Director's Cut

Clay Aiken's audition for American Idol, as broadcast six years ago (January 28, 2003), left a few things out... e.g., his initial audition in Charlotte ("Somewhere Over the Rainbow") and the song he nervously sang for the screening producers in Atlanta (the theme from "Perfect Strangers").

There were also bits of his Atlanta audition song ("Always and Forever") that were left on the cutting room floor (fortunately picked up by various news clips about him), such as two lines from the song that showcased Clay's beautiful lower-register range.

Here is the complete story of Clay Aiken's March through Atlanta:

Giving My Regards

Catch it while you can - Broadway is going into hibernation soon. I just came back from seeing the last Spamalot for Clay Aiken on Jan. 4 (the show continues until Jan. 11). I also saw Patti LuPone in Gypsy and a sprightly cast (not the original) in Avenue Q.

I strategized the Spamalot trip a little, coming into the city one day ahead of my ticket. Clay had been coming to the stagedoor to do autographs and photos with fans, but somewhat erratically. I got there about 40 minutes before the end of the Saturday matinee, met up with some friends, and waited for the barricades to be put up right in front of us (we made a semi-circle in front of the door, knowing about where the barricades would be placed. Hee! That was the only way to guarantee ourselves front row).

It turned out Clay did indeed come out to sign autographs, but not have pictures taken - it was way too cold. He signed my copy of Learning To Sing - Yay!














As for the show the next day - what can I say. It's not the same as seeing it for the first time, but it was fun to participate in all the riotous cheering for Clay. I get the feeling not everyone in the cast was happy about it, but most went with the flow. After Clay's big number, "You Won't Succeed on Broadway," Sir Lancelot rode into his next scene, saying he'd better find out where that screaming was coming from. Hee!

We waited in Shubert Alley for Clay after his last show, and he did not disappoint. Goodbye, dear man! Don't be a stranger.















But you know what, "Claymates" (ugh--gotta love us, but I hate the term) have nothing on the Patti Lupone fans. Gosh! They raised the roof for her, and justly so. The mob at her stagedoor was crushing. My only pic of her was but a blur.





















By Sunday night and after a heavy but wonderful dinner at Sardi's













with other Clay fans, I was probably too tired to see another show. Poor Avenue Q, the only thing playing on Sunday night that I could get tickets to. I was cramped up in the mezz, my knees aching for not being able to move my legs, and fell asleep during the second half. I loved the show, really I did, but I was just too dang tired.

Monday morning clean-out on Broadway saw lines of trucks ready to pick up lines of trunks - audio and lighting equipment as sets begin to be struck for the last time. On 44th Street, "13" was vacating. It was a sad sight.














I'm glad I went - I need to go again. Broadway, come back!!!

love, hosaa
Theatrical cat

Ooo, I forgot to mention - I caught the bouquet at Clay's last Spamalot!! As thrown by Merle Dandridgeto little me in H-105. I apologized profusely to the lady in H-104, but I just had to have it.

Christmas and what-not

Because of everybody's schedules, I had to do Christmas presents early. It's pretty much all over now.

I'm trying to understand why everyone I gave gifts to told me, "That's too much." Every.Single.Person.

What, was I trying to buy love or something? I thought I was showing thoughtfulness, sharing a bit of myself (my photos and artwork were a large part of everyone's gifts this year. I made calendars from them and/or framed photos).

The bulk of the gifts went to my brother's family. He sent me a memory card with family photos on it (many of which I'd never seen before). That was great. But on the card he sent, he signed for everyone else in his family. They didn't even sign their own names.

Is there really any good reason I should feel whiny about this?

Never mind. Feelings are feelings. There's nothing in the term "in law" that suggests enforcement is ever appropriate.

Public Diplomat

Congratulations to Ken Griffey Jr., the latest envoy in the U.S. State Department's American Public Diplomacy program.

All-Star baseball player Griffey "joins Michelle Kwan, Fran Drescher, and Cal Ripken, Jr. as Americans who go out on behalf of the values of the United States – not the Government of the United States, but the values of the United States – to engage with people around the world from very special positions," said Secretary Condoleezza Rice.

Read the State Department's press release here.

