May 15, 2026

Dateline: New York, New York

Patti and I slept in this morning as we didn’t have anywhere we needed to be for some hours. When we did decide to start moving, we found the weather to again be lovely – in the 60s with no humidity and intermittent sunshine and high overcast. Again perfect walking weather. We ambled up 9th avenue in search of brunch and found a place with decent coffee and vegan avocado toast (Patti) and a reasonable omelet for me. We then hopped on the subway and headed for the Upper West Side. The idea was to wander across Central Park to Museum Mile on 5th Avenue, stopping as we felt like it.

Due to some paths taking unexpected directions, we wandered through a great deal of the park’s midsection, taking in the lake, some of the rambles, the Bethesda fountain, and eventually emerged near the Metropolitan Museum of Art. We had been to the Met together on our last trip to NYC together so we decided to skip that this time and headed a few blocks further uptown to the Guggenheim. Patti had never been. I hadn’t been for some decades. The last time I remember going was with Steve on one of our trips in the 90s to see the Chinese terracotta warriors form Xian which were on tour. That visit was memorable as we unexpectedly ran into my cousin Jack and his wife at the top of the ramp. Great minds…

The major retrospective this time was for New York artist Carol Bove. Lots of crumpled painted steel ducting which I rather liked. And it’s always fun to climb that Frank Lloyd Wright designed ramp, even if the parapet preventing you from plummeting over the age feels dangerously low. Once through the Guggenheim, we continued down 5th Avenue and stopped at the Frick which is my favorite New York museum. It’s small but every piece in it is a masterpiece. And it has the Holbeins of Thomas Cromwell and Thomas More on either side of the fireplace in the green salon.

Continuing down 5th Avenue soon brought us to the ritzy shopping district with its stores full of trinkets that are far out of mere mortals’ price range. We looked in the windows, were disappointed that Tiffany’s was not serving breakfast, and sped past Tiffany’s next door neighbor and its golden escalators without engaging. Crossing the street, we wandered through Rockefeller Center (no ice skating at this time of year) and stopped for early supper and cocktails at the restaurant that was Steve and my traditional pre-show eatery – Pasta Lovers on 49th. Vegan penne marinara for Patti and spaghetti carbonara for me, followed by a huge helping of tiramisu.

Tonight’s show was a small off-off-Broadway production of Sweeney Todd put on by Village Light Opera Group. My dear friend David Pohler was in the cast as Toby. It was in a small black box space on the upper floor of a church and ended up being one of my favorite productions I’ve seen of the show. As most of you know, I worship at the altar of Sondheim and I’ve seen about fifteen productions of Sweeney over the years – everything from the original on tour to NYCO’s recreation of the original to Atlanta Opera to community theater to college theater to the Barrow Street version which was done with eight performers in an immersive staging based on the pie shop. The vast majority of these productions have all used the original Harold Prince staging as a template. Only the Barrow Street with its pie shop setting threw it out and set out to create something new. This production did the same thing. The technical limitations of the space and an obviously inventive director led me to be constantly surprised, usually in a good way, by staging and character choices. The whole thing was set in a barber shop/beauty parlor with the props coming out of things one would find in that environment. The ensemble was on stage constantly becoming a Greek chorus and adding movement and a personification to objects that I had never seen done before. Large quantities of stage blood appeared in the second act making Sweeney and Mrs. Lovett’s activities much darker and gorier than usual. Everything was helped along by top notch casting. The Sweeney, who is a psychotherapist by day and a University of Michigan trained musical theater performer by night, gave one of the best sung and best acted interpretations of the role I have ever seen. He was matched by a Lovett with a huge belt and a great sense of comic timing. David’s best moment was his Not While I’m Around duet with Mrs. Lovett. Tender and scary.

After the show, David, Patti, David’s friend Calliope and I headed out for drinks and ended up in a queer restaurant bar that was having a karaoke night. Cocktails were consumed. Karaoke was sung. Much hilarity ensued. I’m planning on sleeping in again.