I already own a total of five pieces by three of the artists represented in the show, although my 10' ceilings allow for salon-style hanging which a '50s house most definitely does not. Their loss.

My loss was that I'd gone in knowing I had no business buying another piece of art tonight, much as I was tempted.

I only stayed for an hour or so, but managed to run into all kinds of familiar faces - the print collective director, the record store owner, the artist I'd interviewed last night, the aging yet handsome hipster, the muralist - before saying my farewells and descending the flagstone steps.

That house is going to be a popular stop for the next few days.

When I got to Plant Zero for 5th Wall's production of "Luna Gale," the usher greeted me by name, led me to a prime center seat and expressed surprise that I was alone (I'd struck out despite inviting three potential dates) to see the first of the Acts of Faith entries this year.

So, yes, in case you were wondering, they do allow heathens at the Acts of Faith Festival, perhaps hoping for conversions as a result. Didn't happen.

A joke at last year's Artsie's characterized 5th Wall plays as being "full of smart women hollering at each other," but tonight's production zeroed in on major family dysfunction, a crazy Christian mother and the machinations of a burnt out Child Protective Services worker in deciding what's best for meth-addled teen parents and their infant child.

Okay, so maybe it wasn't such a joke.

Even the 5% know that sometimes nothing's harder than doing what's best. But best for whom?

Artsies Fever, We Know How to Show It

Dearly beloved, we are gathered here tonight to get through this thing called the Artsies. Preferably before midnight.

Many things happened at tonight's Richmond Theater Critics Circle awards show, many of them in glittery shoes and sparkly clothing.

I wore neither, yet the man who won "Best Actor in a Leading Role, Musical" complimented my ensemble as sexy and demure ("How are you pulling off both?") and referred to his own striking suit as looking "like a couch."

For the record, few couches are that shiny.

Naturally, things got topical. There was last year's Best Supporting Actor - a child actor, mind you - playing the Donald in a blond wig and patriotic ball cap and, when challenged on his fitness to do so given his diminutive stature, responded, " My hands are the right size!"

When the cast of "Green Day's American Idiot" did a medley, it involved a figure in a Trump mask and the entire cast finishing by giving the audience the finger. I like to think they were really giving it to Trump.

Calling a spade a spade, the Best Actor in a Supporting Role, Play called Richmond Triangle Players the "best-run theater in town," and he should know having worked for almost all the others as well.

Even her move to D.C. didn't prevent last year's Best Actress in a Play from being the butt of jokes about her frequent nude scenes, from showing up as a presenter tonight and from reminding us that we are more than a piece of ass.

Winningly, the multi-talented Best Actor nominee in both leading and supporting roles sang a song with green frog hands on.

Prince's "Let's Go Crazy" became the basis for the winner of Best Actress in a Lading Role, Musical and the winner of Best Director, Play to imagine a gospel-inspired MLK musical set to the Purple One.

One of the actors who was part of the deserving group who won the Ernie McClintock Best Acting Ensemble award - the one who's leaving us after five years for a bigger sandbox to show off in  - announced, "If you're not seeing TheatreLAB's shows, you're not really paying attention."

Five awards tonight? Everybody should be paying attention by now.

Because last years's winner of Best Director, Play was unable to attend, her esteemed Shakespeare leanings became the basis for jokes involving tests, balls and cunning linguists set to iambic pentameter.

Behold a 97-year old dancer (who could have passed for 75) accepting an award for Ongoing Contribution to Richmond Area Theater who not only did a few dance movements when she walked onstage, but also said, "I'm grateful to have had a long lifetime in order to achieve so much."

The young 'uns (particularly) in the audience gasped audibly when her age was given and clapped mightily when she sashayed offstage.

Just as moving was the 87-year old actress and mezzo-soprano accepting the same award and sharing her black history in the process. When told by a restaurant server in her youth that, "We don't serve n****rs here," she had the presence of mind to answer, "We don't eat 'em."

And when she told us to hold hands with the people on either side of us, we did while she prayed for a less divisive country and better treatment of women.

One critic's reviews were mocked as too short and another as too long. Both statements were true.

The audience went nuts when nominees for Best Supporting Actress, Play and Best Actor in a Leading Role, Musical sang "Suddenly Seymour" with charm and drama to spare.

There was more Girl Power than you could shake a stick at, like last year's Best Actress winner pointing at another actor in Colonial garb a la "1776" and saying, "This is what a President looked like in the past," and then doffing her own Revolutionary costume to reveal a sexy red dress underneath.

"And this is what a President will look like in the future!" Hear, hear.

Oh, and for the record, 5th Wall does more than "plays where smart women holler at each other." Why is it "hollering" when we do it and "discussing" when men do the same?

You'd never hear the Dowager Countess say such a thing.

Spasms of Honesty

You know how they say a person knows within the first ten minutes of a date whether or not they're going to like the person?

Hello, "Rapture, Blister, Burn," the latest production by 5th Wall Theatre.

I probably knew in less than ten that this was a play I was going to relish based on an early lively interchange about how women's lives have changed since the '70s. It was terribly satisfying hearing so many references to feminist history and theory (Phyllis Schlafly, Betty Friedan), many of which got metaphoric amens from the mostly female audience tonight.

Oh, yes, bring it on. I have some thoughts on this matter.

Let's see, a play billed as "a witty, unflinching look at gender politics?" Yes, please.

Hmm, a play about a woman's so-called choices of sedate marriage and family or go-getter career woman with attendant swinging social and sexual life? Most definitely.

