Soho Rep Gala was easily the swankiest gala I’d been to in a while and I”m not just saying that because I got wasted thanks to the beautiful high-cheek-boned bartender, the moroccan martinis and ministrations of old friends. (a mad shout-out to my good friend Rob Marcato, the mantern, who keeps Soho Rep running!! ) Thanks to Dan Sieradski for his spectacular photo work! (see previous post) for the professional fotos. below on this post are the iPhone pix I took)

Thomas Bradshaw and Roxane Heinze

The evening started with a crazy scrum of fotogs trying to get pix of celebs like Ed Norton, Parker Posey, Capt. Janeway, Edward Albee, Buck Henry and more. Then mingling ensued where I got to see old friends and new, like Thomas Bradshaw and his lovely wife Roxane (from Samuel French, shout-out to the play publishers of record!), Alexis Soloski, Gibson Frazier, Annie Kaufman, David Adjmi, Danny Manley, Kate Ryan, John Jesurun and many, many more. EVERYONE WAS THERE. and if gossip is any indication next season is going to be spectacular!!!

After mingling was the show! It kicked off with Steve Earle doing a number from his new album of Townes Van Zandt covers. Yowza!!!! and proceeded to featured major actors reading from major playwrights. Marian Seldes read David Adjmi, some famous guy I never heard of named Michael Stuhlbarg did Young Jean Lee’s The Appeal (to be honest, James Stanley or whoever played Lord Byron at Soho Rep did it better, but it was a good effort. Young Jean’s work is not exactly party material) Lily Taylor and Kate Mulgrew did Jenny Schwartz (yay Jenny Schwartz!), Steve Buscemi read John Jesurun (who is doing a lot of new work and deserves a retrospective season at Signature Theater!), Ed Norton and Parker Posey read Mac Wellman (with the help  of Gibson Frazier) and then the actors from BLASTED (Reed Birney and Louis Cancelmi) did the whole show as a musical in under five minutes. Haha!! Oh and by the way Steve Buscemi told me that HE IS NOT TWITTERING AND WHOEVER IS DOING IT SHOULD STOP!!! He’s super-pissed. Its not him and someone is impersonating him. And he’s not a big guy, but I’ll bet you he can kick some ass. So hey, whoever it is pretending to be Steve Buscemi, here’s an idea, stop being an asshole and knock it off.

And damn you Dannys Manley and LeFranc for getting me wasted! Do you have any idea how hard it is to type at 4AM with an incipient hangover??? But I have the mp3 files on my iPod to prove you were drunk too! haha! Anyway – here’s some examples of some of my BAD photos and proof of why its great to have a professional fotog with you:

John Jesurun rehearses Steve Buscemi

Mark Sitko and Rob Marcato figuring stuff out

Alexis Soloski and Gibson Frazier

Ed Norton and crazy fotogs

Steve Earle at sound check