AP video on YouTube:

A Hard Day's Chord

"You have to get obsessed and stay obsessed."
John Irving, Hotel New Hampshire

Every now and then a story comes along that makes me smile. Not much I can do with it, but smile.

The press release came in from Dalhousie University in Halifax, "Sherlock of Rock": A mathematician has cracked the chord that launches the classic Beatles film, A Hard Day's Night.



What was that sound? As the release describes, "It’s the most famous chord in rock 'n' roll, an instantly recognizable twang rolling through the open strings on George Harrison’s 12-string Rickenbacker." Math professor and musician Jason Brown wasn't satisfied.

Jason Brown. Photo by Danny Abriel

In more than 40 years, no guitarist had ever been able to replicate the mysterious, compelling chord. Using computer software to reduce the chord to its component frequencies, Brown now theorizes that the reason is the chord contains one hitherto secret ingredient: a piano, specifically an F note that would have been impossible to play with the other notes already in use for the chord on George's, John's, and Paul's guitars.

As a teacher, Brown sees the larger issue in his research:

“Music and math are not really that far apart,” he says. “They’ve found that children that listen to music do better at math, because math and music both use the brain in similar ways. The best music is analytical and pattern-filled and mathematics has a lot of aesthetics to it. They complement each other well.”

Alrighty, then. Professors with lifelong obsessions get research grants. I'm pleased.

I love A Hard Day's Night, and it became a kind of office obsession at The Futurist a few years back when the editors amused themselves by randomly throwing lines out at each other. One even sneaked a line from George's famous "grotty shirt" scene into an article.

"An early clue to the new direction?"


I love that scene for many reasons. It pokes fun at professional trend setters with their complex mathematical formulas, who attempt not just to predict fads but to create them. George would have none of that, and when told he could be replaced, said simply, "I don't care."

"I don't care" truly launched the youth revolution in the Sixties that began in the Fifties. It empowered youth to question authority and to defy it.

I would love to have used Professor Brown's musical math story for the magazine, but just couldn't quite see the future angle in it. Education: use of music to improve math education? Technology: use of computers to aid audio analysis, possible application in forensics? Social: importance of pop culture as reference points in history?

Nah, it would be a stretch. The story made me smile. Maybe it makes you smile too.

Love, hosaa
questioning authority and staying obsessed

Private Lives

Apropos of Clay Aiken's recent revelations, I am reminded of a story.

Once upon a time, I treated a friend to a Sunday matinee performance of a one-man play, an adaptation of P.G. Wodehouse stories called Jeeves Takes Charge, at Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C. I believe it was the last performance of the run.

As I settled into the second-to-last row of the balcony, I looked through the program to see who this guy is, Edward Duke. The bio indicated that he was about my brother's age. I looked at his picture. That is, I gazed, sort of dumb-struck, at his picture. Goggly-eyed, don't you know.

Only one word popped into my head as the lights dimmed. "Perfect." I was in love before he even set foot on the stage.

"Jeeves Takes Charge" program insert:

program page:

program page:

program page:

program page:

The show was promoted as a one-man, two-act, 12-character, award-winning comedy tour-de-force. How this actor could embody all of these characters was beyond comprehension, but his delivery of Wodehouse's words was a revelation. It was the characters and the words that I grew to love after the show was over.

As Jeeves, the brainy cove who eats fish ("from the collar upward, he stands alone") Edward must have been brainy himself, I reasoned. As Bertie, the fat-headed goof, always getting himself unfortunately engaged and wearing inappropriate socks, he was just plain adorable.

But back in the olden days, the 1980s, there was no Internet to help in chasing after an idol. Frankly, I don't know how I ever got tidbits about where he was or what he was doing. So I ended up concentrating mainly on P.G. Wodehouse and reading all of the Jeeves stories I could get my hands on.

When that was done, my mind kept turning to the man who embodied all the best of Bertie Wooster and his man Jeeves. I wrote short skits and scenarios of the characters, taking them to places of my own romantic invention.

