The Surreal Adventures of The Angry Redheaded Lawyer: "Aftershocks" at Theater for the New City

This show’s description caught my eye right away. When I walked in, the set design told you exactly where we were and what show to expect. It’s not something for the kiddies so this is definitely not kid friendly. In fact, I’d say leave your teens at home as well unless you are a very modern and progressive parent who’s totally cool discussing dark subjects in the sexual realm with your kids or you take your kids to strip clubs. From my estimation, that’s not many of you. You have officially been warned.

Photo by Matthew Schechtman

Now, that being said this show managed to integrate the pace and sentiment of “Friends” with some very dark subject matter that most of us would say “how can you possibly make THAT funny?” Somehow, Rori Nogee does it and doesn’t leave you feeling guilty for laughing while also giving you a powerful illustration of trauma from childhood sexual assault.

She also manages to make her protagonist, Kat/Angie (Rori Nogee) sympathetic despite Kat’s being an unrepentant stripper who confidently asserts that she’s not having a committed relationship with anyone. Just ask Ben (Andrew Ricci), the computer tech guy she’s stumbled into a FWB relationship with who’d really like to get more serious and make an honest woman out of her.

Credit should also go to the direction of Lissa Moira as the characters flow easily in this world and you can believe in the connection Kat finds with Elliott (Cameron Cave), a super nervous newcomer to the back room who’s only there on the guidance of his therapist. He’s content to just talking to Kat and gets her to violate the basic stripper rule against taking off the performer mask and mentioning her real name (which is Angie). A sweetness develops between these two and it feels like Angie loses her hardness and cynicism built up as the result of her own sexual trauma. It felt a bit reminiscent of “Leaving Las Vegas” and some of the darkness has parallels to it but this show actually goes further.

I’m totally on board with Kat’s philosophy on sex when she notes it’s importance to life and living though my own statement on it is a bit different and I’m more private about such things. Despite the fact that Elliott is a guy who can not do such things due to childhood sexual trauma that he’s trying to work out, he and Kat/Angie develop a fondness that later turns into an exclusive relationship. He’s aware that she’s got her needs but she makes a grand effort to try and be respectful of his limits and boundaries though does push at times with mixed results. The relationship definitely goes through its ups and downs and when temptation enters in the form of Kyle (Jon McHatton), the very definition of a bad guy not suited for anyone who doesn’t want to be a side chick whom Angie previously had an involvement with, things do not turn out well for Angie.

The dynamic between Angie and Elliott actually reminded me a bit of this guy I shall call the Model Flake. He knows who he is. His problem, however, is social trauma and becoming more agoraphobic as well as reluctant to leave home (which isn’t that close to me) despite being a former model who had connections and backing I’ve never had in that space. He also has separate issues that are a massive paradox to my own world and my own boundaries yet for some reason I still care about the guy in spite of myself. Damn heart!!

My underlying thought is “if he got his mess together and found his passion in life, he’d be a really great guy.” This guy has been in and out of my life over the course of years.

I remember him saying he was intimidated by me, the girl who was called ugly throughout her childhood and couldn’t buy a date with guys she liked in her hometown. I still find that hysterical since if I saw him at random someplace and didn’t know him, I’d never approach him since I’d fear rejection. The conceited hot guy who cheats on women is a trope and while the Model Flake apparently views his not being that way as a defect, I find it refreshing and endearing.

Like Angie with Elliott, I’ve tried to have some patience and latitude with this guy but definitely have my limits as well.

Eventually, Elliott leaves the scene and in the meantime both he and Angie find love elsewhere with Angie getting engaged to Ben. However, when the two meet again for Angie’s birthday outing as he’s accompanied by his new girlfriend Bethany (Zoe Laiz) the train wreck you expected very much happens and then gets darker as you’re thinking a conflict is resolved and things are look bright for Elliott and Angie.

The final question in my mind as I saw the end of the show was “How do you kill the demon?” I haven’t lived childhood sexual trauma so I have no clue how one would do it but apparently a demon does exist when you lived it. The psych major in me and I’m sure countless others who’ve had that experience would probably like to know the answer to that question. Does anyone have an answer to that one?

