| The ghost of Ignatius J. Reilly lives on (article from the local newspaper) |
[06 Dec 2001|04:05pm] |
The phenomenon of "The Vagina Monologues," a theatrical tour de force
that has been roaming the continent since 1997 to high praise and low
controversy, arrived in New Orleans last week.
Perhaps you heard.
This vagina thing sure has a lot of people talking. People who saw it and
people who didn't and people who say the word and those who talk around
it and those who won't go near it at all.
Count WWL-TV among the latter.
Prior to the opening of "The Vagina Monologues" last week at the
Orpheum Theater, Broadway diva Elizabeth Ashley was said to be
unavailable for personal interviews, but an exception was made to get her
on WWL's morning news show because its high ratings around the region
were thought to be a sure way to stir up ticket sales.
Would that it were.
In some last-minute wrangling, WWL nixed the idea of a sit-down between
morning anchor Eric Paulsen and Ashley. Turns out the station had a
torturous time deciding what to call the show. Apparently "The Vagina
Monologues" was not among the options.
Ashley's people were summoned and told the interview would not happen.
Probably just as well; she strikes me as the type more suited to late
breakfast in bed in one of those pouffy, hotel-issue robes, extra blanket on
the bed, morning paper, cigarette butts piling up next to the cold toast, TV
on with the volume off, maybe getting dressed by early afternoon.
I'm just speculating, of course.
Now, I'm not the TV critic here, but may I inquire: What exactly is wrong
with the word in question? To be fair to WWL, they're not the first news
organization -- print as well as broadcast -- to wrestle with this dilemma
as the stage production romps across Middle America. Many outlets have
wiggled their way out of a pickle by calling the show "The V Monologues"
and another popular substitute is -- get this -- "The Virginia Monologues."
I love this. Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. Yes, Santa Claus, there
is a vagina.
But I digress.
A panoply of other possible names comes to mind. How about "The
Victory Monologues"? "The Vascular Monologues"? Since it's in New
Orleans now, how about "The Voodoo Monologues"? Or "Villa Vici"?
Whatever.
Here's a thought: How about calling it by the name author Eve Ensler gave
it and leave it at that and when someone complains say, well . . . what
would YOU call it?
I'm hoping the morality cops don't come after me for this confession, but
my wife and I taught our daughter how to say the word a year ago. She's 2
½ and when the day arrived that we needed to outfit her with the proper
vocabulary to identify not only her own plumbing but that of her little
brother, we cast about for contemporary ideas and alternatives -- talked to
our friends, read the proper books and such -- and this seemed the right
way to go and if you are aghast in horror at this information I ask: What
did you teach your kids?
Pee-pee?
So my kid says the word. What could the city's highest-rated TV station
have to fear from it?
Confessional aside: OK, I did shy away from saying it once last week.
The night we went to the show was my wife's birthday, an honor she
shares with my delightful Aunt Anne, my godmother, who called to chat
and asked what we were doing to celebrate the occasion.
"We're going to the theater," I said.
"Wonderful," she said. "What are you going to see?"
"A play," I muttered and then, brightening: "Well, Happy birthday, Anne! I'll
put Kelly on!"
Suddenly I found myself empathetic to WWL's dilemma. I suppose there
are a lot of Aunt Annes out there around New Orleans, but I wonder if
they'd really get vocally upset about this or be more like my aunt and sit
quietly and muse on how the world has changed so much since she was
a little girl, for better or worse.
And so we went to the show. I ran into lots of my male friends' wives and
girlfriends but not many of my male friends. Shame, that. It's an
ear-popping show, full of humor, horror and insight but I'm not going to
review it here; my colleague David Cuthbert did a fine job of that in last
Friday's Lagniappe section. (The show continues tonight with former
"MASH" star Loretta Swit replacing Ashley in the feature role.)
The opening night audience was a big A-List of local power gals. Among
my fellow theater-goers was the city's First Mom, Sybil Morial, and I
guess I was feeling a little brave after the show and I approached and
asked her: "Well, Mrs. Morial, what did you think?"
She's such a media pro. She knew I was being cheeky, looking for a
titillating sound byte to write in my column, and she gave me a knowing
smile and said: "It was very interesting."
Indeed. She is so much wiser than I.
After the show, there was a cast party at Smith & Wollensky's steak
house, an irony not lost on me as the city's female feminist elite mingled
at one of the city's preeminent manly-man red-meat palaces.
Ashley held public court only very briefly. A titan of the stage -- she is one
of the all-time great Tennessee Williams interpreters -- her 40-plus years
in the business have left her permanently theatrical and jaded. The hair
flies, the hands wave, her cigarette punctuates every remark. Her scowl is
permanent and the darkness around her eyes is composed of history, not
makeup.
"I'm an actress," she breathed. "I love free food." So she retired to a tiny
private dining room in the restaurant, but my wife and I were summoned to
join her as Ashley, a Baton Rouge native, wanted to engage in local
topical discussion. Interesting idea, in theory, but what Ashley did was
hold court for two hours, pausing only to take drags on a cigarette and sip
from her mysterious cocktails and divest herself of the Meaning of Life.
Her two-hour monologue roamed freely across the cosmos, from her
encounters with Henry Fonda, the Rolling Stones and U.S. senators, to
her son's burgeoning acting career to subjects I was, quite frankly, unable
to follow.
At times incoherent, at times brilliant, she is a force of energy unlike any I
have seen. She claims to be a recluse and maybe it was the novelty of
company that set her loose. "A fast mouth and bad attitude got me where
I am," she uttered.
"I AM A DINOSAUR!" she roared. "The last of a breed." I felt like we were
in a remake of "Sunset Boulevard." She tossed her hair, rolled her eyes,
waved her arms and pattered on..
My pen had fallen out of my pocket in my car on the way to the restaurant
and it's just as well; my hand would have fallen off trying to keep up. Her
companion tried to loan me a pen but when I feigned taking notes on a
loaf of French bread, she clammed up for the first and only time.
Her steamy eyes met mine. Steam-rolled me. Shut up, she said, though
she tried to be polite. She would ask: "Where are you from?" and when I'd
begin, "Washington," she would blast "THAT REMINDS ME OF A
STORY!" and the hands waved and the hair flew and the eyes rolled and
the cigarette smoke gathered around our heads like the Confederate mist.
"I AM A VAGRANT GYPSY," she said. More like a treasured Gothic
Southern heroine, a one-of-a-kind, a dying breed indeed. She talked for
two hours but for the life of me I cannot tell you what she said. But I do
remember this: Not once did she say "vagina."
She said a lot of words you'll never hear on WWL, but she did not, in fact,
utter the V-word.
Discuss amongst yourselves.
(written by Chris Rose, Times Picayunne)
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