400

Week 60: Chicago, IL

Yep, this week I gave my 400th performance as Sir Robin. That's 800 screams, 1200 times I "shat my pants", 2800 times I had my wig put on and taken off, and 2000 knee slides. That's a lot of mileage on the ol' carcass.

My week started with a lovely day off; a Monday of luxuries. I started with a little mani/pedi--some of the other performers found a nail place with a grand opening special package and we all flocked in there to get sloughed, trimmed and buffed. Then I took a wintry walk up Michigan Avenue, the "Magnificent Mile," which is pretty much Chicago's answer to Fifth Avenue. Lined with impressive hotels, designer boutiques and glass enclosed malls, it is one of those rarefied stretches of American real estate dedicated to the elite and the wealthy. At the northernmost end of the Mile is the old world splendor of the Drake Hotel.
My buddy Tim met me to partake of the Drake's afternoon high tea, held in the swanky Palm Court, where a tinkling fountain and a fabulous harp player set the mood. And the veddy veddy English tradition is alive and well at the Drake, with tea cakes, scones, sandwiches, clotted cream and lemon curd, and an impressive menu of various teas and infusions. I nearly gave myself a heart attack with caffeine overload from many cups of sweet and strong Irish breakfast tea! It was a real delight, and one of the must-do things of Chicago.

Monday night I went out to the DePaul University campus to see a student theatrical production directed by my former acting teacher and friend, Catherine Weidner. She ran the Academy for Classical Acting in Washington where I got my graduate degree and is a marvelous person and a gifted teacher.
The students performing "Twelfth Night" at DePaul were third year undergrads of varying ability, but the production itself--performed bare bones with a few rudimentary props and costume pieces in the round in a rehearsal studio--was terrific. Catherine's cutting and interpretation of the play was fresh and honest and the performances were exuberant and energetic. She had a four piece jazz combo playing an original score composed by a graduate music student and they added vibrancy and energy to the show. In short, it was a delight. And I sat there, the big shot actor in the glittery Broadway national tour, and I realized I was jealous. These kids are just discovering what they can do and just digging in to Shakespeare and the craft of acting. They bring passion and wonderment to it and I know that the creative process that Catherine led them through was challenging and uplifting. I sat there, a bit misty eyed and applauding their work, and realized that I miss that collaboration that is the birthing of a piece of theatre. I am grateful and happy to be a part of "Spamalot" but as a replacement actor, I missed out on the initial collaboration that resulted in the piece we are performing. I love that first day of rehearsal when everyone comes to the project at the same level and discovers it together. Nothing like it.

One performer in "Spamalot" who has known that experience, as an original cast member of several Broadway shows, including ours, is Brad Bradley.
Brad leaves us this week after a year of playing Patsy on the road, but he has been in "Spamalot" since the very beginning of the production, and is, as far as I know, the last remaining original cast member to leave the production. Brad is a kind and gentle soul and a talented man who started dancing as a kid and is now making the transition from ensemble dancer to principal actor with grace and ability. I will definitely miss him and wish him all the best as he returns home to New York City.

This week couldn't pass without a visit to a museum! I went to the Museum of Contemporary Art on Tuesday, the free admission day sponsored by Target. The slogan of this museum is FEAR NO ART, and indeed the installations I saw there were fearless; some were political, confrontational, others were whimsical and deeply thought provoking. Jenny Holtzer employs electronic signs that scroll LED texts drawn from declassified government documents related to prisoners of war and US plans for the invasion of Iraq, while nearby, human bones are laid out in a sterile and systematic way on cold examination tables. Chilling. On the more whimsical side, there was a wonderful exhibit of pieces by Alexander Calder, featuring his signature mobiles and sculptural "objects" culled from found materials. My favorite installation was of works by Joseph Grigely.
Grigely was rendered deaf at the age of ten in an accident and has spent his life as an artist exploring the nature of communication, of various forms of "speech"--both spoken and gestural--and illuminating for the hearing his unique perceptions of the world. A lip reader, he sometimes employs scraps of paper when holding a conversation with someone to write things out for clarity. He saves these papers and then arranges them in wall pieces that become fascinating mosaics of thought and dialogue. He also did a really amusing video project with a choir singing familiar songs like "My Favorite Things" and "Silent Night;" he wrote out the words that he got from lip-reading the singers, showing how very imprecise this form of interpretation can be. And he recorded the choir singing both the original and the "new" lyrics, presenting a funny and touching contrast. It struck me, walking around this museum, which is, like many contemporary art museums, an exercise in negative space (vast white rooms occupied only marginally by the actual artworks), that the classical artists I love were exploring ways of interpreting the world they saw with their eyes and imaginations. Contemporary artists, many of them, are trying to explore the role of the artist himself. One school of art explored what they saw, and another explores the seer.