The comedy in this show reminded me a lot of “Love Quirks” a show I reviewed in August 2022 thanks to a connection with the show’s composer. Unbeknownst to me, Ms. Nogee was apparently in that show (though not the performance I saw) as well as a show that may have been the last one I saw with my long since ex-husband called “Showgirls! The Musical” which was a hilarious parody of the movie “Showgirls”. If you didn’t see it, you missed out—my ex and I shared an interest in media that pushed back against US puritanical norms.

Photo by Matthew Schechtman

Despite the very dark ending and our main characters not doing right by Ben or Bethany, the show was actually very good since the characters had heart, honesty, sincerity, accessibility and depth and the story had the universal appeal that I look for that made me care. I’d definitely recommend it for the adults, even the ones who hate everything strippers and strip clubs stand for though my conservative mother would probably be a tough sell.

Instituting the "Reasonable Person's" Dress Code

One thing that stinks about the East Coast is the craptastically hot weather. During a portion of my freelance gig (which recently ended), we had a heat wave in NYC. Let me break down my commute on a hot day for those of you having the benefit of traveling in a bubble of flowing air conditioning for your entire lives:

1. Wake up in an air conditioned house & get dressed.
2. Walk outside in the heat to the nearest subway station.
3. Go to subway station located underground.

Note about the subway stations in NYC: about 95% of them do not have fans of any sort in them & very few are located outside. There is NO air conditioning at ALL in ANY of the NYC subway stations that I have been in (mostly in Manhattan & Brooklyn but if there's no A/C in Manhattan, I guarantee there is none in the outer boroughs where tourists aren't visiting). Most of these stations are underground, where the heat is worse than it is outside.

4. Get on an air conditioned train. If there are lots of people on it, as tends to happen in the morning commute, the effects of the air conditioning are reduced. Sometimes, this is reduced to a minimal degree particularly if you have to carry anything with you like a laptop or a purse.
5. Switch trains at another sweaty subway station. In fact, the one I had to switch at was so hot on the other train's platform you could feel heat rising off the platform and cascading over you.
6. Get on another air conditioned train. Remember though, if there's lots of people on it you will not be feeling much of it.
7. Get off the air conditioned train and traverse out in the heated subway station to go outside, where there might be a breeze but where it could very well be sticky outside.
8. FINALLY, get into the air conditioned building where you are working.

Two more pertinent details as related to me:

1. I have sensitive skin. If you look at it weird, it will turn red. If I get too hot, I get sweaty. If I'm sweaty, I get zits. Those zits are usually in uncomfortable places & hurt like Hell. I HATE getting zits. Zits also aren't good for your skin.

2. I'm from the Southeast. If the people I knew down there are any indication, Southerners are hard core when it comes to their air conditioning. Any place you go in the South will usually have central air conditioning or at least have booming cold air anyplace you go, including in a Southerner's car (this was the case in my hometown & Atlanta, at least). I don't know a single native Southerner of my generation who was too cheap to have air conditioning in the summer & it was actually a factor for me in deciding where to go to undergrad (the school with air conditioning in all the dorms won out). Even the ones who were older & didn't have the same access to A/C as us would take advantage of it or use it themselves.

Based on this, I've concluded that Southerners are hard core when it comes to air conditioning. Not having it for a Southerner is asking for trouble. Remember also that Southerners are known for being more aggressive than Northerners, particularly when it comes to protecting their families (per sociological studies); I wonder if anyone's determined that hotter temperatures & more humidity might be a factor. Heat does make people more irritable & I tend to be much meaner if it's hot outside. I might get into a fist fight with you if you give me shit on a heat wave day over my attire.

Keeping those factors in mind, I thank God that I'm not some typical attorney in a law firm. They don't have reasonable person dress codes & demand their attorneys to show up in uncomfortable & stifling clothing in triple digit heat for the sake of "the clients."

I had a horrible experience wearing a business suit for a job interview in NC. After I graduated from college & was deciding what to do, I tried to get paid employment in NC.

I had a job interview for a position with the Department of Social Services where my interview was in the summer (early July, in fact). When I showed up for that interview in my long sleeved business suit (Have you ever seen one with short sleeves, by the way? I haven't.), their air conditioning was out. Since I didn't want to make a bad impression in my tank top I was wearing underneath, I had to leave on my stifling jacket in a room with ZERO air conditioning. It was torture. I was thrilled to get back to my car when the interview was over. No one offered to have me take off the coat & no compassion for the situation was shown.

