The Light, the Heat

It's 4/20. We know you're hungry!
~ sign outside the Village Cafe

Today is 4/20 (smiley face)
~ sign outside Rumors Boutique

A 420 Carol
~ tonight's show at Comedy Coalition Theater

With all that in mind, it only made sense to start the evening in a split level, just the kind of house where kids probably smoked pot to escape their southside ennui.

The occasion was another Designmonth RVA event, this one at a 1954 house on Riverside Drive that has been renovated from a suburban-looking cliche to what the architects referred to as "West coast modern," which involved re-imagining it by removing the split level and replacing it with an enormous vertical addition, moving the garage to the front and putting a massive garage rooftop patio atop it.

Besides more bedrooms than I can recall, it had a home brewing room (see: drain in center of floor), a closet that ran the length of thee master suite and was wide enough for a couch and gorgeous old azaleas in full bloom crowding the back deck.

One of the Modern Richmond crew referred to Riverside Drive as "Mulholland Drive Richmond" because of its view sheds and distinctly mid-century architecture. Driving out, I saw several houses that supported that theory.

Headed back to the Fan for dinner, I couldn't help but notice how much better at being pedestrians the VCU students are at this point. It's a shame, but by the time we train them in the art of walking around in a city, it's the end of the school year. Pity.

Today's warm yet dry weather meant that the top of the blue Dutch door at Garnett's was open, the screen door keeping bugs on their side of it, but allowing soft evening air to waft in.

The only two seats open in the lively restaurant were at the counter and we took them.

The two women behind us were discussing experiences with men in bars, a couple was enjoying a bottle of Early Mountain Rose as part of the date night deal and a young couple with twin babies was trying to have a meal despite two vocal babies.

When our server took a small hotel pan filled with boiling water to their table, it was to put a baby bottle in it to warm the milk. Impressed with her ingenuity, I complimented her on such cleverness. "Yea, I was pretty proud of that," she grinned. "I used to babysit a lot."

Before we'd even finished our salads, we ordered double chocolate cake and the check because we knew "A 420 Carol" was starting soon. Walking by Gallery 5 to Coalition Theater, the throbbing sounds of a punk show reverberated out while black-clad and deliberately disaffected-looking kids milled about outside smoking cigarettes. It could have been 1982.

Ah, youth.

Using the characters and premise from RCC's recent improvised series "High There" about a guy who inherits a head shop from his stoner Uncle Jim, tonight's special edition focused on owner Jonathan's indifference to the high holy day for potheads while his staff wants to close up and experience Bongzilla, the $11,000 bong that's the shop's centerpiece.

Ho, ho, ho, Merry Spliffness and good luck finding the true meaning of 4/20 and all that.

The staff wants to close the shop and party while he wants a good night's sleep (early morning meeting) while they keep the shop open for the expected 4/20 consumers. Further complicating things is that it's his anniversary and all his wife wants is to celebrate that ("He is a boner, but tonight, he should be my boner").

But, of course, Jonathan's sleep is interrupted repeatedly through the night, beginning with the Bob Marley poster on his wall coming to life as the ghost of Uncle Jim, complete with long multi-colored dreadlocks and lots of beads.

"Every mistake I made, I put a bead in my hair," Marley tells Jonathan. So glad that's not a universal rule.

Poor Jonathan, all he wants to do is sleep - "My mellow is 18 hours of sleep a night. Don't harsh my mellow!" - but all Uncle Jim has done is prepare him for a series of ghost visitors to keep him up.

The ghost of 4/20 past showed him how much fun he used to be, frequently using "Full House" analogies, reminding him of nights capped by a group sing of Peter Gabriel's "In Your Eyes," while the ghost of 4/20 present, wearing Redskins pajamas and stuffing jalapeno potato chips in his gob, wanted to know why he wasn't celebrating 4/20.

"Because I'm sleepy and I want my store to be profitable tonight?" he asked. In the voice of Moses, host of 4/20 present thundered, "Oh, what have you become?" and proceeded to show poor Jonathan how dull the party was downstairs without him.

