Art as a public expression of family dysfunction can go in a number of directions:  righteous indignation, raunchy rebellion, and weepy martyrdom are among these. Occasionally, someone actually transcends shock value and does something noteworthy.

I went to see “My Dad is Crazier Than Your Dad” last Friday for opening night of the NYC Fringe Festival. It’s a scientific-ish exploration of evidence cataloging the bizarre and increasingly cruel behavior of the performer/writer Katharine Heller‘s father. The stories can sting but are presented in such a way that  audience members leave invigorated from Katharine’s courage and hilarious candor.

Full disclosure: Katharine and I became best friends in high school. I know her well enough to know that she is brilliant. I’ve been more than proud of the dedication to her craft that she shows in everything she does. But I’ve never been prouder than I am of her for this show, her first one-woman endeavor and an open, honest window into the sometimes twisted but always intriguing canvas where she was created.

Katharine and I became friends when we were 14 which was, well, more than a little while ago.  We rode next to each other on a bus to attend a march for reproductive health. We both had single moms, were theater geeks on the Speech and Debate team at Bronx Science, had the same goofy sense of humor, cared about women’s rights, and had issues about our dads. Her father cut off communication with her several years before we met. Mine abandoned me and my mother when I was barely a toddler, and loomed over my childhood like a phantom antagonist.

Katharine has pulled off brilliant storytelling and impressive theatrical execution but, moreover, she makes damaged innocence and loss seem powerfully absurd. She delivers inspiration for each of us to disarm pain in our background and enjoy the comedy.

Here are the official showtimes. For tickets, click here and choose the date you’d like to attend.

Friday 8/13 at 7:00 pm
Saturday 8/14 at 12:00 pm
Friday 8/20 at 6:15 pm
Wednesday 8/25 at 4:15 pm
Friday 8/27 at 9:00pm

Dixon Place Theater 161A Chrystie Street (Rivington and Delancey Streets)

Honestly, I’m wondering if John Mayer isn’t relying on his scotch-addled media antics to save him from what would otherwise be an inevitable fate of evaporating into the easy listening airwaves – to be filed somewhere next to Kenny Loggins and Richard Marx. I’m just saying. If it weren’t for his “bad boy” image, I would expect to forget about him until he reappears someday on a soft rock music compilation.

Younger types and techies tend to be more comfortable with the amorphous nature of social media and digital communication. They don’t need as much linearity or control over every aspect of content creation.

Unlike print, you can’t edit a social media-based web site until it is perfect. Since much of it’s evolution depends on how users behave and what types of content they share, you have to accept more of a role of jazz composer than orchestra conductor.

I have been looking for creative analogies to explain the differences to clients and colleagues.

Here’s what I have come up with so far (thoughts and suggestions are welcome):

• think of web as organic, as opposed to genetically modified: unpredictable and raw instead of manipulated for uniformity
• improv comedy versus sitcom comedy
• raising a child versus raising a houseplant (in terms of flexibility and hopefully not necessarily maintenance)

Ray Liotta was on television last night. I thought to myself, dang, I would love to see him cast as Rod Blagojevich (a man, who along with John Edwards, proves that maintaining the hairstyle of an 80s teen movie heartthrob can only bring a lifetime of scandal and disappointment). Apparently, I am not alone in secretly wishing for such a made-for-tv masterpiece.

I haven’t yet decided who I would love to see cast as John Edwards.

Dear blog,

I apologize for neglecting you. You mean so much to me. My convoluted musings need a home and you’ve been great about giving them a couch to crash on.

Here’s why I’ve been away…

I’m working with a small web development shop. Actually, I co-founded this little web shop. We wanted to do something meaningful using our skills to help with Haiti relief. In our quest, we found some amazing techie types who were also moved to volunteer their time – including the awe-inspiring innovative crowdsourcing efforts of Ushahidi and Crisis Commons.

To make a long story short, our contribution is a web site that established a network between highly skilled people who want to volunteer to help Haiti and the organizations and individuals who can use their experience and talents. We felt desperate to do something to help and this was what we came up with.

