Paul Rudnick

Last night, theater geeks were torn between honoring the passing of Nelson Mandela, and snarking the live broadcast of The Sound of Music. The snark tended to win out and at one point my vision blurred and I thought that posters were praising the heroic legacy of the musical Matilda.
Somehow I think that Mr. Mandela would have understood. He wasn’t just unthinkably brave, but unthinkably patient. He had an astonishing capacity for understanding human nature, and for enduring evil. His life had the contour of an epic fairy tale, encompassing terror, imprisonment and triumph. And he was one of the rare heroes whose life wasn’t cut short.
As for The Sound of Music, it was clunky and sweet. Even as a child, when I first saw the movie version, I remember thinking that, for a Holocaust-themed tale, it’s incredibly goyische. As the story of a singing gentile family escaping the Nazis, it’s sort of Osmonds on the run. When my family would travel through New England every fall, to see the leaves change, my parents would always point out the Von Trapp Family lodge in Vermont, which, after emigrating to America, the clan had opened as a hotel and singing camp. The Von Rudnicks never stayed there, maybe because the Von Trapps, with their blonde braids and uniforms, felt a bit alien, like something from a perkier Triumph of the Will.
But now I’m being snarky, and as I watched the TV show I was overwhelmed by the genius of Richard Rodgers. Current-day musicals are often fragmentary, as if they’re nervous about being musicals, but Rodgers’ songs are forthright and glorious. When someone as talented as Audra McDonald sings Climb Ev’ry Mountain, the song doesn’t feel sugary, but irresistible. And Carrie Underwood’s earnestness became affecting, even when at one point, she returned from her convent in a headband and a pastel blue suit, and I expected her to tell the Von Trapp kids, “Yes, it’s true. I’m a flight attendant on Delta.”

Become a reality star

Become a reality star with a sex tape

Become a reality star with a sex tape where you get peed on

Worry that the sex tape where you get peed on may affect the sales of your signature fragrance

Become a reality star by dropping out of middle school to become an unwed mother who lives at home

Leverage your fame as a teen Mom to make a sex tape focusing on anal sex

Claim that the focus on anal sex is educational, because it can prevent teen pregnancy

Become a serial killer

Become a serial killer with a religious or political manifesto

Become a serial killer with a manifesto, whom even the Prosecuting Attorney has to admit has great hair

Marry a serial killer while he’s serving a life sentence and expect wedding gifts

Do something which requires talent, education and discipline, and benefits others

Win the Nobel prize

Make a sex tape because you’re the only hot Nobel prizewinner

Become an obese drug addict who hits bottom

Go on a reality show to “work on yourself”

Stay clean for three days, announce this on a talk show and expect applause

Make a sex tape because now that you’ve been sober for three days you’re not ashamed of your body

Write an inspirational book about how you relapsed into drug addiction after your sex tape didn’t sell, but while you were in a coma for three weeks you met Jesus and he told you that you were still a good person

