Ooh, mid-October!

It's finally cold out and that means that the heat is not only on in Saigon, but also in my apartment. It also means that since I can't control the radiators, it's not only 110 in the shade, but also in my bedroom. And just to keep the musical references going, if I received a "little lamb" for my birthday and sang a song to it, it would be slow roasted by the bridge. Unless it was a puppet, but that's something I still completely don't understand.

Monday is usually benefit night in New York City, and I love it! Last Monday I did Kickin' It, which was put together by Lorin Latarro, who has the nerve to have done ten Broadway shows in the last ten years. She literally gets a new Broadway show every time I get my teeth cleaned. Not cool. Anyhoo, this was to help out Natasha "Nabba" Steinhagen, a Broadway dresser who's done tons of shows and is now struggling with ovarian cancer. The show was fantastic. Jim Newman (from Curtains) was the host and told people that he never likes people who host shows just to push their own agendas. He then complained it was hot, took off his jacket and revealed his boldly lettered T-shirt that read "McCain is 'Insain.'" Subtle, but blunt. Lorin directed the whole show and choreographed many of the numbers, and I love that her choreography had such humor. JoAnn Hunter and Noah Racey danced "Knock Me a Kiss," and Lorin's choreography showed them flirting by essentially beating the $%^# out of each other. There's nothing funnier than a romantic dance interrupted by a kick in the family jewels. Maybe the title of the whole night should have been "Kickin' it…in Noah Racey's crotch." The fabulous Josh Henry performed as well, and I expressed my sympathy to him. He was in the ensemble of In the Heights and understudied Benny. He was the first person to give his notice in the show, and he played his final performance in August. The cast was so sad to see him go but also very supportive because he was leaving to play a lead in a Broadway show. Unfortunately, it was Godspell, which wound up canceling its Broadway run. Of course, Josh couldn't go back to In the Heights because his replacement already took over, so he's been out of a gig. Ouch. He had a great attitude about it along the lines of "It's all good." Then, just a few days after I chatted with him, I found out that he's coming back to In the Heights because they need a new swing. Turns out, it is all good! On a related note, what's with the new "don't worry," now entitled "no worries"? What happened to "don't worry" or "no problem"? When did they become un-cool? Was it at the same time I was forced to replace "I'm devastated" with "It's all good"?

On Wednesday I did my "Sirius Live On Broadway" show where I interviewed the hilarious Jackie Hoffman. She has a CD coming out called "Jackie Hoffman Live," and it's going to be hilarious. She sang one of the songs from the CD called "Please…won't you get away with your children?" My favorite lyric: "Your double strollers on the street leaves no room for my feet. And you're leaving me no room to let me be what I wanna be. You think it makes me feel alone and makes me want one of my own… but all it's making me want… is a hysterectomy!" Jackie talked about how she would sass the onstage audience at Xanadu with her signature improvs and that they got longer and longer. Finally, on the last night, she did the whole ending scene from West Side Story ("How many bullets are left in this gun, Chino?") Her co-star Mary Testa knew she was in for a long one and simply left the stage so Jackie could finish. This Wednesday at noon at the Times Square Information Center, I have the stars from Tale of Two Cities and Christy Carlson Romano (Kim Possible, who's starring in Avenue Q).

At the Chatterbox, I had Lin-Manuel Miranda, Tony-winning composer/lyricist and star of In the Heights. He went to Hunter (public school for smart NY kids) and, turns out, didn't grow up "in the heights" but rather in Inwood. I asked him why he didn't write In the 'Wood and he said because Sondheim wrote it better. Quick answer! At Hunter, sixth grade pretty much just focuses on doing the big end-of-the-year musical. When he was in sixth grade, instead of one big show, they did six 20-minute musicals! He was a munchkin, an Oklahoma farmer, a son from Anatevka, Conrad Birdie, Bernardo and Capt. Hook. I asked him to describe how these mini-shows were done, and he said it was pretty much:

RIFF: Hey, Shark! Get out of here!
JETS: (sing) "When you're a Jet, you stay a Jet!"
MARIA: My hands are cold.
Etc…

One of the first shows he saw was Les Miz, and he and his mother would listen to the cast album all the time, specifically "Bring Him Home," which is similar to my mother except for one thing: My mother has the Jewish gene that turns everything negative. Once, I was putting on the Les Miz CD, and she (seriously) said, "Play my favorite song… He's Not Coming Home." It was a wonderful childhood.