Fable For Two

Once Upon A Time… I woke up two days ago to find Reichen had sent me a text message while I was sleeping. For some reason, when my phone is next to the bed, I sleep through everything, but when it is across the room, even on vibrate, any activity wakes me. In this case, the phone was on the nightstand and I pleasantly slumbered through his message. He wanted to invite me to another viewing party of his VH-1 show “Couples Therapy” at a bar I had never heard of before called Fairy Tale Lounge. Even though I instantly assumed it was on the other side of the world (read: Brooklyn), I knew I had to go after the sign off moniker he used was “The Irish Setter.”

You see, the last time I went to a viewing party Reichen invited me to, I described him here as being like “an Irish Setter whose only interest is in setting.” This gave me great pause. It is rare that I hesitate before I hit the old PUBLISH button, as evidenced by the invariable typos and spelling errors I spend the next two days correcting. But as accurate a description of his personality as that may be, I was still comparing one of the more handsome members of our community to a dog. So I wasn’t sure how he would accept that. Naturally, he took it with his usual equanimity and it turns out I am not the first person to see a personality resemblance between him and this particular breed.

The Sweet Smell Of Excess

You know you are in the bathroom of a very fancy apartment when you are halfway through peeing and you realize you don’t know how to flush the toilet. This is why we can’t have nice things. I am out of my element all the time in Manhattan, but never more than when I am hanging out with Reichen. It isn’t Reichen, just to be clear. He is in every way a very earnest and accepting fellow, like an Irish Setter whose only interest is setting. But like a magnet he attracts the who’s who of this and that. If it isn't always A-List, it is frequently at least, an act of becoming, huddled masses on the teeming shores of fabulous with me, the tempest tossed.

Reichen invited me to a private party for his new VH-1 show. Last I heard, he was on that LOGO show which is in every way the afterbirth of Andy Cohen’s very demon spawn. I adore Reichen, but I am not a fan of that particular version of reality. Actually the last I heard of Reichen was his fragrance launch party at Industry, which I had a delightful time at. And since I met my most marvelous new friend Ryan White there, I thought it only fitting that he join me as my plus one for this latest Reichen launch event.

I met Ryan outside a rather nondescript building on the outskirt steak of Chelsea. At first I thought we had the wrong address but Ryan assured me he went to a holiday party in the same building and it was quite fabulous. What the building lacks in curb appeal, it makes up for in soaring twenty foot ceilings and private car elevators so you can literally drive right into your apartment.  “But,” Blair hastily added with a mock sniff. “It’s only a one car garage.” And who can live like that!

Plus None

Here is a really good party tip from someone who doesn’t go to a lot of parties: If you are invited to an event and you only know the host, make sure you bring a plus one with you. It doesn’t matter how many times I get invited to a party where I only know one person, I always fail to bring someone with me. I suppose it is because I don’t have a reliable standby plus one. This is where having a straight female friend comes in handy. In fact this seems to be the primary motivation for most of these symbiotic relationships. Mental note: make new friend, attend party together.

Last week, I got a text message from Reichen inviting me to the bar Industry for the launch of his new fragrance. It is also called Reichen, so for the purposes of clarity from now on, I will just refer to it as the fragrance. That way, when I tell you some Reichen got sprayed in my eye, you won’t think the evening took a decidedly sexual turn between us. But more on the spritzing later.

My new life strategy is to say yes to everything. I will in fact now attend the opening of an envelope, both literally and figuratively. Just ask! As I have plunged headlong into midlife, I have discovered the reason you don’t see forty-something gay men anywhere: It just becomes easier to stay home. You reach a point in life where you have everything, and have been everywhere. There is nothing waiting for you out at Industry that isn’t either already at hand, or can’t be managed with your own hand. But my career dictates a certain level of sociability. I am not so famous that I can afford to hide at home and wait for the residual checks to roll in. In fact, I am not so famous anything.  I need to work, not just at an office, but also a room, a bar, or launch party for a fragrance.

