Fear of Flailing

Betty Shamieh is an amazing playwright--if you don't know her work, catch the fuck up! But with this article in CounterPunch, it's clear she's also an astute, incisive cultural commentator. Check it out!

And so it begins...(a prayer for year 2)

Year 2 of the MFA kicked off today. Ah, Brown...

God grant me the strength of will to endure Russian Formalism
courage to write the plays I want to write
and wisdom to know that I kick ass, regardless.
Lots of vodka will help. Grey goose if ya got it.

Oh.

And toss a few tops my way while you're at it. Preferably that look like
this:



Aaaaaaaaaaaaah men!

Reader's poll: Midget lesbian tosser or playwright?

So I've come to the conclusion that theatre blows big fat monkey chunks and perhaps giving up the exciting world of geology was a mistake. Maybe I should dive back into the earth sciences. I always liked climatology. I miss using words like pleochroic halo and hypabyssal dyke. And shooting lasers at igneous rock material to analyze ratios of Argon isotopes was really much more exciting than it sounds. Or maybe I should do something else entirely. Like go to culinary school. Top Chef looks like a fun time. Why not? In any case, I think it might be fun to see what YOU think I should do. The most votes win!

A) Quit school, move back to San Francisco, and do something meaningful. Social service, public health, porn. You know, something that gives back to the community.

B) Apply to graduate programs in geology. Obtain a PhD. Study mass extinction events. Avoid actual interactions with people at all costs. Especially theatre people.

C) Be a professional midget lesbian tosser. As in I would toss midget lesbians, not be one. I have no interest in becoming a lesbian, either at an amateur or professional level.

D) Say fuck it, move to LA, and try to bust it Hollywood style by writing romantic comedies about upper middle-class white people and their zany romantic misadventures and/or horror films.

E) Stay in this maldita MFA program and continue to write plays that simultaneously make white people uncomfortable and challenge the aesthetic/social strictures of latino theatres and therefore will never get produced unless I produce them myself.

F) Pastry chef. You know how I likes the Crisco.

These are all the options that I see open to me at the moment. If you have any other suggestions, feel free to toss them out. I'm open.

NOTE: Obtaining a PhD in theatre or performance studies is NOT an option. If I'm going to spend my time being abused, I'd rather it be here.

Please advise.

I finally have a photo for my comments!

This is my primary head shot/trick photo. Mead, Marisela, Prince, Tim, Adam, Sheila, Peter and everyone else whose blogs I frequent, look for this face in your box sometime soon.

Your comment box. Y'all are nasty.

Tag this, bitches!

Thanks to Mead Hunter for helping me pimp my blog out even more. Now all y'all lazy bitches who want to comment or leave messages but are too lazy to go through all those steps can just write messages to me (or to anyone else for that matter) on my tagboard. Look to the right and scroll down and...

BOOYOW!

Right there. So. Leave a message. Talk some shit.

And if Madonna calls, tell her I'm not here.

Transgendered latina wrongly jailed

I just checked this out and it's true. Yet another example of police harrassment of trans women and men. Please feel free to repost and if you have the means, donate to her bail fund or to the organization working to support her release.

No human being should be treated with such base disrespect. For those of you who wonder why I care so much about the welfare of transgendered people, read on.

Free Mariah! Help Raise Money for Bail for Community Trans Activist!

On July 17, Mariah Lopez, a young Latina transgender woman and
community activist, got arrested after she went to the police
department to file a complaint about getting beaten up in the West
Village. Since then, she has been held in jail while waiting for trial.

Since she has been in jail, we have had reports that:

* She was first taken to a women's jail, then ordered to drop her
pants to show her genitals so they could decide if she belonged there.
When she refused a 'genital check,' she was moved to a hospital and
then lock-in (isolation) in a men's jail.

* She had her clothing, bra, and underwear withheld from her.

* A male prisoner sexually harassed and assaulted her.

* An officer assaulted her.

She is being held on $1500 bail, far more than she can afford.
Mariah's lawyer has argued twice for the bail to be reduced or for
Mariah to be released on her own recognizance, but the judge refuses
to reduce her bail. Mariah is a long-time community member and
activist who has deep roots in New York City. There is no reason for
her to remain in jail while waiting for trial-especially not in
punitive isolation in a men's prison!

Her trial is scheduled for more than two weeks from now, so unless her
bail is paid, she will be forced to remain in jail for at least
another two weeks.