Because, the truth is, at some point probably everyone wonders about the life not lived.

In this instantly intriguing play, Cathy, a sexy scholar who's written books on pornography and horror film theory and Gwen, a stay-at-home Mom in a less-than-ideal marriage - the two roommates until one left for London and the other married her ex-boyfriend and settled down for a life of penniless domestic tranquility - reunite and decide to try out each other's life.

Because that's an option for most people. Not.

Never mind that this means that the four-year old gets packed off to live with pot-smoking Dad and his hot professor girlfriend while Mom takes the Broadway-loving older son to live in Manhattan so she can go back to school finally.

Plot issues aside, all the discussion of feminism, relationships - "Relationships are an exercise in illusion" - and how women's behavior is perceived is the stuff of dream women's studies classes or consciousness raising groups minus the hand mirrors.

If a woman chooses the career fast track, how much must she compromise to succeed? Is it wrong (or even possible) for family trackers to outsource the homemaking part? What about out-sourcing the child-raising part? Has online porn replaced desire for real sex in middle-aged men?

With a decidedly strong cast, the play covered three generations, making for expansive conversations about how each handled the restrictions (or lack thereof) placed on her at a particular juncture in time.

The millennnial, Avery (of course, because no millennial is ever named Linda or Donna or - gasp - Karen) played by a pitch-perfect Aiden Orr, can't conceive of why 60-something Alice couldn't have gone to a dance when she was young simply because she didn't have a date.

But what if you'd just gone, she presses? Well, that just wasn't done and that's the way it was, she's told and you can tell by Avery's reaction that such a notion is beyond her comprehension because she has no understanding of how differently the world was ordered before she was born.

How people would "talk" about women stepping out of tightly circumscribed roles. Why a woman would not do something she wanted very badly to for fear that it would sully her reputation. That there was a time when "hooking up" meant being called a slut.

In the pet peeves category, the play also touched on millennial Avery's uninformed take on the ongoing struggle. "Yea, I believe in those things but I don't self-identify as a feminist," she says, almost nonchalantly.

Even after years of young women telling me this, I still cringe every time I hear it.

Call me a product of the '70s, but everyone, and I do mean everyone, should self-identify as a feminist, if for no other reason than forward progress of the human race. End of discussion.

My fellow feminist and I used intermission to begin our own discussion group of the topics raised, so of course we stayed after the play ended for the talkback with cast, dramaturg and director.

It was only mildly depressing when a millennial woman asked how it's possible for two empowered people to give enough ground to make a relationship successful.

Tip #1: stop referring to yourself as empowered and decide if this is a person you're willing to occasionally compromise with or not because every successful relationship is going to require it.

Love and alcohol dupe you into thinking average people are great.

A big part of the beauty of "Rapture, Blister, Burn" is how winningly it points out that not everyone has to want a relationship, either.

For those who do, the life-experienced voice of Cathy sums it up best:  My middle-aged observation is that, in a relationship between two equals, you can't both go first.

My middle-aged observation? It's all about exercising that illusion...

The Best Medicine

A favorite compliment came in letter form and said I always seemed to add laughter to a room. Tonight I got thanked for that.

When a friend messaged me about my Friday night plans, I thought sure he'd want to join me once I shared that I was going to a benefit staged reading of the TV show M*A*S*H* at Richmond Triangle Players. But no.

"Nah, saw an ad for that a while back. It didn't really trip my trigger."

Well, it did mine. Even with a life-long disdain for TV, there were, in my youth, a few shows I regularly watched and M*A*S*H* was one of them.

And not prime time, but reruns and eventually - gasp! - on VHS and even when I knew the plots, I still laughed at the writing and delivery. Both appeared effortless, which of course means executed by terribly talented people.

Tonight I needed a good laugh. I'd had a late lunch with a friend, but we'd focused on heavy topics. Then afterward, during an interview discussing furniture, the interviewee managed to take a tangent from chairs to the unfairness of Hillary not being prosecuted for crimes against humanity, I kid you not.

Whoa, there, buckaroo, I didn't give up a cozy porch guest bed and come back from the river to listen to your political rantings.

So when I set out, just my trigger and me, I knew I'd spend the evening not just laughing, but doing good because the performance was a benefit for the Mighty Pen Project, which offers university level writing classes for veterans so their service memories can be archived.

This I can get behind.

The project was founded by local author David L. Robbins (who also directed tonight's readings) but it was the Mutt and Jeff team of Vietnam and writing class vets Glen and Richard who did the explaining about how much easier it is for vets to write their memories rather than speaking them.

They encouraged all of us to tell any vets we know about the project, because, as Richard said, "The writing class changed me." Translation: cool and worthwhile project, both historically and in humanitarian terms.

Tonight's production began with Dean McKnight as Radar playing guitar and singing the theme song, "Suicide is Painless" as the audience sang along, before he and the eleven others in the cast took us through the pilot episode, along with other first season gems such as "Love Story" and "Germ Warfare."

Great casting was the key to the pleasure of the reading with tightly-wound Dean Knight as Frank Burns, Harry Kollatz in fishing hat complete with lures as the oblivious Colonel Henry Blake and the blond and ever-indignant Wendy Carter as Hot Lips.

Like those standouts, the dream team of Landon Nagel (Hawkeye) and David Janosik (Trapper) seemed to have done their homework, ably imitating the cadence and offhand delivery of the original actors to great effect. A fair amount of staging added to the visual pleasure as "documents" were signed or a syringe was administered to the backside.

