Saturday, August 12, 2017

Do I know how to read women or what?

A few years ago I went to see a rather unusual play called TAMARA. The theater is actually a mansion and the audience follows around the various cast members as they perform their scenes simultaneously in different rooms. The idea is to attend with a few people and each person follows someone else. Then at intermission you get together and catch everybody up. I know. It’s a lot of work. And the story is a complicated mess. But it’s an experience and they serve chocolate covered strawberries at intermission.

So I’m following the cute little chambermaid (me and about nineteen other guys). In one scene she goes up to her room to get ready for a date. We follow her and stand against the walls.

She turns to me and starts talking to herself, excited about this upcoming rendezvous. Bad writing but that’s not the point. She’s imagining being in his strong embrace and how she’ll melt in his arms. And all the while she’s looking directly into my eyes.

The vibe is clear. This chick likes me. The suggestive dialogue, her bedroom eyes locked onto mine. There’s no doubt. For whatever reason I turn her on. I had just had a pilot not picked up and was feeling somewhat inadequate so to have this smoking hot girl pick me out of a room full of men really boosted my bruised ego. The hell with CBS! I was a stud!

So I start making eyes back at her, letting her know the Fonz has received the message.

And then I realized…

I’m standing in front of a mirror. She wasn’t looking at me. She was looking through me. She was just playing the scene as if I weren’t even there. Talk about major shrinkage.

For the rest of the night I followed the Fascist Colonel.

8 comments :

Peter said...

I always enjoy your posts about the hot women you like.

But I'm always thinking your wife must have a helluva sense of humour, because I assume she never gets upset at posts like this or your crushes on Natalie Wood and Gal Gadot.

And talking of Gal Gadot, I finally got round to seeing Wonder Woman. What a great film. And she is absolutely brilliant. Every time she was on screen, which thankfully is 99% of the film, I couldn't keep my eyes off her. I think the scene in which she appears wearing the blue dress was where I officially fell in love with her. I want sequel now!!!

DyHrdMET said...

For Friday Questions...have you ever had a case where a sitcom episode's B-story (or even C-story) becomes more memorable than the A-story of the episode? It would be something like a big story involving Sam and Diane on CHEERS but everyone was talking about the crazy antics of Cliff, Norm, Woody and Carla from that episode.

Don R said...

Just caught your Ten-Q aircheck on the podcast. Loved the guys humming the "Beaver" theme as a jingle! Did you ever get flak from the Beaver producers for your air name? In your later TV writing career, did you ever get a chance to work with or talk to the Beaver creators or anyone who worked on the show, and did the subject of your air name ever come up?

John Hammes said...

And then I realized…

I’m standing in front of a mirror. She wasn’t looking at me. She was looking through me.



Don't take it personally Ken: it's no reflection on you...

ChipO said...

Will Tamara ever come? And the rest of the evening continued from that opening.

Mibbitmaker said...

DyHrdMET -

Not an exact example, since the B-story is connected to the A-story, but the first episode of Shelley Long's last season of CHEERS comes to mind. It's very much a Sam & Diane story (the aftermath of Sam choosing Diane over Councilwoman Eldridge), but I consider it Frasier's best CHEERS. He really steals the show with just about everything he does. His renewed stewing about how Diane left him sets it all up perfectly!

ScottyB said...

>>"For the rest of the night I followed the Fascist Colonel.<< Wow. Must've been pretty crowded what with all those Secret Service agents in the room.

Liggie said...

This reminds me of the hunting lodge in Downtown Disney Orlando, where depending what room you went into you saw a skit (sometimes riffing with the audience) involving Flying Ace pilots, maids, inept safari hunters, even a genie in a cabinet. I remember an actor in a white pith helmet who seemed a cross between Radar O'Reilly and Les Newsman. I happened to be sitting in front of a cabinet door he needed to open for the scene, and in character he asked me, "Could you bend over, please?" As I did, a voice behind the cabinets said, "Bend over? Sounds kinky!" I grabbed my forehead in "exasperation" admiring the laughter, and while the actor began talking to the genie veins the cabinet the guy next to me said my reaction was perfect.

I also remember the lobg-running "Tony and Time's Wedding", an interactive play about a New York Italian wedding reception, complete with crazy guests who stubbornly stay in character while they interact with the audience (who's enjoying a price-included meal). Recently, a company in Seattle put on an interactive show based on a 1980s high school dance. They ran into a problem one night. Two characters conducted an "argument" outside the building, but a passing police officer mistook it for reality and tried to instill order. Apparently it took a while for the organizers to convince the officer that this was a performance and not a disturbance.