**How You Can Help**
We are trying to raise enough money to meet Mariah's bail, so that she
doesn’t have to continue to face the inhumane and dangerous conditions she is experiencing in jail.

SRLP as an organization cannot raise bail for Mariah. However, Gael Guevara, an SRLP collective member, is collecting and raising the money as a personal matter.
To contribute, either:
1) Make donations directly to Gael at ALP’s upcoming Chillin’ and Grillin’ Event on August 18th, Prospect Park, Near Picnic House, 12 noon to 6 pm.
Or
S.O.S. Collective Safe PartyAFTER PARTY: August 18th 9PM – until @ OUTPOST-1014 FULTON ST (btwn Classon & Grand) BROOKLYN, NY
2) Stop by the SRLP office, where Gael works, to drop off the money early next week. 322 8th Ave. 3rd Floor NY, NY 10001
3) Make a donation directly from your bank account using PayPal.com.

You can send the money to jesse@tmcnetwork.com.

If you would really like to help, but can only make a donation from your credit card, you are welcome to make a credit card donation through PayPal to this address: merch@tmcnetwork.com (please use this address for credit cards only; use jesse@tmcnetwork.com for payments by bank account transfer). Please keep in mind that we have to pay a fee for credit card payments, so making a no-fee donation directly from your bank account is the best way to ensure that we meet our fundraising goal and get Mariah out sooner.

The total amount of bail we need to raise is $1500, once the case is over we will be donating the remaining funds to the S.O.S. Collective Safe Party and the New Jersey 4 campaign of FIERCE!

Join us in raising our community collective power and help a fellow community member in need. I hope that you all can pitch in!

Thank you for your support!

For more information contact: Gael Guevara at 917-459-8779

For updates and dates for Mariah’s upcoming trial, please send an email to wapinpana@yahoo.com with subject line: support for Mariah. Thank You!

-forward widely-



Gael Guevara
Community Organizing Support Coordinator
Sylvia Rivera Law Project
www.srlp.org
Make a donation to SRLP at: http://www.srlp.org/index.php?sec=09A&page=donate
For volunteer opportunities contact us at : volunteer@srlp.org

Mamita Ya Está Emborachada!

Maybe not. But I do know we're celebrating my grandmother's 100th birthday tonight and she's already had 2 glasses of sangria and a shot of agua ardiente. I think she's had 2 shots. And she's wearing a tiara with flashing lights. That's how she rolls, y'all.

I'm blogging to you live from Pompano Beach, Florida where currently our rental house is filled with the families of 3 of my mother's siblings. I think there was upwards of 50 people here at the party's peak an hour and change ago. But the party--

Juansense. I promised you there would be juansense and readers I shall not disappoint. Tomorrow (when I'm sober and all of the agua ardiente is out of my system) I'll go into detail but for now you'll have to settle for free association:

Colombians
Sangria
Vodka
Drunk Colombians
Fat
Mariachis
Empanadas
Mi abuela (quien cumplio 100 ya!)
cumbias
salsa (que comen)
salsa (que bailan)
comiendo salsa cuando bailando salsa (dippin while you dance)
fat drunk Colombians singing with mariachis eating a pig
Yes, a pig.
No, I'm serious. Like a whole fuckin pig.
Snout. Tail.
Krishna.
I hate everything.
Elvis is here in spirit.
Drunk Colombian minors.
Ay ay ay!
Que puta...
la chimba!!!
This...this will probably not make sense in the morning when I look back on this...
Bueno pues
My sister is reading this. Hi Mercedes. She's fierce.
(I'm only saying that cuz she gives me money because I promised her I would take her to the Oscars if I ever get there.)
Mercedes drives a Chevrolet. Much to her dismay.
Which is why she's now chillin with the drunk Colombians singing.
Yelling every five seconds.
Oh sweet Jesus my mother is dancing.
Sweet Jesus. With a weave.
Jesus' weave. Not my mom's.
Tampoco lo mio. I don't have hair to weave. But oh if I did...
My poor nieces. They don't know what the hell is going on.
I don't know what the hell is going on.
Except now
NOW
Celia Cruz is playing
and all I've got to say is
AY!
No ha que llorar
que la vida es un carnaval
es mas bello vivir cantando
and so I go
to join the drunk Colombians singing.

Adios Atlanta

It's my last night in Atlanta and what did I do? I stayed in and watched Charlie's Angels on TBS. Why? Because Atlanta. SUCKS!