What I'd forgotten (or blocked out) was the political incorrectness of the '70s, what with the sole black character played by Thomas Nowlin called Spearchucker and the priest played by Chip Lauterbach, a former Marine and graduate of the Mighty Pen Project, nicknamed Dago Red.

Awkward. Not so much these days.

But, man, I laughed a lot. The constant commentary and patter of Hawkeye and Trapper is timeless and the repeated interactions between the prescient Radar and the ditsy Henry Blake ("Radar, will you stop saying what I'm thinking?" "Well, one of us has to, sir.") still hilarious after all these years.

When the narrators would describe vignettes between the talking scenes, I could almost see the TV episode playing in my head and it has to be (what?) 30-some years since I last saw an episode of M*A*S*H*.

Each 25-minute episode was over in a flash and after the last one, the cast took a bow. I was sorry to see the well-executed reading come to an end.

From behind me, the director unexpectedly leaned over and said, "Thanks for all your loud laughter" like he really meant it.

No problem. When my trigger is fully tripped, it's loud.

Irish Roots, Plenty of Napkins

It was a red letter post-snow day. I got driven in a car.

Let's see, I believe the last time I motored was last Thursday, so the fact that a friend could show up (laundry in hand to use my washer and dryer, but that's another story) to drive us to dinner and a play was big news in these parts.

That said, it took a ridiculous 25 minutes to get to a restaurant a mere two miles away given the slow-moving traffic, massive piles of snow still blocking lanes and idiots with low-to-the-ground cars attempting to conquer snow drifts.

We are our own worst enemies post-Jonas.

Regaling me at dinner with his snow day problems - cat escaped, a movie that wouldn't play, no beans for nachos - my friend caused me to almost shoot liquid out of my nose when he took a tangent to sing the praises of his small appliances.

"I looove my toaster oven," he gushed, then raised his voice two octaves, "Holla!"

Someone's been spending way too much time in the house alone.

Despite more massive snow piles, getting to Chamberlayne Actors Theatre turned out to be surprisingly easy, not that we didn't manage to miss our final turn, but then everything looks different in the snow, doesn't it? It's not like I haven't been to CAT's cozy theater before.

Inside, my driver went off in search of chocolate for me, returning with a Hostess cupcake and earning my eternal gratitude, while I chatted with the play's charming sound designer, a playwright I hadn't seen in months.

Hardly surprisingly, tonight's crowd was small and included lots of theater insiders - actors, critics, devotees - to take in a collaboration between CAT Theatre and 5th Wall of Israel Horovitz's "Unexpected Tenderness," a snippet of which I'd seen at 5th Wall's preview party last April.

But a snippet could not have prepared me for such a powerful look at domestic terrorism and family dysfunction circa the early 1950s.

The memory play is narrated by the older version of the son, so we alternate between seeing him as part of the family dynamic trying to deal with a paranoid father who rigidly controls the family's lives and as the grown man looking back on it.

Early moments of politically incorrect humor ("No napkins, are we eating like Irish people now?" or "No socks? What are you, Italian?") spewing forth from the mother, Molly, played by a fiery yet fearful Eva DeVirgilis, set a scene of Jewish life in Massachusetts during the Eisenhower years.

Fred Iacovo delivered as the pathological husband Archie who is obsessively convinced that every time he leaves the house, his wife cheats on him, a misconception he tragically comes by honestly since his Parkinson's-ridden father felt the same raging jealousy about his wife ("It was hell being married 47 years to a beauty like your grandmother").

Like poverty, you wonder if it's a cycle that can ever be broken.

Strong performances by the entire cast ensured that the audience wouldn't look away while the darkness of the story made it difficult not to wince watching. In one particularly ugly scene, an involuntary moan escaped my mouth when Archie hit his son. It's wrenching to watch actions you can't fathom.

Dark as the playwright's memories were, the complex play wound down on a hopeful note. "Things have got to keep changing," Molly tells her children. "This is life. Thank god for that."

And while we're at it, thank goodness for CAT Theatre supporting 5th Wall's long-time devotion to the work of Israel Horovitz. Like life, it's not always easy. Like the best theater, it makes you feel deeply.

And for the reminder that tenderness should never be unexpected.

When Days Fly

Dig, if you will, the picture of me having breakfast in front of Wink's, squinting at the ocean through sunglasses as I eat.

The only problem with this picture is that it requires leaving the beach followed by three hours in the car to make it the Continental for lunch.

Despite dire warnings about the UCI bike race, I have zero trouble getting back into town or my neighborhood and parking spaces abound.

Dream, if you can, a restaurant full to the rafters of customers, far too many of them with fussy young children. Our trio is fortunate enough to snag a table on the breezy patio while most of the squawking and food throwing is going on inside.

I should be ashamed to admit how much I enjoy a plate of dirty chips - housemade potato chips covered in jack and cheddar cheese, bacon and chives - and sips of boozy limeade, but I'm not.

For the second time today, I have absolutely no problem getting where I'm going despite seeing signs saying, "Bike Race in Progress" at several intersections.

Decide, if you choose, like a friend and I did, to meet at Toast for a fried dinner - sliders, fries and a seafood bucket - to trade tales of the last fortnight's beach trips (hers and mine), miscommunications (ditto) and soul-searching (always).

Driving over, the streets are noticeably empty, no doubt due to media fear-mongering about coming downtown. A pity, really.

