April E. Brucker's Blog, page 27

Arrested Development

It was a cold winter day when I found myself down at the Tombs. A blizzard had just hit, and the snow was still fresh on the New York City sidewalk. Because of the people heat and the traffic, the snow was starting to melt, becoming an awkward slush pond. My goal had been to get down there as early as possible. It wasn’t to be obnoxious to my less than law abiding friend AJ. Rather, it was because I knew everyone and their Baby Mama would be there in the afternoon, and I wanted to make as little contact with that shady foot traffic as possible.
Then again, it was ironic I was judging them as we all had a friend or loved one in jail. As I stood there, seeing the white bus that had Corrections written on it in blue lettering, I waited for the austere metal doors to open. As I finished my coffee I knew Mother Justice might not have been blind but nearsighted. Sure, maybe marginalized minority young men and poor whites got the rough breaks because they couldn’t afford a Kardashian, but in the end if you broke the law, the law always won.
The Tombs are on White Street, next to Court Street. AJ was waiting there until Rikers had a bed for him. Usually Rikers is overcrowded, so he had to wait. His mother was distressed because her prodigal son could be transported at any day without being notified beforehand. Such things happen when one is property of the state. Either way, the reason I was there on a Saturday was because the visiting days correspond with their last name, and he was at the end of the alphabet. Plus his parents, who came once a week to visit the dunce they raised couldn’t come because of the snow. While it was now a pain in the ass in the city, Long Island where they lived was still rather crippled from Mother Nature’s wrath. After a call from his mother asking me to come as a favor, I decided to go. Plus I wanted to visit my buddy anyway.
Yes, he was a dunce. AJ was my buddy and therefore my dunce. The details of his original charge and arrest were one for the record books, and if he played his cards right he might even be able to earn a Darwin Award someday. Yet while that was more likely as time went on, I didn’t want that. Despite having a head riddled with one bad decision after another, and leading a life on constant collision course, AJ above all things did have a kind heart and was someone I adored deeply. Often, we would check out guys together, the fag and the hag, and joke about getting into trouble with an entire basketball team.

AJ had been arrested for selling drugs to an undercover cop. With AJ, sex is always on the brain. The dude was cute, and he thought he was going to get some action. Instead, he got handcuffed, just not in the way he wanted. Because he had priors for possession, AJ was sentenced to Haven House, a therapeutic community. A place like Haven House is the last stop on the drug treatment train. It is for those who regular 28 day programs had not worked for, and AJ had done those like a revolving door. Jail had not worked either, partially because these people were repeat offenders because they were addicts. So in this setting that was akin to One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, my dear friend was losing his mind every night when he was in the long line to get his anti-depressant medication.
Haven House was not the place for my buddy. An NYU educated dancer, he had appeared on tours as well as on Broadway, where he did everything from swing to dance captain. Before his arrest, AJ had promised me a lesson. Either way, the inmates running the asylum, most of whom lived on the street and had no home training, grated on my pal’s nerves. AJ began to earn day passes, and would run off to meet various boyfriends. Then he would run back to his cage after a taste of freedom. One day, after six months drug free, he took a day pass and was determined never to return. It worked out because an old druggie friend called him.
Next thing I knew I got a message from our friend Dale telling us AJ was missing. No one knew where he was, and AJ was due in court. Because he had absconded, a warrant was issued for his arrest. Of course, as his mother was calling Dale, AJ was partying it up with three nice looking black models in the Chelsea Hotel. Like Amy Winehouse to rehab, he said, “No, no, no.”
After a bunch of us called him to see if he had died, AJ turned himself in. Off to the Tombs he went to finish the rest of his sentence in jail. If his sentence was one more day, AJ would have been going upstate to Sing Sing or somewhere of that like. His mother had given me his info, and AJ had spoken to me on the phone before my visit. Despite being locked up, my friend seemed to be in good spirits. Part of me thinks it is because he was just happy to be out of Haven House. Then again, by the looks of that Hell on Earth perhaps I too would welcome jail.
While some of our friends were surprised AJ headed to the Chelsea Hotel to do more damage when there was a warrant for his arrest, I wasn’t. At one point, before his life had taken the latest wrong turn, AJ had been a regular. My late friend Chacho had been the drug dealer of the Chelsea Hotel. A queeny king pin in his Louis Vuitton, Chacho was like a Santa Claus for bad kids, he supplied a substance known on the street as ice, and it was at the top of their wish list. On top of that, he knew who was sleeping, and he knew who was awake for days.
When I mentioned meeting AJ, Chacho was less than thrilled. He regaled me with tales of how AJ ran naked around the Chelsea Hotel, and was fisted routinely by muscle men. Not to mention once AJ leapt out a window using his tighty whities as a parachute he was so high. (For the record, it was the 2ndfloor and he landed in a dumpster). More often than not, Chacho was reluctant to deal to him and even cut AJ off on a few occasions. His fear, AJ was crazy, and the drugs were just going to make him a safety hazard. When a drug dealer calls you crazy and cuts you off, that says everything.
Then Chacho informed, “He also has a tattoo on his back that says Cum Fuck Pig with an arrow to his ass. I hope he never goes to jail. That will be one rough shower. You didn’t hear that from me, because snitches get stitches and I did illegal things at the Chelsea. Don’t want to incriminate myself.”
The steel door finally opened and I was jarred back to the present. A female guard reminiscent of the drill sergeant in Private Benjamin stood as I entered, eyeing me suspiciously. In a serious, authoritative tone, she informed me that my cellphone had to be turned off or risk being confiscated. The lighting was dim, almost as if they were going out of their way to make the place was depressing as possible. Yes, this was jail.
The female guard seemed angry and scary, so I complied. On the wall, as my things went through the first metal detector, I saw a sign that said, “Stop Inmate Suicide.” Underneath was a 1-800 number that could be called. Yup, I was in jail. No ands, ifs, or buts about it.
After passing the preliminary security check, I was greeted by several more female guards, all less than thrilled to see me. It wasn’t personal. They didn’t like anyone in the building, but then again, there was nothing to be liked about many of the tenants that resided here. One short guard, a Latina, served as an attack dog of sorts. I lifted my arms as instructed, and my sweat pants were rolled up because they were too long and I didn’t want them to drag. As I followed instructions, some skin unintentionally showed.
“Undo your pants so your skin doesn’t show. If you don’t, I’m giving you a shirt to wear so you don’t expose yourself!” She barked. This was her house and she was bitch in charge. Shit, when they took away a person’s freedom they weren’t fucking around. On the other hand, I knew she was probably like this with everyone and this was far from being personal. She had her reasons and I was best to comply. I followed the command, she softed from a bolder to a brick. Then again, dealing with the criminal element would make anyone a callous asshole.
After passing inspection, I was escorted to a waiting room. Across from me was a young woman, Italian or Latina, I couldn’t tell. She had done her hair and makeup for the visit, probably seeing a boyfriend of some sort before he went to stay for a period at Rikers. Either way, apparently her outfit did not pass inspection. She wore a burlap sack like shirt that said, “STATE OF NEW YORK” in white lettering. The bitch who was in charge of the house had gotten her. We exchanged a half knowing smile. It was a long day and it wasn’t even ten o’clock yet. Yes, we were both visiting people who when you said their names, the words asshole or fuck up most likely followed. The staff of this place wouldn’t let us forget it, either.
There were plenty in my group who would call AJ an asshole and fuck up, especially Dale after the antics of the past week. However, I still didn’t see AJ that way as hard as I tried. While I had known about his drug driven escapades through Chacho, I knew AJ the person through my other deceased friend, Joe. AJ had met Joe through Dale. In the gay world, Dale is sort of a Kevin Bacon. Because he is a party planner, he connects everyone by 6 degrees. AJ had gone to Joe’s art show and they hit it off. Through Joe, AJ had heard about his funny friend April the puppeteer and writer, the one with big dreams writing a book. So we knew each other long before we did. Thus in the end, unintentionally, AJ became my living link to Chacho and Joe, two dearly departed friends.  
When AJ found out about my book being published, he always encouraged him to be vocal. Maybe this is what made him such a hit when he taught dance at some of the best studios in New York, the gift to bring out the best in his students. AJ told me that people had to know that it was possible to accomplish a dream, but also that the book existed. He told me this during my visit to him at Haven House where a guy wearing an Afro with a comb in it asked me, “Do you have change for a dollar?” Then again, according to AJ, he asked all the ladies that question. It was his pick up line.
Because AJ was mandated to treatment and had no money, I gave him a copy of my book for his birthday. He had been deep into it during the time of his arrest, and intended to finish it in jail. However, the book was confiscated because there was writing in the front, aka my special message to my boy. Something about security. Again, when the state takes a person’s freedom, they aren’t fucking around.
Looking around the waiting room, the walls were covered in posters that looked as if they had been stolen from the classroom of my 5thgrade teacher. One had a squirrel chewing a nut that stated, “It’s nice to be important, but it’s important to be nice.” Granted, those who were staying here weren’t here for doing the right thing so this was irony at it’s finest.
Then the next poster was a Bald Eagle. The caption read, “Soar high like an eagle.” Now this one was just plain funny, because the clientele in a detention facility had done just the opposite, going for the lowest common denominator as they tested the laws of nature and the land. Not to mention they were terribly allergic to achievement. Finally, the best poster was of an owl with a bubble coming out of his mouth. The bubble said, “Remember The Golden Rule: Treat others as you would want to be treated.” There was no comment for that one, none, except a full belly laugh where I ended up on the floor in my mind.
The book shelves of the place were filled with various reading materials for children. These books included The Bernstein Bears, Arthur, and of course Clifford. Then I realized that when the Baby Mama Squad brought their progeny to see their errant father who had seldom come around let alone paid child support. Probably mostly undisciplined because they were the product of a con and the dumbass that bred with him, these youngsters too needed entertained in the waiting room. This whole set up was campy, bizarre, funny, and sad all at the same time.
Finally, I heard a loud male voice announce, “YOUNG!”
I looked over and there was a guard with a handle bar mustache that looked like he was Shining Time Station with short man’s syndrome. Expressionless, he motioned me to a second metal detector. When I entered the visiting area, these were enlarged versions of Play School tables and chairs. Of course they were cemented in so inmates could not throw him if they felt like rioting. Yes, once again, I was reminded of where I was.
A minute later, AJ entered. Looking more refreshed than ever, he was dressed as if The Trix Rabbit picked his wardrobe. Adorned in a lime green jump suit, I figured the State of New York was already punishing this dude by making him wear something that clearly wasn’t his color. AJ gave me a huge, bear hug. “This is perfect! I am up and just had my hot chocolate.” Sigh, only a gay man would have hot chocolate in jail.
“How are you?” I asked. After all, my buddy was in jail. This was a place where you could get stabbed for being the wrong color. One never knows when they are wearing the bulls eye for the day. “I’m good. Glad to be the fuck out of Haven House. You see, I go to Rikers. Then I am done. No treatment, nothing.” AJ said happily.
“Are you safe?” As I fielded the question I grabbed my friends hand, worriedly. Between the dim light, scary guards, and possible axe murderer for a roommate this was no place I would want to spend the night.
“Yeah, most dudes are drug offenders like me. We just play cards most of the time. Jail is kind of boring.” My buddy said. Then he reiterated that he was glad to be out of Haven House. “Do they heat this place? It is winter.” I informed him.
“Oh yeah.” He told me. “The only downside here is I am without my hair dye. Other than that, I’m pretty good. They have me on a new anti-depressant that makes me lose weight and is amazing.” Again, only a gay man would see these particular ups and downs in this given situation.
As he said this, AJ stroked his salt and pepper hair. He was now in his forties and it was beginning to show. AJ told me his parents had been visiting him weekly, and his mother had been getting on his nerves. It was getting harder and harder for his family to come, and his sister was outright angry with him. She had told him after his initial arrest that if he screwed up again, she was done with him. Well AJ’s sister made good on her threat, proving it was a promise by not visiting him. While this saddened AJ, he admitted he knew she was justified.
Then sheepishly, AJ asked, “Is Dale mad at me?”
The answer began with a Y and ended in a yes. Dale was beyond pissed. From having his patience and friendship stretched, he had to deal with AJ’s ever beleaguered mother melting down on the phone. To boot, Dale had actually dragged AJ out of his drug den in the Chelsea Hotel and walked him to court where he voluntarily turned himself in. Perhaps AJ deserved the words fuck up and asshole tacked on after the mention of his name. He was still my friend, and he had lost his freedom. So I lied and told him no.
 “Am I a fuck up like Benny McMahon?” AJ inquired.
Good old Benny McMahon was a rent boy we had all known. Working as an escort well into his ladder 40s, recently the lifestyle had begun to wear on Benny as he had been forced to get dentures. Sober for about an hour a day, Benny recently got into a neat building with a door man through the welfare system. While Benny would definitely screw this up, he had one thing AJ didn’t: his freedom. Not to mention Benny could also pick his own clothing. In this case, Benny McMahon was far superior. Again, I didn’t have the heart to tell him this. So I changed the subject.
 “Are you happy?” I asked him.
“Oh of course I am. Are you kidding? No more treatment. And as you know, I love the black and Spanish guys, the dark meat. This place is a candy store for me.” AJ informed me, his eyes gleaming with mischief.
I burst out laughing as he said this. Sure, I should have done a face/palm but I couldn’t. Chacho and AJ had something in common. Aside from a serious drug problem, they couldn’t lie. They could steal and have sex with lots of strangers, but they couldn’t lie. As a matter of fact, there were times I preferred they did.
 “You have a boyfriend in here?” I asked now intrigued.
“Funny you should say that. You see the other day the guys asked if I was gay. They said they had no problem with it. Just wanted to know. I told them I was. Next thing I know this hot, gold toothed Dominican drink of water starts tapping me on the shoulder when I am not looking on the tier, and then running away. I was like, that is a dangerous game to play in jail, Pal.” AJ said.
“That is fifth grade affection if I ever heard it.” I told him. “Shit, looks like you found yourself a husband.”
“He says he has a girlfriend, but I think he’s into me.” AJ assured.
“Oh, he’s so into you.” I said. “And before you know it, he will be into you.”
“Oh I hope it’s in the shower. I have always wanted to have sex in the jail shower.” AJ told me. Then we proceeded to gossip about people we knew in the midst of our gigglefest.
Just then, we caught site of a Spanish gangster dude and his gal pal. She was wearing too tight jeans that accentuated her J-Lo-esque derriere. Playfully, she slapped her Boo, and he slapped her back. “Stop that!” The guard with the handle bar mustache thundered. The place went quiet. When things get quiet in jail, it is generally a bad sign. The air became so thick a pin could drop.
“Oh, he can slap me anytime.” AJ cooed. I laughed again. Yes, my gay friend and I were checking out men in jail. His life had sunk as low as it could get, and he could only think about the sexual fantasies he had yet to live. And there I was, checking out a dude with him. The whole thing felt unreal, but it was also kind of fun to behave like 7th grade girls about boys regardless of where we were. Only AJ could make a jail visit this much fun.
Just then the guard announced the visit was about up. “Thank you for visiting me in jail on a snowy day, if there is anything I can do to repay you, let me know.”
“Take care of yourself and stay out of trouble.” I said. Then things got real. It’s the moment where I got to go to freedom, and he had to stay. Perhaps he was making a heaven out of hell to quote John Milton, but alas, he was still in jail. He hugged me quickly and ran off. There was a part of me that was offended, but part of me knew it was a way not to deal with things getting real. Then again, maybe this was why he was looking for love in jail. And this is why he turned to drugs in the first place. AJ couldn’t deal with real, and he had to do whatever he could to escape it.
Exiting the jail felt good, especially when they opened the metal gates and off to freedom I went. Despite the cold, I appreciated the sunlight gracing my skin in a whole new way. Even though I saw my breath as a result of it being January, I was outdoor to see my breath. I got on the subway, and back to my home to plan my day, my decisions and not that of a bunch of guards. Needless to say, I also made sure I had the right away when I crossed the street. I made sure the clerk truly gave me a $5 and not a $20 instead. When I owed money, I paid it honestly. In short, the visit with the friend who made horrid decisions made mine better.
AJ was released and relapsed again. I saw him on the street as he was coming off a bender and brought him hot chocolate, his favorite drink that got him through his time in jail. The poor thing was sweating bullets in November. I had to. AJ assured me he would pay back the favor.