Meet Jeannie!
Jeannie is my dresser here in Chicago and she is a seasoned pro, having done this for 20 years. Her first show was "Starlight Express" (imagine dressing your first production and it's a musical on roller skates!) and since then she has worked with some of the top performers in show business, from Donny Osmond to Tony Curtis. Jeannie is a pistol--quick to laugh and joke around and just a bubbly, delightful gal. I am making the most of my last weekend in Chicago, with some nightclubbing and tickets to a show at the renowned Goodman Theatre. I really like this town, and I hope I will get to come back and explore it again soon. Detroit beckons... I am looking forward to bringing laughter to a community that has been hard hit by the economic setbacks our country has been suffering. More from Motown next week.

Broad Shoulders

Week 59: Chicago, IL

In years to come, people will be asking each other, "Where were you on the historic day that Barack Obama was sworn in as President?" For my part, I was watching the inauguration on a Jet Blue flight from New York to Chicago, and just as Obama stepped up to the podium to make his speech, the plane pulled into the gate and the screen went dark. It was only later that I was able to catch the speech on the internet. Chicago was jubilant on inauguration day, celebrating the elevation of their senator from Illinois. There was definitely a vibration of hopefulness in the air.

Chicago is one of America's great cities and I am grateful that we are here for two whole weeks, so I can get around and taste of its many delights. The place speaks to the city boy in me; it has everything a metropolis should have. It's noisy, dirty, ethnically and culturally diverse. It abounds with art and theatre and culture of all kinds; even the architectural landscape of the city is a work of art. The extreme cold of the Chicago winter has inhibited my wanderings somewhat. I love exploring a city by plopping myself down in a neighborhood and strolling, discovering both the famous sights and the hidden gems by simply losing myself along the streets and byways of a place. It's hard to do that with the icy wind of the Chicago winter whipping you in the face. Nevertheless, I am undaunted, and plan to see as much as I can while I am here.

Our opening here in the Windy City was smashing. Our ebullient first night house received us with great roars of laughter and cheers and applause; a warm way to welcome Richard Chamberlain into our production.
We celebrated the opening at a reception held at a swanky Chicago restaurant, Petterino's, where I posed for this shot with Richard. Our venue here in Chicago is the generically named but opulently beautiful Auditorium Theatre, a massive concert hall style venue of more than 4,000 seats. This national historic landmark was the crowning achievement of architects Louis Sullivan and Dankmar Adler, completed in 1880. It is a grand venue of gleaming gold, vaulted ceilings, beaux arts murals, intricate mosaics and jewel encrusted stained glass windows. Standing on the stage and looking out into the house the first time was quite breathtaking. The Auditorium is just one of a treasure trove of architectural marvels in Chicago; I visited the Chicago Cultural Center this week, housed in a magnificent beaux arts building erected in 1897 as the first Chicago Public Library.
Sumptuous materials used in the interior design include rare imported marbles, fine hardwood, stained-glass, and polished brass, as well as mosaics of Favrile glass, colored stone and mother-of-pearl. The building's most notable features are its spectacular stained-glass domes. The 38-foot dome in the Preston Bradley Hall in the south end of the building is the world's largest Tiffany stained-glass dome, valued at an estimated $35 million. The Cultural Center houses the Chicago Visitor's Center, as well as a theatre space and banqueting rooms for special events.




