Your favorite Fab Four are holding a fundraiser to help rebuild Shady Pines after a mysterious fire.
As Sophia might say, “Picture it, Sunday, Aug. 4 at 2 p.m. We’re at The Sunshine Cathedral Center for the Performing Arts, four drag queens enter dressed as Dorothy, Rose, Blanche, and a little pip-squeak!” In this unauthorized parody, there will be some acting (and over-acting), trivia about the show, bingo, performances, a few mimosas, and, of course, cheesecake! Those attending the show will have an opportunity to take photos with the Golden Girls and see how they size up to Dorothy (I have met her and can guarantee, you won’t!). For information and to buy tickets, go to staygolden.show.
DIXIE LONGATE STARS IN ‘DIE, MOMMIE, DIE!’
Grab your best partners-in-crime and hatch a plot to catch “Die, Mommie, Die!” the last show of Island City Stage’s 12th Season.
Charles Busch’s play runs Aug. 22 through Sept. 22. Kris Andersson leads a multitalented cast of performers in this killer comic melodrama that evokes the 1960s unintentionally camp horror films that featured aging stars such as Bette Davis, Joan Crawford, and Lana Turner. In Busch’s play, ex-pop singer Angela Arden (Andersson) is trapped in a hateful marriage with Sol. But desperate to find happiness with her young lover Tony, Angela murders her husband with a poisoned suppository. Suspicious of their mother, her children slip her some LSD, provoking a wild acid trip in which many secrets are revealed. “Die, Mommie Die!” is being directed by Andy Rogow and co-stars Clay Cartland, Troy J. Stanley, Elizabeth Dimon, Kevin Veloz, and Suzanna Ninomiya.
Most may know Kris Andersson better by his on-stage persona of Dixie Longate, of “Dixie's Tupperware Party.” The show started in bars and ended up being produced off-Broadway, where it received the 2007/08 Drama Desk Award nomination for Outstanding Solo Performance and began an international tour in 2008. Recently, Andersson wrapped up the 16th year of the tour at the Kennedy Center, officially making it one of the longest-running Off-Broadway tours in American theater history. Dixie's follow-up show, “Never Wear A Tube Top While Riding A Mechanical Bull and 16 Other Things I Learned While I Was Drinking Last Thursday” has toured in tandem with Tupperware since 2014.
No word on whether Tupperware will be on sale in the lobby during intermission.
LAST CALL SOUTH FLORIDA
If I may be so bold as to toot my own horn a little. I am quite proud to announce that the second book in my “Last Call” series will be released in a few months. Working with local historian Fred Fejes, we have produced an encyclopedia/coffee-table book about the history of South Florida’s LGBTQ bars, from Palm Beach County to Key West. With nearly 1,000 entries, and hundreds of photographs and old ads, it is more than just a stroll down memory lane, it is a piece of history. My previous endeavor, “Last Call Chicago: A History of 1,001 LGBTQ -Friendly Taverns, Haunts and Hangouts” reached #1 on Amazon’s LGBT Studies list and continues to be one of the publisher’s strongest sellers to this day. It is available via Amazon or directly from the publisher RattlingGoodYarns.com. Last Call South Florida will be similarly available in October, pre-order forms will soon be available from the publisher. The book will have publication kick-off events at Hunters and Stonewall Museum and Archives in October to coincide with Gay & Lesbian History Month.