Make another sex tape because Jesus told you that no one likes a quitter

Hello, hi, I’m Libby Gelman-Waxner and because Paul has what he considers a life-threatening quasi-viral upper-and-outer respiratory infection, and what most people would call a cold, he has asked me, alright, he has begged me to fill in for him. As I’m sure you know, I am both an extremely successful buyer of Juniors Activewear for a major global retail operation; a loving wife to my husband Josh, who was recently named the Upper East Side’s Eighth Most Respected Orthodontist Who’s Willing to Take Walk-Ins; the mother of two perfect children, Jennifer and Mitchell Sean; and most importantly, I am America’s most beloved all-round meta-media omni-forensic cultural critic. I am currently a columnist at the heavenly Entertainment Weekly, which has just named Sandra Bullock as its Entertainer of the Year, and not just because she looks so dazzling in a form-fitting white gown on the current cover. I could also rock a form-fitting white gown, but I choose not to, because it’s Sandra’s week.
I also need to confirm a report that, as a child, I was asked to participate in The Hunger Games, representing my hometown of Great Neck on Long Island. When I was placed in the arena, I was the only contestant ever allowed to go home early, because I had a note from my pediatrician which read, “Dear Hunger Games, Libby will not be able to slaughter any other children today, because she has a nervous stomach as a result of some questionable Rice Krispie Treats. However, if you’d like to send some children to Libby’s home, she might be able to slaughter them later in the afternoon, after Days of Our Lives.”
I have also been asked to comment, by one of my more urgent inner voices, on the use of flameless holiday candles. These candles are usually plastic cylinders with tiny, battery-operated flickering lights, sometimes accompanied by a little flapping plastic flame, which resembles a press-on nail. These candles can be placed in every window of your home, and set on a timer, to allow burglars to ask themselves, “Is that person at home, perhaps with a loaded revolver, or shall I break in and steal their flameless candles?” I will only say this: I thoroughly approve of flameless candles, especially the latest variety which actually turn different rainbow colors, because these candles make electric menorahs seem more tasteful. As a proud Jew, I have questioned that moment when a rabbi is raised, in a mechanical cherry-picker, to light the flames of that huge 12-foot-high aluminum menorah which stands across from the Plaza Hotel. I’m not positive, but I think I’ve heard the rabbi muttering, “Eat that, Santa!”
As for me, I will remember the brave struggle of that tiny band of Jews so many centuries ago, every time I pass the menorah in my apartment building lobbby, and see that the guy behind the front desk has screwed in another flickering orange bulb. Today that bulb will not only mark another glorious day of Chanukah, but also Tyra Banks’ 40th birthday. Much mazel to Tyra and us all.

On a recent Antiques Roadshow, a guy brought in a still-functional laughtrack machine, which he’d found in someone’s garage. When the host pressed various buttons, there’d be anything from a warm group chortle to an avalanche of hilarity. It was eerie. I immediately imagined buying the machine and using it innappropriately in daily life: “I’m going to pick up my prescription for Zoloft” – “HAHAHAHA!!!” “Aunt Debbie just died of congestive heart failure” – “HAHAHAHAHA!!!!”
A friend once appeared on a very popular sitcom, where one of the show’s regulars, an actress, instructed him to pause after almost every line and hold for audience laughter. He asked, “But what if it’s not funny, and they don’t laugh?” The actress replied, cheerfully, “Oh, it’s never funny. But they’ll put in the laugh.”
I would sometimes stand in the back of the theater watching one of my plays, and I’d make deals with God: “If you let the audience laugh at the next line, you can take my right arm.” I would eventually negotiate for my fingers, toes and shins, until, if the audience was especially appreciative, I’d become a limbless, headless torso. This was not healthy behavior.
As a rule, I hate interactive theater. If I’ve paid good money for my ticket, I don’t want to be expected to sing along, follow actors as they move through various rooms of a building, or stare silently into a performance artist’s heavily funded eyes. If I’m paying, I expect the show to do the work.
I was once told that the best audiences are gay men and black women, because these groups tend to be more appreciative and more vocal. This notion is of course a dreadful stereotype, and it’s usually true. I love audiences who don’t sit there with their arms crossed, planning the terrible things they’ll say about the show later, online. It’s so much nicer when an audience is eager to have a good time.
I used to have a personal rule, about never leaving a show at intermission, no matter how awful it was. And then I attended something so terrible that I felt I was choking, and that I was going to die in that tiny off-off-broadway basement. There were only eight people in the audience, so I knew that if I left, the actors would notice another empty seat. I left. I’m a terrible person, but it was a medical issue.

I would like to salute and thank the Oklahoma City Theatre Company, which is currently producing my play The Most Fabulous Story Ever Told. A handful of right-wing fundamentalists have tried to get this production shut down; agitating to put the good people of a theater company out of work strikes me as both un-Christian and un-American.