As I point out in my fantastic new book, When NightlifeFalls (available now on Amazon, for Kindle, and the Nook), I have known Reichen for some time, although not extremely well. He is the quintessence of a celebrifriend. That is a celebrity who I am on friendly terms with but with whom my only contact is in full view of the public.  Truth be told, Chris Rice is my favorite celebrifriend because it feels all literary and classy and he is such a good sport about the whole thing. But Reichen is guaranteed to get attention, anywhere, anytime, and tonight was no exception.

I like Reichen. He is pretty, ridiculously so. And most people stop there. But the more time I spend with him, the more I see only his character. He is honestly and genuinely earnest. If I were pressed and told to describe him in one word, earnest is the word I would choose. Unfortunately, earnest is the gay community’s least popular descriptor, right behind sweet or blousy.  Being earnest gets you into trouble, especially in the big city, because it can so easily read as disingenuous or condescending. I am not at all earnest. I’m blunt and crass. That, for better or worse, is never taken the wrong way. I am like a hostage taker and Reichen is like the negotiator they send in to defuse the tension.

Reichen had the launch party tonight at Industry, one of the newer hot spots in midtown (and about which my feelings are already well established). The party was scheduled to end at ten, which is also when my show ends. So I told him I would be there after the show and he gave me a private password so I would be able to get a gift bag at the event. Since I hate meeting new people, scoring a gift bag became suddenly a primary motivator for attending, mostly out of curiosity as to what might be in it. As I walked out of the studio tonight after the show, I ran into Ben and Dave, making notes ahead of the recording of their latest podcast. I told them where I was headed and joked that since I would be the fattest person at the party, I was going as both me and my own plus one.

Arriving at Industry, I opened the outer door and was immediately greeted by a giant poster informing me that entering was my consent to be filmed. I hoped that by coming late, I could avoid the filming of The A List and as it turned out, while I was waiting to talk to Reichen, some very nice production people shoved me out of the way to cart out the equipment. I’ve never been so happy to be pushed aside in a bar in my life! I don’t know how Reichen puts up with that reality TV nonsense, but then again, people wonder how I talk for four hours every night. I guess it is something you just get used to doing after a while.

Reichen seemed genuinely surprised and happy to see me, but then suddenly blurted out: “You missed the gift bags! I’m sorry. I really wanted you to have one.” Oh well, I thought to myself, it is just a gift bag. But then, noticing an unattended gift bag on a stool, he said, “I wonder who left this here. Doesn’t matter. It’s yours now!” Reichen stole a gift bag for me at his own party! I felt like a star and a criminal at the same time.  That’s a good feeling, in case you were wondering. Intoxicating.

“We’re leaving,” Reichen told me, “Come with us to Le Bain!” Uh. I really had only planned to drop in fast as the white hot party burned down to an ember, so I could quickly nab a gift bag, say hi to Reichen, gather enough intel for a blog entry and still make it to the 11pm train. But I say yes to everything now, so I said yes to Reichen and his after-party adventure! And then just as suddenly I was filled with dread. Tom and Lorenzo had warned us all about the overly dramatic after parties on The A List. Was I leaving the bar just to end up as an extra in some high anxiety wine throwing melee with that horrible hairdresser, the tanorexic bitch with my name and the fat model I’d still fuck even though he got TV fat?

Before I could gather my thoughts, Reichen was introducing me to his friend Zach. “I don’t shake hands!” Zach yelled, simultaneously pushing my outstretched hand away and pouring half his cocktail down my arm, “I like to hug! I love Derek!” I would like to say this was the last time he got alcohol on me, but that instead of love, turned out to be the running theme of the evening with him. 

We all went outside to hail cabs to get downtown to Le Bain, which it turned out is a bar at The Standard. I had never been there before, and I worried about getting past a velvet rope in shorts. I figured I should try to get into a cab with Zach since he was also in shorts and was the only other person I knew, but he and three skinny girls in shiny dresses climbed into a cab behind Reichen’s cab. So, being unusually bold, I waved a heretofore unknown fun black girl and a strapping gay lad into a third cab headed downtown. No doorman in NYC could resist me if I am part of this threesome! I sat in the hump between Farrin, a recruiter visiting from Dallas and Ryan, who said he was an NYU grad student recently relocated from Beijing. They were both a total blast and my favorite part of the evening.

