Great Dame

A few things I know about E. Taylor, DBE.

1) I love her in Cleopatra, especially when she arrives in Rome on a giant golden sphinx, preceded by dancing semi-naked nubians, natch, every inch the great and mighty queen of Egypt and then winks at Caesar like a barmaid looking for a good time.

2) I have always had a hard time watching Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf, even though she's fascinating in it, and a much better actor than Richard Burton.

3) her fake Southern accent in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof makes my skin crawl. It is, however, better than that of Dame Judith Anderson. Not that that's saying much.

4) her greatest role was in the White Diamonds perfume commercial where she saunters into a poker game (photographed through all the gauze available in California at the time,) hauls off her gigantmundo diamond earbobs and says "These always brought me luck." A role model for drag queens everywhere.

5) thinking of her always reminds me of the Saturday Night Live skit where John Belushi impersonates her choking on a chicken leg. Heehee. I am a bad person.

Never Say Die

Perhaps, those of you with a bent in that direction, of a certain age and with a fondness for feelthy pictures will remember the monoymous Bruno from Colt Studios, back more than thirty years ago in the Gay Dark Ages. Of course you do, he had the most beautiful chest hair ever visited on man by the gods. Here, maybe this will refresh your memory:

Somehow, during my recent research on economic platforms for marketing small businesses, I ran across a more recent snap of the old darling. What? It's the internet, it happens. And you know, he's still looking mighty, mighty fine.

The old roue.

Turn to mrpeenee for all your updates on the porn. Speaking of which, I would like to publicly thank the good folks over at www.smutjunkies.com because they are the best source for smut research going.

Sparkle Thombeau, Sparkle

Darlings, even here, in our quiet little burg by the sea, we have culture.  And I don’t mean the kind the nurse down at the clinic takes before you have to call all your recent “dates.”  No, no, I mean EVENTS that add a little glamour even to my own fabulous existence.

For instance:

MONDAY JULY 20 
6 PM - Meet & Greet Reception with Patty Duke

8 PM - Gala Main Event


Marc Huestis presents SPARKLE, PATTY, SPARKLE!

 A Gala Tribute to Academy Award® Winner Patty Duke Live In Person! 
Interviewed by Bruce Vilanch with Screening of the classic VALLEY OF THE DOLLS & Performances by Connie Champagne & Matthew Martin 


 Benefiting New Leaf Services, NAMI Walk/S.F. Bay Area, Mental Health Association of S.F.

 It'll be Patty Duke's time to shine as Marc Huestis presents SPARKLE, PATTY, SPARKLE! a gala tribute to Academy Award® Winning star Patty Duke. The screen legend will take center stage for a stellar live in-person interview with comic extraordinaire Bruce Vilanch. They'll discuss her amazing career including winning the Oscar for her remarkable portrayal of Helen Keller in the 1962 classic THE MIRACLE WORKER; playing the iconic Neely O'Hara in VALLEY OF THE DOLLS; writing 2 best selling books (Call Me Anna and A Brilliant Madness: Living With Manic Depression Illness); and her recent stage triumph as Madame Morrible in the smash hit S.F. production of WICKED (now running in an open ended engagement at the Orpheum Theatre.) 

They'll be fun a-plenty with an only in San Francisco screening of the classic VALLEY OF THE DOLLS, fabu career clip reels including rare chestnuts from THE PATTY DUKE SHOW, and sizzling send up performances by Connie Champagne as Neely O'Hara & Matthew Martin as Helen Lawson. It'll be a night to remember at San Francisco's historic Castro Theatre!

Can you believe it?  Miss Duke her very self taking the stage.  I mention this in particular because Thombeau, the old darling from Fabulon, and I occasionally address each other as Helen and Neely as a nod to our great love for Valley of the Dolls.  And now, Thombeau has announced a brief break from Fabulon.  I initially didn’t think much about it, just nodding when he muttered something about a gig, all the while thinking to myself “Rehab AGAIN?  Didn’t she just get back?  Must have some goddam frequent flyer thing going at Promises.”  But now I see the truth, the timing is just too coincidental.  Don’t you get it?  Connect the dots, sweetie.  “Thombeau” really is Patty Duke.

 This explains so much.  Maybe too much.

Spittin

I am way too lazy to ever actually be involved in conspiracy theories - keeping track of all the possibilities just seems like too much work. Never the less, in the case of the former governor of New York, Eliot "Put It on My Tab, Baby" Spitzer it seems astonishingly coincidental that the vice would just happen to put the hammer down on the very escort service that Spitzer favored with his custom. Maybe they were going after dozens of hooker entrepreneurs and this was just one of them, but I haven't seen that in any of the stories.

Eliot is my man and you want to know why? In every photo, grimacing, shocked and pained, he always looks like he's wearing exquisitely applied eye-liner. Lancombe, probably.



Plus, every time I see his name in print it reminds me that when I was a wee little fruit, I had a huge crush on Mark Spitz. It was probably a combination of the moustache and the Speedo. When I was 17, this was the closest to porn I had come. I still sort of like it.

Sing Out, Klaus

Thanks to the fiercely fabulous Christine for this link about tonight's lunar eclipse: http://sunearth.gsfc.nasa.gov/eclipse/LEmono/TLE2008Feb21/TLE2008Feb21.html

I know it seems like a government funded science site should load faster, but then, George Bush is still president, isn't he? In any case go outside about 7:25 and look up. If you can arrange to listen to the great Nomi belting out "total Eclipse", even better.

Pleiades

I love the myth of the Plieades and this is the best picture I've ever seen of them, plus Mars (I'm an Aries) is in there along with a brilliant Persiad meteor. Click on it to see it better.