And then there is the Art Institute of Chicago. It is, quite simply, an astonishment. One of the great museums, on a par with the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, this institution houses an extraordinary collection of art and antiquities from all periods, but is especially known for its extensive Impressionists collection as well as a remarkable collection of American art. Some of the most famous and recognizable paintings in the world are in this museum, and for an art lover there is that tingling frisson of excitement when one stands before Grant Wood's American Gothic, or Edward Hopper's iconic Nighthawks, or perhaps the most well-loved and most visited piece in the museum, Seurat's masterpiece A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte, which inspired Sondheim's musical "Sunday in the Park with George." The impact of seeing these famous works was not lost on me, but I of course went in search of my favorite periods in art, particularly the Italian Baroque.
While the museum does not own a Caravaggio, there is a remarkable gallery of artists from the Caravaggio school, including Manfredi and Baglione, represented by works with mythological or religious themes executed in that almost photographic vividness of light and shadow that characterizes the school. I guess I love these paintings because they are like theatrical tableaux, posed carefully and lit dramatically, yet full of earthy vitality. I wandered through the Renaissance and Medieval galleries and, as if emerging from a deep and austere winter into a vibrant and sun dappled spring, I emerged in the Impressionist wing, where the flowers, fresh faces and daring color schemes of such masters as Van Gogh, Monet and Renoir seem to dance off the walls. Amazing. To give a catalogue of the many wonders of this incredible museum would take forever. You must visit if you find yourself in Chicago. One special surprise for me was the gallery containing the Thorne Miniature Rooms.
These 68 tiny interiors were the brainchild of socialite Mrs. James Ward Thorne, an avid collector of miniatures who studied architecture and conceived this rather mad project of assembling these minute rooms, each representing a period in European and American Architecture and interior design. Between 1930 and 1942, she commissioned a team of artisans to build the tiny furnishings, construct the rooms with their elaborate moldings and ceiling murals, and even hand needlepoint the miniature rugs. These are by no means little doll house rooms, these are painstakingly accurate reproductions of real rooms--like the most elaborate and well constructed tiny set models you have ever seen. They are so detailed one could spend hours in this one gallery eyeballing these things. Talk about a hobby gone wild! My day at the Art Institute was overwhelming and highly enjoyable and I plan to go back once more before I leave Chicago; the museum allows non-flash photography and I want to return with my camera.

Segue to my visit to the Museum of Contemporary Photography, just a stone's throw down Michigan Avenue from the Art Institute. The current show explores the photography of artists who capture the every day life of the modern workplace, the office environment. The exhibit included the work of Karen Yama , who photographs the little still lifes made up of personal items that workers arrange in their cubicles to personalize them; she then keeps the detail of the photos and objects that make up these tableaux and manipulates the backgrounds, flattening them and enhancing the plastic, impersonal quality of the sterile office environment. There was an amusing film installation that featured four New York lawyers in their suits performing a strange expressionistic sort of dance piece by the elevators in their firm offices. It was funny and striking at the same time.
The main focus of the exhibit was the work of Michael Wolf, and his project "The Transparent City," in which he photographed the skyscraper landscapes of Chicago office buildings and also focused in, voyeuristically, on the people he captured through the many windows of these towering geometric structures. He has a keen eye for detail and a fascination with capturing small gestures and everyday objects. His work really spoke to me.

Ah, there are so many things I want to do before leaving Chicago--visit Navy Pier, stroll along the Magnificent Mile and take tea at the Drake Hotel... we shall see how much I get to.
Part of this week was about rehearsing with our new Lady of the Lake, Merle Dandridge, who replaces Esther Stilwell and joins us from the most recent Broadway company of "Spamalot." Merle has played leading roles in "Aida," "Rent," "Tarzan," and is also, I am told, an award winning video game actress. She is a stunning young lady with a soaring, effortless voice--I got to see her performance in the Broadway company when I went to see Clay Aiken, and I was impressed by her diva attitude and her thrilling vocals. While we will miss our dear Esther when she leaves us next week, it is good to know that she has such a talented successor.

So, more from Chicago next week, friends. Aside from sightseeing and meeting up with some old friends, I am also going to get to see a performance at the Goodman Theatre of "Desire Under the Elms," starring Brian Dennehy. Chi-town has so much to offer; two weeks is not nearly enough to do it all.