“How did you get a gift bag?” Ryan asked me in the cab ride to The Standard. “There were only like seven of them or something.” Suddenly, I realized that I didn’t see anyone else with a gift bag. Zach didn’t have one. None of the girls in sparkly dresses. Not even Ryan and fabulous Farrin. “Reichen gave it to me.” I offered up but even as I said it, I wondered how I ended up with it too. When pressed about how I knew Reichen, I told them about my radio show. “Oh, like Ben and Dave.” Ryan offered, then suddenly something clicked. “Wait a minute. Weren’t you on their show a couple of weeks ago? I thought I recognized your voice.” True story, I was recognized from someone else’s show in the back of a cab. Only in New York, kids. Only in New York.

Our cab was the first to arrive at The Standard. The three of us waited briefly downstairs to get our ID checked and our hands stamped before we jumped into a packed elevator to the top. The bar itself was not very crowded at all and the view south to ground zero was lovely. Ryan suggested we all go upstairs and that was the revelation. Le Bain is an outdoor rooftop bar and it was spectacular. The night air was crisp and breezy. There was a hint of fall about it but it felt refreshing instead of chilly. Ryan was cold but Reichen agreed with me later that the night air was perfect. It turned out that this was his favorite place in the city and spending only a few minutes up there it was clear why.

Le Bain wasn’t very busy when we arrived but the crowd began to thicken fast. It was a funny crowd too. There were mostly young guys there, mid twenties. There were some older guys in bow ties and button down shirts tucked into shorts. That is trying too hard even when a twenty-something urban hipster does it. A blond guy across the crowd in a tight red t-shirt caught my eye. I smiled at him and he winked back. That was nice. But the best was that none of the other A Listers were there and no one was filming anything. So in all, I had a really good time. In fact, I was surprised. Plus none and non-plussed, you might say.

As the evening started to wind down, I went to say good night to Reichen. Zach was there with a tester bottle of the fragrance. Zach was even drunker at this point, so I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised when he sprayed me with cologne and then two seconds later forgot that he already had and sprayed me again. At one point, he sprayed it directly into my eyes. “It’s all organic!” Reichen assured me as I struggled to see. The cologne has a nice clean scent to it but I barked at Zach to stop spraying me. “If I get any more cologne on me, they won’t let me on the train!”

He looked at me funny. “What train is that?” Obviously I couldn’t mean the NYC subway, where if you aren’t shitting into your own hand you get a good conduct medal from the city. When I told him, I lived in Westchester, he dismissed me. “Oh, you have no power.” And there it was, I thought, the cruelty of not being a Manhattanite anymore. You live in the suburbs and you are worthless. I asked him what he meant, ready to get into a terrible name droppy fight about how close I live to Martha Stewart and own instead of rent but then in his drunken haze he suddenly made it clear he thought we were all still without electricity since the hurricane last weekend.

I guess that is the lesson of the night, and a fitting lesson when dealing with Reichen. People so quickly assume he is one thing when he is something completely different. I thought I would end up in a horrible reality show but instead I landed in a calm oasis high above the city in the welcoming night air. I thought the rooftop bar at The Standard would be a drag but it was friendly and nice. I met new people and they turned out to be a lot of fun. And even though I was awash in cologne, the conductors still let me on the train back home. Gift bag and all.

Sundance With Me

If you are gay, the first Sunday of the Sundance Film Festival is THE day to go. For my money, it is the only day to go. There is plenty of gay stuff that goes on at the festival, harkening back to the early 1990s when gay films won both best documentary and best feature in the same year. It was the birth of modern queer cinema and Sundance has had a healthy gay sheen to it ever since. But at this point, for the casual observer, the big gay parties on Sunday are the reason to come to town.

The fun started yesterday with the Queer Brunch. It is sponsored by HERE! TV so there is usually a nice smattering of HERE! stars there (this year Reichen!) mixed with current and past queer filmmakers, journalists and cute local Utah boys looking for a free meal and sex with an out-of-towner. For me it is a chance to see all the gay people I need to know, but never see because they live in Los Angeles or San Francisco. I dragged my Utah friend Jasey with me because I hate wandering through these things alone.