And when I was done with that, I still needed to connect with the source of these inspirations: Edward Duke. In my most professional big-girl voice, I called a professional theater guild (it might have been Actor's Equity, but I don't remember now. Perhaps Screen Actor's Guild) and asked for the membership department. I asked for the mailing address of one of their members, Edward Duke, and received the information with professional courtesy. (I later learned that whoever gave me that information probably should have been fired. I tried asking the same question again another time and was rebuffed when I confessed I was not a member myself.)

So with an address to write to, I wrote my fan letters to Edward. I wrote about how he inspired me and how talented he was and all that. I don't know how many letters I wrote - enough to run out of topics, I'm sure! It was a little like writing to Santa Claus - since I didn't think he was really receiving the letters, I could say pretty much what I wanted. But after a year and a half, I gave up. It was rather silly, I knew.

But then, out of nowhere, I received this in the mail:

autographed publicity pic:

A simple autographed photo. My prized possession! I showed it to everyone I knew and laughed when they all asked me, "Which one is Edward Duke?" He's both, of course, My hero, my ideal man, with Jeeves's brains and Bertie's heart.

It was staggering to realize he must have actually read my fan letters - or some of them, anyway.

After I got his autographed picture, I was so thrilled and inspired, I wrote a novel "based" on what I thought he might be like (a romantic, wise, handsome hero, of course). I actually sent him the novel, and a year later, when he came back to D.C. in another show, he called me at work and invited me to attend that evening's performance as his guest!

I had heard from a friend that he was touring in a musical based on the strained relationship between Gilbert and Sullivan; Edward played the chowder-headed Alfred, son of Queen Victoria, who was enchanted by the theatre. His character gets to have a walk-on role in "The Mikado" and carries around an enormous bamboo parasol.

Sullivan and Gilbert handbill:

"Backstage, what? How very ... theatrical!"

After the show, I was to go backstage and meet Edward! Can you imagine how through-the-roof I was? In a daze, I wandered through the downstairs abyss that is the Opera House {correction: it was the Eisenhower. ~h} backstage at Kennedy Center, staggered through the dressing room areas, then saw my Edward, sitting on a bench and putting on his shoe.

Beside him were two young fan-boy boyfriends (stereotypically gay enough even to tip me off). Edward was gracious but flamboyant. Okay, I had to change my mind about who I thought he was! But I never stopped loving him.

After the run of Sullivan and Gilbert ended, Edward stayed on in D.C. to reprise Jeeves. ("My cheap little show," as he called it.) I met him in his dressing room each time I went - three or four times during that run. He gave me the window poster for Jeeves' limited engagement at Ford that year. He also gave me a publicity photo of himself taken at the age of 18. (Sorry, no scan of that. Personal treasure.)

At one point, he complained to me bitterly about the staid Washington audiences. "You have to jump through hoops for a standing ovation!" I then sent him this little doodle to cheer him up:

My cartoon for Edward:

After these encounters, and meeting him with yet another of his fan-boyfriends, I felt that I knew who Edward Duke really was, and loved him even more. I was inspired to write another play, this one about an actor dying of AIDS and the fan who loved and cared for him. I sent that to him too.

When I went to see him again a few years later, in another play (Private Lives, ironically, with Joan Collins), he gave me the biggest, warmest, lovingest hug. Then he said, "You wrote a play ... about me!!!" Since my hero dies of AIDS, I said, "I hope not!"

Edward Duke and Joan Collins, Private Lives:

I had sent him flowers backstage, and chocolates (which he gave to Joan, "she's mad about chocolate"), and he said I was the only one who remembered him. He seemed sad, or just tired. Then he invited me to hang out in his dressing room for the Saturday matinee, which I did. And after that show, I got to walk out of the stage door of the National Theatre (the same one Clay Aiken exited earlier this year after performing the song "Sarah" at the gala for Ford's), and was at his side when other fans begged for his autograph.... I felt so special to be his lady friend!

National Theatre backstage, Edward Duke dressing as "Victor" in Private Lives:

National Theatre, Edward Duke with fans:

Two years later, a friend called to tell me she just read his obituary in the New York Times. He'd died of AIDS at the age of 40. I never stopped loving him. He inspired me, and he genuinely seemed to love having me for a fan.