Months later, I had a DVD taping. AJ told me he was coming, and I put him, Dale and the rest of the posse on the guest list. However, AJ was a no show. Word on the street was that he got arrested again. I hope he finds Mr. Felony Murder in jail, because visiting a friend once is good for the soul but it’s not something that should be done twice. Either way, it’s nice to be important, but it’s important to be nice as the poster says. I hope AJ gets it right this time. Like the bald eagle, I hope he soars high. And I hope he isn’t like the squirrel looking for his latest pair of nuts. Sigh McSigh Sigh.

www.aprilbrucker.com

The Live Comedy Conundrum

This past week, I have been flirting with the idea of possibly producing a live event. Without getting into detail, I have my pick of spaces. One is a cabaret venue, a legendary one, that I have a longstanding relationship with. The other is an Off-Broadway Theatre on restaurant row, one in which show that begin there end up on Broadway at some point, or are critical favorites. I have earned the right to consort with both. Dealing with which one I should pick is six of one and half dozen of another.
In the end, it is the same storm of bullshit and the same red tape. The question is, in the end which storm of bullshit and red tape do I want to deal with? Well kids, what I am trying to say is welcome to the wonderful world of live theatre in any capacity.
There is nothing like live performance, whether it is comedy, cabaret, or theatre. You are in the moment, and anything can happen. Applause is like an orgasmic response or a drug, and sometimes both at the same time. It is a high when a show goes well, and like a heroin addict you only want more. The actors are feet away, and then your scene partner forgets a line. You make it work, and together your effort almost makes it better than what you rehearsed as the audience is glued. You get a heckler, and your one the mark comeback is better than any joke you ever wrote as you get a round of applause……There’s no business like show business.
When I started in New York, I did a lot of live performing. For most Saturdays, I performed as a part of a children’s show at an Obie Award winning theatre, both legendary for it’s talent and the eccentric members that lived there. I also performed for a short while doing improv, but improv is not my gift. Then was my stint in a weekly Off-Broadway dinner theatre show where I played a meaty, fun character role and moved up to a lead. Add in my Saturdays with a puppet show at Green Acres Mall for the children where I was head puppeteer and voice artist. I also did a few variety shows and play readings during my NYU days. So I do appreciate the lore of live theatre.
Then in addition, I spent my younger years performing comedy, and quite a bit of it. I spent most nights in basements either soaring or dying for various crowds, and then my food money on subway fair. Sometimes, I would be up onstage six times a night. Comedy at it’s core is in the moment. Like acting, it is based on the truth we are all trying to get to. The audience can tell if you are so full of shit you can’t see straight. Comedy makes a performer real honest real quick, because comedy comes from that place of being uncool. This is why a comedy club is so magical. Right there, in front of a crowd of strangers watching, you can make a discovery that is not only funny, but the root of who you are as a person.
While acting was what my degree was in, and I did both acting and comedy in college, standup was where the doors ultimately opened after I graduated. I found myself on the road most weekends, and became rather good at hosting and middling. When I got the chance, I started hosting my own weekly mic in the basement of a taco joint. The ceiling leaked and most of the time the stage made out of something akin to plywood was a safety hazard, and the mic almost never worked. We got crowds of tourists to watch us, and we all were baptized by fire. After that, I hosted another mic and produced show wherever they would let me.
And then slowly, I began to burn out.
Around my mid-twenties, I found myself on the road most weekends. While the audiences were sometimes good, the money was awful and was eaten up by gas price. Sure, I was getting experience, but burning my paycheck was getting old, especially if they paid me shit for ten hours up and ten hours back. I made comedian friends, but most of the time they weren’t going anywhere except gigs that were 50 bucks and a burger. I also ran the open mic circuit, but as each mic had inside jokes and I found myself consistently performing for the sick fucks that are comedians, I didn’t find myself getting better let alone funnier. Then I hosted and produced for one club and it’s sister, and the manager I worked under was an abusive, tired, embittered frustrated actor who had never risen above student films. Most of the time, I did check spots, being bumped for male comedians or those who somehow were just luckier than I was in that setting.
Then in order to get stage time, it became a rat race that made me ill to run. It was like a thousand rats, literally, going for the same tired ass piece of cheese. What, a spot in some basement for three people because the producer won a shit award? Bitch please.
On top of that, the combination late nights, long mileage from travel, stress, and poor eating habits were making me sick. Sometimes I would vomit because I ate bad food. Sometimes I would vomit because I was so exhausted. Sometimes I would be too sick to vomit, I would just collapse at random times in my apartment. My body was tired and I couldn't feel it because I just kept going. Yet the more I kept going, the more I felt like a rat in the same rat race on the rat wheel going crazy. 
Frustrated and unfulfilled, I began making my own puppet videos. May Wilson and I interviewed celebrities or just did skits, sometimes with other puppeteers, but sometimes on our own. When I made my videos I found I had more fun, and I found I wasn’t as bitter, angry, or tired. I also found more opportunities opened for me with my writing in conjunction with my videos. As I was getting money to blog and make videos, I began to question why I was even still pursuing standup comedy, an art form on life support. 
I produced shows several more times before hanging up that towel for a few years. During that point, I went through lowered attendance, possibly because my videos were getting all my energy. I started to haggle with the space and then didn’t care. In the end, when as one producer, a small time comic who I will not name, aggressively tried to steal my people for his audience. That is when I knew I had to go in a new direction. So I made more videos, helped pitch a possible television idea, and drafted my book.
A few months later, my puppet children and I got a television opportunity that changed our lives forever. I put the club I had done so much work for on television, giving them more exposure than they had gotten elsewhere. They thanked me by firing me from my job. I figured a flagship club would scoop me up. Didn’t happen. So I was back to square one with no home.
Other doors opened. Because of my video making, I got a job as a talking head and other talking head gigs followed, sometimes online and sometimes various apps. While they weren’t perfect, they all paid. Not to mention my night wasn’t dependent on whether or not people showed up. If no one showed up, I could still do my rant or whatever else. On one site I could be booted off if I wasn’t liked, but at the same time I could perform for up to a few thousand at a time. Question: Why the hell was I worrying about a shit comedy spot for three fucking people?
Then there were more doors that opened. I had not only the opportunity to write my book, but to publish it. I also have blogged for some hoity toity blogs and magazines. In my simple days of being one of a herd of cattle, I never had these opportunities not would I have sought them out.
I also was able to do some things with acting, and was even in a television show, commercial, and movie. Not only did I realize how much I missed my first love, but more than anything, I discovered how much I liked doing film. I was able to go, do my job, and make a new discovery on each take. After filming a pilot for IFC, I came to believe there was more to be done in this area for myself not only as an artist, but as a person.
Of course, I was also able to do more with puppetry. I not only got to work as a ventriloquist, but also a hand and rod puppeteer. I did a weekly show for children, and served as head puppeteer in a short film winning accolades in festivals.
Lastly of course, not only did I start to record music, but also had a song that was number one on the internet charts for five weeks. Making the videos for these was fun, and recording was a blast. It seemed like putting standup on the back burner and exiting the club opened up a whole new world full of possibilities, creativity, and not so much tired ass bullshit. Getting fired from that club may have actually been one of the best artistic and personal accomplishments ever.
I told myself that if I were to return with the gusto I once had, it would be on my terms. So this past year, I figured I had gotten notoriety and was somewhat visible, I might as well. This past April, I produced and starred in my DVD taping. For two months I ran my set in my apartment, did publicity, and harassed anyone who would listen about the event. Day of the event, success. However, had a Rocky-esque meltdown afterwards. My friend, a fellow puppeteer, impersonator, and opening act assured me that it was all going to be okay pre-show. It was, but it almost killed me. 
Then I remembered that while TV appearances and such got me fans, there was a reason my live appearances were limited. It was because the planning, drama beforehand, and everything else leading up to it could kill a person. Sure, the payoff was wonderful, but was it worth all the shit? 
After that, I started to do more comedy again and remembered what had attracted me in the first place. And in what seemed like a call back to an era gone, I wasn’t tired. I wasn’t bitter that I wasn’t born a man. I was actually energized to get onstage, and had a tablet full of jokes. About a month later, I headlined a theatre for not one but two nights. I managed to kill both nights, and made a crowd of new fans. The first night the crowd was cute, but the second night the house was packed. Both shows made me remember why I pursued comedy in the first place. It was because I loved making others laugh. 
However, I also found myself frustrated with the promoter. He promised me my opener would pack the house first night, and my opener failed to do that. Second night, the promoter overbooked the show with every friend and comedian he felt sorry for. Thus it made my job harder because instead of a headliner show, it could well turn into a situation where the audience was tired of comedy and there was no way in hell I was having that. I let my grievance be known and was accomodated, but it was some frustration, and again, remembered why my appearances were limited. It is the before show drama that we must all face, novice to headliner alike. Sure, the show turned out well, but I hate having to turn into a diva on people. He was a good dude, but I know what works. I have been around too long. 
About a month afterwards, I did other spots and readied myself for a book signing event at a well known cabaret theatre. My dance card was full, and I did not anticipate this as I got the event date. Not to mention it was a holiday weekend, and the only time I could get my performers together. My boss Bruce’s assistant Laila helped me plan the event, and it ended up being a success. But there was some drama with the venue and confusion over the guest list and other details that nearly made me lost my mind. Actually, I think I was screaming in a bar restroom during one of my meltdowns. The event ended up being a success as I said. My coworkers were superb, my boss fabulous, and everyone enjoyed the show and my book. Yet it was another reminder why I stepped back from live performing and producing both.
For the last several months, I have done an open mic here and there and a show or two but nothing real serious. Organizing a DVD taping and a book release event will kick a person’s ass. Plus I hate having to pay for stage time. Call me a bitch but I am above it. Yes, I am above it. Not to mention the last month and a half I have been more on the broke end of things anyway.
It is also making me question which way I should go with my career. I love being onstage, but hate the bullshit that come with live events. Should I stick with film, go back to acting class, and run that way? Maybe it’s time I knock on that door again. I am finally old enough to start playing some of the roles I am good for. Plus I have comedic timing, life experience, and other skills I can bring to the table. If anything, I am ten times the actor I was ten years ago.
Or maybe I should do the whole writing thing. I love writing, and have enjoyed writing my blog and for other publications. Heck, I even wrote a book. Maybe I should get a steady freelancer or staffer position somewhere. After all, I can write in any and all styles. Plus like the whole acting things, I have comedic timing, life experience, and loads of other skills I bring to the table. I am ten times the writer I was ten years ago, when I first started blogging.
Then there is the pure puppet route. This year I ended up doing some hand and rod work, and becoming a student of the craft of puppetry, and not just ventriloquism. I want to do more and learn more, not to mention there aren't very many women who are good puppeteers to begin with. 
For some people, stand up comedy is the springboard. For others, it is the destination to film/television/radio, writing, producing, club management and every other goal. Maybe standup was just the mere springboard for me. If that is the case I accept it.