Conceive, if you try, of a thought-provoking two-actor play called "Uncanny Valley," which is the term coined for the human tendency to react negatively to robots that seem human (see: "The Polar Express" movie - disconcerting, right?).

Produced by 5th Wall and performed at the tiny Hatt Theater out in the hinterlands (driving west on Patterson for what seemed like hours, my friend says, "Where are we? Canada?"), the play addresses the question of what it means to be human ("In your mind's eye, how old are you?").

And, more specifically, what does it mean to be human and so filthy rich that you can keep yourself alive indefinitely by having your life experiences and memories uploaded into a robot who looks like you at whatever age you choose for it to (34 in this case).

Alexander Sapp is brilliant as the robot being coached on human behavior by the maternalistic scientist played by the reliably-strong Jacqueline Jones ("We're a skittish species. That's how we've lasted so long.").

With the addition of each component - another arm, torso, legs, he becomes more human-like - but it's his early, robotic like voice and distinct learning curve that provide many of the early laughs while endearing him to the audience. This is Julian A.

A real relationship develops between the two and after much coaching from the patient Jones, he receives the download from the dying man (Julian B). The result is the new creature, Julian C, an amalgam of human and a robot.

Playwright Thomas Gibbons took the stage afterwards with director Morrie Piersol and the two actors to talk with the audience about the provocative nature of the play's subject matter, inspired by a National Geographic article he'd read at his dentist's office.

I don't know that an article on artificial intelligence would've grabbed me the same way, but the resulting play certainly did. Are we merely our consciousness? Can it be replicated for another body?

The play raises some hard questions, all the more significant for how close apparently we are to this sort of thing becoming, well, a thing. Only for the 1%, mind you, but that's even scarier since all the "immortals" will be the super-rich.

It may be time to start worrying about the Donald doing something like this.

Or, better yet, it's definitely time to go see "Uncanny Valley" because this is the very best kind of theater: beautifully acted, subtly directed and forcing us to look at some hard issues of personal ethics and technology.

As Gibbons pointed out in the talkback, algorithms already shape our daily lives. Should they be used to shape the minds and personalities of robots to achieve immortality?

Call me the skittish type, but you can probably guess how the woman without a cell phone or TV is going to weigh in on this.

Real life in progress. It's enough for me.

What Will Be, Will Be

Let's spend Friday night looking at life, shall we?

In the case of the Anderson Gallery's new exhibit "Myron Helfgott: An Inventory of My Thoughts," it was a wide-ranging retrospective covering the 45-year artistic career of one of my favorite curmudgeons. I can say that because I've known Myron for 15 years and besides, he'd say it about himself.

Despite the multiple hours and afternoons spent in his studio interviewing him for my profile, here, in Style Weekly, I'd only seen a fraction of the work that made it into the show. So tonight's three-level exhibit was as much a surprise to me as to the rest of the world.

In 1971's "Salute," hands cast in lead were captured in a box with a lead flag on top. Lead, so different a material than the plywood and paper pieces he's been creating the past few years. Pieces such as "Windows" from 2013, a segmented view of the Kroger parking lot from his condo.

I was captivated by "We Share the Same Interests," a mixed media piece from 1981-82, comprised of a metal figure of a woman that Myron had taken all around town - Monument Avenue, MCV, VMFA - and had himself photographed with. The dated photos were part of the piece and provided a glimpse into Myron long before I met him in 2000.

Immediately recognizable was "Waterfall after Duchamp" from 1990 because it had been in the foyer of his condo when I'd first interviewed him. Here the motorized waterfall took its place among the many pieces powered by small motors.

"33 years and 6 months" was another lead piece, this one from 1970, showing a pair of men's underwear. "Don't look at that too long. People will talk!" a man stage-whispered in my ear as I gazed at it.

Listening to reactions from the ever-growing crowd, I overheard, "Phenomenal work" and "This is the shit, man. The shit!" High praise, indeed.

I went through all three floors of Myron's art twice, knowing full well I'll need to come back when the crowds are gone to enjoy it all without the socializing distractions. And they were many tonight, with all that old '70s VCU art crowd in attendance.

When I finally made it back to the tent, there was Myron, wine in hand, holding court. He pinched my cheek, he hugged me and he thanked me profusely for my article, especially thrilled that I hadn't talked about his work.

Who needs to try to describe astonishing art when there's a crabby old man with a lifetime's worth of opinions to share instead? Not that the work doesn't tell an amazing story of a man who never stopped evolving, but anyone with eyes can see that.

People were still pouring in to the gallery when I left to meet my theater date for dinner at Bistro 27, finding him at the bar with a Cosmopolitan in hand. The hostess raved about how cute my tights were and seated us with a great view of Adams Street. I kept my meal simple - Caesar salad with grilled shrimp - to offset a decadent chocolate torte for dessert.

Over dinner, we covered the multiple months' worth of life that had happened since we'd last gone to a play together. We compared notes on "Mame," made plans to see "Sister Act," exchanged Christmas vacation trip stories and restaurant gossip. Then we high-tailed it to Richmond Triangle Players for another kind of look at life.

It was opening night for 5th Wall's production of "The Lyons," a black comedy I'd first seen a sample of at the 5th Wall preview party last August. Even that snippet had been enough to see the potential of the play about nothing more than family relations, which is to say, everything.