An ongoing source of laughter was how none of the ghosts could remember their role, always identifying themselves as the "ghost of Christmas, I mean 4/20 past, present or whatever." Sounds to me like ghosts are freelancers who take whatever jobs they can.

You wear as many hats as you need to to make rent.

Wearing black satin elbow-length opera gloves ("These gloves feel amazing right now" said the first-time satin wearer) and a black shroud, the ghost of 4/20 future points out Jonathan's grave marker and shares that if he doesn't change, his High There shop will wind up becoming a Blimpie's when he's gone.

"Which would be perfect if Blimpie's came back," Future opined, momentarily unconcerned about Jonathan's fate for the sake of a good sub.

Laugh-out-loud improvised moments were constant, including a Matthew Broderick/Godzilla reference even some of the actors didn't get ("Huh?") but was quickly explained. Once Jonathan realizes that he really does have a wonderful life, he tells his girlfriend, "It's our anniversary! Roll me into a blunt and smoke me like one of your French girls."

That was the cue for the staff to toast each other with blunts and begin singing "In Your Eyes" again.

The end, except not really, because the sound guy immediately cues up the real "In Your Eyes" and everyone in the audience went out on a high note, possibly even hungry, definitely not harshed.

And my mellow? Nine hours of sleep a night. Yea, I'm pretty proud of that.

No Truth is Marching On

Another night in J-Ward, another new friend wowed.

Lessons learned from Mama J's on a Friday night: Arrive at 4:00, like the couple next to us (he'd also been there last night, pre-KRS-One at the National) or after 7:00 (happy hour is over) when the waits are shorter than the length of the meal, a worthy goal.

Ordinarily, I'd never attempt Mama's at prime time but that's the window we had available and I wanted to show off the neighborhood fried chicken and cake. Okay, and the fried catfish, the perfectly cooked greens and the corn muffins.

As it was, with the bar two deep and a crowd of people waiting by the door, I used the time to school my newbie on the importance of choosing your cake variety early to have it cut and set aside before the cake's all gone.

Coincidentally, chocolate cake with white icing is tops for both of us, so that worked out very nicely.

We were making do with one stool when the bartender pointed us to the end of the bar and two open stools, but I no sooner planted my backside when the stool's previous owner got indignant with me. Of course I moved and the barkeep apologized, but also whispered that she'd been ready for some new faces, namely us.

A table soon opened up so I could introduce my first-timer to Jackson Ward soul food while the Spinners and O'Jays played overhead. I pity the fool who isn't won over by that combination.

Our massive slice o' cake had to accompany us to Richmond Comedy Coalition for "High There," the weekly improvised sit-com set in an inherited head shop. Odd as that might sound, it isn't the first time I've shown up there with cake in hand (last time it was Garnett's).

Cake and comedy, it's a natural, don't you think?

Tonight's sealed envelope revealed the two-pronged plot: High Times magazine was coming to review High There while the two ditzy staffers plot to get a 50-cent an hour raise. Grace needs it for her kombucha brewing start-up and Townsend tells Grace she needs more money because her cat, Mr. Tibalt, has colitis and it's getting very expensive (Grace: "I know, I follow the blog!").

The dreadlocked reviewer Star Brody shows up and mistakenly interviews Joe, the owner of the bookshop upstairs, while the staff waits on a woman they think is the reviewer but is actually writing for Water Aerobics Weekly ("Yes, weekly, there's enough water aerobics news for a weekly!").

And if you're dying to know how the shop fared with the review, you'll be happy to know that it was rated three pot leaves and a half. Not only that, but the staff managed to sell the 8-foot king bong (with matching tiara), so they both got 75-cent raises.

Let's just have a moment, shall we, to appreciate the RCC talent, a group of people who are able to improvise such hilarious situations and dialog on the fly.