Should I swallow the sexism, bullshit, politics, and tired ass drama of live performance to chase a laugh? Should I concentrate my energies elsewhere as the doors continue to open there? I dunno, I’ll sleep on it. 
www.aprilbrucker.com

A Conversation About Art

Freshmen year of college, I had a movement teacher named Joelle Edwards. A petite lady with a black crew cut, she would be your friend one minute and then enemy next. One minute she was telling me I had too many mental health issues and perhaps should see a therapist. Sure, I was a high strung nineteen year old. Maybe she had a point. In the next sentence, she was having a mood swing where she would just scream at students in the hall of the studio. One time, she took a knee pad and flung it at a second year in a rage. The next day she apologized. Then she told us her therapist couldn’t see her that day, and sometimes she had episodes.
Yes, Joelle. I still remember her. She told my mother during Parent’s Weekend I was doing quite well. Weeks later, during evaluations, she ripped me up and wrote some ugly, nasty things about my aptitude and work ethic that are still on record. Not that I really care, but it is a testament to who she was. Then in the next episode she would tell us as a woman who was married three times, had been a squatter on the Lower East Side, and might or might not have been bipolar, that she knew all there was to know about acting. Granted, she had never acted. She had only danced. Yet Joelle was informed. She told us all acting and performance needed to occur from the pelvis. Therefore, we should have as much sex as possible, just not with anyone in our group.
Joelle’s crowning achievement, aside from a one night stand with Richard Gere, had been her days as a dancer in a downtown experimental theatre company. As Head of Movement and Student Affairs, her black and white photos from her dancer days decorated her office. While this avant garde troupe was not well known, this was a credit she constantly bragged about. Yes, being a Mamette Carlisle dancer. Mamette Carlisle was not Martha Graham, but by the way Joelle spoke about her, she might as well have been. Instead, Mamette was what the Lower East Side was in the 90s before the rent was jacked up and her like moved to Brooklyn. Mamette Carlisle was one of a self-important conglomeration of trust funders who created masterbatory art that no one got or cared about. Usually, they faded into obscurity, and that truly made the world a better place.
Joelle would routinely pull me into her office where I always got a gander of the photos. It was usually to tell me she was concerned about me, but meanwhile she would freely admit to being off her meds. Or it was to inform me my teacher, Ariadne Schwartz, who I routinely butted heads with complained to her I “wasn’t listening” again. Meanwhile, how can I listen to someone like Ariadne who only ranted about the acting career she should have had but didn’t?  Then in the next breath Joelle always told me I was doing fine. It all depended on the day, and if and when she saw her psych support network.
Joelle thought it was important we understand art of all sorts, so she organized a field trip at the start of the second semester to The Mamette Carlisle Studio. The way Joelle spoke about her home base, I thought it was on par with Alvin Ailey. Instead, when I got there I found it was closer to Avenue D, yes, the place where a week earlier during a wrong turn I saw a heroin addict and his buddy shooting up. The front of the building was dirty, and the day was already gray and snow filled as well as depressing. Of course, this had to be the back drop for this adventure, or misadventure depending on how you wanted to think of it.
As we entered Mamette’s studio, it was on the third floor of this building that should have been condemned. Walking up the stairs, a girl, Lori, who bragged about how many famous people she saw on the street, let out a blood curdling scream. Her bleach blonde hair flailed. “That’s a rat!” She yelped.
“Welcome to New York.” Joelle cooed and laughed. We exchanged glances. Hopefully, we would survive this afternoon jaunt.
Entering the studio, we were greeted by a smell of must and a look of a place that was barely if ever cleaned. It was as if Mamette Carlisle was not expecting company of the first years from a prestigious performing arts program, but rather that we had barged in. As the door closed, someone announced they felt cold. I turned. It was Bobby, a kid from the Midwest who had recently announced to his dorm floor he was gay. We had all known, so it was no surprise to us. But Bobby had to do it for Bobby, so he made the announcement to about ten people who shrugged apathetically.
“I do not believe in heat. A warm dancer is a sluggish dancer!” A loud, bass voice thundered. It sounded like it could have belonged to a female impersonator anywhere. Emerging from the corner came a rotund woman who looked not like a dancer but rather a linebacker for the New York Giants. Dressed in something that resembled a trailer park fat wrap, she had sewed fur onto this thing making it much more hideous than it had to be. On her face was a combination of shades that looked like Mimi from The Drew Carey Show had done her makeup. Except Mimi from the Drew Carey show was likeable, and this woman was not.
When Mamette spoke, she had a put on tone, a faux English accent almost like the one Madonna uses. In this case Madonna is an actual star, and this woman just believed she was one. Mamette told us she was once like us, from the “Provinces” before the “Kingdom” called her to make art. By Provinces she probably met Idaho. Mamette explained she had studied dance in Chicago, but did not have the “traditional” body type to be a dancer. No, she did not. My cousin Mandy had danced and toured with City Ballet. Mamette’s name didn’t just make the notorious dancer Fat List, this woman was the Fat List. Mamette blamed the “fall of dance” on Balanchine and explained woman had to kill themselves to be dancers. She said she wanted to crush the perception, and believed all people could dance. While the mission sounded worthy, no one anywhere would want to look at her in a leotard for any reason whatsoever.
Mamette walked as she spoke, and the floor boards creaked for dear life under her weight. Bragging, Mamette claimed she was often inspired to “mother” her pieces from her sculptor husband. She told us they were love at first site, and the ultimate creative team. For a second, I felt terribly for judging her. Perhaps I needed to get past the exterior to realize Mamette was truly an Ellen Stewart, a downtown innovator who’s eccentric manner was a tad of a turn off but underneath was pure genius. Maybe this was a lost La Mama no one knew about.
Moments later, Mamette introduced her husband Fredrich. He was a slender, slight man who looked almost sickly. On his head, he had wispy gray hair that was thinning. Fredrich was as white as the snow outside with a sallow undertone, and looked like he had not seen sunlight in years. It was perhaps because Mamette kept him prisoner so he could create more sculptures to inspire her. The clothes he wore were tattered, and his blood shot eyes indicated that the man had a rough life. The bones in his fingers visible, it looked like food was a dream for this poor man. It was probably because Mamette got the last pork chop, just like she got every pork chop. As he spoke, Fredrich had a soft, gentle voice. He was a relief from the thing that had greeted us upon entry. After two sentences about his art, Mamette cut him off. She thundered, “THANK YOU!” Like a mouse who had narrowly avoided a glue trap, Fredrich quickly scurried away.
“Now, Mamette is going to show us a video of a dance she created based off of a sculpture her husband did, called ‘The Gloves.’” Joelle said.
“The dancer might look familiar.” Mamette explained. She turned off the lights, and turned on her projector. As the show began, Derek, a kid from Michigan, who had asthma, began to cough violently because of the dust particles. Another rat ran by, and Lori shrieked again. Being sober for this experience was a trip in itself.
The projector rolled, and Joelle was on the screen as a young woman. As the dance began, it was to old rag time music. She was wearing a coat and tails, and had the same terrible crew cut. “This is when I was squatting in the Lower East Side. My building at the time was illegal and the cops kicked me out the next day. They also arrested my heroin addict boyfriend who beat me.” She chirped with a manic energy that made the room full of college freshmen exchange wide eyed, helpless glances.
The dance began, and Joelle bopped in place. She made did the cliché, canned jazz hand motion. I sat in anticipation, waiting for Fosse choreography. Instead, this went on for about five minutes. While Joelle was quite perky and cute as a young woman, this dance was completely and utterly pointless. After five minutes, a striking young man who looked like he had just tumbled off a turnip truck and needed twenty dollars badly, and this was what they asked him to do, ran onstage. Without prompting, he stole Joelle’s gloves. She fought him, making it look like there was a struggle. Joelle then chased the man for three minutes until he simply gave her the gloves back. Then thankfully, the piece was over.
When Mamette turned on the lights, there was feigned clapping. She was our teacher, and perhaps our grade for the semester would depend on it. There were some questions asked. Julia, a girl who was from the Deep South and perhaps the only Republican at NYU asked, “Who is the random guy that stole her gloves?” We all laughed as she delivered the question in her thick, matter of fact drawl.“Oh, that was my last husband.” Mamette said contemptuously. “You see, he was good about being in my pieces, but just up and left one day.” No, Lady. That is the excuse you gave to the cops. Food was short, funds were low, and you had to draw straws and he lost. So yeah, you ate him.
Mamette then announced she had another dance for us. And as she stated this, she told us this was the dance she was most proud of. I was hoping it was better than the last disaster I had been subjected to, but knew I couldn’t be so lucky. Gosh, and my parents were taking out a second mortgage on their home for this.
While the last dance had no point, this one didn’t just suck. Let me tell you it was awesomely bad. At the start, a willowy man graced the stage with a board. He put it down and began to tap dance. As he danced, I realized he actually was pretty good. Maybe there was hope for this routine after all. Getting a closer look, I recognized the dancer was Fredrich. Mamette confirmed my suspicions seconds later when she stated, “That’s my baby. That’s the husband that didn’t leave me!” Yes poor Fredrich was once a dancer and sculptor with dreams. Now he was a prisoner of a fat fur mumu wearing witch who deprived him of food, sunlight, and fresh air. Oh that poor man.
Just as Fredrich danced, a voice boomed from a loud speaker, “I was a farmer, and the government stole my crops. Now I am forced to dance to feed my family.” As this was said, Fredrich stopped dancing. I knew it was all downhill from here.
Just then, Joelle ran onstage. She was wearing a bikini and began twirling a hoola hoop. Joelle in all honesty was the worst hoola hooper I think I have ever seen. Every five seconds, she dropped the hoop. There was no music of course, and Fredrich was no longer dancing. Just then, a high, shrill female voice ascended from a loudspeaker. It declared, “The government stole my children because they are evil. The government then slaughtered them. Now I must hoola hoop to survive.” Several of us bit our lips in an effort not to laugh. Was this actually happening? Oh yes it was….
Just then, a bunch of female dancers came onstage. Some were dressed in bikinis, but these weren’t bikini bodies. One woman lifted up her arm pits to expose a mound of hair. Just then, a familiar rotund woman ran on the stage naked. Mamette shouted at the top of her lungs, “That is I!” As I sat there, I prayed to God not to turn to stone. But if I did, I was sure my parents could sue the university for a pretty penny.
As if that wasn’t enough, a good looking man who seemed like he could be on a billboard at any point but probably needed the money ran out in boxer gloves and Rocky trunks. He stood in front of the group pretending to box, as the women danced seductively behind him. The would be Rocky then began to punch himself before knocking himself out. “He actually knocked himself out!” Mamette informed us. Rocky won my respect. Not only was he committed, but I would have done the same thing too if that tribe of women was gyrating behind me.
“We thought he had sucker punched himself.” Mamette said as the piece dragged on. I wanted to tell her I couldn’t blame him. If I was in a theatre piece like that, I would attempt suicide myself. As the room sat in a disturbed silence, the dancers on the screen stopped. Together in unison they yelled, “THE GOVERNMENT IS TRYING TO CENSOR US! THE GOVERNMENT IS TRYING TO CENSOR US! THE GOVERNMENT IS TRYING TO CENSOR US!”
Just then, disco music came on, and they began to dance. It was as if their boxer comrade was not sprawled on the ground, and they just needed to work around his injured body. Disco had indeed died, and these assholes killed it. Disco had been brutally murdered. No, actually, it had been tortured. And as they danced, all horridly out of sync, I wanted to scream, “The government should censor you! The government should censor you! The government should censor you!”
Finally, Mamette turned the lights back on. Again, we fake clapped. This was akin to a nursing home pageant, except with a nursing home pageant the performers are likeable. Joelle beamed, and smiling with a comfortable superiority for a job mediocrely done she cooed, “Those were my glory days as a dancer! This company found me after City Ballet told me I had no future.”
City Ballet was correct. This woman had no future. Usually every great is told at least once that they have no future. Those people are sometimes wrong, but there are times they get it right. This was one of those times the powers that be hit the nail on the head, and they should have done more to crush her spirit.
 “We were such a hit they gave us an extended run.” Mamette declared. Her maniacal eyes bulged from her chubby face. I didn’t know what was worse, that there was an audience for this crap or that people paid in the first place.
 “Any questions about the rehearsal process?” Joelle inquired as she looked around at the shocked eyes of her first years.
My initial question was almost, “You guys rehearsed this? Seriously?!”
Instead someone beat me to the punch. It was a druggie girl by the name of Andrea. With pitch black hair, at nineteen she already smoked a pack a day. Her mother was the house manager for some summer stock theatre in upstate New York, and her father was a playwright who bragged he would have been Harold Pinter except his boozing got in the way. Andrea, nose ring sparkling, suspiciously inquired, “Dude, you seriously rehearsed? This looks made up on the spot.”
“This is devised ensemble theatre, similar to what you kids do in Joelle’s class. We did a series of improvisations and got this piece. Good theatre looks unrehearsed.” Mamette condescended. This indeed looked unrehearsed, but good theatre it was not.
“What inspired this piece?” Steve Hollander asked. He was a kid from California, and a favorite of Joelle and every teacher in the studio. At the time, he was dating the daughter of a famous movie producer. However, he also had a bizarre relationship where he would flirt with a male voice teacher of ours. This man, attracted to Steve, would grab his butt cheeks and inform him he was sure he was going to be the next Anthony Hopkins. Steve would flirt right back and told him he had nice eyes. Note: Steve is no longer acting.
 “The government yanked my funding. They claimed my work had no grounds or no merit for the grant I requested.” Mamette explained. “This was in the era when the NEA was oppressing artists.” This may have been correct. However, in her case the NEA was correct not only to yank her funding, but to make sure she never got any of my parents hard earned tax dollars ever again.
A few more questions floated about the air space, mostly from kids playing the favorite game. The inquires weren’t sincere, they just wanted to keep their names atop the star list. When one asked if Mamette still choreographed, she explained she did. However, she injured herself during a performance and had to “take a step back.” She claimed it was her foot. Actually, the correct name for that appendage was hoof.
Mamette then went into a tirade about how the only funding went to commercial theatre, and pieces for the school children in impoverished areas. Yes, normal people apparently didn’t need art or creativity. And why would youngsters who are artistically underserved need the arts at all you fat, ugly, loathsome troll of a woman?
Then Joelle informed us, “The reason you are here today is because as an artist, you will be in constant conversation with other artists.”
The room was silent. Just then, Kyle Smith, who’s mother was a well known concert pianist, leaned towards me. Whenever Kyle would speak about his life, he spoke about his mother first and foremost. Kyle said, “Yes, and if my mother were here, she would begin the conversation with, ‘what the fuck was that?’”
Seven weeks later, I was told by Joelle I didn’t belong in my perspective studio. Three weeks later, I made the steps for a transfer. When I announced I was leaving, Joelle acted surprised and hugged me out of despair. She told me she didn’t want this to be the end of my relationship with my former studio, and wanted to invite me to return for transfer track or specialty workshops. I yessed her to death. There was no way in hell I was ever going back to that nuthouse.
The year after I left, the real chaos began within the studio walls. Our studio head and his wife, a well respected indie filmmaker, went through a nasty divorce. Through the process, she came out as a lesbian and left him for a woman. The studio head began an affair with a then student and married her after a three month courtship. His first wife had been beautiful, but this woman looked like a vampire who had a skin disease. However, she took over studio operations and used unemployed alumni as slave labor thus eliminating Joelle’s job.
Joelle, in response, had a nervous breakdown. She shaved her head, and was found wandering around Washington Square Park by a few of my former section mates. Shoeless but with a plan as most who have lost their mind have, Joelle told them she was looking for butterflies to catch. This would have been feasible, except it was March in New York City. And while it was a warm night, there were no butterflies. So they put her in a cab and took her to Bellevue.

