Since I’m leaving NY for LA at the end of this month, I feel it appropriate to dedicate a few of my blogging hours to crafting an electronic homage for the city that has been my home for nine of my most formative years. The best way to do this, of course, is a Top Ten List.
As a bonus, this list employs the cinematic terminology that will become my native tongue in the City of Angels.
TOP TEN MOVIE TITLES AND TAG-LINES BASED ON MY EXPERIENCES HERE
- “Those Stories and Andy Rooney”On the Upper-West Side, a young man hangs out with the entire cast of 60 minutes and learns that every one of them has leathery skin. Even Steve Kroft.
- “Puke Boy” She invited him in. He threw up on her rug. They still made out. Gross.
- “B & E & Me” Locked out of his cheap, dirty apartment over Winter Break, a desperate junior shatters his own bathroom window and climbs through into the shower, which now contains many glass shards, in addition to his toilet.
- “Foam Home” As an extra on the set of a low-budget Italian sex farce, a confused 20-something learns that staged foam-parties are fun for 10 minutes…and then the soap burns your eyes for the next 5 hours.
- “So This is a Leather Bar” When his band plays a gig at NYC’s most dangerous gay club, he thinks that holding a keytar will say “no thank you sir.” He’s wrong.
- “You Say Tomato, I Say Intestines” A young graduate brings his mother to tears for many reason when he “dies” in an off-off Broadway play, in which his exposed guts are represented by a ball-basting bucket of tomato puree. Thank God for Gold Bond.
- “Please Don’t Keep Those in the Living Room” Love is a glass of wine. Heartbreak is a six-foot tower of Colt 45 bottles.
- “Murder on the Papa Johns Roof” A young producer films his first sketch amid aromas of melted butter. No actual murder involved, but what a title, right?
- “If This Disgusting Couch Could Talk” Though his work is rejected for it’s unorthodox style, a young theatrical rebel is nevertheless ushered into “The Chill Room” at a legendary comedy theatre, hovering nervously over the pee-stains of movie legends.
- “I Have Not Written a Bridge for This Song” In ten years the former front-man of Soul Coughing will be struggling and jaded. But now it’s 2001, Valentine’s Day, a tentative solo show. A boy stands in the back, listening to all the old hits. It feels like they’re both starting something new.