Ok. I'm a little harsh, but what this summer has proven to me is that I have zero tolerance for any city where I am forced to drive in order to cruise men. Give me San Francisco! Give me Montreal! Hell, give me New York even. Just give me a city with an efficient public transit system, hot guys who look like they were ripped straight out of the pages of Instigator, and a bottle of Jungle Juice, and I be SET!

So what did I do this week? A lot of nothing. A lot of sitting on my ass in Caribou Coffee refusing to venture out and explore the city because IT WAS OVER 100 DEGREES EVERY DAY! That's right. So I did a lot of net surfing. And eating. I highly recommend Chow Baby.But my sister Martha and I did hang out with her friends Patty and Andrew last night, along with their adorable 3 year old daughter. After dinner, Patty, Martha, and I went to see Blueground Undergrass in concert and then hit some breeder bar in Little 5 Points--a cute section of town that reminds me of Haight St. If Haight St. were 2 blocks long.

So, yeah. August is not a pleasant time to visit Atlanta. Lesson learned. I'm sure it has it's charms, but driving? Eeeeeeeew. I'll come back though to visit Martha. And there's an uber yummy man I chatted with on Manhunt whom I never managed to meet up with. Maybe next time. Totally my type, too: shaved head, tattoos, goatee, looks like he could kill me. Sigh...

Speaking of men, the man-with-whom-it's-too-complicated-to-even-call-him-an-ex-because-it-would-imply-we-
had-a-functional-relationship-to-begin-with called randomly last night to catch up. He's such a lovely man. And we have such lovely conversations a lot of times. Grrr. So problematic. Why must I be so attracted to men who are so completely damaging to me? Picture this and you will understand the attraction: If computational linguistics had a sordid affair with surrealist painting and had some sort of autistic ninja baby, that'd be him. With tattoos, of course. Except not a baby because like ewwww! Do I look like Michael Jackson?

But no matter. There are plenty of men waiting in Ft. Lauderdale. And it is nearly 3 a.m. so I should go to bed. My sisters Marina and Monica and her daughter Jamie Leigh arrived a few hours ago. I haven't seen any of them since March. Tomorrow we'll have a good 9 hours to get reacquainted as we make the drive down to Ft. Lauderdale to meet up with my mom, my sisters Maria and Mercedes, Mercedes' daughters Fallon and Kimberly, and their stepdad Mike for a week of family vacationing and celebrating my grandmother's 100th birthday.

100 years old! Can you believe it? That bodes well for me. Why, just ten years ago I thought I'd die a slow horrible death from AIDS by the time I was 30. Or at least be serving up some buffalo hump wings with some crixbelly pie. But no. Now if I could just drop 100 pounds or so, I'd be a lil' latin Lindsay Lohan with my entire life to look forward to if I can stick to a healthy diet and fitness regimen (but, unlike Lindsay, I'll lay off the glass pipe) and keep living my mantra:

Wrap it 'fo you tap it!

Tomorrow: updates from the FLA. Word.

Putting the hola in Hotlanta

Hey hey there, readers! (Does anyone actually read this? Anyone? Maybe I should be one of those insightful, intellectual theatre bloggers instead. I'll think on that.)

After two months in San Francisco and the month of July split between New York and Montreal, I now find myself in Atlanta! This is my first time here in the "San Francisco of the South," where I'm staying with my crazy neo-hippy sister Martha before the Urueta family travels en masse (when latinos travel, we travel in French. Betcha didn't know that, did you?) to Ft. Lauderdale next Monday for what I'm sure will be a week of joyous celebration (my grandmother turns 100!!!!) combined with utter juansense.

But Atlanta. What can I say about Atlanta, based on the 24 hours or so I've been here?

1) I learned that the gays live and/or frolic in "midtown". The lesbians do their processesing and/or folk music playing in Decatur (see also: Dykeator, Dickhater). Go here. Order the bruschetta. And an iced coffee. Mmmmm...

2) A frat boy from my undergrad years at William and Fairy, who not only repeatedly called yours truly a faggot (back in my angry gay man rainbow flag waving days when I found the term offensive), but upon rumors of his own sausage sitting said such wonderful quotables as "I can’t help I’m cute and dress well" and let's not forget "I'm not gay, I'm just European", has not only burst out of a closet so tiny that even Tom Cruise rolled his eyes at the sight, but has become quite a public fixture in gay (white) Atlanta life due in large part to what is perhaps one of the gayest and most classist events I can imagine, short of a fagutante ball. "Our mission is to provide the Atlanta gay community with a more civilized and elegant activity that gay men and women can enjoy outside the club and bar scene." Civilized? Elegant? Whatever! Give me a can of Crisco, a bottle of poppers, and some homo whose name I'll never bother to ask any day. But good for you, Matt. You're here. You're queer. You're bougie. And that's the gay (white) American dream. Congratulations! Consider your debt to faggotry paid in full.