After a six month stay in the mental hospital, Joelle announced she had retired from being teaching. Being Head of Student Affairs had been taxing on her psyche, fragile to begin with. Mamette Carlisle’s husband Fredrich left, aka he had been eaten. So she took Joelle in as her roommate, free of charge. These days, Joelle is trying to be a writer. She keeps a blog about her time as a squatter on The Lower East Side. Her writing is much like her dancing, awesomely bad. The internet and web are free to anyone who wants to blog, and as we know art is subjective.  So perhaps the crazy bitch did teach me something after all. 

www.aprilbrucker.com

I'll Be There For You (The Rembrandts)

Monday night I went to Astoria to hang out with my friend Wade. He was insistent that I come over. To give you an idea, back in the day Wade was a Ford model. You may have seen his washboard abs sporting underwear on various billboards worldwide. Heck, I saw him on one before I knew him and developed a crush. Then I found out he was gay, but we are amazing friends. These days, he is doing less modelling and wants to help the environment.
At first when he insisted I come over, I thought he had his heart broken. Wade and I always go for the wrong men. As I came in, Wade informed me he had planned a semi-impromptu get together for my belated birthday. According to Wade, he had heard me whine about turning 30 and wanted to do something special. It’s not that I am unhappy with my life. Time just goes by. One day I was twenty and then poof. Pulling it out of the refrigerator, I realized Wade had spent the last two hours baking me a gluten free birthday cake. One by one, our friends arrived and our little surprise get together got underway. The event and gesture was so wonderful it made me cry.
As a group of gay men, all with perfect voices, Broadway style, sang “Happy Birthday” to me, it made me realize that no matter what happened, I had my friends. Whether 30 brought me more things checked off my bucket list or not, I had the most important thing of all. As I said it, my friends.
This year for my birthday, it seemed many of my friends came out into full effect. I don’t usually celebrate my birthday extravagantly. It’s because over the years I have sang “Happy Birthday” to so many people in so many places. These have included the CFO of the NHL, the husband of the Sultana of Saudi Arabia and the best friend of Forbes Regular Blake Mallen, the song has kind of lost it’s luster for me. Plus I like my birthday to be a calm affair. However, this year my boss Bruce, entrepreneur of the singing telegram company I worked for, called me and gave me a “Happy Birthday” phone gram. Not many can call their boss a friend, but I am one of the few who can. He is an inspiration at every turn.
Heck, my boss and all of my coworkers are. This past summer, I did my book event in which they all took part in. While my gift was writing the book and emceeing the evening, my coworkers lent their tremendous voices, tremendous sense of craft, and tremendous hearts to the event. Their generosity and giving to make my event the success that it was moved my heart beyond words.
My boss’s assistant Laila, who has been a singing telegram person and a cabaret favorite in the city for nearly two decades, helped me organize the event. On several occasions, it looked as if I was going to lose my mind. After a small meltdown, she gave me a pep talk where she quoted David Mamet’s book, True or False, and told me to step away from the event for a little bit. I am like a buzzard, I keep going until I run into the wall. While my work ethic has always been good, it in the end is always my undoing. So I stepped away and felt better. When I returned later, I was able to focus. It was amazing. That’s what friends are for, right?
Add in Nishu and Hedda, my friends from the neighborhood. Nishu is the literal ringmaster of various characters. Hedda is his lady love who keeps him in check. Despite the adventures, and sometimes misadventures we all find ourselves on, Nishu has been there for me this past year. Same with Hedda. Yes, they were present for the book signing. My singing telegram cohort Jeanie and I did a special number for Hedda’s bestie’s surprise party. Was it fun? You bet. Am I sad to see Hedda go to Spain? Ya. Will she be back? Duh. Until then, Nishu and I have some mischief to cause.
I can’t forget Spooky Juice, my super who gives me inappropriate kisses and hugs. At the same time, he reads every blog I write and has bought several of my DVDs to resell to his various friends all over the world. He has also bought several of my books to give away. A magician when it comes to fixing things, he prevented me from getting some dripping disease by fixing my sink.
Then there are the boys at Vibe West who get all my packages. They are always on the stoop smoking cigarettes in between clients. Yes, we all gossip about boys because these are gay men. It’s always nice to see a friend when I come and go into my apartment running about. Sometimes that is what you need during a stressful second, and it might be what they need to as they are smoking their nicotine, the legal choice drug in combination with caffeine of many a New Yorker.
The corner store is another place where I have friends. Of course I have a playful yet flirty relationship with the men behind the counter and the regulars. We gossip about the news and sports, and the dudes always know the NFL scoop as the cabs are hitting shift change. The jokes are raucous and dirty, but it’s a great start to the day as we drink our coffee.
Then wherever I go up the block, past the funeral home, I see a friend. Then to the gym whether it’s the pool I see an acting teacher friend of mine, Trish. A lifetime member of the Actors Studio, Trish has either known, taught, or dated practically every acting teacher I ever had. One day, steaming naked in the sauna, the subject of a player would be leading man I dated briefly came up. When his name was posed, Trish remarked, “Mike could be a good actor, but he’s too into himself.” SNAP!Add in the girls I brunch with. Plus the girls in Astoria. And my red carpet friends. Damn, I have some serious friends.
Then there are those who have become friends through the comedy world. The people who have given me rides to places and who were so kind they wouldn’t accept my gas money knowing I was broke. Or those who bought me food when I had none. Add in the older headliners who helped me with a punchline or gave me career advice solely because they liked me. And then there are the crazies like myself. How could we not bond?
The wonderful thing about friends is when I haven’t seen them in a while, and they pop up. One friend of mine, Rich, had worked in my college dorm freshmen year. He saw me perform live my first year of doing comedy in the city. Afterwards, he graduated and went to law school. After law school, he joined the Navy and is now a JAG. Last summer, he came up to the city. Rich had purchased my book and was giving it to a friend of his who wanted to be an actor. It was a wonderful reunion.
Another wonderful surprise was at my DVD taping this past spring. After the show my friends and fans were greeting me, and one familiar face stood out in the crowd. It was Derek Judy. A school mate of mine, he had been a stand out as a boxer. We went to the same elementary, middle and high school as well as rode the same bus for our school careers. As a matter of fact, I believe his dad was my mailman. Anyway, he had gone off to West Point and I had not seen Derek, that is, until that moment. He apologized for being an unexpected surprise. While unexpected, he was a pleasant surprise.
At the same show, I had a reunion with Emma Olsen and her sister Betty. While Betty was younger than us, Emma and I were in the same English class senior year and survived a psychotic student teacher with the ultimate eye twitch. The experience not only bonded us, but now we both live in New York. This woman as unforgettable, but it brought us closer together.
As I think of the various people I cross paths with, I think of those I haven’t seen in forever. I see the faces of old cast mates of mine from various projects who I was close with for a time. Then I see the faces of friends of mine from college who pop up every once in a great while. Or friends of mine from writing groups who cheered me on as I penned my book. Then there are puppeteer and filmmaker friends that have shared their genius and knowledge with me such as Guenevere Dean.
I have friends that have gone to jail. I have friends who worship Satan. I have friends who have hustled, sold drugs, robbed armored trucks, you name it. Relax, they aren’t doing it now. It makes for lively conversation. It makes for some laughs. It also makes for people who don’t judge me when things are going wrong. People who fly right don’t always have that skill set.
Then I think of some of my friends who aren’t here. I see the faces of Chacho Vasquez, and hear him talking about his latest sexual conquest in one breath, but then he is educating me on how to screw someone over without getting caught just because he doesn’t want to see me stepped on. I see Joe Cannava, the friend who told me I would be on television someday, and to be patient.  However, I will always remember Joe because he was the one who pushed me to write my book. He didn’t stop until I did mind you, and although he is no longer here in some ways he lives on through the words he inspired me to write. Add in Michelle Dombrowsky, who was a friend to me when I had no one in the comedy world. As I remember her huge laugh and even bigger heart, I just want to tell cancer it sucks. Lest I not forget Ray Payton, who used to give me spots at doing opening comedy for the shows at the TSI Playtime Series. Diabetes can suck it, too. Egardo Rodriguez, how could I forget his quick comebacks and snappy style? Sometimes, I even feel his spirit in front of the salon he once worked at. Otto Petersen, Dear Lord, ventriloquism is nothing without you, Sir. You taught me so much. And lastly but certainly not least, my breakfast buddy Spenser Kimbrough. Yes, we had breakfast every Saturday as the soy milk curdled in my coffee. You were one of the first people to tell me I was funny and should pursue comedy. Then an unknown cause took you in your sleep.

In my 30 years of life, I have met some people who have sucked, yes. At the same time, I have also met some awesome people. Not only it is wonderful they are in my life, it is a blessing. So what is the best birthday present I got this year? Answer: The tremendous people I call friends. Your generosity makes me cry. Thank you for being a part of my life. 
www.aprilbrucker.com