Will It Play in Peoria?

Week 58: Peoria, IL

Eight performances a week plus constant traveling make touring an endless grind that requires total discipline and the stamina of mountain goats... Playing a new city almost every week is a mixed blessing. It's fun discovering the unique character of various parts of the country, getting to know northerners and southerners and westerners in their differing environments... I was surprised to see, in all this traveling around, how homogenized our country has become. City after city, state after state, the same malls with the same shops and Cineplexes selling the same movies and clothes repeated themselves everywhere... it seemed like we'd keep getting on planes, fly a thousand miles, and then land in the same place.
--Richard Chamberlain, "Shattered Love"

Hail, fellow! Richard knows from where he speaks, having been in two enormously successful Broadway musical tours. If you have not read his memoir, I highly recommend it to you. I have always been an admirer of Richard's charisma, his talent and glamorous screen image, but I never knew the side of him that he reveals so powerfully in his book. Far from being a show biz memoir, this is an intensely personal revelation of his spiritual journey and an exploration of profound ideas. I admit that I picked up the book in order to have a better understanding of this star before beginning work with him; what he offered me was a better understanding of myself, at a time of powerful spiritual exploration and questioning in my own life. I am more excited than before to work with, and hopefully, get to know this remarkable man.




Back in the days of vaudeville, it was said that if an act succeeded in Peoria, it would succeed anywhere. Since those days, Peoria has continued to be a city used as a test market for new products, for stand-up comics and rock bands to try out new material, and even to gauge popular opinion in political races. The term "Heartland of America" was coined for this region of the country and Peoria is still considered to be "the test market capital of the world." Visually, Peoria is rather ho-hum; and the downtown area we are in is so much like other similar cities in America--somewhat busy during the work day and absolutely deserted at night. There is a nice riverfront section of town along the Illinois River, where our gym this week is located. However, with 7 degree temperatures, the ten minute walk to there from the hotel and back is a workout in itself! I grew up with seasons in Massachusetts, but the damp cold of a New England winter is nothing compared to the dry, deep, bone chilling cold of the Midwest. I have no idea how people exist here year in and year out.

So what can I tell ya? Not a whole lot to do in Peoria to begin with, and the record cold temperatures are limiting the agenda of activities.
My time has been taken up with working out, studying and rehearsing with Mr. Chamberlain, whose Arthur is going to be charming, regal and just lovely. We are performing at the Peoria Civic Center, designed in the early 80s by the renowned architect Philip Johnson. Three structures are enclosed within a streamlined glass arcade that presents a very pretty contrast to the Peoria City Hall building adjacent to it, an historic structure in a sort of neo-Renaissance style, circa 1897.

Sarah is my Peoria dresser.
She is such a down to earth lady. This is one of her jobs--she also works in social services, and during the winter months is the sole breadwinner for her family (her husband is a roofer and works in the warmer months). She has two kids, a nine year old and a thirteen year old. Such a devoted mother is she that she has some of her younger daughter's artwork tattooed on her body--it's very cool and endearing. Sarah's family is going through some rough times and she is handling it all with grace. She is not the only new friend I have met on this tour who has filled me with awe and deep respect. I have had the good fortune to have connected with some of you (and you know who you are) who have taken the time to write to me after seeing the show, or who have met me at the stage door, and have opened your hearts and shared your stories. Some of you have become friends. Your personal journeys have touched my heart, opened my mind and inspired my deepest respect for the hardships and challenges you have endured. The greatest common denominator in all of your experiences has been the positivity and optimism with which you have faced what life has offered you. I am forever grateful for these special connections I have made with extraordinary human beings who I have been lucky enough to bring a little laughter and pleasure to along this journey.

Chicago is the next stop on the tour, for two whole weeks. Having not spent nearly enough time in that great city, I am looking forward to exploring all it has to offer. And of course, I celebrate with the rest of the country the inauguration of Barack Obama. A new era begins...