The site has taken on a life of its own: thousands of visitors and hundreds of registered users. Now we’re hearing that people have used the site to connect with other volunteers and organizations, some even forming specialized teams that are planning ways to restore Haiti’s infrastructure in areas such as water and sewage engineering.

It’s a small contribution but we hope it helps. Sadly, it left me little time to think, let alone spend quality time with my blog. Hope you understand. I’m back…

I found out this weekend that Kim Kardashian makes mucho dinero ($10,000 according to my source) for each time she tweets product endorsements. Makes me wonder if booty implants would have been a better investment than graduate school.

I love Yael Naim’s version of “Toxic” and this performance on French television. It’s worth comparing it to Britney doing the same song on stage. And this would probably considered one of Britney’s better television performances. Pop really kills the soul out of a song, huh. I’m sure that the songwriters are grateful to Yael.

Acclaimed Native American author, Sherman Alexie, was on the Colbert Report this week. Most of his interview was a rant against the impact of digital media on published literature. Alexie has decided not to make his books available for purchase through Kindle or any electronic book distributor. He argues that digitizing storytelling will ruin its integrity and the ability of artists to earn a living.

The part of me that loves technology bristles at Alexie’s concerns. That part takes serious offense to his disparaging remarks about the “open source culture” of the internet and its devaluation of everything. Ouch. There’s much to rebut this with. He’s being hyperbolic and misunderstanding the brilliant cooperative innovation offered by open source communities.

However, there’s part of me that loves the gritty texture of a book–the same part that collects records and refused to deejay with MP3s until my back started to break from lugging those darn things around. That part empathizes with Alexie and other purists who cherish the authenticity of dogeared leaves of the magical printed word.

Here’s the thing… there are enough of both of those influences to keep old and new school literature alive. Rather than fight the change, we may have to accept that the neighborhood bookstore may persist but more in the form of the neighborhood record collector store. Meanwhile, artists will persist in creating and thriving, as will business interests, in all formats for which there is a demand.

I finally saw Adam Lambert’s “controversial” performance at the American Music Awards. Other than the fact that it seemed more like the Emmy’s than an AMA typical type of performance, I don’t see the big deal.

I can’t wait until the day when all gay performers come out of the closet. For homophobes, it’ll be like the climax moment in your traditional alien invasion movie: “Oh my god, they’re on every single channel and throughout my entire record collection. I can’t even get away at the theater or Abercrombie & Fitch.”

For these people, just like John Mayer said about folks who were shocked to find out that Britney Spears lipsyncs her shows and want their money back, “Life will continue to be hard for you.”

before/after

Dominican baseball star Sammy Sosa’s skin seems to be turning white. His publicist can say whatever… metrosexual skin treatments, bad lighting, lemon astringent… But, coupled with the permed hair and green contact lenses, there’s a pretty complete story. He probably doesn’t like being Black.

Is this new? Heck no. Skin lightening and a million potions for becoming more Euro-lovely have existed for a long time. My grandma used them, I’ve seen them around the world, and I even used them when I was much younger and confused about how I matched what society told me was pretty.

It seems that every country where people are pigmented has an aesthetic caste system based on color. Latin cultures are certainly no different. That’s why I find the concept of the monolithic “Latino” to be so perplexing — as are the generic images of tanned people with straight hair that are universally meant to depict “Latin” in pop culture.

I’m not a Latina. I was just mistaken for one enough times on the streets of New York that I decided to finally learn Spanish. At least then I could give directions to the people asking me for help every day. I spent time throughout Latin America and noticed something interesting:  a heck of a lot of Black people. Then I noticed something else, few of them wanted to be identified as “Black” because that was bad, just about as bad as being identified as indigenous or “Indian.”

To this day, I find it rare to hear a genuine conversation about race and Latinos. If anything, hopefully the fact the Sammy Sosa is being accused of pulling a Michael Jackson might start a dialogue about the reality of skin color and the social invisibility of darker Latinos.

What pops to mind is one of my Latin college professors joking that if you watched typical Spanish-speaking television dramas, you would think that they were cast in Sweden.