Despite all that, I thought I turned in a decent interview. However, they took forever to get back to me. The guy I'd been dating before graduating had invited me to go to Florida with him the same week as the interview so I was also irritated about missing out on that (though he was visiting his family & based on how he acted later, it was probably better I opted out). This guy had offered me a place to stay if I returned to Atlanta, which prompted me to leave at the end of the month.

I didn't hear back about this job until I was working a couple weeks at the law firm, only to learn I didn't get it. This was only one in a series of jobs I didn't get in my hometown so perhaps I made the right choice to leave, huh? Shows that not everyone should be staying in their hometowns. I knew I wasn't going to be happy there & it felt like all this failure with job searching (back in 2003) was a sign from the universe that I didn't belong there. I got my law firm job in two weeks while I didn't have a job in NC after 2 months, despite my best efforts looking and applying for work.

It was at that time that I came up with my "dumb ass" theory on employment. I still stand by it today.

So I have sworn that when my company has an office, we're instituting a reasonable person's dress code. It seems many of these businesses haven't bothered to consider legal ramifications of someone getting heat stroke trying to get to work b/c the company made them wear something too stifling for 100+ degree heat & they had to wait in a hot subway station for the next train (I did have to get off at a hot subway station once to get a different train when the train I was on had problems; it was crowded & there was no other train to transfer to nor any breeze of any kind in that area).

The first basic rule of a reasonable person's dress code is that the employees must be adults. I'd rather not employ little children myself considering if I wanted them, I'd go adopt some or have them myself. I don't know why more companies haven't followed suit.

My basic stance on a reasonable person's dress code is to dress reasonably for the weather without showing your private parts with equal opportunity for both sexes. If men get to go shirtless, then women get to wear bras or bikini tops; if it's too horrid, they can also go shirtless. The men also get to wear shorts.

This dress code would also state that everyone gets to wear comfortable shoes. You DO know that high heels cause collapsed arches. Personally, I'd rather not have collapsed arches. If that's not enough to scare you, watch Sheila E.'s episode of Unsung. She talks about how she ended up losing height & having all kinds of health problems due to her touring schedule & how her footwear was a contributing factor.

Of course, this dress code would be optional. If you want to die in the heat or get collapsed arches, be my guest. You just won't get to sue my company over it since you made the voluntary choice to dress that way. If the air conditioning is blasting, you need to bring a sweater for the office; I always do that in case I get cold & will wear it as needed.

As for clients, a free tip: you want people to be comfortable & in a good mood when you meet with them. You do NOT want to meet with me when it's triple digit temperatures outside & I've been forced to endure stifling train platforms and gotten super sweaty on my way to the office. There are certain environments I make sure to stay clear of since it would be a disaster for all concerned such as working in small confined spaces on hot days.

Court would also be a place that should be doing this but we all know that's never going to happen unless we get some much younger judges who don't like dying in the heat. We CAN, however, start setting this up in private businesses. If the tech people were able to get casual dress into the corporate/office workplace, then we can surely get a reasonable person's dress code in there as well. Especially in light of global warming & the documented long term damage of high heels to women's feet, legs and general health.

Honestly, I think higher ups in companies not instituting this stuff go to work in NYC via cabs, personal drivers, any method not involving the subway & live in a cocoon of constant cold air since only a sadist piece of garbage would demand someone to show up in sleeves on a heat wave day. That person should be forced to wait at the 4/5/6 downtown bound platform in Union Square during morning rush hour during every single hot day in NYC for 3 of the hottest summers. That would teach a lesson.

Also, if you are a bus driver & you don't cut on the air conditioning at full blast when it's over 80 degrees, prepare for me to loudly comment on how you're going to cause a lawsuit against the MTA b/c of someone getting heat stroke (and I will make sure those aggrieved people get to sue the pants off you by finding them a lawyer & informing them of how quickly they have to file the proper paperwork). If it's a heat wave day & you have no air conditioning on, be prepared to die a slow & painful death. If the heat doesn't get you, I will.

I wonder if my theory on Southerners is true. You'd think every single business in NYC run by a Southern transplant would have A/C & then some but I don't know for sure if that's the case. I'll tell you this: I would deal with that expense if I were one of these business owners since I'm not spending time in an unbearably hot space. Society as a whole doesn't want me doing that either & the lawsuit will probably cost more.