But what a family! In a magnificent brown curly wig, Jacqueline Jones chewed up the scenery and spit it out as Rita, the matriarch of the Lyons family. This is an actress I've seen in all kinds of roles and never have I seen her so completely inhabit a character. She will be undoubtedly be honored come awards time next year for this part.

When her dying husband (the always excellent Alan Sader) muses that he may go to hell, she shoots him down succinctly. "What have you ever done to go to Hell? Who are you?" Nobody in this family seems to have a kind word for anyone.

The first act was mesmerizing as the parents had their adult children (a gay writer and recovering alcoholic mother with two kids) come to the hospital room to learn that their father was dying. Despite the seriousness of it, the family immediately devolves into bickering and bringing up old family issues. Meanwhile, Rita peruses decorating magazines, planning to redo their tawdry living room once husband Ben is dead.

No one feels comfortable when they're intimate. 
Your mother used to vomit a lot.

Watching this family argue - the father endlessly cursing because he has nothing to lose, listening to Rita criticize her dying husband and messed-up children - was like eavesdropping on a majorly dysfunctional family. Awkward but utterly compelling.

Significantly, playwright Nicky Silver even weaves in the particular bond of siblings; they may not like each other or respect each other's choices, but they share secrets that Mom and Dad were never privy to. That's real life.

Romance is a treacherous arena.

At intermission, my friend and I discussed how director B.C. Maupin had created a tightly wound production that never ceased to elicit reaction from the audience, whether we were squirming in our seats, anticipating discomfort, embroiled in embarrassment or mortified at how this family treated each other.

Meanwhile, a cadre of black-clad crew miraculously turned the hospital room set into a much, larger studio apartment, as big a set change as I've seen at RTP, a feat only believable if you saw the transformation.

After the first act, my friend had commented on the robust laughter coming from the back of the room and, sure enough, the Man About Town (the source of that laugh) stopped by to discuss Myron's show and our enjoyment of the play we were seeing.

Writing short stories is like selling Victrolas.

If the first act had set some people's teeth on edge, the second began with a scene uncomfortable in about a dozen more ways. As it unfolded with missed signals, over-reactions and brutality, little of the dark humor remained.

The set was again changed back to the hospital room, this time without an intermission, but it was accomplished briskly and efficiently while the audience listened to "Que Sera, Sera." It was so impressively done that the crowd broke out in spontaneous applause for the crew.

Since when do you talk like a character from "Cagney and Lacey"?

The final scene begins with the father dead, but the remaining members no less unhappy or rude to each other. Hello, real life.

Watching the widow tell her son and daughter that she's decided to go on with her life in a manner that appalls them becomes one of the most satisfying moments in the play. Changing from power pumps to pink slides before a flight to Aruba, Jones makes a compelling case for delayed happiness after a loveless marriage that's almost worth standing up to cheer for.

Some people are happy, some people are lonely, some people are mean and sad. That's the way of the world.

As 5th Wall's production so ably demonstrates, it's every person's choice to decide which of those people they want to be. As if I weren't already in the first category, a superbly-executed production such as this one makes me even happier because Carol Piersol is back at the helm of a cutting edge theater company in Richmond.

Here's to long, artistic lives. Fortunately, they seem to thrive in this town.

Titillating and Informative at the Same Time

It's probably terribly post-modern of me to write about writing, but here goes.

If, as Benjamin Franklin said, you should either write something worth reading or do something worth writing about, where does that leave writing something no one will read?

I spent a fair amount of my day writing a letter that I didn't send, but needed to capture. Thoughts have been swirling around in my head and in order to make them stop, I needed to get them down in words and sentences, which I did.

But the more I thought about it, the more sure I was that no one needed to read them. But, plain and simple, I needed, really needed, to write them.

The words I wrote weren't about being the 282nd person to vote at my polling place or about the sweet old lady outside it who questioned me intently about whether I'd been challenged when I provided my photo ID to vote (I hadn't).

They weren't about taking my hired mouth and a friend to lunch and having him remind me that we should be getting together for more than lunch, say music or art.

And while it was a lovely meal, my words weren't about dinner at Lucy's where my fellow diner told me about a car chase, crash and arrest on Broad Street this afternoon, snarling traffic westward for hours.

Irresistible was the soup of the day, a tomato-based mahi mahi and potato with just a hint of heat, worth slurping up every spoonful. Then I tucked into the lemon-vinaigrette-dressed winter salad of kale, roasted Brussels sprouts and sunflower seeds while hearing tales of familiar faces showing up in commercials and TV shows (so I'll never see them).

Post-dinner, I made my way to the Speakeasy to see 5th Wall Theater's staged reading of "Writer's Weekend: A New Musical," sharing a table with two women, one of whom turned out to be in the show's band.

I'd seen the first reading of the play last Spring and thoroughly enjoyed the story of six people attending a writer's workshop in hopes of fine-tuning their writing skills or, as the only published writer in the bunch put it, "Jump-starting my literary libido."

A four-piece band of two keyboard players, a bassist and drummer accompanied the actors as they sang of their frustrations and hopes for their writing careers, all in various stages. The sci-fi writer was self-published with cartons of her books crowding her basement, the former TV action star wanted to be a playwright but his concept was weak, the newspaper reporter hoped to use his journalism background writing about crime to pen detective stories, the young technical writer was trying to branch out into fiction, the suburban slam poet still had more attitude than talent and the oversexed romance writer had writer's block but a string of best-sellers behind her. Add in the bitter writer who leads the sessions and the potential for snappy dialog was obvious.