Mi Vida Loca

Yes I live a crazy life. Mi vida loca. They say 30 is the new 20. They say 30 is the end of the line. They say a lot of things about the number divisible by 3, 5, 6, and 10. Yes, 30, it is an even composite number. It is the number that makes you realize that your twenties are important and they fly by. Thank Jesus my twenties are gone. Thank Jesus the days of being angst ridden, crazy, and having to prove something to the world have evaporated.
Yet there is also this feeling that comes with 30. It’s a reminder that you are an adult. It was the same rude reminder I got at 20. What is cute at 16 is no longer cute at 20. At 20, you are expected to have half a brain. Looking back, 20 is in fact young. However, the state can stick a needle in your arm for your crimes. At 30, if you make the same mistakes you did when you are 20, it’s no longer cute. It’s a cautionary tale. Yes, in some ways I probably am a cautionary tale.
My house is dirty. As for my refrigerator, I think a monster lives in there. I do battle with a mouse named Mordeci who is the closest thing I have to a man. Add in the friends I have who either have tested the judicial system in some fashion or the laws of nature in some way. Not to mention I have no man, and the two men I fell in love with were absolute disasters. One I have a different mailing address because of, the other was technically a fugitive until several months ago. Factor in that I am chasing a pipe dream living  a Princes Pan type existence as my normie friends from high school get married, buy homes, and produce babies. There are some woman who at my age would be freaking out at the sight of my bank statement, house keeping, shaky career, lack of a love life, and little stability on the horizon. Not I.
There is this fear that at 30, people will lose their looks. They lose their vitality and youth. When I said I was turning 30, more than one person put their arm around me and said,  “Welcome to the club,” jokingly but not. It’s as if mortality has become real, and time and space collided. In their minds they say this because the believe it all goes down hill from here.
But does it?
In the last 72 hours, I have had more people hit on me than ever before. It all started the day before my birthday, a dirty old man overheard me talking about being broke. He grabbed my arm and offered to pay any of my bills anonymously. I didn’t know what to say except, “Wow.” Something in me knew better and I thanked him and left.
The next day was my birthday. I was at the pool taking a swim when a female lifeguard, bushy taled, gave me this mega watt grin. I recognized it as school boy developing a crush. I looked down awkwardly, as if to shy away from this attention. While she was quite cute, I wasn’t prepared for whatever was going to happen next. She walked over and asked if I had a lesson with George, the Jamaican head lifeguard who rules the pool with an iron fist but is also an Aquatic Einstein. When she saw this advance failed, she apologized sheepishly and remarked she liked my suit.
Later that evening, I delivered a singing telegram to a 14 year old kid in cheerleader form. At first his friends were lukewarm. But as the performance continued, they got into me. One kid asked if I was varsity. Then I put my arm around the birthday boy, who was so shy and cute. This same buddy yelled, “Now that’s varsity!”
When I sang to the kid, I gave him a red lipstick kiss on his cheek. His little friends, who by this time would have kept me all night if they would have been allowed, swarmed in for the close up. Barely letting the celebrant breathe, they zoomed in with envy to get the red mark on their friend’s cheek. Oh yes, I was a hit with the young and sex starved. Either way, it felt cool and awkward at the same time. While the guys loved me, I could also be signing up for a certain registry if I wasn’t careful. However, I don’t think they would have stopped that show.
On my way home, I got hit on by a creepy man while riding The Metro North. His opening line, “Hi, I’m Nick. What’s your name?” Excuse me, that is rather bold. Wow! So I moved. It was strange. It was weird. It was WTF?!?! This was more sexual attention than ever. WOWSA!!!
The next day, I was over a friend’s house. He wanted to show me a song he wrote. After having battled various demons, by buddy now wants to perform drag, don’t ask. As he sang his song for me, his neighbor came over to borrow some sugar. The neighbor, a big man built like a tank, sat down and talked to me while my buddy took a phone call. He proceeded to tell me he used to be a skinhead and the beliefs of his people prevented race mixing. However, his skinhead ideology was being tested because he found out he was part Puerto Rican. Also, he liked to sleep with black girls. Then he told me about some of the crimes he committed. Then it hit me. This dude thought he was impressing me. WOW! I made some excuse to leave. Something about a dude being a member of a racist skinhead gang is such a no. On a positive note my friends song was good.
Just then, I decided to go to the deli and get some octopus as a treat. As I entered the deli, the dude behind the counter started hitting on me. Yes, the little Russian from wherever asked me if I spoke English and any other language. What kind of question was that? Then I realized he was only 16, and then he wanted to know if I wanted my octopus fried. I was like wow, what a terrible pick up line.Sunday started peacefully, until a homeless dude cat called me. I wore a blue sundress to church, figuring it was one of the last Sundays. With it I wore red classy Marilyn Monroe heels. As I walked into church, I made myself comfortable in a pew. As I was ready to ask God for guidance and perhaps see my crush Church Boy walk in, I was confronted by a nun. An old shrew of a woman, she had the classic habit and evil eye my father speaks about when he recounts the horror of his Catholic School days. Thus this is why being Catholic is like a heroin habit. It’s bad for you, but you can’t quite kick it no matter how hard you try. Even if you do, you always end up back where you started.
“This is church!” The woman sneered in a heavy accent from somewhere in the former Communist block.
I nodded my head aware of where I was. Yes, church.
“This outfit is not appropriate for church. It’s appropriate for the outside, for amore.” She glowered. Now her eyes were so red I wanted to call an Exorcist. I was a slut in the house of God.
I said nothing. I wanted to tell her I was homeless and this was the only thing I owned. I wanted to point out a woman on the other side of the church was wearing something more scandalous. Oh, and maybe I should have told the old corpse that at least I was in attendance at the House of God unlike the rest of those who lived in our sinful city. Not to mention some people would probably enter in short sleeves, cargo shorts, and flip flops. Perhaps they deserved her sermon.
When I didn’t respond to her crazy, she yelled, “PRAY!” Then she made a shooshing motion with her hand and off she went. After which she made her way to the back and made some fuss to a parishioner who was old and overdressed and not to mention overweight. The parishioner, who still had some grounding in reality, escorted the piece of driftwood out and gently reassured her at least I was in attendance. Either way, throughout my 20s nothing like this ever happened to me.
After exiting church, I was walking to my deli and a white haired dude in a car hit on me. He asked me where I was going and if I needed a ride. I told him I was meeting my mother which made him speed off. Either way, between being yelled at by a nun and now this. Wow.
Then I went to my deli, and got hit on again by a Russian dude. He asked me what I was doing later, and if I could help him with a home improvement project. It wasn’t even eleven o’clock and I had already had quite a day. In my heart and in my mind, I didn’t know what the hell was going on.
Junior high had been dateless and high school there were no men in site. My twenties saw the earlier part either with men who didn’t want me, crazy men, or bad choices in general. Towards my mid and latter twenties, the focus became so much so on the career that I neglected to date and most nights when I wasn’t performing stayed in. I did more in those years than I thought possible, and did little to seek male attention. And now it is flying at me. Actually, male and female attention.
Later I called my pops. He asked if my plans included a date or boyfriend. I told him I had a record number of men hitting on me. He asked if any were worth anything. I told him I didn’t know, I was still getting over the shock. However, I left out the part about women hitting on me. Hey, you have to keep all your options open I suppose.
I told my friend about the time I had been having. She told me perhaps the universe was telling me it wasn’t the end of the world, but the beginning of another chapter.

My friend’s granddaughter said, “Or April looks good. She’s not too fat, she’s not too skinny. She’s just right.”

www.aprilbrucker.com

30 Things I Learned in 30 Years

Yeah I am 30. Yes, the big 3-0. Ought oh. Oh no. Here she goes. Yes, NYC's very own puppet girl is 30!!!

Now here are 30 things I have learned in 30 years. You ready?.....

1. When in a depression, it is amazing how a shower and fresh clothes can make things better.

2. The cooler and sexier you try to be, the most desperate you come across. #truefact

3. Getting fame and recognition for your gifts is a wonderful thing, but don't get hung up on it. There is no substitute for the work.

4. Negative people are like quicksand. They will always try to drag you on down.

5. When in doubt, close the blinds.

6. Some people get lucky for whatever reason. And sometimes they continue to get lucky. But if you work hard, you will pass them up, because luck doesn't last forever.

7. If a guy has a 1-800 number, lose his number fast.

8. If a guy is right out of prison he will be well behaved. Not just because this is his first chance with a lady, but he also needs a place to stay.

9. Always tell someone you love them when you do. And if you fight with someone you love make up with them. It's beyond words when it's too late.

10. People who continually belittle others and cattily gossip about what successful people achieve will never be successful.

11. Ice cream cures the blues

12. Most men believe they are 10's in bed, but most men are mostly 5's.

13. Be yourself. You are the most unique gift the universe has to offer.

14. The only way through the darkness is to keep going.

15. If opportunity does not knock, build your own door.

16. Friends are more important than lovers. They will be there when the loves screw up. And trust me, your lovers will.

17. People will tell you that you have no future or imagination. You must know you have a future and imagination. If you know this, these people will continually eat your dust.

18. Always learn. Always sharpen your tools. You never know what might come in handy.

19. Wear the captain's jacket even if it scares you.

20. If you are betrayed by a friend, write it off as a loss. Know for the one friend lost, ten better friends are out there.

21. Sure, it is a man's world and the paradigm oppresses women. But we all have a strike or two against us and we need to work with it the best we can.

22. Revenge is sweet, but kharma is much sweeter and more creative than you could ever be.

23. If you have a goal, go for it. Don't ask questions and don't think it through too much or you won't do it.

24. Despite what others say, don't settle.

25. When in stress, remember one day what you are stressing about won't matter.

26. You don't need a relationship. Anyone can be married.

27. Alcohol, drugs, food, and copious amounts of cigarettes and caffeine solve nothing.

28. Sometimes the best thing to do is reach out to a friend and talk when you are feeling stressed.

29. If you do your 20s right, you will look back and say, "Jesus, 22 was fun but never again...."

30. Tell your hair dresser all your secrets. They don't work for the CIA and will keep them hidden.


Check me out
www.aprilbrucker.com

Half Full

Two years ago nearly to this day, I had just recently published my book. About a month afterward, I was making the rounds. Many of my comrades in the theatre and comedy community had generously offered me various platforms for my publicity. One came through a show at a well known NYC comedy theatre. 
It was the weekend before Sandy hit decimating New York. I stood with two former Tischies from NYU. Both of them had interned with a well-known theatre company. One girl, Megan, had trained at Experimental Theatre Wing and had SNL dreams. The other, Tilly, had done her training through the Meisner Extension. Both were disillusioned I soon found out as the conversation unfolded.
Megan had given up acting after her experience interning, because she felt burnt out. She also expressed that NYU had been artistically and academically so rigorous that now she was working as a makeup artist. In the next breath, Megan admitted that while she was burned out on acting, she missed performing and wasn’t happy with her work. She grudgingly did it because it paid the bills.
Tilly had been a star at the Meisner Extension and then ended up at the Classical Studio for her advanced training. In between, she did the summer at this theatre company like Megan had. Like Megan, Tilly too was burned out on acting but was somehow still doing it. Since graduating, Tilly had abandoned some of her aspirations in the theatre and was doing plays wherever. She relayed that she was in rehearsal for Sex With Zombies and Aliens: A Space Aged Drama. I could already tell this contrived piece was penned by a writer that was trying to be a comedian but the jokes were probably bathroom humor level. While I did not have a crystal ball, I could tell this painfully desperate piece was a craigslist effort in the making.
As they both spoke, they seemed to cut me out thus I functioned as the middle woman in this boat ride on the River of Broken Dreams and Self-Pity. At this theatre company, they apparently played favorites. Both Tilly and Megan were not on the favorite end for one reason or another. These things happen in the acting world. I know from experience. There have been times I was a favorite, but there have been times I wasn’t. It was like these two were stuck on a snag and resentment based on their experience at this place. I wanted to tell them this wasn’t the only theatre in town. For Goddssakes this is only New York City. I wanted to recommend that they go to where it was warm.
 I did after a hellacious training experience my first year at NYU, and ended up at the Lee Strasberg Institute where I believe I had some of the greatest teachers in the world, hands down. My father petaguagean had a simplistic way to get into character, hence the term The Method. I still speak to my old classmates and teachers and fondly remember those red doors. I rarely think let alone speak about my first studio. So yeah, why the hell were they looking for oranges in the hardware store? Not every theatre or director will like you. It’s what being an artist is.
Then Tilly lamented, “You are either one of the cool kids or you aren’t.”
This is true. However, the cool kids always change on a dime. My first year doing comedy, I saw people who were on Last Comic Standing shine and be lauded as the next big stars. Years later, I see them aimlessly wandering around Brooklyn looking for spots. Then Megan asked Tilly, “Are you frustrated.”
Tilly mentioned she was. Frustrated. It’s a feeling I know all too well as an artist. The phone isn’t ringing and the less deserving are moving ahead. The ideas are popping out but no one is listening. You are well trained but no one knows about you. Yes, as a woman in comedy I know the sensation of getting kicked in the gut when I am bumped by a less talented male headliner because the producer is afraid I will ruffle his feathers by outshining him. I have experienced all these things and more. Add in being passed over for things on a technicality.
Then she mentioned she was. I asked Tilly what she was going to do about it. Only two years earlier I had felt her pain, one of the many comedy cattle in the city of New York. After being sexually harassed by a male booker, I felt discouraged. Male headliners propositioned me for sex over and over. No one wanted to listen to anything a girl carrying puppets had to say. I was being worked to death at a hole in the wall comedy club as an open mic host, and being given the worst spots one could get. The club owner wasn’t giving me what I wanted.
So at my friend Joe Cannava’s urging, I wrote my book. Then I published it. I focused on what made me who I was and stopped feeling so damn sorry for myself. These things were my personality, my puppets, and my ability to create my own work. Basically, I got out of my own way. I had chosen this profession, no one else. It is one where you are told you are likely to fail going in. When I asked the million dollar question, Megan and Tilly looked at me as if I informed them they had a flesh eating virus and only minutes to live. How dare I crash the boat ride on the River of Self-Defeat? Then I excused myself. Nothing new was going to be gained from this conversation.
At that moment it occurred to me that this is why a lot of people don’t make it in my field. It’s not lack of talent or lack of dreams. It’s a terrible attitude. Some of it is a sense of entitlement based on where they trained. Then add in the competition is in fact staggering. Of course it is a thousand mice going for one piece of cheese, and only one can have the cheese. But it is the defeatist mantra where you focus your energy on what you don’t have rather than what you do.
Aside from self-defeat and negative whining, jealousy is another trap performers fall into. I had an acting teacher in a summer theatre program, Jay O’Bierski, who used to tell us not to gossip. He would make a sing a song that went, “I’m going to get, out of the shit, yes, yes, yes.” At the time, this was a crazy concept. We were teenagers. We wanted to gossip. We were at a theatre camp, it’s what you did. Years later though, it all has sunk in and made sense.
Early in my comedy career, in my 50 dollars and a burger road gig phase, I used to go on road trips with other comedians. We would begin talking about say Bob Jones and how someone did a gig with him. For the first two minutes the conversation was nice. Then immediately, it turned into an assault on Bob and his character. Then someone would mention Bob was on TV. Suddenly, Bob wasn’t all that funny. Then it was Tom and we would go down the list. It felt superior to trash others in those days. I was fearful, I was insecure, and I had dreams I wasn’t sure would ever materialize. However, my dreams were not materializing because I was focusing on others and not myself.
When I began creating my own work, my fate changed and so did my outlook. Doors opened because I built them, and people with things to offer began to knock. While I would like to thank talent, it was more or less action that put me in a favorable position. As my luck altered, I found myself on  the other end of the gossip stick. Those who had given me car rides were now spewing venom about me. When word got back to my ears, it hurt. My little heart was shattered. It shouldn’t have surprised me. 
These bottom feeders were just being who they were. In a twist nearly out of the Bible, one young woman I had severely character assassinated came to my defense when my so called friends so badly about me. She mentioned she didn’t know anyone more deserving with more of a work ethic. Over time, the rumor mill has claimed both she and I have had a lot of sex that we weren’t present for. However, maybe she got ahead because she had a good attitude and didn’t associate with “the shit.”
Part of getting out of “the shit” is not letting bottom feeders drag you back down to their level. About a year and a half ago, I had several people insult me at an open mic due to some of my progress. Some were digs at my writing, and others at my ventriloquism. It got me depressed, and I began to lose my passion. After a chance facebook chat with a comedian I looked up to, I lamented my pain. My comedy angel informed me there was only one way to deal with negativity, and that was to starve it. He told me that if I fed into it, this would only make it worse.
Days later, as if in an effort of some flight of angels, I saw a former college classmate of mine on the street. This young woman was on Broadway at the time, and has a voice that is soulful like that of Whitney Houston. As she saw me, she hugged me and complimented me on my progress with my puppet children. It flattered me, because her life was going so well, but also because she was so positive and it seemed no one, anywhere was going to be happy for me. Then it hit, the magic word was me, me, me. And to think, she was the damn singer here. Point being, successful people are able to be happy for and appreciate the gifts of others. They realize that while they might have one gift, someone else can have another and we can all exist peacefully. In case you didn’t realize it, a performer that isn’t catty is more rare than a black diamond in NYC. After that two day universe God shot from the theatre and comedy worlds, I no longer indulged in “the shit” and haven’t been back since.
As a matter of fact, the essence of theatre and film is the collaboration of talents. During my book signing event this summer, it happened due to the fact I wrote a book. My skill as an emcee made the event move smoothly, and May Wilson made an appearance. However, my fellow singing telegram company comrades shined by lending their talents to the cause. Some had superior vocal ranges that I will never have, and belted out a song and musical comedy routine that made the audience applause. Others were daring, dressing in drag or doing burlesque, two things I have yet to master. Then my boss lent his knowledge of the industry as well as his love for both his employees and clients alike. This was the only way this could have ever happened…..appreciation for others.
Then of course sometimes we sell ourselves short. We believe we will always be the bridesmaid and never the bride. That it will never be our turn. I felt that way when my book went into the NYU Bookstore and the Brown University Bookstore. At NYU, my alma mater, I was shelved with a comedienne who had just sold her book rights to a Hollywood studio. At Brown, I was shelved next to a MacArthur Fellow. Both made me feel intimidated. I would never be that successful. Damn them both. Then it hit me, I was sharing shelf space with them. I had written a book. If I kept on my journey, maybe I could sell my book rights to Hollywood. Maybe I could be a MacArthur Fellow. They were winners, and if I kept on course I could be a winner too.
Then I remembered my early days in the city, where I followed people who are now on network television. Or at the time, they were making the rounds on network television. The truth is, while it scared me, I learned a lot. In order to get good, you need to be around good. Heck, Sir Laurence Oliver lamented in his autobiography about his understudy, a bright young actor named Anthony Hopkins who was the bane of his existence because he was daring and talented. While this was true, imagine the dread poor young Tony from Wales must have felt waiting in the wings, ready to replace the genius and legend if something were to happen. Those were big shoes to fill.
This being said, of course we get frustrated. Of course it’s not fair. Of course it is oh so tempting to give up. That is when you have to look at the big picture. If a door is not opening, maybe it is time to build one. That way, knocking can occur. Don’t focus on what isn’t happening, focus on what is. Stuck, feel inspired? Take a class. I took several this summer and one recently that refocused my energies and changed my life. Waiting for the phone to ring? Write. Have a thought or idea, get it on paper before it flies out of your head.
Yes, there is so much that is intangible. Yes, there is a lot you cannot control. No, you should not and cannot be defeated.
There is a difference between powerlessness and helplessness.
Powerless you may be. Helpless you are not.