Edward Duke, February 1992:

This is how I respond to Clay Aiken's soul-baring experience. People need to get over the idea that only romantic love counts. Love is like water - it finds its own level and its own journey. My romantic fantasies, of course, will change. But my love for Edward, for Clay, and for anyone else who wiggles his way into my life for the better - that won't ever change. Not from this. Not even close.

Private Lives? Privacy? We wonder what those things are anymore. It was instructive for me to learn about my heroes' private lives; it allowed me to understand more about them. It makes me sad that Clay had to provide a glimpse of his private life in order for the rest of the world to achieve this understanding.

love, hosaa,
Not hero-worshipping. Hero-loving.

"Mirage" and "Fallen Angel"

The 1965 psycho-suspense drama Mirage, directed by Edward Dmytryk and starring Gregory Peck, Diane Baker, and Walter Matthau, has yet to be made available on DVD, and even VHS copies of it are hard to come by.

An even rarer commodity to come by is the novel upon which the film was based. IMDb credits Howard Fast, but it turns out that he wrote the story under the pen name Walter Ericson, and the original title was Fallen Angel. I managed to find a copy at a local warehouse, Second Story Books in Rockville, Maryland.

For those interested in collectibility, the book itself was in great condition, hardcover with a plastic covered dust jacket. No tears or marks. It is a first edition, signed by the author, so that is what put its price up more than I wanted to pay ($127 including tax), but I wanted the book. I wanted to read it.

I really can't tell you why I "had" to read the book. You want what you want. In fact, it had been so long since I had read a complete book, uninterrupted, that this in itself was a startling mission to find myself on yesterday. When I got home, I'd realized I'd done all my Saturday morning errands without benefit of breakfast or coffee, so I set myself up at Starbucks and dug in with my new prize. Two hours later I was a third of the way through the book, but I got tired of sitting in the coffee shop, so went home and finished the story.

I am not a fast reader, so to tell you I raced through this book at a rate of 30 pages an hour (or two minutes a page, and yes, I read each word in my head. None of this 'scanning down the middle of the page' crap for me), should tell you the story was gripping.

Though created roughly 15 years apart during the rise of the Cold War era, Fallen Angel the book and Mirage the film were definitely one and the same. By the time the film was made, the Cold War's influence on the American psyche had altered somewhat, from the post-World War II existential angst induced by more recent memories of its atrocities to an almost sophisticated hubris about how to prevent those atrocities.

A few alterations seem minor, but I like noting them. The principal character (played by Gregory Peck) was David Stillman in the book and David Stillwell in the movie; the private eye (Walter Matthau) was Mike Caselle in the book and Ted Caselle in the film. And the sinister character Vincent in the book became The Major on film. (There was also more cussing in the book, a distracting insertion of "toughness" that I was glad did not convey to the film version.)

The most interesting invention added to the film adaptation was a peace-promoting organization founded by the heroic character of Charles Calvin (unseen in the book but shown in fleeting but memorable flashbacks in the film; he's the fellow who is found having fallen from the skyscraper in the opening scenes). The story involved research on atomic weaponry; in the book, written in 1951, the goal was to make cheaper atomic bombs, but by the 1960s, when the film was made, the goal had transformed to finding more-peaceful use of atomic technologies (which, in the hands of evil, would still be perverted toward further destruction).

The goals of the peace-promoting foundation were noble but corrupted by a military influence (hence, The Major) and by corporate influences. The foundation run by the fictional Charles Calvin (film version) attempted to achieve its goals by violating some rules, such as mixing for-profit and nonprofit activities. Calvin saw his work as existing above these arbitrary rules, and his hubris helped lead to his downfall.

I bring all this up because the military had a great deal to do with the rise of futures studies in the mid-1960s and advanced such techniques as scenario writing. More so than the book, the film well articulates the fears of the era surrounding the birth of the World Future Society. Read about it in founding President Edward Cornish's memoirs, "The Search for Foresight: A Brief History of the World Future Society," a series of articles appearing in The Futurist magazine in 2007.

More than half a century has passed since Howard Fast expressed his fears of man's isolation and animal aggression, and of technological progress used to promote power and destruction. Are we any closer to solving these problems, taming our obsessions?

My own adventure in an obsessive little search seems to indicate that we can still be taken over easily by an idea. We want what we want. We should try to want good things.