Lord Arux and I got tickets to see the preview of “An Evening Without Monty Python”, directed by Eric Idle and BT McNicholl.
We first met at Katsuya, a kind of hip sushi restaurant here in Hollywood nearby the Ricardo Montalban Theatre where the show was playing. We sat for a short while and held hands across the table, being ridiculously mushy as usual, before two men entered and were seated nearby. I’m not sure exactly what it was but suddenly Lord Arux and I were seized simultaneously with the realization that one of the men was Eric Idle. We clutched one another’s hands in a decidedly not mushy way, eyes wide, hearts beating wildly for reasons that for once had nothing to do with our treacly romance or our tympani-pounding physical chemistry. We dug our fingers into one another’s flesh for several more moments until I found the strength to tear away and…Tweet.
Holy shit! Eric Idle is sitting just a few feet from me on the same booth at Katsuya. Um… Eek?
about 4 hours ago from Twitterrific
The music was too damned loud in that hipster haven, which made it difficult to eavesdrop. Normally we enjoy this because it means no one can hear us being impossible, but now it was downright aggravating.
Not that we would have listened, of course.
So we carried on, musing that the other gentleman was the BT mentioned on the website. We got to hear Eric say, “I’m not dead yet,” which inspired another round of hand clenching and holding of breath so as to not give in to a spasm of laughter. And then, as abruptly as they appeared, they slipped away.
The show was wonderful. The timing, energy and everything worked very well. In some places it was clear they were intentionally disregarding the old timing or tempo of a skit to try something new, and mostly it worked. Jane Leeves was fantastic as the only woman in the troupe (who also happened to be glad she had a penis), as was my friend Bill’s brother, Jeff Davis. (My only experience of Jeff until now has been of him slouching about in the backyard of Bill’s house with a beer bottle in his hand.) But seriously, the entire cast was fabulous. They even included a Neil Patrick Harris joke that made me giggle.
If you’re a fan, go see this show before it runs away to New York on October 6th. Go on. GO!