I saw Reichen of course. He was in good spirits and had even been skiing, so he was having a well-rounded adventure weekend in Park City. Honey Laborador was there, and I hadn't seen her since she filled in for Romaine one week this past summer. Harrison was there, competing with Reichen to be the most tan gay person in town (Harrison won,but Reichen pulls it off better). I ran into Jeremy, actor/indie producer and boyfriend of Chad Allen. The only downside of the big gay Sunday at Sundance is that it is a little bit like a gay cruise. You keep seeing the same people over and over again. So I assured Jeremy that I would see him nine times yesterday. And each time we spotted each other across a knot of homos, I would hold up a number of fingers representing how many times it had been at that point.

All my usual HERE! friends were at the brunch especially Chris and Josh (Ben Harvey is of course enroute to Borneo so he couldn't make it) who were working and spent most of the morning looking frazzled and irritated. Having worked this same party planning job at a movie studio, I know that everyone has fun at the party but you. And party guests take the whole thing WAAAAAAAY too seriously. It's just a room full of people, some free cocktails and a gift bag. No one but you cares that your free Ginch Gonch underwear isn't in your size or match your eye color.

From the Queer Brunch, Jasey and I had some time to kill so we met my dad for lunch at a szechwan place in Park City. Still missing Panda Express (always), I ordered the orange-flavored chicken. It was okay, but not the same. Like the bbq patty at Subway just isn't a McRib (which is back in Utah and I might have ordered two on Friday and will have another two today and, if my heart doesn't stop, two tomorrow on my way to the airport). Then it was off to the Queer Lounge for the GLAAD "And The Nominees Are..." party (thanks Ross for the shout out).

Romaine and I have an interesting relationship with GLAAD. She used to work there and when the Advocate went to town on them a couple of years ago, Romaine happily threw in her two cents on record. Last year, our show joined the folks at HERE! in condemning the old rules for getting a GLAAD award (The L Word, a show about gay people created by a gay person and appearing on a Viacom network was eligible, but Noah's Arc, a show about gay people created by a gay person and appearing on a Viacom network was ineligible). However, GLAAD has since changed the rules, for the better I might add, to reflect 21st century media and I am pleased with the change. But when I finally met the head of GLAAD Neil Giuliano (who is a lovely and handsome man, by the way) there was a sudden glimmer of recognition in his face as I was talking and all of our past transgressions as a show flashed before his eyes. That being said, Damon Romine, who works at GLAAD listens to and loves our show and he assured me I was on the list for the party this year.

Jasey and I waited patiently outside for the GLAAD party and when the doors opened up, it turns out I wasn't on the list after all. Fortunately, Damon Romine was within earshot and cascaded down the stairs in his best Hostest With The Mostest mode and whisked us past security right to the (much to my surprise) photo line! Last year no one took my photo at the event, but this year I was ushered into the press room like an actual celebrity and posed for a photo with Neil Giuliano! I felt like a star! What can I say? I am easily pleased and impressed and true to my previous assertion, Sundance is the place where a C list celebrity goes to be treated like an A list celebrity. Although in my case, it is a place where a nobody can be treated like a C list celebrity, which is good enough for me!

I spotted Jeremy for the seventh and last time at the GLAAD party. I was certain I would see him later at my fourth and last party of the night but I guess he got tired of my mug and called it quits. Rex Lee from Entourage was there to announce the nominees and I didn't get to say hi. He is a sweet guy and never misses an opportunity to harass Romaine on our show about her continued refusal to see his show. My old HERE! friends (plus new HERE! friends Billy and Ross) were happy to see that they had been nominated this year. Later, Damon wandered over to our group of three and said "congratulations on all of you being nominated this year" and then he turned to me. I pretended to burst into tears because of course everyone was nominated in the group but me. "We don't have a radio category," Damon offered, "but maybe next year." Whatever. Just getting into the party filled with free booze was award enough for me. Plus, there was a giftbag, and on our way out, they gave us each two of them!

