Yesterday,
my phone rings at 4:15 a.m. It's Scott, my husband, calling from
Heathrow airport, and he proceeds to inform me of what's happened there.
I
had been dead asleep, having just put myself to bed around 2:30AM (I
know, late for a school night; I have a lot of hobbies.) In my fog, I
try to process what hair gel has to do with terrorists.
In the
course of a minute, all manner of images and thoughts run through my
mind. He asks me if he should get on the plane or not. Officials
were asking people to postpone travel if they didn't absolutely have to
fly.
He'd already been in London on business for eight days. I
was looking forward to him getting home, and I know he was missing me,
too. So I just say, "Look, I know you're dying to see me ... But you're
not
dying to see me. Don't fly yet. I love you." "I love you too," he says. We hang up.
Fast
forward. It's about 10PM Eastern. He calls me and says he just had a
life-changing experience. "What!?" I ask. He says, "Her name is
Pam Ann."
For a second I think he's gone back to being straight. But no, Pam Ann is a stage act. He saw her at the
Soho, a former synagogue and now an experimental theatre, which lists Pam Ann thusly:
Pam Ann, a-list air-hostess to the stars, is back and this
time she’s brought reinforcements. Meet Susan, the [British Airways]
bitch with a dark secret who treats all her passengers as if they were
personally responsible for the death of Princess Diana, Donna from
EasyJet - she’ll take you up the cockpit all the way from Krakow to
Cork (and back again) and old favourite Lily - watch those Gucci
handbags.
Join Pam and her new crew for the trip of a lifetime, you’ll be flown like you’ve never been flown before.
So
my first reaction is that I hate him. Already this week he'd seen
'Billy Elliot,' 'Beautiful Thing,' and Dame Judi Dench in 'Hayfever.'
But he proceeds to tell me that the show was incredible, over the top,
and the perfect way to process a day of living with airline terrorism.
Why?
Because apparently Pam Ann is so brilliant she'd already integrated the
day's events seamlessly into her act. These aren't exact quotes
but, remembering lines, Scott paraphrases her assaying things
like:
"Now we request your full attention as the flight
attendants demonstrate the safety features of this aircraft ... and I
KNOW you'll pay attention this time ...
... A life jacket is
located in a pouch under your seat. But when the plane blows up, you
won't know what hit you, so the life preservers won't really be that
helpful. How about I make an origami duck out of it instead?" [Proceeds
to produce an origami preserver-cum-duck.]
Scott says "Every moment was funnier than the one before. She
captured campy, kitschy personas like I've never seen. She related to
the audience completely through the whole show with kick-ass comedy."
I
asked him how it helped him process the day and he tells me, "I was was
kicked off this flight because of a terrorist incident, and Pam Ann was
able to use black humor to take something scary and make it funny.
Timing is everything and hers is perfect."
In two-gay-degrees of
separation fashion, Scott happened to be sitting next to a friend of
Pam Ann, who generously invited my hot, single-for-the-night (hey!)
boyfriend to a little after party. About meeting Caroline Reid, the
woman who created and embodies Pam Ann much to the extreme delight of
gay men worldwide, Scott shares that "she's the kind of person you you
can't take your eyes off. She's captivating on stage, and scintillating
off stage."
'In Bed With Pam Ann and Friends' is the #1 critics
choice for gay entertainment in Time Out London. As soon as you feel
safe enough hopping a flight over there, sounds like you better do it
so you can catch this show. Just remember, you're going to have to buy
hair gel once you get there.
In my gay fantasy mind, I saw judge Michael Kors channelling Norma Desmond. Michael, whose recent whereabouts have been a big mystery and of concern to viewers, turns to the camera, tilts his head back and says, "It's a return, a return to the millions of people who have never forgiven me for deserting the screen." <fade lights>
"
My pals and I attended a super fun gay night of baseball
last evening: Night Out at the Nationals. We joined more than 1,600 other gay, lesbian, bi and trans
people who were there, too. (Pictured L to R: Al, me and Jeff, looking sporty in the
stands of RFK Stadium.)
