The Devil Went Down to Third Street

I have seen the devil and he was at a diner.

Which is not where I began my evening. First up was meeting a friend at Aziza's, where I walked in to an empty restaurant.

As in no one but me and the hired help.

Apparently Restaurant Week is taking its toll on non-RW places, although our server said that an early crowd had just left.

I felt bad for the staff, money-wise, but their Halloween costumes were good and I was okay with one-on-one service.

My friend followed me in shortly after I struck up a conversation with a customer picking up his to-go order.

When I heard him say he'd painted himself brown for Halloween last year, I had to ask.

"It's no big deal," he shrugged. "I'm Mexican so it's okay."

Wow.

The wine list yielded up Riscal Proximo Tempranillo, a red we needed given the damp and cool night.

"I think it's actually going to freeze tonight," my friend said incredulously. Kill me now; it's October 29th.

Despite multiple compliments on my tights tonight, I am in no way ready for tights weather.

We had lots to discuss: upcoming anniversaries, CD gifts, whether or not guys ever fully mature, you name it.

Our servers were unfettered enough to join in on conversations throughout the night, providing illuminating other viewpoints.

For dinner, we chose whipped Prosciutto with cashews, citrus, basil and balsamic on bread.

The concept of whipped Prosciutto intrigued us both but the resulting spread had an appealing depth of flavor that we loved.

Neither of us could resist local wood-grilled rabbit with Brussels Sprouts, carrots and anchioade, but we were both surprised that the veggie mixture was not hot.

Which is not a complaint, because it was a flavorful, textural delight.

The rabbit, although a tad salty, was perfection when eaten with the craisins for contrasting sweetness.

Although I wasn't crazy about the music (a vintage '50s station), both my friend and the servers loved it.

It led to a discussion of which Patsy Cline song is best done karaoke-style.

That's information I never need to know.

Sipping our wine after we finished, our server offered dessert and we declined...until we started talking about the great Aziza cream puff and then we caved.

Setting it down in front of us, our server justified it saying, "It's small anyway." What she meant is that it wasn't as big as our heads like it usually is.

After discussing the Lincoln movie with a guy who didn't make it in due to his size ("No one over 200 pounds," he said. "People were skinny during the Civil War, especially Confederates."), we left.

Even though it was almost 11, we had theater to see.

"Robert Johnson and the Devil"was playing at, of all places, Third Street Diner.

Most surprisingly of all, it was playing on the third floor of the diner. I didn't even know that there was a third floor.

It's not a big space and it filled up quickly but there was drink service up there, so things were pretty convivial.

The play was about blues guitarist Robert Johnson selling his soul to the devil at the crossroads of Highways 49 and 61 in Mississippi.

The fog machine put out a serious amount of fog in the small room and lasted far longer than the audience expected.

But the short play was elevated by Roi Boyd's performance as the Devil, although his horns had a bad habit of slipping down to his shoulders.

Friend and I laughed so hard we almost cried.

The story of a man fascinated by women and whiskey (as opposed to, say, men and tequila) took a turn for the worse, like the musician's life, when a jealous husband laced his bottle of booze with strychnine.

Because apparently, even a deal with the devil can't ensure immortality.

There was a guy in the front row with a loud but distinctive laugh. After the show, the narrator put the mic in front of him and said, "You should just laugh."

When the play ended, the actors became musicians and a blues band kicked into high gear where moments before a play had been.

The Devil was absent but he probably had souls to buy.

But not mine. There's nothing I want badly enough to sell mine for, at least nothing that I can't get on my own.

I hope.

And the Award Goes to...

I got to play dress-up tonight because no cute boys were available.

My friend the theater critic hadn't met anyone he wanted to invite to the Richmond Theater Critics Circle Awards so he settled for inviting me.

"It's formal," he wrote. "Do you have a nice evening dress?'

Conveniently, I do and I can cover up my legs when it's required.

Despite me not being of the sex of his dreams, my date was gallant enough to pick me up since driving in a full-length dress is a pain.

The evening began at Popkin's for a reception and the first person I saw was singer Desiree Roots in a dress with a train.

A train. In Popkin's. Think about that.

After schmoozing and glad-handing for an hour, we moved across the street to the Empire Theater for the awards.

I didn't see many open seats and the crowd was a lively and stylish one, so it felt more like a seated party than a stuffy awards banquet.

And because these were theater people, there were not one but two intermissions to allow people time to get their drink on.

The entire show had been scripted with loads of inside jokes and lots of theater humor, including critic roasting.

When two of the presenters talked about acting versus teaching, one said that the advantage of teaching was that you could send difficult students to the principal..

Or even suspend them.