Remember those words on your journey and walk through a life in art. 


www.aprilbrucker.com

This Charming Man (The Smiths)

Things have been strange lately regarding someone from my past. It’s not someone I had a deep involvement with. Friendly acquaintance and school mate would be more apt terms. I met him when I was 18 and new to the city. Then again, he was 18 and new to the city as well. We were starting first years at NYU. 
The whole place seemed weird. This had always been a dream of mine, to study acting in New York. Here I was at the studio I had always dreamed of too. The doors were glass and the place smelled as if there were hopes and tears of aspiring theatre students in the floors of each room engrained in the wood. I still remember meeting him, and how he just had these piercing, dark, mysterious, eyes. In a way they scared the hell out of me, probably because deep down I feared I was some sort of phony and the university had let me in by mistake. Years later, I would find out I suffered from what is known as Imposter Syndrome.
The fellow with the piercing, dark, mysterious piercing eyes seemed confident in a way I wasn’t. He knew himself in a way I didn’t. I had to convince everyone of everything, including myself. He didn’t have that problem. Maybe it was confidence. Maybe it was life was easy for him and he was blessed that way. Maybe it’s a man thing, part of being on the upper end of the paradigm where they are born without the self-doubt women are gnawed and plagued with on a daily basis.
There was a light about him, and he shined first year. He wasn’t like the others who shined first year that would later burn out on acting never to pick up a play let alone enter a theatre again. I had a feeling the whole theatre thing would be good to him. Life would be good to him. Again, he was blessed and lucky that way. Maybe the piercing, dark, mysterious eyes had magical powers unbeknownst to me.
I wasn’t so lucky or so blessed. I wasn’t born with his natural charisma or charm. First year was a nightmare for me as New York handled me like a misbehaved puppy dog. Over and over, the city that was supposed to make me a star was taking my dreams and puking them up on my over made up face, monochromatic wardrobe, and uneven fake eyelashes. Each day, I oscillated between anxiety attacks where speech was hard to depression so terrible I could cut myself. I never did cut myself, I was too chicken.
I wasn’t like the people around me, so arty and attempting to be different they were asinine balls of conformity. I hadn’t gone to prep school or boarding school. I wasn’t a slut, I wasn’t a prude. I felt the existential Esther Greenwood crisis, somewhat self-centered yet universal as I struggled to forge an identity away from my parents and hometown. Not to mention I loved puppets and still do. Most thought they were weird or laughed them off. The one with the piercing, dark, mysterious eyes thought they were neat. It was during one of the few times I had the guts to speak to him my first year. It was one of the few times I had the guts to connect to another human being. One of the few times I didn’t take the emotional cowards way out and escape.
After my first year I ended up leaving the studio I was in. The place was unbearable for me. It emphasized imagination. They said they welcomed art and original thought. I found real quick that was a lie. My teachers were failed actors for the most part, bitter they had to teach and took it out on their students whenever they could. I especially found I was unhappy, putting myself on diet after diet to quell the pain I felt from being stifled.
More often than not, I butted heads with my teachers. My imagination wasn’t grounded in reality, translated, they wanted a boring choice. Boring like themselves. Boring like the dreams they still had about the careers that never materialized. My choices had no truth they said. Neither did the boring choices of the sheep who blindly followed them, nor did the choices of the dippy girls and pretty boys they favored.
One teacher in particular made my life hell, Ariadne. A frustrated, tired, worn out shell of a woman, she looked like Meryl Streep if Meryl Streep had a crack baby clone. Ariadne, named after the Greek Goddess by her theatre critic father, had the talent to make it but didn’t have the guts to take it. Then again, most bullies never do. Ariadne Schwartz had studied with our blessed mother petagauge before her passing years ago and had been a prized student. From day one, Ariadne had an axe to grind with me. She informed me I had no imagination whatsoever, and no sense of craft. Over and over again, we did these stupid exercises, and in return for her insulting me I would roll my eyes and make it obvious I was tuning her out.
Ariadne was eager to see me kicked out of the studio for some odd reason. I had done nothing to the woman except exist. In any case, she would go to the head of student affairs and claim I wasn’t listening to her which was a complete lie. She wanted to terrorize me, and did so because she was in a position of power. Most of the time, my choices were original and she couldn’t stand that. I had more of an imagination that she did.
 “You have no future onstage.” She said to me calmly during the conference we had at the midterm. I felt crushed. This was my dream. I just cried. Her bug eyes fixed on me, as if she defeated the plant named Audrey and now bug girl could reign supreme.
Ariadne looked satisfied that my soul and spirit were successfully crushed. I was looking at leaving New York, and my parents suggested I maybe switch life goals. Deep in my heart I knew this was right. Someone at Tisch suggested Lee Strasberg and off I went. I went to a place where the teachers loved to teach, and the learning environment was healthy.  My refuge was an artistic home where the Method made sense, and our teachers didn’t trash talk other techniques. No one such as Ariadne would have been allowed on faculty at Strasberg. Since Ariadne, I have gone on to perform comedy and have been on national television several times. I also write and star in my own work. The best she ever did was no pay theatre work here in the city.
Who has no future on the stage now, bitch?
Either way, when I left that studio, I left the boy with the piercing, dark, mysterious eyes. He became a face filed in a part of my life I wanted to forget as things steadily got better for me. Slowly, the wardrobe saw more colors. The lipstick became less loud, and the fake eyelashes became a thing of the past. So did any thoughts of the comrades from my old studio.
I would see friends from that place, and we would still be friends of course. Inside, they brought back memories of something I sought to forget. Sometimes I would feel anger about what I had experienced the year before. Other times, I would get this sense that they were mad I left, and that in some ways I had left a cult. Then again, that particular studio was a religious compound in a sense. You were either one of them, or you were not. They were intolerant of other forms of the Method and other techniques. I was at Lee Strasberg, the evil empire. It was time they condescend or completely ignore me.
I didn’t have that experience with the boy possessing those piercing, dark, mysterious eyes. He always waved when he saw me, not forming an opinion as to why I stayed or went. Unlike many busybodies, he seemed to have a life. I saw him twice really to be fair, once he was playing guitar with an upperclassman in a hole in the wall joint in Chinatown. They looked like the young Beatles. I was set for perform with May Wilson, and I looked like some tranny had kidnapped me and did my wardrobe. They came and left and I went on two acts afterward.
Then I saw him again at some party where I was relatively drunk. The poison helped calm the nerves that were still ever present in my young body. I said something to piss him off, I know that much. It was pertaining to a theatre company a classmate of mine started. Feminist voiced, they put on weepy pieces where everyone was raped in some way, shape, or form. “There was a lot of rape going on, and I didn’t have time for it,” I stated. He didn’t find it funny. I only know this because someone told me later what transpired.
Third year we had an academic class together. He still had those piercing, dark, mysterious eyes. The hair was a mix of a young Beatle still but now with a smatter of aspiring Beatnik. There were a lot of folks from my old studio there. I felt weary to and from class, feeling a ripping in my stomach. It was the same gut wrenching kick I felt whenever I walked through the glass doors of the hell I had tried to escape from. Sometimes in my mind I felt them judging me as inferior. Like the haunts in Harry Potter, I always tried to run from them after class had dismissed.
I judged them too. After all, I felt it only fair and justified. Sure, my life was working out, but they reminded me of everything that had gone wrong that first year. As the semester went on, I found I was actually quite hard on them, and they were not evil at all. That time in my life wasn’t happy, and I found it easier to vilify them than to let go of the resentment I felt, and let them symbolize a place that had wronged me. Actually, they turned out to be imaginative, fun, and engaging. The one with the piercing, dark, mysterious eyes turned out to be the most insightful and he also had a wicked sense of humor. Thus we became friendly once more.
One day, through idle chatter I found they had elected to leave the studio I had escaped from. At NYU, two years of primary training is done, and then one elects to do advanced training. I had broken the mold after being put on probation by my primary training studio, and thus the first year counted as part of my advanced training. My two years at Strasberg, however, were more artistically and academically successful. As we talked, the group revealed that they had the same thoughts I did about the studio I left. They felt it was a mecca for maladjusted, frustrated actors who were afraid of the industry that were now teaching, and frankly were angry about it. Some of them even told me they admired my courage to jump ship when I did. The young man with the piercing, dark, mysterious eyes was most vocal.
Through the conversation, he mentioned he was doing Experimental Theatre Transfer Track and he was much happier. Then his eyes lit up, yes those piercing, dark, mysterious eyes, as he mentioned possibly studying abroad. I found myself comfortable, as if I were relaxed among a group of peers. That part of my life suddenly didn’t hurt as much. I didn’t want it to, and it didn’t have to.
Life was crazy in other ways, still. The gnawing anxiety and feeling of never being enough still ate at me. Most of the time, although it was only once a week as opposed to every second of every day, I still felt like an imposter. While school was better than it had ever been, my life choices dictated that I didn’t like myself so much. I was in a so called “adult” relationship that progressed to the level of dysfunction of a bodybuilder on steroids. Slowly, I isolated from my friends and school became harder and harder. Yet somehow, I still maintained A’s for the most part. Needless to say, as the quicksand of that craziness pulled me down, the boy with the piercing, dark, mysterious eyes was just a member of the chorus in the operetta on my stage.
For the rest of college we didn’t cross paths. We graduated, and the continued gnawing anxiety and feeling of being an imposter cause the bottom to fall out in my life in ways I never imagined. School became an idyllic memory as the nightmare of the reality I had tumbled into smacked me in the face. Things got worse, and I almost made it my business to forget the past and the people in it, good or bad. I didn’t want to be judged, and feared they would do that. On the other hand, I was behaving so terribly perhaps I deserved a little ridicule.
I did see him once, and I was having a day. Running, I had spilled coffee on myself and he waved. That was the beginning and the end of our encounter. I don’t know whether or not he took note, or if he reported to the sources at the camp I was a bigger disaster than ever. I doubt it. I think the hello was just a hello.
As I struggled to climb out of the grave I had dug for myself, combination of bad decisions and low self-worth, I saw him on the front of a magazine. He was in a show. Yes, I knew them, those piercing, dark, mysterious eyes. There was a part of me that envied him, and how things had always come so easily. Then there was a part of me that downright hated him, because his life was so good and my life had become such a struggle. Yet there was a part of me that wished I had his ease, the one someone has when their self-worth is at a healthy level. Yes, the ease that men have more than women. I was also happy for him. He was truly talented. I could say I knew him when and happily grovel like a peasant.
Life continued to treat my friend with the piercing, dark, mysterious eyes kindly. We spoke once, and he was in another successful show. It was a fun, cute, but rather short conversation. I couldn’t tell whether he wanted to talk to me or was eager to lose me. Later that day, I would deliver a Hershey Kiss singing telegram proposal to a bride. In my adventure I would risk getting struck by lighting. This would help spark the inspiration for my book. Life would continue to get better for me. Maybe one day I would join the party that he was at.
We both popped up in each other’s news feed from time to time online. Other than that, our paths never crossed. Once again, in my life he became an afterthought as those who are out of sight, out of mind typically do. Recently though, things have gotten a tad strange if you will.
For the past several weeks I have been threadbare, what else is new? Before bed, I went on facebook one more time. Apparently Mr. Piercing, Dark, Mysterious Eyes is in a new play and seems to be doing well like he always is. Never a hard day in his life. Not that I wish that on anyone, and maybe I just see ease and no struggle because I want to play the eternal, professional victim. Either way, then I went to bed.
Well the piercing, dark, mysterious eyes appeared in my dreams. Except in my dream, he was my boyfriend! WTF!!!!????!!?!?!? He wasn’t even my type. For one, he has goals that he fulfills, and has never been to jail or drug treatment even once. There was no way someone like that would ever want me for real. Of course this was a dream. I had never been into him like that either. He was just a classmate. This was so bizarre. The Sandman was up to something and I didn’t know what.
Yet he was the best boyfriend ever in the dream. He didn’t have a criminal record or drug problem, and he still wanted me. Not to mention he was a good boyfriend: patient, kind, caring, and I trusted him. This never happens with the dudes I date. At the same time, he was a complete guy and didn’t let me push him around. We laughed and had a good time, and had mad, passionate sex. Yes, I looked into those piercing, dark, mysterious eyes. No, I didn’t feel tempted to cheat or to ask for an open relationship. No, I wasn’t my typical I will be mean and nasty the second you are nice to me self.
Then I woke up. Shit.
Wondering what the hell had inspired what went on, I went to his facebook page. Life was good to him as I suspected, no rough patches in his extensive feed. I was happy for him. Still, why was I dreaming about a dude I had never previously been attracted to? I had had rough, raunchy, jungle dream sex with an old school mate that I was acquainted with at best. Granted, the dream sex had been sweet but still…..This was risky dream behavior. He did buy me dinner in the dream, though. I also saw he was dating a gorgeous, leggy Argentinian model. There was no way he was lusting or holding a torch for me when he could go home to that. I didn’t expect him to be. We hadn’t spoken in years. Still, I had sex with her man in my dream. Did that make me a dream wrecker? Dear God this was a mess. Piercing, dark, mysterious eyes could have his perfect luck, his perfect life, and his perfect looking lay. I had errands to run, and I had to shake off this dream before it occupied the rest of my day.
I told myself I had manufactured this because the winter had been hard, and the summer had been sent bingeing on work, wearing the career like a full body tattoo instead of a loose garment. As of late, my career was in freefall and I was on thin ice with my boss. Of course I needed an escape. I also told myself it would never work. He’s an actor, a man who says someone else’s lines. He’s a guitar player, a real suavecito. He’s a DJ, need I say more? Not to mention he is a Capricorn, a true ram in the china closet and wants to be in charge all the time. His perfect life and perfect luck would get under my skin. I would resent Lady Luck’s constant favor in his direction. I would give him all the bad days he never had. Maybe he has had some, but I would just give him more because I could. And when he was kind to me, I would rebel. I would eat him alive, ha!
After my errands, I stuck some new photos and videos online. My usual people commented and messaged me telling me they liked Mortimer, my new blue monster in the closet puppet pal. However, I got one new message. It was someone from my past. Someone I hadn’t thought of for some time really until my dream last night. It was someone who’s passionate albeit imaginary kiss I felt deep on my lips and deep into my core. Yes, the guy with the piercing, dark, mysterious eyes. My jaw dropped open in complete shock.
I called my mom to tell her about my dream fling. E Harmony had expired and this was the best I was doing at the moment. My mother agreed, this was indeed freaky. It was almost as if he had read each other’s energy streams. Either way, this was easily a “holy shit” moment.
Maybe this was the beginning of some crazy love triangle I would end up entangled in, one that would end in murder/suicide. Maybe this was just be being lonely and pathetic, knowing in my heart I would be too awkward and shy to pursue him for real. Or maybe the universe is gently reminding me that while enemies come out of the woodwork, so do friends, new and old.
Also, perhaps it was an amends to myself for the mini-nervous breakdown I have experienced this past month. It’s a reminder to be gentle to myself, I am only human. The fact I push myself is my best and worst quality. People might love me or hate me. I can only do my best. If that isn’t good enough they can eat shit and die. My imagination is my gift. If only it could clean my socks.When I sleep, maybe Mr. Piercing, Dark, Mysterious Eyes and I can have more hot, steamy, imaginary sex. 
If he reads this blog, I think I might die.  Hopefully, he won’t read this blog, because he might get a hot, steamy, real life restraining order. “Officer, security, I am telling you, it was only a dream.”