Star Struck

Week 57: South Bend, IN

I can't imagine that I need to introduce Mr. Richard Chamberlain to you.
Those of us of a particular generation will remember him as the "mini-series king" and lead actor of such TV epics as "The Thorn Birds," "Shogun," and "The Man in the Iron Mask." Those of an earlier generation will remember him as the star of "Dr. Kildare." He is also the star of some movies I especially love like "The Three Musketeers" (with Oliver Reed, Michael York and Raquel Welch) and the little-known big screen musical adaptation of Cinderella, "The Slipper and the Rose." Richard has played leading roles in some very successful Broadway musical revivals in recent years, including "The Sound of Music" and "My Fair Lady." Well, he is opening with us week after next as King Arthur, and it's very exciting to have the chance to work with him. When I was a teenager and had dreams of being a strong legit actor, my mother used to point to Chamberlain as an example of an actor who took control of his destiny and made a classical education and a commitment to quality work his priority. With the overnight success of his 60's TV series "Dr. Kildare," he had every reason to stay in Hollywood and build on his stardom. But Richard chose to go to England, study classical acting, and perform as a leading actor in plays of Shakespeare and other great playwrights. When he returned to Hollywood in the early 70's, he came back as an accomplished leading man with great presence and finesse. Consequently, he was the number one choice for any drama that came along in period costumes! We met Richard at our company meeting this week; he will be rehearsing with the dance captains and our stage manager this week and next before his Chicago opening. He has a great bearing about him, still possesses chiseled good looks, and is easygoing and friendly. I look forward to seeing what his King Arthur will be like and the new dimensions we will find in the show and our individual performances by working alongside him. So cool!!

South Bend has proven to be what I fondly call a "rest stop." There is little to do here and I am housed in a very comfortable efficiency hotel which is like a little apartment. The weather has been cold and snowy and I have found much to do indoors, catching up on paperwork, reading, and beginning a new fitness program which is part of my new year's resolutions. Sometimes it is nice not to have so much sightseeing to do.
South Bend, as you may know, is home to the University of Notre Dame, one of the grand old college campuses. Our venue this week is the gorgeous Morris Performing Arts Center. Built in the 1920s as The Palace Theatre, it was part of the thriving vaudeville circuit of the time, featuring live performances and motion pictures. Exquisitely restored, the theatre is a confection in blue, rose and cream with ornate gilding. It's a very grand place, and home to the South Bend Symphony Orchestra.

You will forgive me, I am sure, for not having made it to the Notre Dame campus during my visit here, and if you have been following my blog for a while, you will understand that I didn't make time to see the College Football Hall of Fame. I did, however, get in to the South Bend Museum of Art (of course). The permanent collection is primarily dedicated to Indiana artists, and many of these are marvelous landscape painters. One of the things I love about exploring regional art museums is the opportunity to fall in love with an artist one has never heard of.
At SBM Art, I discovered the luminous work of George Ames Aldrich, an Indiana painter who created beautiful Impressionist landscapes, three of which are a part of the collection here. The temporary exhibit on view this week featured works from the collection at the Guild Hall Museum in East Hampton, New York. Established in 1931, the focus of the Guild Hall collection is on works that use eastern Long Island as subject matter, or were created by artists who were part of the East Hampton community. Consequently, this show was eclectic, ranging from exquisite 19th century landscapes by Thomas Moran and Frederick Childe Hassam to 20th century modern pieces by De Kooning, Jackson Pollack, Roy Lichtenstein and Andy Warhol. The museum was highly enjoyable and featured a gallery of student and faculty works from the art school there. The museum worker I chatted with told me it was her last day at work, due to cutbacks. The institution itself is in precarious financial straits. Everywhere I travel these days the signs of the struggling economy are conspicuous. Here in South Bend, the local health food store has virtually empty shelves; healthy eating and organic produce have become luxuries here and they can't afford to order merchandise. In Cincinnati last week, panhandlers on the street bore cardboard signs with things like "Laid off--Anything will help" emblazoned on them. I pray our economy takes an upturn soon.

