part two of My Johnny Angel

As rumor has it there were quite a lot of backstage problems during the last show. Hank had promised Terry the MC position, but never told Rodger. Terry also did not want us “Featherette’s” in the show, but Hank never told us. Sammy was supposed to do “Le Jazz Hot” with two back-up dancers, bartenders Marty and Peter. Peter was the muscle stud bartender who was now living with Oe, the assistant manager. Peter has as much acting talent as Anna Nicole Smith buy Oe kept throwing him at us to let him perform. Rodger told Oe that Peter didn’t have talent- you can imagine what that relationship turned into. Oe wouldn’t even look at Rodger, never mind say a nice word about him. So Team Terry got Oe’s support and dirty tricks. Oe had his hands on a scissor and Rodger’s cassette tape. (ps ; cassette tapes were a way of recording music back in the day. We would usually record the whole show on one tape and the dee-jay would just have to pause the tape after each number. Pretty easy.) Being there were so many people in this week’s show Rodger just put his own song on the tape. My song was on a 45 record so when I got it back I wasn’t surprised to see a freshly made scratch in it. Casper just liked to look chic and really didn’t give anyone any trouble, like Alton. The difference between the two was that Casper could command an audience and Alton could not.
“Le Jazz Hot” was a song from the recently released movie “Victor/Victoria”. Gay movies were just being discovered at this time, but most of them were AIDS related, “Long Time Companion”,” Philadelphia”, and freaking “Torch Song Trilogy’! For years all I heard was, “Do you know who you sound like?” Casper Sammy and I went to see Torch Song together and all we heard during the movie was Casper proclaiming “Sister that is you! That is you!” Now, mind you I wouldn’t mind coming home to Matthew Brodrick, but Casper was referring to the deep, nasal voice.
Anyway, I digress, Sammy kept having problems with Peter’s rhythm, basically – he had none. So Sammy called the number off- then it was back on after Oe threaten-in a nice way- to fire Sammy. Then it was off when Peter realized he was going to look foolish- this coming from the guy who did Connie Francis as a rape victim singing “who’s sorry now” as the rapist was dragged away in hand-cuffs. It wasn’t until Sammy arrived at Rodgers and slammed down his MARTY DE GAYBAR original that we knew the number was back in
MARTY DE GAY BAR was the name we gave to Marty the bartenders designs. Marty had gone to FIT (Fags in Training) Actually the Fashion Institute of Technology. He was embarrassed for us having to wear Rodgers thrift shop dresses so on occasion he would design and make a dress for us. He made Sammy’s “La Jazz Hot” dress in less that two days…Great outfits and more on Marty later…lol..all the dresses cost $100.00.
Anyway that was the back stage drama. Terry was supposed to leave the show a star and the rest of us washed up. Unfortunately for Terry and myself, I stole the show and we all pretty much held our own. That only meant that Terry and Oe had to try harder to get rid of us.He started with the name calling, Queen Eddie, and he wasn't done with me yet.My Irish grandmother taught me to never run from a fight, but she also liked Michael Landon which Johnny reminded me of..
Terry was away for the next two weeks and they were two weeks that will never be forgotten by anyone who lived them!
Till Tomorrow, be kind…