Then again, actors aren't the biggest eggheads let alone readers. So he probably won't see it, after all, he has the Argentinian model......
www.aprilbrucker.com

Waiting Out the Shit Storm

Lately, everything has been a challenge. I cannot tell you why. It just has been. Life has been difficult. There are days when I will admit, I would jump into the Hudson River, except the only thing stopping me is that I would live. Then there are days where I would want to get a semi-automatic weapon and do away with those who piss me off, except bullets and guns are mighty expensive these days. Basically, it has been rough.
The last several weeks have seen a shit storm. My landlord and I got into a shouting match on the phone, and I feared I was going to be evicted. After which I had my refrigerator replaced after becoming deathly ill. Apparently when the top half only works as a refrigerator and the bottom does nothing, you can get sick. Oops. On top of that, someone who talked me out of a rough time in my life had hit one in his. To solve his physical and emotional health crisis, he took his own life. As if that wasn’t enough rain, I experienced a rift in a group of friends of mine with a crazy bitch and her mean girl toadies that are jealous of all they have done. Every time I see them, they are always trying to start beef with me. It’s been work not to strangle them accidentally on purpose, so in order to save my sanity I can no longer do some things I wanted to do.
On top of that the career has been kind of stupid as of late. Everyone is dragging their ass with my work that needs to be done. Then there are some things in the air which has left me waiting. A film of mine should have advanced in this thing. Yeah….
Then there has been the no money coming in game, and the paralyzing fear of losing my apartment. As things pick up, people I have been dealing with have been absolute ass weeds. One producer for this project has just been a dick who jerks me around. I can’t stand him and I almost want to tell him, “Consider someone else please.”
The talking head job I had dried up which sucked. I enjoyed it and worked hard. Not to mention I was the most popular person on the app. However, my bosses were idiots and ran themselves and their funding into the ground. They invited me to stay on for free, truth. I was like, no thanks, bye.

Another woman playwright who’s work is probably shit invited me to audition for her contrived piece, but the way she had the invite there was no way anyone could schedule anything. Needless to say, I emailed her and she told me the audition slots were full. Maybe it’s better I didn’t work with someone who took her hackneyed piece so seriously.
After that, I was almost set to headline a theatre when the producer tried to talk me down from my original price. He mentioned the sound man was getting 900, him 600, and me 300. I have friends who don’t have my TV credits that do the same job for a few grand without getting shit. I was replaced by some local hack who later backed out. HA!
There have been a few signs things are getting better, but they never last. Friday I did a job for a family who owns an overpriced bakery in the Bronx. I have been there and the place is DIRTY! As a matter of fact, I believe they gave me food poisoning once. Not to mention their servers are notoriously rude. Anyway, the woman picked me up from the train and she was ghetto. I get there and did what I was supposed to do. Nevermind these people didn’t know which train station was which. The girl taking me back to the train was surly as a mofo. Not to mention she relied on me getting her to the train station, when she lives and works in the town.
Then my boss called me and asked how it went. He explained the client called and was super pissed and wanted her money back. My boss said she told him that they pretended to enjoy the show but they didn’t. It was all just an act. My boss asked them if they tipped me to which they replied they did. Basically, they were trying to rip my boss off and had planned this all along. Every once in a while, we get these clients.
Well so it goes. My boss told me that lately I have been snippy on the phone and he wondered if I took it out on the client. No, me being snippy had nothing to do with the client. Just the fact my life and everything about it has sucked. But maybe I should have taken it out on the dumbasses.
I also explained that they couldn’t get me to and from the train they were so dumb, and I was lucky I got out of that town because their stupidity could have killed me. My boss then asked if I took that out on the performance. No, but maybe I should have. In the end, they still tried to rip us off anyway.
On top of that, my boss asked me if I still enjoyed the job. When the clients aren’t assholes I love it immensely. For the whole summer, most of the people I delivered to were better than dreams actually. But when I get assholes wanting a free show or some axe to grind because they just do, no. There you go, honest answer.
I still got tipped, I still got paid. Those fuckers can turn on the television and see me from time to time and choke on their fucking poison canoli’s. Just for fun, I went online and apparently one of their employees made racist comments towards a bi-racial customer. Then the owner explained his dark skinned assistant was, “Trying her best for someone who was that way.”
Friday ended splendidly. I got into a street fight with a stranger. As I was having a meltdown on the street of New York, I was cussing at the top of my lungs. After all, the only thing stopping me from diving in front of a train is I might live and become a cripple and have real problems. The stranger yelled something and I told him to go fuck himself. He told me I was pathetic and he had more money in the bank than me. I screamed, “You do! You probably do! Congratulations, you win!!!” To which he didn’t know what to do or say.
As my life stands, it looks like I am on thin ice at my job. My career is at a standstill. There is a chunk of people who were once friends I can no longer call friends. My landlord hates me too. Not to mention while rent always gets paid, this is one of these months where it will probably happen by some act of something else.
On the flipside, I am dancing in the storm. I am writing like I have never written before. Not to mention I am also taking steps to produce and direct as well as star in my first short, and get funding. I have some amazing things on the horizon. I have also been taking classes with some amazing teachers, one being DW Brown, a Meisner expert in Hollywood. My support system has also been amazing. They have been the only reason I didn’t take the plunge from the GW Bridge.
The thing about killing yourself is you don’t give life a chance to get any better. While things feel like cold, hard concrete at the moment, that also functions as a proverbial trampoline. What comes down must come up. So now that I have hit cement and am banging my head there I am going to bounce back up. I have to. I just don’t know when.
By next week my landlord might not hate me. I might be back on my boss’s good side. My money situation might improve. My career might not be at a standstill. The world might end, but could we all be so lucky? Either way, as the shit continues to rain I am no longer protesting it. I am just letting it hit because soon enough this too shall pass.

Alas, and so it goes.