Just like when I saw episode #1, between scenes we were shown the cheesiest vintage commercials known to man. I'm talking Mr. T cereal and Valley Ball, a Van Nuys bar boasting a vodka drip and topless dancers. An amusement park called Flintstones Bedrock City in British Columbia ("Kids, get your dinosaur driving license!") and a Chuck Norris movie of non-stop violence called "Code of Silence."

After this week's episode ended with a group hug, our host invited everyone to stay for the late show, but, alas, my companion works tomorrow morning, so we walked back to my house and said goodnight, but not before I was given way too much credit for dreaming up a great evening.

Stop that, it's just not all that tough to do where I live.

I couldn't think of any reason not to go right back for the late show, even getting the same seat, for a show based on Reddit's ridiculous postings. The funny part was, more than a few of the comedy crew admitted that they had no idea what Reddit was before planning this show.

Oh, good, then it's not just me.

A screen shot of several Reddit pages and the accompanying comments were screened on the wall, honing in on a guy named Superthug with an obviously Photoshopped gash on his head, a bullshit caption and, in the comments, a brief video of what claimed to be "Siri's ass."

I suppose for those of you who follow Siri's directions, this might hold some appeal.

Believe it or not, this evolved into a skit starring a man with a head gash because of having sex with a shark (but still looking for more action) and a stilted-voiced Siri checking her data base, only to inform him that Helen Mirren was "DTF."

You can challenge me on this, but I'm willing to bet that Helen Mirren and "DTF" have never before been used in the same sentence.

After a miscue by our host who tried to send us home before the second part of the program. we again scanned Reddit, this time coming up with a piece about a guy who took credit for telling Obama, "Yes, we can" and creating his campaign slogan. The comments section yielded a reference to Forest Gump and his indelible effect on history and they were off and running.

Two brothers both want to be president, but it's the simple-minded Marquise who talks of nothing but recycling, composting and garbage (his three-pronged political plan) who gets the support of big money, Angela Merkel and the little people, who chant, "Marquise, Marquise, Marquise."

Along the way, Dark Justice gives a speech while others hum the "Battle Hymn of the Republic" and an interpretive dance is done. "Did you just shoot me with an interpretive dance gun?" DJ asks Marquise incredulously. Sure did and probably recycled it afterwards.

You'd think people couldn't make this stuff up, but I'm here to tell you they can. Glory, glory, hallelujah.

Porno for Political Philosophers

Schneider's dead. And that's not even the most interesting obituary I read in the paper today.

That honor would go to writer Florene King, whom I'd never heard of when I awoke, but whose work I'm now determined to explore because of this sentence from her Washington Post obituary: Miss King, who once wrote pornographic novels for fast money, was a punctilious prose stylist who became an essayist and pretense-flaying satirist along the lines of a latter-day H.L. Mencken or Dorothy Parker.

Sign me up. One quick question, though. I could be making fast money writing pornographic novels? Why am I just learning this information now?

Of lesser import but kind of fascinating was actor Pat Harrington's obit, not because I watched a lot of "One Day at a Time" (I didn't), but because I learned that the man who played the clueless chauvinistic building superintendent had a master's degree in political philosophy in real life.

Damn, that's a hella good actor.

Closer to home, I started at Reynolds Gallery where Richmond's art elite regularly gather at openings and tonight was no exception. Richard Roth's "Speed Bump," Leigh Suggs' "Double Vision" and Tara Donovan's "Slinkys" attracted an "A" list of local talent, mainly women and I happily chatted with all the ones I knew.

Suggs' intricate hand-cut pieces were a marvel to inspect at close range, at least when I could get the social set to move from in front of them so I could actually see the art. I know, I know, see and be seen.

It was a completely different scene at ADA Gallery for Tom Condon's "Haptic Fugitive" (and, yes, I learned a new word tonight- def: based on the sense of touch), a series of direct positives that resembled nothing so much as the images of a black and white kaleidoscope.