On a happier note, I visited one of the popular attractions here, the South Bend Chocolate Company. Started in 1991 by a chocolate lover, and under license to produce chocolate novelties for the University of Notre Dame, the organization has grown to 10 company owned stores in Indiana and 10 franchised stores throughout Indiana and Michigan. There is a chocolate factory here in town and the store itself includes a cafe with wonderful food as well as, of course, sweets of all kinds, and a children's play area complete with chocolate treehouse and animatronic M&Ms. Since I am on my new year's resolution diet, I limited my indulgence to a cup of Mexican Hot Chocolate, dark creamy chocolate with a hint of peppery spiciness. Perfect thing to warm up on a cold and snowy day. The snow here has been a pleasure actually, reminding me of my childhood when we used to put on our snowsuits and trudge out with our toboggans and sleds for a day of winter fun. Spending time in my little hotel room watching the flakes come down has been really lovely.

Tracy is my South Bend dresser.
She lives in Florida now but came up here for an extended visit with family and took on some work with us at the Morris Center. Tracy started her theatrical endeavors as a performer, and has worked extensively as a radio disc jockey and voiceover artist. She has a bright and happy smile and upbeat demeanor, as well as very glamorous hair and makeup every single day. Such a pleasure to work with. Our next stop is Peoria, Illinois, where we principal actors will get our first rehearsals with Richard Chamberlain and meet our new Lady of the Lake, Merle Dandridge. I want to send love to the Broadway company of "Spamalot" as the production closes this weekend. After four years, 1579 performances, three Tony Awards and a ton of confetti, the Shubert will go dark on "Spamalot." We will carry on the legacy, continuing to bring the bright side to America! Congratulations, Broadway Spamily, on a great run. Stay warm everyone! Until next time...

Queen City

Week 56: Cincinnati, OH

And this song of the vine,
This greeting of mine,
The winds and the birds shall deliver
To the Queen of the West
In her garlands dressed
On the banks of the beautiful river.
--Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Now you know why it's called the "Queen City." It is called Cincinnati after the Society of Cincinnati, founded to honor George Washington, who was considered in his time to be a latter day Cincinnatus, the Roman who was called upon to be dictator and resigned the position as soon as he had accomplished a great military victory. And that completes today's history lesson.

Happy New Year!! I hope that you had a good time ushering out 2008 and welcoming in 2009. The new year arrived clear and cold here in Cincinnati. "Spamalot" celebrated in its usual festive style, taking over the upstairs of a popular martini bar following our performance that night. Show biz people clean up real good, and all our lovely ladies took the opportunity to break out their most stunning frocks and give us a glimpse of beauty and class.
This trio of lovelies is, from left to right, Cara, Jen and Paula. A good time was had by all. It was wild to remember last New Year's Eve in Washington, D.C., which was right after I opened in the show , and to realize that a whole year of touring adventures has passed. What will 2009 hold? Well, we all have our hopes, our dreams and a few resolutions. For the world, I hope that we can find our way to peace; and for our country, that we can emerge from our economic crisis, get behind our new President, and learn to be more accepting and inclusive of all Americans. For myself, I look forward to a year full of more creative opportunity, abundance, adventure, joy--and health and well being for my loved ones.

I must say I like Cincinnati. The downtown area is concentrated enough to be extremely accessible and walkable.
Fountain Square is the heart of the city and a sort of miniature Rockefeller Center, bordered by hotels, restaurants and cultural institutions, like our venue this week, the Aronoff Center for the Arts. You may recall the Overture Center in Madison, Wisconsin and its very beautiful streamlined modern design. That venue and the Aronoff Center were designed by renowned Argentinean architect Cesar Pelli. The Aronoff is quite nice, all honey toned woods and plush seats in sage velvet, with a ceiling of translucent tiers adorned with twinkling lights.