The Odd Couple

About a month ago, I introduced my friend Keeley into my blogs and her roommate Bobby in Matilda Rides Again (http://missaprilb.blogspot.com/2014/0...) . However, I was talking to a writer friend about them recently, and they informed me this dynamic duo needed their own blog.
Enter Keeley. She is a makeup artist and hairdresser who has worked with some of the biggest names in Hollywood. Originally graduated from NYU film, she is like a great many alumni from our sacred institution, brilliant at what she does but an otherwise maladjusted, somewhat entitled, art struck nutcase who will take the most dramatic route possible. After film school, Keeley discovered her talent for special effects makeup and this led to makeup in general. So she found a niche.
For years, Keeley subsisted as a successful makeup artist and has a lexicon of tales. She was successful, living in midtown after having struck a great deal in a luxury high rise. But all good things come to an end as the building was sold. Her rent got jacked up to market value. The place was spacious, and Keeley could have gotten a roommate or even moved to Queens where a guy she knows owns a building. However, she decided to fight the increase in a court of law.
Keeley is a Pacific Heights type of tenant, a nightmare for any landlord. Like the Michael Keaton character, this was not her first rodeo in eviction court. Keeley had lived rent free for a year in each of her previous domiciles as she battled her landlords. However, she had stayed in this particular place for nearly a decade without incident. Wanting to save money, Keeley reschooled herself on tort law and battled her landlord in court for two years. While part of me reviled her tactics, she was also a bit of an inspiration to become a complete dead beat.
Keeley fought the law, but the law won. So she was forcibly removed from her apartment by the marshal. Keeley went through a series of apartments. One was a swanky pad of an old friend on the Upper West Side where she basically had the first floor of their three floor duplex. Keeley got into an altercation with the daughter of the owner and her Puerto Rican pot smoker boyfriend, and there was alleged money laundering going on anyway. So the mother sold the place and Keeley was evicted. Then Keeley had a brief affair with an old Jewish fellow who had been successful in real estate, and she moved into his Yorkville apartment. Suspecting his maid was not in fact deaf but rather working as a spy for the government, Keeley got into a shoving match with her. An Occupy activist, Keeley insisted the government was sending spies, and this woman fit the profile. Once again, Keeley was thrown out.
Now Keeley found her way into the shelter system. A conspiracy theorist as we established, Keeley surmised from her findings that the government wanted to keep the homeless in their current state, and she also felt experiments were being conducted on her. Unwilling to be stepped on, Keeley decided to stage a revolution in the shelter. Keeley enlisted the help of two schizophrenics who believed Obama was following them, and an unmedicated bipolar woman who had delusions that she could read the minds of politicians on television. Add in the crack head who fancied herself a female Robespierre. Needless to say, they were all evicted from the shelter.
Homeless with no where to go, Keeley moved into a storage elevator in the facility her things were being kept in. She survived for two weeks by stealing food and using a friend’s shower. However, a storage elevator is no place to sleep. Keeley slipped and fell, and had to go to the hospital. Yes, she fractured her hip. Keeley, needing money and justice, attempted to use her legal skills to sue the facility. The case was thrown out of court. It was illegal for her to be sleeping there to begin with the judge said.
After getting out of the hospital and having her legal prowess humbled, Keeley needed a place to stay. In her desperation, she hit up my friend Nishu, the fairy Godfather and literal ring master of any and all uber eccentric New Yorkers. The Keeley drama, he decided, was too much for him to handle. Nishu was having drama of his own.
When he moved to America from India, Nishu had gone on a lease with a woman named Sandra in order to get a more favorable rent deal. A 35 year old who claimed she was 23, Sandra was his significant other on lease only. As per their agreement, Sandra could come and go as she pleased. Desperate for love, she dated racist Marines from PlentyofFish.com, and one was even trying to join the KKK when he was discharged I believe. This ended when Sandra faked a pregnancy in order to keep him. Needless to say, Sandra had spiraled out of control, and her stalkers were now harassing Nishu.
To make matters worse, Nishu was still in his playboy phase and had a bad habit of dating web cam models and other women who took their clothes off for a living in various fashions. One had even tried to kill him with a steak knife and was led away in a straight jacket. So Nishu’s ladies and Sandra’s stalkers were starting to meet, and disaster was unfolding. He needed to move and quick. Nishu needed to start his new place off with no drama. That is when Bobby enters the picture.

Good old Bobby is a low budget porno producer. Cam girls star in his films when they are getting their start and going up, but also when the sex industry has beaten the crap out of them and they are headed downward. While he is an operation that is low tech, he fancies himself a Vivid Video director. Bobby had met Nishu in his wildling days long before Hedda came into the picture and laid down the law. At the time, Nishu had done computer work for Bobby. In exchange for the hard work, Bobby paid him well and fixed him up with some of the women that worked for him. These women all turned out to be very damaged as all porn stars are. Yes, Bobby fixed him up with the one who tried to kill him.
Bobby’s films do no pay well. As a result, many of his women must resort to exotic dancing and prostitution. They feel Bobby is only a mere step up on the ladder of XXX films. However, the naïve ones truly believe he is someone. Often in exchange for roles in badly written flicks, Bobby forces the women to have sex with him. For the record he is about 300 pounds, never bathes, has greasy brown hair, dawns dark To Catch a Predator glasses and wears a fanny pack. Most of the models cringe when they speak of their sexcapades with Bobby. But in his mind, Bobby is a sex tiger. In addition to being a boss who pays his undressed help in slimy quarters, Bobby never pays his assistants. I know, what a guy.
Nishu and the rest of all unanimously are skeeved out by Bobby. Hedda in recent times has also put her foot down.Yes Hedda, the female zookeeper who had caged the buck named Nishu and tamed him  This is because Bobby brings his old, weirdo friends to Nishu’s parties and they eat all the food, drink all the beer, and are so strange they scare the regulars away. So Bobby is that friend no one likes. However, the only reason Nishu has even kept talking to him is Bobby has a boat. We all party on the boat several times a summer, and we hang out on there until the sun comes up. So yes, we kind of use Bobby. Hey, when casting a play in hell you don’t get angels as actors. The boat is dirty because Bobby is a slob, so even that excuse gets old, though.

After some thought, Bobby agreed to take Keeley in. They agreed that because Keeley was destitute, she could not pay rent. However, in exchange for free living space, she would buy him food with her newly acquired EBT card and clean. This worked out because Bobby is a complete slob and Keeley is a neat freak. Bobby’s building is a co-op of sorts, so a person living there who is not on the lease could get him evicted. Right away, there was some confusion on the move in date. Keeley came, and Bobby was not home. He believed it was the next day, and was shooting a short with one of his models. Keeley, angered and confused, settled every dispute the way she always does. She called the cops. The cops arrived, and all was settled. Bobby narrowly managed to avoid getting evicted, and Keeley moved in.
About a month into her journey under Bobby’s roof, Keeley had her jewelry stolen by one of Bobby’s girls. Employed as the star in his latest flick, Cucumber Love, a bondage laced narrative where the leather clad lady shoves a cucumber up her derriere, she had taken Keeley’s expensive earrings, bracelets, and dresses. Nevermind that Keeley could have sold these things and have some money to live on. A girl has to have a few things I suppose. Anyway, to his credit Bobby came completely clean and was honest. Yes, the hooker stole her things. However, unlike Keeley this working girl had a job and she had to look good for the nightly clients. Bobby admitted that there might be plans to return the merchandise, but he was not sure.
Keeley was not taking any chances. After Bobby grudgingly gave her the address, Keeley arrived at the house of the John. Unlike Bobby’s house which pretends to be a place of ill-repute, this was an all out brothel. Jade, the name of the porn starlette/prostitute in question, saw Keeley coming and panicked. She had been wearing her dress all evening and had performed a job in it. In a flurry in a head already filled with many bad decisions, she threw off Keeley’s clothes hoping the angry woman would not notice. Furiously, Keeley pounded at the door. She wanted her things back. Jade decided to tap into the dim light bulb on her head for one more suggestion. So she answered the door stark naked, implants and all hoping to prove a point.
Keeley was determined. She made her way into the brothel and demanded her things back. Jade denied having them even though Keeley saw them out of the corner of her eye. That is when the John, an Italian greaser, stepped in and settled the dispute. Keeley got in his face, and he did what any man in his position would do, he pimp slapped her. When Keeley got home, she was angry and demanded Bobby get her things back. Bobby refused claiming he wasn’t responsible if his women stole her things or not. So Keeley did whatever she could to thwart the production of his porn films. This included calling the Department of Health.
Finally, Bobby was sick and tired of this. The two got into an all out shouting match in which Keeley tried to trip him. Angry, Bobby decked her. A frantic, panicked neighbor, an older woman called the cops. Bobby was taken away in handcuffs and spent the night in jail. Out of spite, not fear, Keeley pressed charges and filed a restraining order. Meanwhile, during Bobby’s night in jail, Jade returned with the jewelry and dresses. She said she thought they would make her more money, but failed to impress her gentlemen callers. Jade, wanting to be an ambassador of good will from the world’s oldest profession, told her she was sorry for the pimp slap. She explained Rocco was protective of his women.
Bobby got out of jail. There was no way he was going to make Keeley leave. Sure, she had gotten him arrested and now he had a court date. However, the free food and maid service had spoiled him. Keeley couldn’t leave either. She had no where to go. Periodically though, she would remind Bobby she had a restraining order and could kick him out at any time.
Bobby was at the end of his rope with Keeley, and attempted to enlist the help of Nishu and Hedda by-proxy. During a very tense, bizarre, and awkward brunch, Bobby begged Nishu to control Keeley.  Present during this occasion, Hedda was rather vocal about how Bobby made her skin crawl. Putting her foot down, she informed Nishu that Keeley had dug her own grave, and perhaps these two deserved each other. Putting the nail in the coffin of his life pre-domestic bliss, Hedda told him he was not to interfere anymore with this drama that was a mix between soap opera and psych ward gone wrong.
Meanwhile, Keeley and Bobby returned to getting along. Keeley came to regret her quick decision to get a restraining order, and wanted to drop the charges. The DA, who was a young jack that wanted his conviction rate up, kept pestering Keeley and refused to honor her request. They were given a court date for September 11th. So off those two went, wasting tax payer time and money.
As the court date loomed, Keeley used the restraining order as blackmail whenever Bobby didn’t honor her wishes. Bobby then got back at Keeley by doing things to annoy her. In the sweltering summer, as she slept, he would turn off the air conditioner and roast her out of bed. During this time, Keeley got a job as a makeup artist and began to get on her feet. She was having a check mailed to the house, and Bobby promised her that one piece of mail wouldn’t make his landlord suspicious. Bobby got his mail daily, and denied Keeley’s check had come. Keeley’s employers had proof they mailed it. Then Keeley had the suspicion that Bobby stole it. Thus she reminded him of the court date looming, and he returned the check. Then they made some roommate rules, Keeley could not halt production of his pornos and he could not steal her things, and neither could his girls. It was time for order.
As one would believe, the court date proved to be a disaster. The DA was angry that Keeley was living with Bobby despite the restraining order, and told her she was in violation herself. Keeley in turn explained neither one wanted to go to trial. The DA stated he didn’t understand. Keeley said they were getting along and the state needed to butt out of her business. The DA, self-righteous and straight out of law school, explained he took the upper hand against scummy men like Bobby, and no woman in his town would have a man like this. Keeley explained Bobby wasn’t her boyfriend or husband, but a friend who kindly took her in and this resulted in and this was a roommate fight gone wrong. The DA now was flabbergasted. With a mix of an axe to grind and still wanting to get his conviction rate up, his assigned this twosome another court date.
After this episode, there was more drama. Bobby’s ex Janae came to visit. Back in the day, Janae had been a live booth girl in Times Square. Her aspirations had been Playboy. However, her teeth were crooked and while her boob job turned out well, her face was kind of odd. So more or less, she had to settle for the back pages of Hustler where all the well-endowed marginal looking women go. Janae had worked for Bobby when she started, and for a while he had managed her. The two fell in love and started dating.
The relationship was a disaster because most women who work in the skin industry are insane as we established. However, Bobby still held a candle to Janae. While she had put her adult film and centerfold ambitions on the back burner, Janae had other dreams. The shapely red head from West Texas had gone to cosmetology school, and worked as a hair dresser in a high end salon but then was fired after burning a customer’s forehead with a curling iron. This was in combination with giving the woman the wrong hair color. Mind you this was an Upper East Side Salon.
So now Janae had her dreams set on being a screenwriter. She wrote a horrid drama about a woman from West Texas who becomes an adult video star. It’s fictional, Janae was never a star. Anyway, during a luncheon years ago, Keeley had tried to assist her. Janae informed Keeley she was nothing but ancillary and couldn’t have any input. The screenplay is collecting dust as it should be.
Bobby hoped to rekindle his flame with Janae, and all weekend made Keeley leave the house so he could have a chance. It didn’t work out. Janae wanted to use Bobby to fund her never released screenplay still not produced ten years later. When Keeley returned home, Janae had cooked all of her food. Apparently, Janae is a terrible cook and burnt the bottom of all of Keeley’s pans. It was late, and Keeley wanted to wait to do the dishes until the next day. Janae was not having it though.

She waited until Keely got home and reamed her out. Janae claimed because Bobby was spending so much time in court with her, he couldn’t produce her film and it was all her fault. Additionally, she made fun of her for being homeless and informed Keeley that she was everyone’s maid. In a move to be nasty and get the ultimate shot, Janae informed Keeley she gained weight since their last encounter. Ouch, them fighting words.
Angrily, Keeley snapped back and called her a has been porn supporting player. She also told her she had crooked teeth. Janae stepped forward, and Keeley was on the assault. A grudge match was about to go down when Bobby stepped in and stopped it. He separated the two, and ordered Janae to the bedroom. Bobby comforted Keeley, and Keeley confided in him that she was tired, in pain, and had cramps from her impending ladies days.
Bobby has this supply of oxycotin that he claims he got years ago after a car accident. While he claims he does not sell it, Nishu has expressed his doubts. This among other things is why many of us don’t associate with him unless we have to. Bobby, feeling pity upon his friend, gave her a 60 mil tablet. Now that’s a lot of opium in case you don’t know. Anyway, at first she felt woozy. Then she began violently vomiting until blood came up.
Bobby began to panic. What if she was accidentally overdosing? He debated taking her to the hospital, but he had a domestic violence charge hanging over his head. He didn’t want to be in court for an actual felony. Janae, seeing this, decided it was too much for her and bolted. Keeley didn’t overdose but instead just had a bad reaction. Then she admitted that this compounded with other drama and now she was due in court at the end of the month again with Bobby.
Keeley lamented her existence, and told us once she had done the makeup of Melissa Etheridge who hit on her. In the tirade, Keeley reflected on her encounter with the Sapphic sister, “I should have slept with Melissa Etheridge when I had the change. I should have let her munch my rug!!!”
As she was bemoaning her life, Bobby called. He needed her home early. During accidental near overdose, he had neglected to mention Janae had nearly destroyed the bathroom. Bobby, although he refused to help her when she could have become an overdose fatality, was trying to be sensitive to her needs. However, now she was fully recovered and he needed his domicile dusted. So off Keeley had to go, back to being Bobby’s belligerent butler.
He could kick her out. It’s his house, but alas, a maid you don’t have to have sex with is just too good. She could leave, but alas, free room and board with the adventure is a small price one has to pay in New York. Part of me wants them to get married, but then it would all make sense. Either way, these two give me a lot to write about so the little devil inside me wants the crazy train to keep careening off the tracks.
Until next time.

Cue Odd Couple Theme Song.

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