Bar Called Therapy

Posted August 2nd, 2005 by Sean Williams

I’m sure in every town around the country there is a bar called “Therapy”. It’s bound to happen, it’s too good an idea to pass up. However, I’m pretty sure that most of the other bars called “Therapy” don’t have a sweet struggling musical theater performer with a full beard wearing a sailor hat as a bouncer who’s passing out condoms at the door. They also probably don’t have a foul-mouthed host featuring works of new musicals every Monday.

I just don’t want to live anywhere else.

So, we had a little performance last night at this amazing bar, two stories, air-conditioned, drink specials and *totally* uptown. I’ve always been nervous in the downtown gay bars, the ones that look like they came straight out of “Police Academy: Back In Training”, because I don’t like being around people who think I’m fat and poorly dressed. But this bar last night were totally our people, professional people who love theater and happen to love sailors as well.

Originally, I pushed for us to do the opening number of the show “Fleet Week”, mostly because that way we would feature Tony Nominee Melissa Hart. But I was quickly convinced that “Queer At The Pier” was the right number, and man, that was a good call. Melissa would have been the biggest star in the joint, but our Chaplain was the Queen of the Homo-coming Dance, and that’s what the night really needed.

Rob Maitner, who should have a one man show running 365 days a year, went up as the representative of the show. He was, how do you say, already drunk. So when the foul-mouthed host of the evening (“Sailors make my pussy wet,” he said) asked him when the dates of the show were, Rob started on a rhapsody of all things “Fleet Week”. The host yanked the mic out of his hand and said, “okay, okay, you passed out postcards, we’ll figure it out…” suddenly Rob’s voice piped up, “I found the other microphone, BITCH…” and then he continued with his diatribe.

We have the best cast we could ask for. I’ve never produced a play where I didn’t think I should be playing every single role, I’ve almost never seen a show where I didn’t think I could do it better, and there isn’t a single person in this show that I could replace. It doesn’t even shame me to say that. Look, these pictures suck, but look how adorable our cast is:

That’s the middle of the song, where Sachs and Ravioli almost kiss for the first time. This will continue throughout the show.

Look at how cute everyone is! Jesus, Laura, the girl who plays Swallows, is so adorable that I will find myself just grinning ear to ear during rehearsal, and then I’ll look across the room and Jordana is watching her and grinning twice as big.

And Rob Maitner is a force of nature.

All right. One apology. I don’t have anything else to talk about but this play. When you call me, I will inevitably talk about this play. I’m really worried about my sister, I’m really excited for two of my brothers, and I’m anxious about my mom, but I can’t seem to talk about anything but this.

So.

Here’s another picture.