You're Invited to Funny Uncles Blogging Party in DC on October 31st
My dog, Madeleine - who some of you may have seen performing as Cupid in one of our recent works, the VSA-commissioned "The Farthest Earth From Thee: A Suite of Sonnets" - is asleep at my feet. We have a great tradition. Well, maybe tradition is too strong a word. She's only ten months old, so it hasn't been that long we have been doing this. But it has been almost her whole life, so in those terms, it has been a long time.
Madeleine in the Studio
Whenever we're in the car, she will sit on the armrest between the two front seats, which puts her face level with mine. And there she'll sit while I drive, leaning against me for balance. Every now and then, if I lean my right cheek forward and toward her and say, "Kisses!", she plants several wet licks on my face. And then she resumes her watch from her perch, watching the world and all its other dogs go by.
A moment for our Funny Family File.
I am watching Jay Leno, and Ross the Intern is on TV. How far funny uncles have come! They have sent Ross to cover a Texas football game. He kids around with all the folks - very down-home Texans who don't seem to care about who Ross probably "is". In another time, either Ross would have been made fun of, or he would have come off as superior to the country locals. When Ross meets the Redneck Queen of the Sooner Schooners, he quips something about how he'd make a fine Redneck Queen. No cowboys recoil.
A moment for Funny Uncle Forward File.
In Funny Uncles, we equate modern dance to being the "funny uncle" of the art form. And during the process of making the work we ask series of questions that relate to aspects of our subject matter. Like:
What is your funniest family ritual?
A time when you were odd man/woman out? The third wheel?
A time when humor eased a moment in a good way?
Your oddest, funniest, most eccentric Holiday custom?
The most unholy thing you or your family does on a holiday?
Describe a meal where all was aligned: sense of family, good conversation, well-being?
A time when you, though geographically far from family, felt close to family?
A time when you, though geographically close to family, felt far from family?
Describe a time when family unexpectedly stood up for you.
Are there people who are not blood-relations who you consider to be family? Why?
If blood is not the connector to some who you consider to be family, what does connect you? How do you come to be connected?
Attach the best picture of your pet in some kind of drag.
(Or yourself in drag, or your uncle or aunt in drag....)
Show us your funniest face.
The face you think is your sexiest, but friends think is your funniest.
Attach video snippet of a funny walk, a funny encounter, an odd grouping of things you would not expect to be together....
Funny Uncles Family
Come to Our October 31 Event in DC
This all leads me to our October 31 event at Busboys and Poets in Washington, DC.
We would love for you to post your responses to our above questions, which you'll be able to do in upcoming posts--or, you can start below. But we also know its good to see each other face to (fun) face. So we are hosting a blog-a-thon with some available laptops and a video camera. We'll also have some entertainment on hand: Regie Cabico, performing poet, himself his own brand of funny uncle, Lorraine Gailliard, sings in foreign and non-foreign languages, some of the Funny Uncle cast will dance. And there will be a few other surprises.
But its YOU who will be the main ingredient: come rub elbows with the rich and the weird, the sane and eccentric.
Posted by
Peter Dimuro on October 12, 2007 12:03 PM
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You're Invited to Funny Uncles Blogging Party in DC on October 31st:
What a wonderful idea! (cute dog by the way). I would love to come to your dc dance blogger party but will be on an airplane at the time.