"I know some critics I'd like to suspend," actress Susan Sanford cracked. "From a bridge. Or a tall building."

Singer Susan Greenbaum asked co-presenter UR basketball Coach Chris Mooney why he'd wanted to participate, given his non-arts occupation.

He answered, "I'm not really known in this part of town." The audience loved that.

One of the biggest laughs went to Anne Holton when she was asked about the high points of being First Lady.

She mentioned the Queen's visit in 2007 and the challenges of learning all the protocols required.

"Thank God there are no queens here tonight," she deadpanned.

Another good pairing was Culture Works' John Bryan with DJ Melissa Chase.

Talking about the contribution of costume design, Bryan said, "Without costumes, theater would just be a bunch of naked people sitting around."

Pause. "Like in radio," he said.

"Hey, we wear headphones," Chase corrected him.

But it wasn't just banter. A song from each of the nominated musicals was performed throughout the evening.

Favorite lyric: "I'd rather be nine people's favorite than a hundred people's ninth favorite."


I, too, aspire to be nine people's favorite. I just want some say in who the nine are.

Like any awards show, there were surprises.

The very first  award winner wasn't present.

Another acknowledged how surprised she was with her win by saying, "I was so unprepared that I'm still chewing gum."

The very talented Alan Sader got my vote for most dapper evening attire for a male in his red plaid kilt and high socks.

He looked magnificent accepting his award for Best Actor in a Leading Role in a Play (for King Lear).

My money is on him winning next year for playing Big Daddy in "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof."

Best Musical was a tie between "Dirty Rotten Scoundrels" and "Title of Show," prompting comments about RVA having room for the biggest musicals as well as the smallest (budget).

I had just turned to my (critic) seatmate and commented that Henley Street Theater hadn't won anything (she gave me a cryptic smile) when lo and behold, they won Best Play for "Last Days of Judas Iscariot."

When all was said and done, the crowd was well-lubricated, a bit hoarse after so much yelling for favorites and savoring the camaraderie of the Richmond Theater community.

What else could we do but go for munchies and rehash it all?

My handsome date who opened doors for me and introduced me all night long by saying, "This is my date. Isn't he pretty?" and I were joined by another couple at Third Street Diner.

Over diner food of nachos, cheeseburger, chicken fingers and fries (in our defense, they were out of lettuce), we watched a waitress clean the floor with the vacuum cleaner strapped to her back.

We talked about gay men with girlfriends for beards and which lecture topics attract lesbians.

And before we left, we ogled the contents of the vending machine at the front of the restaurant

Cigarettes, Advil, tampons; all the essentials of life were there.

Our server said the machine used to have candy and condoms, too but, alas, no longer.

Not that my date and I needed either. We were full and neither of us was getting that kind of lucky tonight.

Not that we hadn't looked fine enough to tempt a couple of (very different) guys.

We just didn't meet the right ones.

Disco Diner

A seldom-scene friend was in a celebratory mood today and called me at the last minute.

Today was the two-year anniversary of when he gave up smoking and discovered he had cancer.

After an appointment this morning confirming that he's now cancer-free, he wanted to have lunch and celebrate himself.

Usually he lets me choose our destination, but today he announced that we were going to Third Street Diner, a place I haven't been since before it reopened a few years back.

It turned out that we were going for memory's sake.

Back in his radio days in the 90s, he said, he'd spent a lot of time at Third Street, "Upstairs, snorting lines, drinking coffee and eating pancakes."

Let's just say he led a far more colorful life than I could ever imagine, so I just wait for the tales.

The decor was (how do I say this?) interesting.

The curvy black fake fur banquettes with matching faux fur chairs looked like they came from the disco era.

In my cantaloupe-colored dress, I created quite the Halloween effect against all that black.

But other than that and the new candy machine up front, it was all pretty much the same.

They still had the rotating dessert case, the dim bar, the plastic menus.

I'm not even sure that the menu items have changed.

But it's pure diner food, which is my friend's favorite.

He got his usual hamburger (never with cheese!) with lettuce, tomato, mayo and fries.

They were the old-fashioned crinkle cut fries which he loves to douse in mayo.

I've known this guy for over 15 years and I've seen him eat this exact lunch more times than I could count.

I'll tell you what, though, he seems to take pleasure in it every single time.

I played it safe with a grilled cheese with bacon and onion rings on the side.

The onion rings were not freshly made for me, but the sandwich was perfectly satisfying.

I mean, if a diner can't make a decent grilled cheese, all the fuzzy banquettes in the world aren't going to make a bit of difference.

I can't speak to how good the pancakes were back in the day, but from the sound of the stories, I don't think it mattered much.