Since today is the day I'm plugging last chance events instead of, you know, working...

This Friday, Pinchbottom Burlesque is presenting the third and final performance of You Only Pinch Twice, their burlesque homage to the James Bond movies. Pictured above is the finale to the show's opening sequence, which combines a choreographed routine by ten performers, with projected animation in the background, with all 21 Bond themes strung together and sung live with new lyrics by Bastard Keith and Naughtia Nice. This is in the first 15 minutes of the show.

Pinchbottom is produced by Jonny Porkpie and Nasty Canasta monthly at Collective: Unconscious in Tribeca. Every month they take on a theme, from movies to science fiction to super heroes to cooking shows; and bring together fabulous line-ups of performers whose numbers are linked together by a very funny thematic script. They continue to up the ante from month to month, and New York's burlesque performers are working to keep pace with new performances; everyone keeps upping their game and feeding off of each other's creative energy in what can only be called the "Pinchbottom Effect." Every month, seeing this show makes me feel incredibly lucky to share in an experience that only 75 other folks in an off-off-broadway space are having. Jonny and Nasty are an inspiration to any independent show producer.

Anyway, these sell out and Bond has been their most popular show; get tickets online right now! This is why you live in New York!

(photo by Dale Harris)

Last chance...

This is the last week that my exhibition The View From Here is on...uh, view. The last day is Saturday March 3rd! That has really snuck up on me. So, if you haven't made it to the Skylight Gallery in Bed-Stuy yet, you have four more days. I'll be there on Saturday myself if you're interested in an impromptu tour.

Also, he signed in as "Malcolm Jamal Warner"

Dale Harris, friend and photographer for our February installment of What's My Line? uploaded his photos last night, and it immediately reminded me how great our celebrity mystery guest Zach Galifianakis was. He made the time to come for our show the week of his two sold-out shows at Irving Plaza; he was completely charming and very funny, and I'm glad we had a great crowd there to enjoy it. He also got up from his seat while the panelists were blindfolded and drank some of Jonny's beer.

I recognize that pool table

We watched the first episode of The Black Donnellys on NBC, and I don't think I'll feel the need to watch it again-but it was cool to see that the primary interior location for the show is the Parkside Lounge, where we do What's My Line? every month! The exterior shots set their fictional bar somewhere in a hagiographic Irish neighborhood in the boroughs, but the interiors are all Parkside. Just a reinforcement that the Parkside is one of the most picturesque old-school divey bars in Manhattan-the squat building on the corner of East Houston and Attorney Street has never been anything but a bar, and certainly feels like one of the last of a dying breed in the City; it's also staffed by some of the nicest people to work with in the City, and it's a pleasure to do a show there. Even if it didn't have the great hidden lounge in the back with the intimate stage, it would be my kind of place. Go, have a drink.

Armory at all?

Without the excuse of working a booth this year, it's looking more and more like I'm not going to make it to the Armory Show at all this year, which makes me feel a combination of relieved and out of the loop.

But I was lucky enough to have passes for the opening night of Fountain New York, one of the new alternative to the alternative shows, installed in a rough store front space across Twelth Avenue from the looming Armory piers. An intimate group of ten Williamsburg-based galleries and collectives, Fountain is a typical mixed bag, but with some terrific highlights. The galleries overwhelmingly showcase painting, printmaking, collage; with so much of the work by young artists, the focus on traditional media is refreshing and manages to avoid repetition of style-for the most part. Highlights are the classically derived works of the McCaig-Welles gallery, the post-modern photo and painting works from Front Room, and the new media offerings (offering some balance with the rest of the booths) from the collective Glowlab--who, in full confession, were my ticket in; I'm lucky enough to be consulting on development for Glowlab's annual psychogeography festlval Conflux. Don't skip Fountain on your way to big guys up the block.

It's true, the title confuses people.

Thanks, Lindsay!
I say it a lot, but every month I'm so happy to have Lindsay Robertson on our panel, and not just because she gives us great plugs on her very funny and popular blog. And it's true, the story she tells here will probably never be topped, no matter how long we do the show.

Would the mystery guest enter and sign in please?

It was my birthday yesterday, and Jen discovered an utterly charming and unrealized coincidence: I share a birthdate with John Charles Daly, the host of the original TV version of What's My Line! If that's not fate, I don't know what is. I can only hope to aspire to Daly's urbane wit and sophistication, and his fantastic ability to provide long, drawn-out clues that actually hinder the panel more than help them. This makes me even happier that my into-the-weekend birthday celebration begins tonight with the February installment of What's My Line? Live in NYC! Come on down if you're free...and live in New York.

I'll have the volcano lichee duck and a fog cutter.

To the left you'll see an image of the highlight of my weekend in Boston for the Boston Burlesque Expo: escaping the dreary confines of a conference center/hotel for Sunday rum-soaked brunch at Kowloon, one of the country's few remaining old-school tiki restaurants, in Saugus Massachusetts, of all places. From left to right that's Kenny Law, Peekaboo Pointe, GiGi La Femme, Wassabasco Bill, Jonny Porkpie, Nasty Canasta and Clams. The Saturday night performances by the ladies pictured were far and away the other highlight of the weekend.

We pretty much ignore Valentine's Day around here...

...but this is awesome.

If only they were still together.

The year I was born also looked like this, happily. Thanks to Nasty Canasta (another February birthday!) for passing this along. Gosh, that show looks familiar.

And who wants another jellied tomato refresher?

In honor of my birthday this month, a loving look back at what the world looked like the year I was born.

One of these days Laura, I'm gonna punch you in the face!

Our country has truly come full circle: That's My Bush just came out on DVD.

If you find yourself in Boston...

...the weekend of February 16-18, I'll be there for the Boston Burlesque Expo. Nothing better than Boston in February! Woo! But anyway, as part of the event I'll be part of a panel on the role of men in the burlesque community, with four of my friends: Jonny Porkpie (producer/performer/writer/What's My Line panelist/Mr. Nasty Canasta), Bill Morton (producer/significant other of GiGi La Femme) and Kenny Law (Editor of Screw magazine/Mr. Peekaboo Pointe). Oh, and there will also be some women taking off their clothes that night, if you're into that sort of thing.

Anyway, I have no idea what to expect as far as an audience, but the four of us are thinking about going for kind of a hung-over, Rat Pack vibe; at least we'll entertain ourselves!

You only think you don't like avant garde contemporary solo dance.

You have until the 11th to see Julie Atlas Muz's solo show at P.S. 122. Go now, and see why she's both Miss Exotic World 2006 and a 2004 Whitney Biennial artist.