3) It's hotter than a ham biscuit in Hades up in this piece. Hotlanta for reals, y’all! I could deal with the heat (maybe, but I think I’m philosophically opposed to it being 95 degrees at 9 p.m.) if not for what's like a gajillion percent humidity. But as it is I feel like I'm walking around a sauna, without the convenience of men who have sex with men walking around in towels ready to pummel each others' bowels. So I have chosen to spend the day here enjoying the ozone depleting air conditioning and free-with-purchase WiFi so I can do useful things like update my blog, catch up on e-mail while listening to Stevie Nicks, and cruise Manhunt.

Oh WHATEVER! Don’t judge. I've always said if you're not going to do anything productive...

Do it on your back.

I've always said...

4) An equation for yum:

Southern fried fags + a breakfast plate that can only be described as transcendental=
The Flying Biscuit Cafe. I swear the home fries must be laced with crack. And the biscuits! Oh the biscuits...*drool*!
Not to mention the best
apple butter I've had in years! Everything comes with a bisucit. Eggs come with a biscuit. Salad comes with a biscuit.
French toast comes with a biscuit.. Your biscuit comes with a side of biscuit. Respect!

Plus if you come during the daytime, you’ll be entertained by the cute and bitchy gays who work there AND have the opportunity to meet three company members of Twinhead Theater. It was fun to meet them and hear about their work. They’re theatre work. Seeing them in their day job was just pure theatre.

An equation for entertainment: Restaurant drama + gay drama= site specific theatre

Go for the biscuits! Go for the gays! If you ever come to Atlanta, just go eat at The Flying Biscuit.

5) Or here. Carnitas + portabello + guacamole= the best burrito made by white people I've had since (click here ). Gringos making kickass burritos? Look where multiculturalism has gotten us.

6) Or you could eat here. Might I recommend the Coronary Bypass?

Coronary Bypass= Cheeseburger + 3 strips of bacon + 2 slices of cheese + a fried egg + mayo.

Oh. And a side of tater tots.

I thought I’d have a “healthy” version of said burger by cutting the mayo and substituting the beef patty with bison (did you know that bison has less fat than skinless chicken breast?).

I'd never had bison before, and being the adventurous eater that I am decided "Why the hell not?" And it was gooooooooooooooood! Jumping Jack Jesus was it good...

Still, though, can I just say…

What the fuck was I thinking? A fried egg on a bacon cheeseburger? “Hi! I’m Enrique and I’d like an order of triple fried fat on a fatfat with a fittyfat on top and a side order of fat. But can you use a low-fat patty? And bring me a Diet Coke. I’m watching my figure. Thanks.”

Attention readers—this just in: I am the bastard child of gluttony and juansense.

7) I’ve always said that the South is much friendlier than any other part of the country, but damn! Even the homeless here are friendly! My sister’s jeep needed a jump and the combined forces of her, her ex-roomie, and her “I’m not gay, I’m just a Brown student” little brother (did I just refer to myself in the third person? Yeah, she did! In fluent shebonics at that…) were no match for the homeless man who came to our rescue and gave us an auto maintenance lecture and jumped my sister’s car. We thanked him, I gave him a twenty and he just replied that he was just another “worthless homeless guy.”

“No human being is worthless.” That’s what my sister said. Which brings me to:

8) My sister rocks!

And that's all I have to report so far. Very little work done so far. No bites on Manhunt. Or cruising the streets of midtown. Perhaps that’s a good thing. Perhaps I should focus more of my attention on rewriting Learn To Be Latina or revising my syllabus for the class I’m teaching next fall as opposed to trying to pick up men in the 5 full days I have here. Quizas, quizas, quizas…

Perhaps I’ll sleep now. Now there’s a thought.