After the GLAAD party, things started to get really weird. At the event, we met a couple of guys named Don and Mike. Mike was soooo cute and very flirty. They were both corporate lawyers which would normally mean lame, but they were actually really fun. So Jasey and I went with them to the Turning Leaf lounge, along with Josh from HERE, who had some time to kill before his dinner with Paris Hilton. Turning Leaf has the best scam in town. It is a party where you pay a dollar to get in and you get up to six free glasses of Turning Leaf wine or Stella Artois beer, as determined by hash marks on your wristband. But if you are a dedicated alcoholic, you can just rip off your wristband, pay another dollar, walk in off the street and start the process again. We all got good and boozed up at the event. Jasey met some rappers in super awesome fur coats who thought he was great and wanted him to fly with them to Vegas in their private jet for the night. I was sober enough to realize that this was a very bad idea. What if he accidentally got separated from them and was stranded in Vegas. It was all very shady but exhilarating.

Josh left us at the party and from there the four of us went off to a premiere party for a movie called Portland that was up in The Yurt, a tent-like structure up in the middle of nowhere that required a van ride and a Snowcat to get to. While waiting at the Yarrow for the vans to take us to the Snowcat, I winnowed down my four GLAAD giftbags that I had been carrying all night, down to one big gift bag filled with the stuff I cared about. The other three, I abandoned like orphans in the lobby of the hotel. We piled into the van and then from there climbed into a giant sixteen person Snowcat for a harrowing ride through the snowy wilderness. It was a night fraught with danger and excitement and our intense intoxication only made it more heightened.

Once at The Yurt we were greeted by a large empty room with a bartender, an open bar, and a chock-filled chocolate fondue station. The four of us chatted aimiably and flirted a bit with the other three homos (Craig, Craig and Craig) who had joined us on our journey to the middle of nowhere. All of us wanted to get to the final party of the night for Paris Hilton's new movie "Hottie Or Nottie" but the Snowcat only came once every 20 minutes so timing was everything. I traipsed out into the snow to find the heated portapotty and along the way was creeped out by a lone radio speaker near an abandoned ski lift playing music to an empty area. In my head I thought, "if this was a horror movie, this is the point where the deranged killer with the axe would come out of nowhere and hack me up just outside of earshot of my friends partying in The Yurt."

Instead of serial killers, we were instead greeted by more alcohol and a few other stragglers who came in on the Snowcat. Don and Mike joined Jasey and I out on the abandoned ski lift where we all took a series of outrageous drunken photos. Moments later, the Snowcat arrived and we all tried to make our escape. The three Craigs joined us in a van headed down the hill, but Mike and Don somehow got lost in the shuffle and were last seen boozing it up in the warmth of The Yurt. In the van on the way down the hill, while lamenting the loss of Mike and Don, I realized I also left my GLAAD giftbag behind as well. Three hours of lugging that crap around only to leave it in a yurt.

We arrived at the Paris Hilton party just before 11pm. Chris from HERE! had said the party would start between ten and ten-thirty, so eleven was the perfect time to get there. And then we waited. An hour! In the freezing cold and snow. My toes froze solid. But we waited patiently in the guest list line, all the while watching people who didn't wait patiently, get ushered into the party. Finally, we got up to the front and lo and behold for the third time that day (including the Queer Brunch), I wasn't on the list again. Finally I spotted Josh out on the balcony and begged him to come down and rescue us from the relative obscurity of the gutter we were told to wait in.

Once inside, we warmed up, but were still pretty cranky about the whole thing. The party was in full swing and Paris was still there. Jasey really wanted a photo with her but I had a feeling that was going to be pretty impossible. She was in a private area and only emerged briefly to leave. She strode out of the area into the heart of the party with her arms in the air, giant grin on her face, and a determined strut out of the party. I must say, it was a high quality exit. Jasey did get his photo with Reichen, which was a fair substitute. And by the time they threw us out at 1:30am, I was all partied out. After fourteen hours straight with the same gay people, I was really ready to go home.