Jacqueline Jones narrated the play, sometimes even helping it along when there was overly-long silence. "I think that's a music cue!" she said cheerily to get everyone back on track.

And just in case the audience was unclear on what being a writer means, it was spelled out in song. "A working writer means a writer who gets paid. Who knows, I might even get laid." Don't count on it, friend, it never got me laid.

I couldn't decide which character I found the funniest, the timid technical writer played by Mark Persinger who was seduced by the older woman ("Old is the new black") or the ebony goddess poet played by Carolyn Meade, all attitude and adjectives.

Like last time, there was a lot that made me laugh out loud (editor jokes, older woman comments) including the written-to-be-awful manuscripts the would-be writers shared with their peers ("Rickets: The Musical").

And like with all his staged readings, director B.C. Maupin had made sure we got a lot more than just actors with scripts reading in chairs. Characters made eyes at each other, moved as if to dance, met at a bar and just generally suggested a lot more staging than some readings deliver.

Even though I knew the story, it was interesting to hear the songs come out of different mouths this time - and there were some excellent voices in the cast - and watch how these actors put their spins on the characters I'd met last May.

Seeing "Writer's Weekend" satisfied old Ben Franklin's directive to do something worth writing about. As to the other part of his wisdom, I'd even go so far as to say my earlier, unsent letter was worth reading.

Didn't get paid, didn't get laid, but there's always tomorrow. I'll probably write about that, too.

Down versus Pound

It was really too beautiful to spend the evening indoors - 77 degrees in mid-October - unless love was involved.

As it turned out, it was, but I didn't know that. I thought I was getting dinner and a play.

Given the bodacious weather, I was hardly surprised when I arrived at Magpie to find only one couple in attendance. I took a seat at the bar to await my friend's arrival and discuss my theater plans with the bartender.

Although he'd never been to Richmond Triangle Players, he used to work with their bartender, a woman I've bought wine from on many an occasion. Funny how there's never more than three degrees of separation from anyone in this town.

Right on time, my friend arrived (amuse bouche: easter egg radish slice with golden raisin chutney and carrot top) and we lost no time ordering so we could discuss theater without our mouths being full.

My only regret was that he invited me to go with him to see "Book of Mormon," a show I could never afford, and I'll be out of town that weekend. Drat the luck.

Once dinner came, we focused on that.

Not that anyone needs to eat their sweetbreads chicken-fried, but as long as they were offering, why not? These came with turnip hash, pickled relish and house hot sauce and I also shared a side of roasted brussels sprouts with my friend as he ate his huntsman's stew, which smelled divine.

Unfortunately, we had so little time left that dessert wasn't an option so we left for the theater to see 5th Wall Theater's staged reading of John Anastasi's new play, "Transition," without my sweet tooth being satisfied.

Instead, I sublimated it when the reading began with a sex scene between two women, one of whom came noisily moments after the action began. Unfortunately, her partner hadn't come (or enjoyed the strap-on she'd been using), causing her to lament, "I'd rather you went downtown instead of taking me to Pound Town."

Hmm, "Pound Town." That's a new one on me.

"Transition" was the story of a man born in a woman's body who takes 28 years to decide he needs to transition to the male he's always been. The problem is that his partner, the love of his life, is a lesbian who wants a female, not male, partner.

When he tells his mother about his planned hormone treatments and surgery, she's forced to come to terms with what she always knew but never acknowledged: her daughter is her son. "You haven't even started the male hormones and already you're acting just like your father!" Jacqueline Jones as the mother said to a big laugh.

Ditto the laughs when the subject of genital reconstruction surgery came up. "That glorious organ with the head but no brain." Ah, yes, we know the one.

But the most unexpectedly funny moment came when Melissa Johnston Price (as the doctor planning to do the surgery) explained all that was involved, right down to creation of the brain-less head. "So that's it in the nutshell," she said before turning to look at the audience with a classic WTF? look on her face. "I never saw that coming."

The audience laughed long and hard at her reaction to the line in the script.

Danya/Daniel, the woman transitioning, was played superbly by Eva DeVirgilis, who tries to convince her true love Addison (played by Sara Heifetz) that even if she has the surgery, they'll still love each other just the same, pulling out Shakespeare's "A rose by another name would smell as sweet" to prove her point.

Addison is having none of it. "Male hormones do not smell good," she retorts, miserable at the idea of having a male partner when she's madly in love with a woman.

But the bigger issue wasn't about smell or hormones or any of that. The play asks us why do we love the person we do? Is it their heart, their soul, their personality, their body?

The play was terribly poignant in parts, especially in a scene that takes place five years after surgery and the couple's split, when Daniel runs into the doctor who tries to assure him he'll get over the loss of his true love. He corrects her.

"Those who've had a real loss know that it never gets better. You just get better at living with it." I'd like to see someone put that in a fortune cookie.

The play ended ambiguously, leaving the outcome to the viewer's imagination. Some saw a happy ending and others didn't. Sort of like life.

But the biggest question remained. Could you still have real love if one of the people changes?

During the talkback with the playwright, director Carol Piersol and cast, the audience had a lot of questions and a lot of opinions on what needed to be changed and not changed in the script.

That's a major reason I look forward to this kind of reading. Part of its purpose is to provide feedback to the author and another part is to gauge audience reaction to the idea of seeing the play fully produced.

As an opinionated woman and a theater lover, I find it immensely satisfying to have a chance to provide that kind of input.

