All Christmas, All the Time

Well over a year ago, I did a freelance gig for a production company contracted by Radio City Music Hall to create video set elements for the legendary Radio City Christmas Spectacular (Now in its 79th year!). I worked a solid three months in the sweltering heat of summer creating animatics for a wintery North Pole scene featuring candy and elves and snow, and presents.

If you don't know what animatics are, they are animated mockups made to work out the look, feel, and timing of a sequence before shelling out money on the final animation.

When my mother told me she was planning to take her granddaughter (my niece) to see The Radio City Music Hall Christmas Spectacular, I told her not to buy tickets until I checked to see if I could pull strings and get her a discount.

"Okay," she said, "two tickets for me and two for yourself if you and Deborah want to come." I was curious about how my work turned out, but attending the show didn't interest me very much. I asked Deborah if she wanted to go, but she was even less interested.

"We'll do whatever we can to help facilitate your travels, Mom, but I think we'll pass on the show." Bah, humbug!

As a small cog in a gigantic wheel, I couldn't get a discount. '"Sorry, Mom, no luck. So much for being a big shot."

"That's okay. There's been a change of plans, anyway." It's difficult for my mom to get around these days, and she had second thoughts about fighting the New York City holiday crowds. "The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak."

I didn't give the show any more thought. At least not until the other day, when I was surprised by a last-minute invitation to the Christmas Spectacular's opening night, along with passes to the after party. I had to let them know right away. "What do you think, Deborah, you want to go?"

"Okay, why not?"

A colleague of mine would meet us underneath Radio City's marquee an hour before showtime with the tickets. It was dark and rainy, and, as showtime neared, neither of us felt like leaving the apartment. That happens a lot -- too much these days -- but we drank some coffee and pushed each other to move.

Deborah injured her foot recently. She's not sure what's wrong with it and is waiting to see a podiatrist. In the meantime, she tries to stay off it as much as she can. We arrived a few minutes early and waited in the crowd that was smushed together under the awning, out of the rain. Deborah's foot began to ache. "I should've bought some aspirin," she said.

"Wait here, and I'll go find some."

I had to walk several blocks before I found a deli that sold pain relievers. Three dollars for two pills? Are you kidding? Outrageous! I didn't have time to argue so I paid the extortion money and headed back to the theater. When I found Deborah, she was standing next to a middle-aged woman with long frizzy hair dyed jet black. Deborah nodded toward the woman and gestured to me that the lady was nuts.

"Who, her? Why, what happened?"

The woman had been standing in the middle of the packed crowd with an open umbrella. Deborah got her attention, "Excuse me," she said, pointing upward toward the awning. "You probably don't need your umbrella."

The woman's eyes widened, her nostrils flared, and she began to shake. "I am an <i>actress!</i>" she said. "I need to protect my hair from the humidity. Why don't you mind your own business!"

Did she really say that? Deborah looked around to see who else might've heard the exchange.

"I was trying to be polite," Deborah said to the woman.

"Well, you weren't very, so mind your own business," she said again.

"Listen, I was just trying to be helpful. You don't have to be a fucking bitch about it."

"No, you're the fucking bitch."

Deborah looked around again and caught the eyes of another woman who just shrugged, smiled, and did her best not to get dragged into anything. Deborah laughed. The actress mocked her laugh. Deborah shook her head and and that's when I showed up.

"I think therapy is helping," said Deborah. "Before, I would stew about something like that for days. Now I can just call a woman a fucking bitch and be done with it."

Progress!

We sat with Bob, a fellow freelancer who worked with me on the animatics, and his partner, Jim. Deborah was thumbing through the program and came across an ad for Peter Pan starring Cathy Rigby.

"Cathy Rigby?" said Deborah. "Isn't she like seventy years old?"

"She'll never grow up," said Bob. "She's Peter Pan."

"I'm not so sure about that," said Deborah. "She used to do Tampon commercials."

We laughed at the thought of Peter Pan doing tampon commercials.

"Don't worry, Peter, you can still go swimming and do all the things you always did."

"They have wings!" said Bob.

The show itself held no surprises -- an over-the-top, candy-colored, seizure-inducing schmaltz-fest. Until the end, of course, when they put on the famous "living nativity" scene featuring live animals and little baby Jesus. The scene is introduced by Santa Claus who, predictably, tells the audience not to forget the true "reason for the season." In other words, never mind all the time, money, and effort put into the previous hour and fifteen minutes, the true meaning of Christmas is this: real live camels!

What can I say about the after-party? You know how it goes, showgirls, ingenues, glamour pusses. Snorting cocaine off well-toned asses, sipping champagne from shoes. Or not.

I ran into another colleague of mine, Adam, who had been working in the theater nonstop for the past three weeks, doing final tweaks. He said he became so comfortable wandering around the empty theater that he was upset to see all these people off the street invading his home.

"What kind of changes have they been doing?" I was curious to know.

"Remember the animated sign that says THE ROCKETTES that rises from beneath the stage? Well, it was supposed to be an actual sign, a set piece. The thing was built and everything, but they were having trouble figuring out how to get it on and off stage, so at the last minute they decided to make a 3D animation instead."

"Pretty soon, the whole show will be animated," I predicted. "The Rockettes and everything. It'll be The 3D Radio City Christmas Spectacular Movie."

"They're halfway there already."

"I guess that's good news for me."

There's not much to say about the after-party. Free food and drink are always good. Half the people were decked out, the guys in festive suits, the women in sequined dresses. The other half, myself included, were schlubs. Various Rockettes could be seen posing for photos, instantly snapping into dramatic showbiz poses with toothy showbiz smiles as soon as anyone lifted a camera. Bob spotted a young woman on the other side of the room wearing a hat from the wooden soldier routine. "She's gonna get in trouble," I said, then did my best impression of a 1930s choreographer: "There are a hundred girls out there hungry for your job, sweetheart!”

Deborah spotted her favorite Rockette. "There's my girl!"

"Go ask for her autograph," I said.

"Ha, yeah,"

"Go say hello," said Bob. "She'll be flattered to know she stood out."

Deborah thought about it for a second or two, but just laughed and shook her head. "She's so much shorter in real life."