Cincinnati is known for its many cultural institutions, fine theatre and dance companies and museums. While I was disappointed, what with the New Year's holiday smack dab in the middle of the week, not to have gotten to the Cincinnati Art Museum, which is some ways outside of the downtown area--I did get to two fine museums.
The Taft Museum of Art is a real gem of a collection housed in a stately mansion built around 1820 by Cincinnati's first millionaire. In time the home was bequeathed to iron industry heiress Anna Sinton, who, with her husband Charles Phelps Taft, amassed an extraordinary collection of paintings, decorative art and Chinese porcelains. In the 1920s, these patrons of the arts bequeathed the house and the artworks to the people of Cincinnati and in the 1930s the museum was opened to the public. It is a wonderful place, part historic home, part art museum, and reminded me of a miniature version of places like the Isabella Stuart Gardner Museum in Boston or the Frick Collection in New York. Each room has been painstakingly decorated with Federalist antique furnishings and reproduction carpets and window treatments, in color and design schemes that compliment the period of the artworks in each room. A wonderful feature of the house is a series of wall murals painted in tromp l'oeil style by the prominent 19th century African American artist Robert S. Duncanson, commissioned by the then owner of the house, arts patron and abolitionist Nicholas Longworth. The Taft collection ranges from Dutch masters such as Rembrandt and Frans Hals, to 18th century portraitists like Gainsborough and Joshua Reynolds, to artists of the Barbizon school such as Camille-Corot and Daubigny, who was a strong influence on Monet and other impressionist painters. There is a treasure trove of Chinese artifacts as well as an extensive collection of Limoges enamel pieces from the 16th and 17th centuries.
My favorite pieces in the museum were the early Whistler masterpiece, "At the Piano," John Singer Sergeant's portrait of Robert Louis Stevenson, and a hauntingly beautiful portrait by Ingres, "Mademoiselle Jeanne Gonin," exquisitely rendered in amazing detail. Incredible, really.

By contrast, the Contemporary Arts Center is a far cry from the decorative splendor and classical antiquities of the Taft. The museum building, opened in 2003, is a marvelous combination of industrial materials and innovative design by architect Zaha Hadid. The space is vast, open, airy and is a strong background for the challenging exhibitions of contemporary art on display. My favorite of the shows was the first U.S. solo exhibition of Austrian artist Maria Lassnig.
Now 90 years old and still painting (most of the pieces in the exhibit were executed within the last five years), Lassnig's work is spontaneous, vigorous, sometimes startling and confrontational, at others, touchingly human, particularly in her depiction of less than "perfect" human bodies. Applying oils to raw canvases with enormous courage and vitality, her use of the layering of color to create surreal depictions of human flesh are startling. I found it an extremely invigorating show. On the top floor of CAC is the "UnMuseum"--a center for arts education and an interactive museum for kids that I found wonderfully creative and imaginative.

My cultural exploration went from high brow to low brow, when I conducted a "when in Rome" foray into local cuisine phenomena.
Cincinnati is obsessed with chili, considering itself the true chili capital of the world, and they do it in a very special way. A meat based chili, with a slightly thinned out consistency, it is flavored with unsweetened cocoa, cinnamon and Worcestershire sauce, and served spooned over spaghetti and topped with a mound of shredded cheese. If you want your chili "Five Way" you would add to this a pile of additional toppings, including onions, refried or kidney beans, and crushed oyster crackers. So, I tried it. I had been warned it was an acquired taste. I did not acquire it. I found it icky. And it was almost instantaneous heartburn. However, the local taste I did acquire was the yummy goodness that is Graeter's Ice Cream. This frozen confection is made using the "French Pot Process" in which fresh cream and egg custard is gently swirled around the sides of a slowly spinning French Pot freezer. As it thickens, blades scrape the ice cream from the sides of the pot, folding it in on itself. This accounts for less air in the product and a denser, thicker ice cream. It is beyond rich and delicious.

My dresser in Cincinnati is Pat.
Pat studied design and stage management at the University of Oklahoma and when the "Spamalot" tour was last here, she worked as a stitcher on the show. This time she decided to get into the action back stage and she has done a great job dressing me and Brad Bradley. I asked her about herself and she said, 'I have two kids and two cats. The kids are out on their own and the cats are still at home!'

Our midwest odyssey continues next week in South Bend, Indiana. This next stop will be the calm before the storm in a way, as our engagements in Peoria, Chicago and Detroit will all bring significant changes of cast, with a new King Arthur, a new Lady of the Lake and a new (or I should say, returning) Patsy.