Playwright Anastasi told us he'd spent a great deal of time talking to a doctor who does this kind of surgery in order to get the finer points right. "I still take a lot of criticism as a heterosexual writing about the trans experience. But, Stephen King, did he kill all those people?"

I think not. Clearly, the man had a sense of humor.

What he did make clear was that what he had written was, more than anything else, a love story. By the end, Daniel has fully transitioned and has finally gotten what he's wanted his whole life. But in the process, he's lost the only person he ever needed. He's alone but acknowledges that that's his choice.

"He chooses not to have someone else if he can't have the love of his life, "Anastasi told us to wrap things up.

And that, if you ask me, makes it a hell of a love story.

Better Than Your Dreams

It was an absolutely lovely date with myself, full of new this and new that, and right in the neighborhood, too.

With the humidity hovering at 80% but no chance of rain in the forecast, I dolled up and strolled over to the latest reason to eat four blocks from home: Graffiato.

Aware that it had just opened Wednesday, I knew enough to arrive early, sailing to the bar past disappointed people being told that the soonest a table would be available would be 10:00.

That said, any of those people could have followed my lead and sat at the bar (or even one of the rapidly filling up communal tables) rather than putting on a sad face and leaving.

Renovation on the former Popkin's space was well executed if you ignore the two screens over the bar (I can't, especially with sports on) and I easily found a seat next to a couple from Bon Air tucking into the Shire pizza with gusto.

In no time at all, we were chatting about their enthusiasm for the upcoming Southbound restaurant coming to their neck of the woods and how they hope to move into the city so they, too, can walk places.

My first choice, "Love Drunk" Rose (tag line: "When reality is better than your dreams") from Oregon had not yet arrived I was told, so I went classic with a Provence Rose, Domaine Jacourette, a pale pink delight.

The place was humming and the staff seemed enormous, black-shirted employees everywhere I looked, and within minutes, another couple took the seats to my left.

They were from the edge of the Museum District and proclaimed themselves foodies who ate out all the time, although they had to be shown where the purse hooks under the bar were.

Not a judgement, just an observation.

I took my time ordering my first course, watching one of the many bartenders make an array of complicated drinks right in front of me.

When I settled on smoked burrata with heirloom grape tomatoes, corn and arugula pesto over Billy bread, it was delivered to me by a very young looking food runner who said it was one of his two favorite dishes on the menu.

The museum couple looked over drooling, asking what I'd ordered. Turns out they'd never heard of burrata.

They were enjoying the broccolini with red pepper relish, walnuts and feta, a savory dish I'd already had at the D.C. Graffiato's last year.

A favorite local chef was having dinner at the pizza bar in the back with his family and came over to say hello and compare what we were eating.

Bon Air couple said goodnight after a discussion of Europe and empty nests and were replaced with a another couple, this one curious about the play I was going to see tonight.

Seems she'd designed an ad for Richmond Triangle Players' playbill and wanted to know if I'd seen it (not yet).

I was having no shortage of conversational partners tonight, even if everyone else was in Saturday night date mode.

From there, I ordered the Amish chicken thighs with sauteed escarole and pepperoni sauce, tasty enough although I prefer my thighs with bones.

As I was chatting to my right, couple to my left prepared to leave, tapping me on the shoulder to say goodnight and thank me for the conversation.

They'd barely left when a woman approached, asking to order a drink over me while she waited for her date to arrive.

"He's my boyfriend, but I'm 41, so it feels funny to call him that," she said, explaining that he'd been delayed.

I ask you, is man friend any better?

He soon arrived, having dropped off his 15-year old daughter at a party at a hotel (such parties didn't exist when I was 15), saying he needed a drink after all the rigmarole of getting her off to the event.

A DC Mule seemed to do the trick.

Like the other couples I'd talked to, they were impressed that it was a mere four block walk for me to Graffiato, so I asked about their home bases.

He lived on Porter Street in Manchester and she lived in the West End, but refused to call it that, stating for the record that she lived on Three Chopt ("That's the West End," he insisted).

We got to talking about how they met and she said friends had introduced them, they'd had one date but she'd realized she wasn't yet ready to date.

Eighteen months later, he asked again and they've been an item ever since.

He tried to convince me he was a bad boy, but she denied it, saying he was the nicest guy in the world.

"You have a motorcycle and race cars, but you are definitely not a bad boy," she told him with finality.

"Couldn't you at least pretend I am for my ego's sake?" he asked. They were pretty cute, but were soon called to their table and I lost them (although they asked me to come join them if I had time).

Which was fine because I had just under 15 minutes until I had to leave and my salted caramel gelato had arrived to cap off my meal.

Hopeful people were still arriving as I took my leave, secure in the knowledge that I now have one more solid choice in the 'hood for sipping and supping.

Across the street at the November Theater, people were arriving for 5th Wall Theater's production of "H2O" in the little TheaterGym space.

I chatted with one of the ticket guys, a transplanted New Yorker who'd arrived in 1995 and, like me when I got here in 1986, had a long period of adjustment to being in the south.

"I was in sales," he explained in his obvious New York accent, "and no one wanted to buy from me because I came across as not from here. Then I found out if you went to Ukrops, if they saw you there, that meant you were okay."

The Ukrops test so to speak.

Inside, my seat was primo, last row but with no chairs in front of it for a straight shot view to the stage to see what this new theater company born out of the ashes of the old Firehouse Theater could show me.

Before the play had begun, I'd heard someone say that it had no intermission and it didn't take long to see why.

