I came out here with my friend Tim, and we decided not to take the Hamptons jitney because the Fourth of July traffic could be a headache. What we didn't realize was that the Long Island Railroad would be headache-ier. It was so crazily crowded that we had to stand in an aisle for the whole two-hour-and-40-minute trip. The good news is the guy sitting in the seat right near where we were standing had his cell phone ringer on a DMX song. Whenever it rang, he would make sure not to pick it up until he carefully checked the number of the person calling him, so we got to hear an extended DMX concert every time. Yay.

Betty's first By Request show was on her birthday (July 3), and the last time we did the show at Feinstein's was on my birthday. The ironic thing is apparently some people think I'm much older than Betty. Recently, I've made some "I'm old" jokes on the radio and the Chatterbox, thinking that it's obvious how I exaggerated my age. Apparently, it's not. Someone wrote on my Facebook wall that they can't believe how great I look for 60 (!) and someone else emailed my website and "complimented" me by saying that they thought I had amazing energy for someone who's 68. Wow. Here's hoping I get that revival of The Gin Game with Angela Lansbury.

This week I've been rehearsing for the Rosie Family Cruise, which leaves July 11 from Seattle. We're sailing to Alaska, so, of course, the opening number has some Sarah Palin jokes, but now that she's resigning I guess we'll have to change them to some hilarious Sean Parnell jokes. Anybody? Nobody. He's going to be the new governor of Alaska, people. I'm awaiting the crickets.

On Wednesday I had Loni Ackerman on my Sirius/XM Live On Broadway show at the Times Square Information Center. A lot of musical fans know that she originated the song "Crossword Puzzle" in Starting Here, Starting Now, but they may not know about the great roles she took over. She said that she wanted to play Evita, but Hal Prince didn't want to see her because he thought she was too funny. She finally got an audition and decided to counteract his image of her by being more Evita-like….aka aloof and standoffish. It worked because she got a few callbacks, and at the last one she sang "Don't Cry for Me Argentina." Hal Prince was in the audience and walked up to the stage. She thought she was supposed to sing again and when he said, "So…should we do this?" she nodded politely and started walking back to the piano. Hal was miffed and said, "Okay…I'll see you at rehearsal." Loni then realized he was offering her the role (!) and immediately dropped her fake coldness. She screamed, ran to the lip of the stage and jumped off, into his arms! Unfortunately, she has a fear of heights, and one night she had an anxiety attack before climbing the stairs to the balcony of the Casa Rosada. She was standing with her dresser as the chorus was chanting "E-vi-ta! E-vi-ta!" and Loni told her dresser, "I'm not going up there." Her dresser thought she was kidding and ignored her. It was almost the sixth "E-vi-ta" chant which was when Loni was supposed to start climbing and she told the dresser again "I'm not going up those stairs!" The dresser, who was petite and under five feet, realized Loni was serious, so she did the only thing she could think of: She reeled back and slapped Loni in the face! Loni nodded, said "Thank you" and calmly went to the balcony of the Casa Rosada. I would not have tried that on the real Evita. Or Patti LuPone, for that matter.

I also interviewed Paul Castree at my Sirius/XM show, and he regaled the audience with details about plunging to his death nightly in Saturday Night Fever. He played Bobby C. and would climb to the top of the onstage Verrazano Bridge, which was many feet above the stage and then he'd fall. Right before he hit the ground, there was a blackout, and when the lights came back on, he'd be gone. He actually had a harness attached to him, and there was a crew member backstage who was holding onto the wire that suspended him. The crew member would let Paul go on a certain cue line, and when the wire got to a certain mark, he would grab it again so Paul wouldn't hit the ground. There'd be a blackout as Paul was wheeled across the stage like he was a shirt on a clothesline. It was a cool effect unless the blackout was late and the audience would see Paul being wheeled backwards towards the wings. He says they'd think, "Oh my G-d, he's about to die! Wait…he's actually a backwards-flying Superman." The great part was that there was no mat on the stage because the wire could never break — just like the Titanic could never sink! That's right, one night, Paul started falling as usual and when the stage crewman stopped him, Paul dangled above the stage as usual…and then felt the wire snap! He wound up falling straight down from about six feet above the stage. Luckily, he landed on his hands and knees and didn't break anything, but he said the experience was a crazy mix of art imitating life because his subtext that night was "I'm Bobby C! I'm dying, I'm dying!" SNAP "Wait…I really am dying."  Continued...