My views do not necessarily reflect the views of my employer.
January 2023
Amanda and I woke up early to start our road trip to my favorite city. We took the bus to an inoperative Radisson Hotel to pick up the rental car, and then set out on the road. When it became apparent that our only options would be fast food at rest stops as we made our way through four states (Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey and New York), as we scouted out breakfast options on the rest stop signs, I remembered that Dunkin’ Donuts was coveted on the East Coast (unlike the West Coast).
It ended up being adequate, but I think it was the best choice out of our options! We arrived at our hotel in New Jersey which sat right next to the PATH train, dropped our bags, and trained into the city my heart calls home. In Times Square there was still confetti left from New Years.
Amanda LOVES theater just a little bit more than she dislikes Midtown, and today her feelings had not changed.
This picture makes me think of how I feel going back the the Caribbean- here I go again… what we do for Art!
I had no idea what we were in for, but Amanda had seen a previous version of the show before it came to Broadway.
This show was written by the same person who wrote Fun Home, which I saw in Denver a few years ago. It’s about a girl who has a fictional disease where her body ages four times faster than everyone else’s so as an emotional high school teenager, her body was nearing the end of its life. She has a dysfunctional family, and makes friends with the outcasts. The show is weird and funny and inspiring, and I’m pretty sure the moral of the story is to seize the day even if it means breaking the law.
The characters were so layered and unapologetic. I loved every element of this show. It’s a tough one to advertise- the title, as well as the show itself, is so surprisingly charming in context, that a quick description to entice people to come see the show has no chance of doing it justice. My heart was so full as we left the theater, and yet, our weekend had just barely begun.
We would be meeting Ann for dinner. I have gotten together with Ann so many times when I’ve come to visit Amanda that I can no longer just describe her as Amanda’s friend. But we had some time before dinner, so we stopped for a snack.
Schmackary’s is an essential stop in midtown. I love these cookies so much that I haven’t unsubscribed from their newsletters even though I now go years between visits to New York.
Before the pandemic, the Drama Book Shop wasn’t doing so well and it was going to close. My buddy, Lin Manuel Miranda and some of his Hamilton friends decided that the bookshop was too much a New York Institution to be lost, so they bought it and renovated it.
The costumes from Six (our next show) were on display!
A ‘book worm’ weaves its way around the ceiling…
And splatters into the wall.
We huddled up and kept warm while we waited until it was time to meet Ann for dinner.
Finally the time came and we met up for a great dinner at Dutch Fred’s, where we shared some appetizers and had some delicious cocktails.
Before the show, we waited outside to see if Ann would be able to get a last minute ticket…
She did!
Ann was down in the orchestra, and we were way up at the top.
The show was a short and fun pop-opera. They set it up as a competition for which wife was the best (I mean, I was assessing who my favorites were anyway) and then at the end they said it really doesn’t matter- they were only famous because of their husband, but now their stories might stand on their own… or something like that.
I was very excited to see a plus sized lady on the stage, even though she turned out to have the lamest character.
I think this show might have been built up too much for me. It was one of the only broadway shows I’d heard about from friends over the past couple of years. Though now that I think about it, they were very excited that they were going to see the show, but when I told them I was seeing it, I didn’t hear from them. It was a very fun show, but it wasn’t as thought provoking as other ‘newest most different’ shows that had changed Broadway. I loved that not only was the whole cast female, but the orchestra and the backstage crew were as well.
When the show finished, we weren’t quite done with the evening, so we decided to make another stop for some dessert and fancy cocktails.
We sat at the bar so we could not only chat with each other, but with the bartenders as well. Amanda had fond memories of a bartender who worked here who told stories about serving celebrities like Frank Sinatra.
The cheesecake was out of this world!
My friends are as friendly as I am, so of course we got involved with the conversation of the couples next to us. The couple on the other side of Amanda was celebrating the wife’s birthday and they had gone to see MJ (on Broadway). Well it turned out that the couple next to them were the parents of the actor who played MJ, and they weren’t able to see it for some reason! The guy of the first couple told the parents that the show made him cry. It felt so magical to be part of this serendipity (especially after a couple of cocktails).
On the way back to the hotel, we sat across from this girl who appeared to be on the way home from her bachelorette party.
I looked for her girls who should have been taking care of her, but it appeared that she was being escorted home by her fiance, who was lovingly capturing her demise.
I can’t tell you how much I enjoyed watching him both take care of her and document evidence to be used later.