Sad Day for Theatre

So I'm sitting here tweaking my blog links, adding new playwright websites and blogs (check out Daniel Alexander Jones and Sharon Bridgforth if you don't know their work, especially you Marisela. You'll love them! I'm teaching plays by both of them in my class in the spring). Anyway, from Sharon's page I found Daniel's and a link to this kickass theatre in upstate New York called the Todd Mountain Theatre Project. A summer theatre that does contemporary non-naturalistic work by folks like Len Jenkin, Catherine Filloux, and Daniel Alexander Jones? Who fuckin knew?!

So that prompted me to add links called "Kickass Theatre Across the US", where I have the link to Todd Mountain Theatre Project. I decided to add other kickass theatres that I know of across the country (which I'll add a bit a time--and playwright/theatre bloggers out there: send me links of theatres that you think kick enough ass to be linked from my blog). So check out the theatres in that soon-to-be-growing links section.

I remembered Infernal Bridegroom Productions in Houston, TX. Now, I've never been to Houston, so I only know of IBP from their national rep for producing kickass work (they did the world premiere of Suzan-Lori Parks' Fucking A, among many other works of note). So I googled them to find their website so I could blogroll it, and I find this.

It's sad to see the demise of one of the few theatres in the country committed to producing such daring work AND engaging their communities through theatre. I'm sure their absence will be felt, in Houston and around the US.

Damn I need a drink now.

In good company

Rather than doing anything productive at 4 a.m. (like sleep), I decided to check out the statistics from sitemeter about who's reading my blog. I found thislink in an old Flavorpill mailer online about the National Queer Arts Festival this past June. I had a reading of my play Forever Never Comes---which was quite fierce (how could it not be? I had fabulous actors on board: Alexandra Creighton, Monique Jenkinson, Diana Gutierrez, Parker Leventer, Lawrence Radecker, Carla Pantoja, and Patrick Alparone, and got to work with the fabulous Mary Guzman once again). I'll go back and talk about the reading in another post. But check out the link and scroll down and you'll see the National Queer Arts Festival announcement:

"...the festival continues to celebrate contemporary voices such as Dorothy Allison, Marga Gomez, and Enrique Urueta, as well as emerging artists from Youth Speaks and the Bent Writing Institute."

I just got lumped in with Marga Gomez and Dorothy Allison. How cool is that?!

I bet Marga and Dorothy are sleeping right now, which means I should, too.

Goodbye Montreal

You've been a lovely and generous host. Thank you for the wonderful gifts over the past two weeks: the wonderful summer weather, poutine (mmmmm....french fries+gravy+cheese curds= more booty in the butt, but gooooooooooood), and the men. Oh, the men...words can't fully express the dead sexiness of the Quebecois men. If you're an ass pirate and want to have a fabulous (dare I say it) gay time, here's a link that'll be useful for you. I recommend GI Joe's...

But the men! I can't stress enough how hot the men are here. I swear I haven't gawked this much since the first day I stepped foot in San Francisco (another city filled with absolutely stunning friends of George Michael). The men in Montreal can best be summed up as:

1) skinny
2) beautiful
3) Crispy fried Christ are they hung!!!

All that and they're bilingual. In Montreal anyway, for the most part. So to all you fags reading this, save up, fly out here for a week or two, and I guarantee you'll have yourself a good old-fashioned ankles-to-Jesus time.

Goodbye, Montreal. For now...

Salve Vagina

God bless the Filipino prison system. What better way to rehabilitate criminals than meta-drag? Hail Holy Queen, indeed.

I say we go to Manilla and rob an adobo truck or something. Maybe--just maybe--we'll get to experience the joy these prisoners must have.

Holy Pinoy!

I'ma come out and let y'all know that Sister Act is one of my all-time favorite movies. What's better than a black woman in witness protection pretending to be a nun teaching middle-aged white women to praise the Lord with a lil' bit of rhythm?

This is. Featuring the return of the tranny. Look at her go!

Radio Lumpia

Freddy Mercury is weeping tears of joy in heaven. And mixing it with powdered lube to create the perfect consistency to grease up his stretched out hole. He was such a slut, wasn't he?

Whenever I feel like my soul is long past dead, I'll watch this and be reminded that life is worth living

What's better than an early 80's horror music video starring a then-black Michael Jackson? How about a re-enactment 20 plus years later. With prisoners. Filipino prisoners. Awake, my dead soul. Awake!

Check out that tranny. She is totally working it like she going for a Oscar. I bet she ain't got a MFA either. Shoot...

Heidi Schreck, if you're reading this. Watch out. You've got some competition out there. In ten to twenty. Unless she gets released early for good behavior.