Racism & the "Censored 11"

Even though I'm working at a TV production company, I actually don't watch many current shows. The most recent thing I've seen is "United States of Tara," a program on Showtime that I must say is quite innovative not just b/c of the main character but b/c of the civilized treatment it gives to homosexuality as seen in Tara's son, Marshall. I can't wait to see where it goes. A few others I'm looking forward to are "Breaking Bad" and the next season of "The Boondocks."

There are a lot of earlier shows that I like but one of the things I've watched since I was little was cartoons. Particularly Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, etc. from the pre-1948 era. My husband's also a cartoon watcher; we've actually gotten EVERY SINGLE Golden Collection DVD & will probably get the next Bugs Bunny & Daffy Duck sets in April.

If you've got a smart remark about my watching cartoons, kiss my ass!!!

If you watch "Family Guy," "The Simpsons," or "South Park" you definitely have NO credibility here. The Looney Tunes shorts were originally for grown ups, NOT kids.

Since these cartoons were made back in the '30s & '40s when racism was a-okay, there are a number of shorts where characters were in blackface or that featured black characters who were caricatures/stereotypes. This should give you a context about the Censored 11.

What is the "censored 11?" Read this.

Allegedly, Warner Bros lives in fear that there will be some massive backlash if they ever released these censored 11 cartoons. People believe that society has gotten WAY to PC for these shorts & others to ever see the light of day.

This is something I have a SEVERE problem with. I think the shorts should be released if:

* They are in a package labeled for "adults" or "adult collectors"; basically making clear that stupid parents don't get to whine & moan if their kids see them
* They are COMPLETE & UNEDITED

Now despite the best efforts of the Man, you can find these shorts online for downloading if you know where to look. I have personally seen the "Censored 11" cartoons; they are VERY offensive & completely non-PC.

BUT....if you wanted to teach someone about the conditions black people faced in that time, it's a very stark and hard-hitting way to do it. I think it's far more effective than saying "We were segregated." It's just like a classroom experiment where the blue eyed kids are treated as 2nd class citizens by the brown eyed kids.

Despite the offensiveness of these cartoons, there's two very good reasons why they should be released:

1. Historical: Censoring these shorts & trying to bury them is like denying racism existed. How do you expect to avoid the mistakes of the past by pretending they didn't happen? Not to mention the effectiveness of these shorts as a classroom teaching tool. Those & the Spike Lee movie "Bamboozled" could be the foundation of a wonderful course on how black people are portrayed & the pervading racism of those times and today. I think things are better but racism still exists. Many of us weren't alive to see those shorts or portrayals & denying they happened doesn't allow society to progress.

2. Giving a Pass: To me, censoring this stuff is like giving a pass to the old white guys who created it (maybe women had a role but considering the lack of women bosses at the time & utter sexism of the day, I assume men are to blame). Hiding it is the same as saying "It's okay that you created it. We aren't going to call you out for it." You know what, though? Regardless of the times, you should have to face the fact that you had a hand in promoting racism. I'd hope some of these people would own this fact & regret it today. How would you feel about creating that stuff if you had black friends or family members to answer to? I'm sure the media would LOVE to shirk its role in keeping black people down but if you're committed to equal rights for all, should you join in? I don't think so. I wouldn't let someone get away w/racism in my presence so why would I encourage someone to deny their actions by censoring something despicable that they did?

My mom, who was alive to see this stuff, also says that it's not the cartoons that's the problem. It's the parents & their attitudes about race. I'm fortunate that I never lived in White Land & had parents with close friends who weren't white. People being different was never considered a bad thing at my house since there was never that initial shock; there wasn't an "us vs. them" since we never really knew a world w/out people of color. My own mother is the one who told us never to use the "n-word" & taught us not to be bigots, unlike some of the kids attending the private school we were at. To give you an idea, the man who was principal at the time openly said he wouldn't let black children attend. Oh, and this was a religious school. I was 100% happier in public school.

I was shocked when I went to college in Atlanta & how much of an issue race IS down there. I couldn't conceivably deal w/a racist (and I mean someone who is an ACTUAL racist, NOT a person who is branded that by someone for not letting the person of color break rules or walk all over him/her). I HATE that stuff & won't give blanket $ to my undergrad b/c of their attitude about it. If I wanted to support racists, I'd give my money to the Ku Klux Klan. Don't hold your breath for that contribution.

For all this talk, my main point is that I'm anti-censorship & personal mores should have nothing to do with what the public can see. This goes regardless of how heated the topic is.