The Luna Park Gazette

“ The Mets have shown me more ways to lose than I even knew existed .” — Casey Stengel, New York Mets manager, 1962 to 1965. On June 21, 1968, Earl Warren submitted his resignation to President Lyndon Johnson after 15 years as Chief Justice of the United States. On this first day of summer, Secretary of the Army Stanley Resor announced that the Army had sharply reduced its support of civilian marksmanship programs and would no longer sell pistols, only excess rifles. The move came in response to demands for tighter gun controls following the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy, who had been murdered in Los Angeles earlier that month. Mort Sahl was playing at the Village Gate. The Party , starring Peter Sellers, was showing at the Alpine Theater, just a few blocks from my family’s home. And way up in Flushing Meadows, the New York Mets clobbered the L.A. Dodgers. “If some benevolent dream merchant decided to compose a script for the satisfaction of New York Mets fans among ...

I’ll get right to the point—thank you, St. Genesius! We had our first performance of my one-act play Mercy Road at the Chain Theatre on Sunday and it was a blast. I was absolutely out of my mind leading up to the show, conjuring all kinds of hellacious scenarios, none of which—surprise!—actually happened. My new best friend, St. Genesius of Rome, came through with interest. The two cast members acted up a storm, and the audience appreciated every second of it. Of course, I was short-tempered and completely irrational leading up to showtime. I freaked at every single disruption no matter how small. The big blowout occurred when I entered the building and mistakenly thought both of the elevators were out of commission and we’d all have to walk up three flights of stairs to the theater. “My aunt can’t climb all those stairs!” I wailed, as a young woman pressed the button for the front elevator…which was working. “I’m sorry about the outburst,” I muttered as t...

Okay, St. Genesius, it’s up to you now. For the last week, I’ve been furiously praying to the one-time thespian who became a Christian martyr and the patron saint of actors, clowns, comedians, dancers, and musicians—along with lawyers, barristers, people with epilepsy, printers, stenographers, and victims of torture. That’s quite a roster, come to think of it, but right now I just need St. Genesius of Rome to please, please, pretty please with two tons of sugar on top, look down upon and bless my one-act play Mercy Road , which kicks off tomorrow for a three-show run at The Chain Theatre in Manhattan. As we got closer to the premiere, I became so twisted that I pounced onto Google, hammered out “patron saint of theater” in search of divine intervention, and learned about the Roman comedian who used to perform in plays that mocked Christianity. According to legend, Genesius had a rapid change of heart while performing before Emperor Diocletian. He had planned to thu...

"We learn the rope of life by untying its knots." — Jean Toomer The name Evan traces its roots to an ancient Hebrew moniker meaning “God is gracious.” As a standalone Hebrew word, it translates to “rock” or “stone,” while it’s sometimes used as a shortened form of Greek names like Evander (“good man”) or Evangelos (“good messenger”). All those terms work for me, and they apply to a neighbor who came to my aid last week when I was seriously tangled up in blue. Evan walked into my life during my weekly visit to the laundromat. I was about halfway down my block when the drawstring on my laundry bag got caught in the wheels of my shopping cart, and everything came to a grinding halt. I looked down at the snarled mess gripping the axle of my cart. The cords of the laundry bag had a lo mein–level stranglehold on my ride, and I couldn’t move an inch. I have since learned that knots are among humanity’s oldest technologies, predating even the Stone Age. ...

We interrupt this week’s blog post with some monstrous news: if you’re going to be in New York next month, please stop by the Chain Theatre. Back in May, I submitted my one-act play Mercy Road to Chain’s summer festival and promptly forgot all about it. I was certain it would go nowhere and I’d get another cordial rejection letter thanking me for participating while pointing me to the exit. But then this theater company on West 36th Street pulled a fast one on me. They said yes. Wait — what? That’s exactly what they did. Suddenly I was responsible for assembling a director and a cast, and I didn’t begin to know what to do next. I was sorely tempted to withdraw from the running, but my buddy Jerry — an actor who’s appeared in several Chain productions—talked me out of it. He offered to find the actors and direct the play as well, thus saving my keester. I’ve been promising for the longest time to get out of the comfort zone, and I certainly think this qualifies. We’...

One of the things I miss most about my brother Peter is his laugh. He would call me just about every day, and I loved getting him laughing with a joke or funny story. When it came to laughter, Peter did not hold back. I was thinking recently of one of my favorite Rodney Dangerfield jokes — one I know would’ve had him roaring. “My doctor told me I was crazy,” Rodney lamented. “I told him I wanted a second opinion. He says, ‘You’re ugly, too!’” We also traded war stories about our father, who could get mighty ornery with very little provocation. Today is Father’s Day, and tomorrow is Peter’s birthday, so it feels like a one‑two to the heart. Peter loved his daughter Kristin so much, and I know he was incredibly proud of her. He also loved animals, particularly dogs, and I recall how he once started crying when he told me about a movie where someone’s canine died. And Peter wanted absolutely nothing to do with A Dog’s Purpose, a 2017 film where a dog dies and is reincarnated...