Sunday, October 28, 2007

Cherubs from Utah, The Tranny Turnpike

Our very good friends are opening a café on Santa Monica Boulevard right across the street from a Honda dealership.

While waiting for their final board of health approval so they can open, they began a weekly Saturday night with friends, kind of hangout-hootenanny with wine. This weekend was the first one.

By chance, the son of a famous Mormon singer who lives in Utah (think Paper Roses and Porcelain dolls) and the nephew of the guy with the purple socks, is understudying for a play next door. He has befriended the ladies who run the café. With his guitar. His twenty-four year old guileless goodness. With his chestnut brown hair. And most importantly, with his singing voice. He can hit a high C#, full. His intonation is perfect. He has the genes. One could even say they’re a little bit country, a little bit Rock n’ Roll.

But truly, his voice is outstanding and he gave us a mini-concert in the cafe. Big event as it turns out. The four women went haywire. They fell in love. They wanted to take him home and make sure that he would always be fed. Among other things. The three men were in awe.

Talk naturally led to when he was going to do a show in the café, that we would all help produce it, make sure the place was packed. Even though he is the child of fortune, he does appear to need a little boost. Often, famous kids eschew help and connections from their well established parents because they want to be able to do it on their own. And here we were a bunch of boozed up middle-age theatre types at the ready to produce a showcase for him.

After he left, there was much discussion about how to handle and help this kid, who, upon consideration, probably doesn’t need any help at all and was just humoring us. Everyone had flurries of ideas, while snarfing down grilled cheese sandwiches and goblets of wine. One of the women got very upset because she felt her territory was being invaded and that people weren’t listening to her. She just “Didn’t want him to be overproduced!” She collected dishes and started washing and banging them around in a frenzy of petulance and hurt. Hilarious.

It all died down by three in the morning, standing on Santa Monica Boulevard. A transsexual prostitute ran into us, which is nothing unusual for that stretch of road. (S)he was on X, with her beard stubble, her bleached out long hair and her whore outfit. (S)he was messy and inarticulate, giving us half phrases about how abusive and wigged out others can be toward her(im) and how (s)he doesn’t really know exactly what (s)he is, still trying to figure it out. We were imploring her, “Just love yourself, man. Be yourself. It’s cool. Be it all. That’s fine. What else do you want to do with your life?”

When asked, (s)he said she was from SLC. Salt Lake City. We tried to help.

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