effusive sheela says to me I am not obscenity before your patriarchal fiction all I were be benediction Before Bob and God: Is the Virgin Mary really a gay icon? To Church Father as Judy is to Vincente? It’s the only question I missed on my SATs over a half a century ago. Can’t let it go. I chose c) Punch. Still would. So I’ve lived a life of righteous humility, as only one beaten and robbed of their perfection can. Not really, of course. Any of it. But truly. All of it. So Sheela Na Gig is my spirit guide when I meditate on the problems with Christianity. This musical answer to such problems is short and sweet. Yet I can see it swelling gloriously into a full-blown opera cycle. First installment: _Key Party. Of The First Part._ The storied lovers Peter Abelard, Ernest Borgnine, Johnny Depp, Héloïse du Paraclet, Amber Heard, Robert Mapplethorpe, Ethel Merman, and Patti Smith loom out of the overture and a stormy vortex of time and music itself. Looking for all the world like just-folks stuck in a squall at an ultimately wife-swapping backyard cookout, they sing the opener: _Wherefore, Whence, Whither, Whaa?!_ They don’t know how they got there, or how they’ll escape the lightning that could and-- spoiler alert-- actually does apotheosize them. Fun fact: lightning often rises from the ground up, towards heaven. _That's What Really Gets Me!_ they rage in the finale as they ascend on their respective flashes of glory. Or they resound elegiacally as they’re zipped into body bags and carried to a mass casualty trailer. It all depends on venue and prevailing cultural mood. But in between, they group and regroup to ponder their options. Does a fob count? An Uber app? _Too Non-Phallic. Way. Way. Way!_ the girls sing. Well what exactly can Héloïse properly grasp of Peter's to toss in the plastic crystal bowl they’ve unceremoniously dumped and wiped clean of any vestige of marshmallow salad as the boys insist it’s _Gotta Have Tinkle, Sparkle And Clink!_ They have come to believe that the only way to escape is to perform a rigidly heteronormative partner exchange where the men will drive another’s car and take _Off With Another’s Signiflover To Lie In A Bed I Never Made._ But it’s retro-prog-rocking, guitar-wielding Johnny and Patti, with Robert on digital bone flute and Amber at the DJ controller who seal the deal. The spontaneously improvised band, _Three Confirmed And One Comanch,_ hypothesize that their ritualized re-enactment of _Partible Paternity_ will bring a personal and collective psycho-spiritual absolution like-unto that of Holy Communion's Derrideanesque deconstruction and/or Jung-wise Integration of our cannibal origins. As the oldsters joyfully concur, the symph-rock anthem morphs into a mesmerizing greek-week-cum-beserkers-round-the-bonfire booty-call and response _Like-Unto! Like-Unto!_ It rings out as hopeful prayer to an angry heavens and suddenly they are in the eye of the storm. All is well: petitioning for deliverance from divine judgment, they’ll happily settle for dispensing with the rational kind. The lights come up, and the audience gets to pee. Back from the intermission, we are treated to _Junker, Beater, Clunker, Pickup, Cream Puff, Lemon, Hot Rod, Crate. Sweet Purrfection, Asphalt-Hugger, Rag-Top Beauty, Hooptie, Stretch,_ a recitativo secco meets rap slam. Héloïse is ahead, filling her note pad with the most synonyms for the modern conveyance. They’ve decided that the winner of this mental joust will decide how to _Be Authentic_ without that non-existent fourth key. Divinely inspired, the Abbess has heard the still, small voice to say “ass-fall tugger.” Ernest, craning to copy off her, asks _What Does Ass-fall Mean I Wonder._ Three times, a solitary flute punctuates the innocence of his meditation. After Patti and Robert wonder, _Why So Silent? Whutchee Thinkin? Mad Or Talking To God?_ Earnest breaks the fourth wall for the molto profundo _Would Genuflexions Ever Get Me To A Bottom Of The Likes Of Her?_ Then Héloïse snaps out of it with: _I Don't Know, Asshats, Why Don't You Tell Me!”_ It’s the coloratura tour de force the audience came for. As she KO’s Ernest with sheer emotion, Peter's somewhat less ornamented piacevole counterpoint in high head voice offers an intricate mansplaination. He’s probably taking her side, but it’s a subtle argument in Latin, so who really knows. Outlasting his wife’s dazzle, Peter continues through the riotous applause and cheers she'll certainly garner, to shift our focus to Ethel shooting daggers at the Deity’s darling. As the cheers and warbles die down, Ethel in solemn processional, with Peter following in silent, expressionistic dance, offers her painfully tender and soothing, _So Everybody Gets Their Nerve Up, Nino, Sometimes Eh?_ She lifts the limp, fetal-positioned and flying-harnessed Ernest effortlessly into her lap and then pieta-like…. No, I mustn’t give too much away.

• published: 10 Feb 2023
• views: 44