It's The Business

Moving towards the conclusion of the Round The World In Drag journey in 2001. Jo still being a good ear to my gossip,- Well, Jo, That was L.A. – done and dusted. We’re in New York now. And nearly home. Oh, my God! This place is crazy, but you’re going to have to wait for another E to find out how. You see, we ended up going to Las Vegas. I think Roger did it to please me, but it was a long long drive across the desert and we were only there a night and I didn’t get to the Liberace Museum or the Elvis Chapel before we were back off across the desert to….more desert. The heat was getting to R and he wanted some wilderness, he said, so I ended up sleeping in a Motel called the Rancho Dolores (my new name if I ever take one) while he got up early and made friends with the lizards. In fact you’ll have to have my Mandy Guide to Las Vegas when I get home, but it was all great fun, even the casinos where, needless to say, we hadn’t got any money to play the machines or tables. I had a little go but not enough to win the fortune which will enable me to live in L.A. in luxury for the rest of my days, so that was that. I liked the Egyptian place, Luxor, and the musical fountains (R was keen on them too). The heat was almost unbearable, the slap almost ran off me, and without air-con we would have died. It’s a bit of a sad place too, all those people losing their money, but, as someone may have said, If there wasn’t a Las Vegas you’d have to invent it. So we came back to the L.A. Motel for a night and I got my date. Not as earth-shattering as I’d hoped but interesting. But I’ll just tell you what I’ve discovered about this part of America (well, that part now, since we’re in N.Y.). It came to me when we were at Mickey’s Bar on the Boulevard this time last week, the night after Pride. They have a weekly drag show on Mondays called “Dream Girls”. Now I’ve seen a lot of drag here, and a lot of it was quite extreme, but “Dream Girls” reminded me what it’s all about. You get the usual three-some, one big, one white and skinny, one thin, sexy, athletic and black, and they do all the stars. Celine Dion from the white girl and Janet Jackson, from the thin black one. There’s Cher and Eartha Kitt, and after the break, Gloria (“I Will Survive”, of course), and Diana Ross, and a few I couldn’t quite make out. All very good, even if the white girl has made-up cheek-bones that make her look like Celine Dion all the time. In between times the fat one does the character numbers, - a hokey version of “Over The Rainbow” and old blues numbers with suggestive words, and a pregnant one where her bump bursts and out falls a baby, and Dolly P. Loads of costume changes, and a lot of audience stuff, - birthdays, naughty drinks onstage, - before they do the “Voulez Vous Coucher” finale together, and slip into “Do You Believe In Life After Love?” . I don’t get their names but the big one turns out to be Marilyn from Cuba and she’s the star of the show as well as M.C. They get lots of money of course, and that’s when I got the message. Maybe you won’t think it’s very important, but I did. There’s this guy in a wheelchair and during the show he wheels forward and gives Marilyn some money and at the end of the number she says how “special” she’s found the little encounter with him. And the guy glows and grins and is very happy. Alright, you say, - so what? Jo, this is the most worked show I’ve seen on our travels, - they do it several times a week, in Long Beach, and all over the place, and I think they could do it in their sleep. It’s professional. It’s got what Scott and Dante are after – and I am too. It’s got what America is after – product. Now when this girl says to this guy that it was “special” I get a bit cynical and think, Bet she says that to everybody, and this guy is sure to get it said to him because he’s in a wheel-chair. But in America, if someone says it’s special and another person believes them that’s real. Never mind how true it is. L.A. is where you get your illusions perfect and hold on to them. It’s where imitating things is an art. It’s the business, isn’t it? And it’s the money. And I know all this and don’t know how real any of it is any more. What is behind those freeways and palms? Maybe nothing. Maybe I’ve been talking to Roger too much, or I‘ve just got to be thinking girl after all this time, but I’m really mixed up by all this and our friend Jane says that’s how L.A. can get to you, or you just dissolve in the dream of it. I don’t know whether to dream or wake up. It’s like Roger was when we got to India, lost. Anyway, that’s how I was when we got back from Vegas. New York has shaken that up a bit, and I had my date, didn’t I? To bring back a bit of sanity. Howard, not a dream, but a sort of confusion. He got to me on the net, I think. It was back in Australia and a lot’s happened since then. I pestered him on the E-mails to meet me, and he couldn’t last week because he was shooting a film in Texas, but we just made it before we flew away. He’s a commercial film producer which means adverts and documentary stuff and he said he wanted to introduce me to the Queen Mary. Well by now I’d done the QM inside out but a date’s a date and I hadn’t met him to know if he would go for the gothic night so I said Yes. And I got on my glad rags, long black slit dress and big hair, all the better to charm him with. Roger disappeared down the Boulevard to cruise a few bars. And just like with Trish meeting Howard was a bit strange. You don’t know if you’re going to set up a night of passion or a quiet chat. And this one was more the chat than the passion, by a long way. I was sitting there in the motel room with the door open, watching the TV, and he appears, a bit late. In fact I thought for a while I’ve been stood up. There’s this smallish, neat, English guy with slightly greying hair, in his late thirties, early forties. We say, Hello, we talk a bit, we set off in his Range Rover, we go for a meal in the ____________, (he pays) we go on to the QM, and I find it all a bit difficult. I can’t tell if he’s disappointed by me, or just doesn’t like my type, or he’s only turned up out of courtesy, or is a shy guy or what. But we talk a lot, about his filming, and L.A. and he’s all Barnsley-plain and very low-key, and I know this isn’t going to be one of the nights of our lives. It’s alright, and I end up thinking he’s a nice guy, but when we’re in the Queen Mary his eyes are all over like he’s still looking for something after all these years (he’s been in L.A. for nearly 17 years) and hasn’t found it. And I’m not it either. He tells me he’s been to the QM a lot and for the first few times couldn’t pluck up the courage to talk to the girls. I wanted to ask him how many he’s taken home in his time, back to Silverlake, and what happened, but we’re like two people in an audience, looking at the QM show (and I don’t mean the one on the front stage) and I can’t feel part of it like I did with Billy-June, Katrina and The Lady Dante, and I can’t ask questions like that, however much I want to. I’m going to have to work at this Internet dating, Jo, it had me in a fluster, which is not where I like to be, you know that. We came home before one and he dropped me at the door, and then decided to use our loo. But it was only a loo-stop. And he was gone. Why did I leave L.A. in such a funny mood? I love the place. I want to live there. I’m going to be a star. But it’s all about illusions, Jo, isn’t it? Dream Girls who say the right things, and what happens when you stop to wonder about the dreams and how real they are. Maybe it was time to move on – for now – after all. One thing is certain, I’m a thinker now. And I’m thinking about me. And you, of course, honey. Get hoovering, girl, I’ll be back before you know it, and break out the gin, because I’ll be weeping for weeks. Mandy