I can remember exactly where I was when I had the idea for Most Fabulous. I was sitting across from the director Christopher Ashley at the Empire Diner on 10th Avenue, and we were grousing about how fundamentalists liked to oppose anything gay by insisting that “God made Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve.” I asked Chris, “But what if God had made Adam and Steve?” and we stared at each other and smiled, because we instantly knew that this was an idea for a play. Most Fabulous, over many drafts, became the story of Adam and Steve, the first gay men, and Jane and Mabel, the first lesbians.
The play was first performed at the Williamstown Theatre Festival, where the cast included the glorious Jessica Hecht as Mabel. In one scene, Mabel announces that she’s been personally sent the word of God. When the other characters asked why Mabel was chosen for such a divine opportunity, I looked at Jessica and gave her the line, “Because I have the best hair.”
The play includes a section set on Noah’s Ark, where the wonderful Becky Becker, as Jane, began to flirt with an assortment of animals, including Lisa Kron as Babe, a lustful sow. Lisa is currently enjoying much wildly earned success at the Public Theater, as the bookwriter and lyricist of the superb Fun Home, and as an actress in The Good Person of Szechewan. But if you click on this website’s Plays section and scroll down, you can see what Lisa looks like with an adorable snout; she also got to seduce Mabel by telling her to “Try the other white meat!”
Back then this section also included a pair of rabbits , including the always sublime Peter Bartlett, who sneered at the ark’s racoons, referring to them as “Just moles with eye makeup.” While the rabbits were ultimately eliminated from the script, I will always treasure the image of Peter in drooping ears, madras shorts and a backpack.
When the play opened downtown at the New York Theater Workshop, there were some protestors, and both the theater and I received many identical postcards, from people who had clearly never seen or read the play. The postcards basically said, “God is all-loving and all-forgiving and He wants you to burn in Hell.” I’ve always admired fundamentalists, for their good cheer and venom.
Since then, the play has been performed all over the country, where I think it surprises people. Most Fabulous isn’t an anti-Christian screed, but a comic exploration of faith. With an imperious Pharoah, his boyfriend Brad and a hunky rhinocerous. For various reasons, the Pharoah is nicknamed “The Mouth of the Nile.”

Again, I am deeply grateful to the Oklahoma City Theatre Company, and to all the theaters that have performed The Most Fabulous Story Ever Told. And as for those pesky fundamentalists, I agree with Tibby, the goodhearted socialite in Regrets Only, when she says, “You know, I’ve never understood deeply religious people. I mean, I admire them and I think that their faith is so amazing, but they pray and they pray – and they still look like that.”

I have experienced more open bigotry over my food choices than regarding my status as a gay Jew. People have sneered at the fact that I prefer eating dry cereal without milk, and that I adore marshmallow Peeps, which some folks consider a form of packing material. And this morning my partner John and I did one of our very favorite things: we went to IHOP.
We’ve visited IHOPs all across the country, and we’re thrilled that IHOP is finally staking a claim in NYC, with branches in Harlem, on 14th Street and a rumored flagship in Times Square. John and I like the IHOP just above Houston Street, right across from the community recreation center which doubles as the facade of a police station on the TV show Person of Interest. New York remains the fictional crime capitol, thanks to shows like Law & Order SVU and Elementary, with a dead hooker or a mutilated stockbroker behind every dumpster.
My childhood IHOP, in New Jersey, still favored the Swiss chalet look, with a peaked roof, mullioned windows and windowboxes brimming with plastic geraniums. All of today’s IHOPS look soothingly identical: the walls are always the color of a ripe band-aid, the carpeting is always a sooty grey, the artwork is always a few evenly-spaced canvases of apples or flowers, and there are never any tablecloths; the waitperson just tosses you a paper napkin wrapped around a few basic utensils. This should all be depressing, but it’s not; IHOPS are always clean, and they resemble a luxury dining spot in, say, the Ukraine. The menus are thickly laminated, the soundtrack has just switched from Motown to Johnny Mathis Christmas carols, and the staff is always friendly, and able to cheerfully ask things like, “Have you tried our Rooty Tooty Fresh ‘N’ Fruity?”
IHOP is also one of the few restaurants where, through the artful use of whipped cream and banana slices, many of the entrees have faces. I bet that at Bouley, the food never smiles at you.
A trip to IHOP is like leaving town; because John and I sat up front, we could still see the street and the river. It was like Ohio with a view of the West Village.
I have never had a bad buttermilk pancake at IHOP, and I prefer the Old Fashioned Syrup – you’ll notice that the name doesn’t even reference any sort of maple flavoring. There’s always a syrup caddy which includes other choices, such as Strawberry and Butter Pecan. This caddy reminds me of a gift set of international aftershaves.
But make no mistake: John and I do not appreciate IHOP ironically. We genuinely love it. And this weekend IHOP introduced an additional holiday menu, with pumpkin-flavored everything and eggnog pancakes. I’m hoping for a limited-time-only syrup called Santa’s Blood.