The Tonys was just the anti-depressant I was
needing last night. After two days of sadness and tributes for Anthony
Bourdain and then a day of watching how #45 pissed off everyone at the G7 in
Canada, I was depressed all day. Then the prevaricator-in-chief had
the audacity to accuse Justin Trudeau of giving out "false information."
I felt moved to actually write a note to the Prime Minister to apologize and
assure him that we weren't all behind our inglorious leader.
I actually had started this entry before
dinner as a diatribe on my depression about the country, the kids being
taken from parents, and #45 in general.
But then there came the Tonys, my favorite of
the awards shows even though I never have watched any of the shows, but it's
always such a polished show, and it helped clear my depression. It's
the awards show where 90% of the recipients can actually think on their feet
and give appropriately-timed, thoughtful thank you speeches.
And I learn about shows to look for. I
had never heard of The Band Visit, which won for best musical, but
was pleased to see Tony Shaloub take home the award for best actor in a
musical. I have always loved Shaloub on Monk, another show I
love to watch in marathon.
Shaloub's sister is an actress locally and I
always feel a bond with her when I see her perform, though I've never spoken
with her. I felt like I'd like to corner her and tell her how much I
enjoyed her brother's Tony speech.
I had never heard of Once on This Island,
which won the award for best revival of a musical, but the other two
nominees were Carousel and My Fair Lady, so I am assuming
those two will be making the rounds of community theaters in the next year
or two.
But for me the highlight of the night was
Robert DeNiro's unscripted comment before he read the script to announce
Bruce Springsteen.
DeNiro raised his fists and said "F***
Trump!" which brought a standing ovation in Radio City Music Hall.
It made me miss Paul. Paul was a huge
DeNiro fan, his favorite movie being Taxi Driver, where DeNiro played
Travis Bickle ("you talking to me?"). In fact, when Paul's best
friend Kag (whose real name is also Paul--he's the host of the annual "Paul
Picnic") became a father, he wanted to name his son after Paul, but didn't
want people to think that the baby was named for his father, so they named
him Milo Travis. Milo is ready to go to college this fall (he's always
a reminder of how long Paul has been gone, since they weren't pregnant
with him when Paul died) and Kag tells me that the one thing they have to do
together before Milo goes out into the world is to watch Taxi Driver,
which Milo has never seen.
So watching DeNiro bring the audience to its
feet with his comment about #45 I knew how tickled Paul would have been.
When the show was over, there was a Bourdain
tribute and then more of the depressing news.
He offended all of our allies (see the
difference between the two photos) and then headed off before the discussion
of climate change, which he doesn't believe in, for a meeting with the North
Korean dictator, whom he thinks is a nice guy and for which he doesn't
believe he needs to prepare because he's so smart he will just "know" in the
first minute whether he should stay or leave.
1 comment:
My friend is starring in The Band's Visit, he's the third lead, and we were thrilled that the show did so wonderfully!
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