Overall, it was a very successful day at Sundance. I met plenty of fun and cute people. Had a few drinks. And even though I was allowed to feel like a celebrity for a few fleeting moments. I was repeatedly reminded that I wasn't all that famous after all. In the end, I don't mind. I much prefer being an ordinary citizen to being famous. Paris may have had a good time at her own party, but she didn't get to meet anyone new or interesting or just hang out in a corner and have a conversation about why the gays prefer Hillary to Barack. But I suppose that is the difference between us. That and millions of dollars and hotness.

Stars Fell On Alabama

Someone's friend, by way of getting to know me, recently approached at some night out and said, "I hear you know every gay celebrity." While it is true that I am a shameless name dropper, especially in my blog, it sort of surprised me. When I reflect on my life, it is always the quiet moments that ring out the loudest for me. In biographies, it is the stories of stars meeting stars at cocktail parties and movie sets and the like that pad the otherwise dull adventures of a life lived. But when I think back on my own life's biography, it is rare that a celebrity encounter or friendship leaps out as a defining moment.

I think about the many overnight trips I took driving at night alone from Los Angeles to Salt Lake City, my car winding through the darkened canyons that make up the narrow Nevada/Arizona/Utah connection, dramatically illuminated by my headlights under a starry night sky. I think about the dead kittens I found in my barn in Michigan, ripped to shreds, and kneeling alone in the yard to bury their tiny parts behind the abandoned chicken coop. I think about riding the rockets in Tomorrowland with my friend Geoff singing "Fly Me To The Moon" at the top of our lungs. But tonight I think about Danny Roddick.

I never really knew Danny. I met him briefly a few times, most memorably earlier this year at the GayVN awards. He sat behind me during the show, making catty gay comments about people that I strained to hear over the noise of the crowd. I don't think he knew I was eavesdropping but I doubt he would have cared.

There was a screening tonight of Brotherhood, his last film for Buckshot Productions, over at Jerry Douglas' perfect New York City apartment. When I called Jerry to RSVP on Friday, he said something about "concerns about exploiting the situation with Danny" but I had no idea what he was referring to and I made a mental note to ask him about it tonight at the party. Before the screening, Jerry said a few words, as a director is wont to do at their screening, and it was then that I learned that Danny Roddick was dead. Moments later, there he was, youthful, smiling and beaming on Jerry's TV, as though nothing had changed.

Tonight I came home and decided to look for some information on what had happened. He was so young and it seemed such a surprise. Drug overdose is the apparent cause, although according to some, it was the porn industry itself that took him to the edge and beyond. I don't work in the porn industry so I only know what I have seen first hand. It's a business, and one in which the performers have a very short shelf life, and I don't mean that in a callous way. Erik Rhodes is right. Once they've seen your pussy (Britney!), what else do you have to show them? Those who have stayed in the industry for decades have done so because for them it is a career, and not a short term ego boost, an infusion of quick cash, or publicity for their escort business. I don't think the porn industry has a drug problem. I think the gay community has a drug problem. And having the kind of job where you can make a grand in a single day is just the kind of work drug addicts love: short hours, quick money and plenty of time off.

It would be impossible for me to know every gay celebrity, or even most of them. Not really know them anyway. After all, how much do we really know about anyone? Even in our tabloid culture, we still know more about Britney's pubic hair than we do what's going through her mind. Danny Roddick's MySpace page lists "Children: Someday" but that someday is never going to come. It's just too late now. Maybe I should have turned around in my seat at the Castro Theater, introduced myself, and gotten to know him better but I always assumed he would be on the radio show on that very same someday and I would have gotten to know him then. Then again, Reichen Lehmkuhl and Jenny Shimizu were both on the show on Friday and even after 40 minutes, I can't honestly say I know the two of them either. I even spent some time with them later in the VIP room at Splash, putting them on the spot to spell each other's difficult last names (they both succeeded with flying colors). But I don't think I understand them any more now than I understand why, among the DVDs and VHS tapes of Madonna videos and camp classics that Splash had a copy of "Schindler's List" on the shelf.

Maybe I will never really know anything or anyone. The late Gene Siskel used to end every celebrity interview he conducted with the same question, "Tell me something you know for certain." The answers would often be something like "I know that I love my children with all my heart." One thing I know for certain: I will never know Danny Roddick.