What was cool was hearing eager-beaver VCU students cornering him to pepper him with questions. How did you do these? It looks like you manipulated this part, did you? Was that done in the darkroom? When I left, he was explaining that he'd decided not to include his recent large-format digital photographs in this show because they had such a different feel than these.

From there, it was a short walk under my umbrella to Richmond Comedy Coalition for the premiere of "High There," a new weekly improvised sitcom. "You can't binge-watch this one! This is appointment-only comedy!" host Ryan warned us.

As if I binge-watch anything.

Set in a head shop Jonathan inherits from his uncle, each week's episode begins by opening the envelope with the week's premise. Tonight's was - drum roll, please - the pilot episode. Time to establish characters and scene, in other words.

After an appropriately corny theme song, we watched and laughed as Jonathan and his girlfriend Eve (who intends to be president once she's 40 and can't decide if the weed connection in her past will be a pro or a con for her run) acquaint themselves with their new property.

They're not exactly experts on weed or paraphernalia.

To help them out, they have two staffers, one of whom, Townsend, has been quietly embezzling $25,000 since Uncle's death and the other, Grace, a dizzy type, who, when told that no matter how big a number is, you can't divide it by zero, says enthusiastically with a big smile, "That doesn't mean anything to me, but I'm gonna Google it!"

Talking to Eve about her political aspirations, she wonders, "Are you, like, a liberal or a little bit cuckoo?" Because those are the choices in politics.

Laughs came courtesy of young Jonathan's travails, but also the vintage TV commercials between acts that about brought the house down. A vintage Doritos ad, one for a cheesy '70s bar called Al E. Gator's, complete with ferns and disco dancing, a pineapple burger at McDonald's "for a limited time only" (thank you, Ray Kroc) and a Pepsi commercial that focused on why Coke had changed its formula, all had the crowd in stitches with disbelief.

That's just how corny TV was in the olden days, I'm afraid. Toni Tennille haircuts were everywhere.

Naturally, weed humor abounded, such as when Jonathan mistakes a vaporizer for a "pen with a light" and employee Grace brings him up to speed, informing him it's called an "El Discreeto."

Also helping him learn the ropes is new-agey Waylon who runs a bookstore upstairs and knew Uncle. When the $25,000 shortage is discovered, Waylon says, "I'd offer to lend you the money but I run a Mom and Pop bookstore," which got a big, knowing laugh.

Luckily, Waylon has a philosophy for Jonathan's first day of business blues and it's this: Things work out, you break even and then everybody dies.

Fortunately, not anytime soon. There's seven more weeks of laughs at High There and the best part is you have to be there to find out what happens. It's the showing up that appeals to me most.

Just this morning, a friend messaged me to say he couldn't make our planned movie date next week. He excitedly tells me his consolation was finding a European streaming site that allowed him to watch the new Tarantino film last night.

Nice, but no help for me, I write him back.

You have computer and Internet, it's just not as social, he assures me. I remind him that I don't watch movies anywhere but in public places with others, the way god and MGM intended.

He points out that I sleep late and am sometimes late for appointments now, changes from ten years ago, so there may be hope for me yet. I dismiss this entirely.

I see a cell phone in your future, he audaciously writes (which is doubly funny since just two days ago I got an email from another friend wishing me a happy new year and asking, "Will you buy a cell phone in 2016? I don't think so but doesn't hurt to ask."). As if.

Then he asks what movie I'll go see without him. "Maybe I'll see if I can find that one online. Then we can discuss."

Not entirely certain, but I think he's suggesting an appointment-only movie discussion. I hope my sigh of disgust doesn't transmit through the Interwebs.

Am I an alarmist to think that this is how the world will eventually separate itself, into those willing to show up for life and those just as happy to experience it alone and on a screen?

Excuse me, I may feel the need to pen an essay or perhaps a pretense-flaying satire on the subject, but first I've got a punctilious pornographic novel to write. Pen name: El Discreeto.

Fast money, baby, to be spent out and about in the real world.