Marga Gomez has a big problem--and shares it in POUND!

Marga Gomez
(photo: Kent Taylor)

Now that Pride weekend is done and gone, and the USA women's soccer team has its way through New York's Canyon of (She)roes, what's left to do, people?

Opening night's standing ovation made the answer clear. The Dixon Place to be is at POUND, a presentation of the 2015 HOT! Festival and the latest one-lesbian show from Marga Gomez, directed by David Schweizer. You'll need some stamina; the monologue feels much longer than its advertised 75-minutes and could use a few scissor snips. But if you find Hollywood movies involving lesbians in any way absurd and surreal--and why wouldn't you?--you'll laugh your head off.

Gomez whip-blends encyclopedic knowledge of movies and culture, rambunctious physicality, and tireless ability to zip from character to character, decade to decade and gentrified coast to gentrified coast without much mussing her lumberjack flannel. If Bound is on your Favorites list, try POUND. If you agree with Gomez that Basic Instinct made America "a little afraid of lesbians," and that's a really good thing, try POUND. If, like Gomez back in the day, you relied upon the National Legion of Decency to actually be your dyke-flick recommender, try POUND.

POUND continues Fridays and Saturdays, July 11, 17, 18, 24 and 25 at 7:30pm. Click here for information and tickets.

Comic monologist Reno
performs free shows at Dixon Place
during the 2015 HOT! Festival.

Another HOT! tip: Also see Ignorance Is No Excuse, Reno, an hour with the matchless comic provocateuse at Dixon Place--free!--Mondays, now through August 3, at 7:30pm. Click here.

For more HOT! Festival events, click here.

Dixon Place
161A Chrystie Street (between Rivington and Delancey Streets), Manhattan
(map/directions)

When Reno talks, money...

It's been long years since I last saw the comic Reno perform, and I'm happy to say I braved last night's obscenely cold weather to head down to Dixon Place for good reason. She's still brilliant, still bad, still crazy like a fox after all these years, and she's talking money (Money Talks with Citizen Reno).

Only a mind like Reno's can discern a connection--no matter how occult-seeming to the rest of us--between dog whisperer Cesar Millan and economy whisperer Alan Greenspan. Doubt me all you want, but check in with Reno and you'll see. Listening to her is very instructive: She will enlighten you on the meaning of collateral debt obligations and the all-important difference between assets (especially the toxic kind and their attendant shock syndrome) and liabilities. Anyone still thinking that the credit crunch might have something to do with Ben & Jerry's ought to get schooled, right now, by Reno.

Not much gets by this tough cookie--and, lord, do we need that clear-eyed toughness with all the bullcrap flying around out there in PublicDiscourseLand these days--and she even handles DP's minor audio glitches with aplomb. But the most delicious thing I'd forgotten about Reno is just how dancerly she is--a very physical comic with surprisingly graceful flow and superb, controlled timing in every gesture.

With her canine sidekick--the well-mannered and equally-shaggy Edith Ann--offering support, Reno held down the Dixon Place lounge for about 90 nonstop minutes in this workshop performance. Just when it began to feel overextended, she wound it up. Some tweaks here and there as she goes along, and I think she'll get it just right. So, check out one of her upcoming Monday night performances--January 18, February 1, February 15, March 1 or March 15--at 8pm.

Dixon Place info