The intense two-person drama focused on a self-important, successful Hollywood actor and an uptight religious fanatic who aspires to make it as an actress and it never let up.

The question was, who needed whom?

Beginning with a thwarted suicide attempt and moving through a vanity production of "Hamlet," the story was riveting because of the strength and talent of the actors, Landon Nagel and Liz Earnest, alternately tearing at each other and falling for each other.

Add in a top-notch script and some magnificently inspired direction and you get the kind of theater that first bowls you over and then gives you plenty to chew on as you leave the theater.

This was some powerful theater executed superbly.

When the play ended, the audience sat stunned, not even clapping until the lights came back up and the actors took their bows.

As for that question of who needs whom, Richmond needs 5th Wall Theater.

This from a woman who dates herself on a Saturday night and enjoys every moment of it.

Here's To the Girls Who Stay Smart

It was a theater lover's wet dream.

The preview and party for 5th Wall, the new production company from Carol Piersol and B.C. Maupin, was a great big celebration at the Hippodrome (how convenient for me) showcasing some of the major talent in this town.

Walking in, there were plenty of familiar faces - the hat, the neighbors, the critic - and before long we invited ourselves to join the table of a handsome couple we did not know.

By the time we finished introductions, the show was starting.

Host Eva DeVirgilis began by saying, "It's fun to be out on a Wednesday night, huh? Feels kind of naughty."

As someone who's out every night of the week, it feels kind of right to me.

The program was a satisfying mix of theatrical scenes and musical numbers, the cast changing up for each one. The crowd ate it all up.

In the first act, songs alternated with scenes from 5th Wall's last season, so I recognized the adoration humor of "Patti Issues," the excruciating tension of "Gidion's Knot," the touchy issues of "Race."

Singer Susan Greenbaum came out with her guitar and smiled, saying, "I learned this from my theater friends," and tossed her red scarf over her shoulder. Saying, "Despite the fact that it's twelve degrees in here..." and boy, was she right about that, she launched into "Summertime."

Seeing a scene from "Breast in Show" made me sorry I hadn't seen it.

Eva provided some humor with a monologue about how directors are always expecting her take her clothes off. "I'm an actress, too, you know," she insisted before being called over by the pianist, revealing that the pants she was wearing had no fabric over her butt cheeks.

It got her lots of laughs and we got a great view of her lovely backside.

Georgia Rogers Farmer came out looking demure with her blond hair and sweet face and began singing a slow burn cabaret style version of "Baby Got Back," so far removed from the original in tone and tempo that I'd bet some people didn't even recognize it.

It was fabulous beyond words on a night with many stellar performances.

As if her languorous version wasn't enough, she complemented the singing with some magnificent ass-shaking, twitching, hip rolling and just about any other possible bottom motion.

When she finished my friend learned over and told me that after her divorce, her husband had sent her a copy of that song because he'd missed his baby's back.

True story.

Next came Matt Shofner killing it on "Wig in a Box," but then every theatergoer in town knows he's chomping at the bit to start rehearsals for "Hedwig and the Angry Inch" this Fall.

When Debra Wagoner came out to close the first act, she walked up to the mic stand and looked up. "Every time, it's too tall," she joked.

Matt came rushing over to adjust it. "A diva doesn't move her own mic." More truth.

"Also, we need a clean-up on chair five," she cracked, pointing to where she'd just left.

Drink in hand, her version of "The Ladies Who Lunch" was hilarious, powerful and pointed.

Over intermission, I chatted with our table mates, unexpectedly discovering that we shared some common history.

You never know when you'll meet someone who's experienced the same difficult thing you have.

The handsome and big-voiced Russell Rowland did a great job with "Being Alive," pulling everyone back from the bar to their tables.

The second act began with Eva introduced as local actor extraordinaire, Scott Wichmann, and she came out dressed like him, moving like him and even talking like him, to the great amusement of the crowd.

Introducing "a woman who needs no introduction," Carol Piersol came out ("Thanks, Scotty!" to Eva) to start the preview portion of the evening with scenes from upcoming plays.

"The Lyons" provided some of the funniest lines of the evening around a dying Jewish father talking to his adult children and wife while in the hospital.

Mother: Everyone feels uncomfortable when they're intimate
Father: Your mother used to vomit.

"The Human Terrain" featured the always impressive Molly Hood in a story of an anthropologist embedded with a combat unit, something that apparently happens in real life.

D.C. actress Felicia Curry (currently appearing in "The Color Purple") came out in what had to be the best shoes of the entire evening and sang, "Whatever Happened to My Part?" from "Spamalot," subbing in lines such as, "This is one unhappy diva, Billy Christopher has deceived her."

She raved about her time in Richmond, singing "Get Here" as a love song to our city, then doing a duet with Katrinah Carol Lewis of "For Good" that had them holding hands and tearing up as they traded "love letters" to Richmond.

But when she really brought down the house was with "Random Black Girl," singing, scatting and strutting as "just the random black girl singing the soul," while the crowd clapped along.

Everyone who'd performed tonight came back on stage for a sing-it-to-the-rafters version of "Seasons of Love" from "Rent" that was goose bump worthy.

It had been an all-star coming out party for Richmond's newest production company.

Eva had the last (hilarious) words with, "Join us tomorrow night as we do it all again with a gender-reversed take on tonight's program directed by B.C. Maupin."

If only.

But if they did, my money is on Matt wearing those epic shoes of Felicia's.