My sister took this. See if you can find me.

Womper!

Till we find our place on the path unwinding

Fun Follies Fact: I'm the king of whatever it is that I'm the king of in our "Circle of Life" finale. I carry my lovely and regal queen onstage among all the romping animals and glorious singing at the end of each show. I spin her around regally for all to admire on my regal shoulder (which is actually just one of the two regal shoulders I possess; they come in a set for us royalty). I set her down. We ascend a singer-lined staircase, gesturing gracefully with our regal arms. We reach a platform at the top. Our adorable child races up the staircase after us. I lift her proudly and regally to my regal shoulder (though I remind you that both of my shoulders are, in fact, equally regal) in that momentary musical breath between the singers' final "of" and "life." The profoundly emotional and eternally grateful audience leaps to its feet in roaring waves of obsequious adulation. And, scene.

Now, I spend a great amount of manly backstage time each show moving our massive staircase and platform units. I spend a great amount of showtuney onstage time each show dancing on our massive staircase and platform units. I am therefore exceedingly familiar with their roomy massiveness. But every night when my beautiful and regal queen and I gracefully ascend our "Circle of Life" staircase, it seems uncharacteristically crowded. Up until tonight I've been focusing on not tripping during our ascent, so I didn't spend any time focusing on solving the mystery of the uncharacteristically crowded staircase. Tonight, finally confident in my ability to climb a staircase without tripping, I noticed that all the singers were actually leaning forward on our graceful ascent, as if they had each simultaneously dropped a quarter and wanted to make sure it didn't roll away. Which happens more than you'd think in big splashy musicals. In any case, all that quarter-searching was really restricting our stair-climbing space, and it was reigniting my temporary dormant fear of tripping.

And then tonight, halfway up the staircase as the music soared around us and the animals romped below us and our graceful arms gestured regally about us, it suddenly hit me: There weren't any lost quarters; everyone was BOWING. To US. Because we were ROYALTY. In CAPITAL LETTERS.

Now, despite all the rumors and the understandably logical conclusions they inspire, I have never, in fact, been royalty. So until tonight I've never been -- or even suddenly realized I was being -- deferentially mass-bowed to, on a staircase or otherwise. Being surrounded by servile sycophants has never really been my thing. UNTIL IT SUDDENLY WAS TONIGHT ONSTAGE IN FRONT OF 2,000 ENRAPTURED WITNESSES. And even though it royally impedes my royal ascension of our royal-by-association staircase, I WANT MORE BOWING. So you need to always remember to bow in mass obsequious deference when you see me, whether or not there is any combination of soaring music, romping animals or graceful arms involved in the circumstances of your sycophancy. Kthanks.

Other Fun Follies Fact: I maintain a balanced and equitable budget in whatever it is that I'm king of by pairing my royal, not-at-all-triage-nurse-or-attending-surgeon-looking regal garb with my house-painting shoes that I got for $3 (total! not each!) at Walmart. It's royal austerity measures like this that go a long way toward keeping my peasants bowing not because they're desperate to keep their quarters from rolling away but because THEY KNOW WHAT'S GOOD FOR THEM.

And, scene.

Follies: Seasons of Love

It's time now to sing out, though the story never ends. Let's celebrate, remember a year in the life of friends.

Oh, nothing

Just hanging out with my lobby girlfriend (I have a lobby girlfriend) after my standing ovation. How was YOUR afternoon?

Curtain up!

Happy opening night, Follies!

Well actually it's happy opening matinee, which makes the sun wash out the shimmery chaser lights on the marquee and exposes the fact that my worshipful, adoring opening-night throngs are really just some random dude who didn't even know his indifferent butt was photobombing my glamour selfie, which means I am not, in fact, living the Bette Midler dream this afternoon, which also probably undermines my Equity points and my Broadway salary, which means it's just pretzels and beer again for dinner, but I'm still here writing a Facebook post so I guess I'll do the show. Just as soon as I can find my hat.

Catastrophic crash + glow tape = theater magic

So Follies preview night was a smashing success, despite the fact that even with all my meticulous costume presets I still managed to mis-preset a pair of pants and completely lose into never-to-be-found thin air the giant overcoat I'm supposed to wear in the opening number.

But! I also learned some kind-of awesome Paramount Theatre lore: There is a rather unfortunately located column just offstage right behind the first masking curtain. I don't know if it's load-bearing or if it contains can't-be-moved electrical or plumbing lines but it's a person-wide tower of concrete that stands exactly where a person would naturally exit from the front of the stage. Plus -- like every backstage surface at every theater in the universe and beyond -- it's painted black. The Paramount Theatre stage crew has helpfully marked the corners of the column with glow tape and posted signs to call attention to its presence so actors don't crash dramatically -- as if there were any other way they'd do it -- into it as they leave the stage. But from time to time it's bound to happen, right?

And guess what? Not only does it indeed happen from time to time, but look at the tally marks in this picture. The stage crew actually keeps track of the crashes. WITH GLOW TAPE. And even though I've never seen a crash of glow-tape-worthy severity -- and I certainly understand and empathize with the people in the rushed, in-total-darkness-situations where such crashes could unfortunately occur -- I nonetheless see this glow-tape crash tally as pants-splittingly funny. And I know a thing or two about splitting your pants on stage. And it's always funny

So anyway. We open tomorrow at 2:00. And by 5:00 Sunday our three shows will be over and we'll all disperse to wherever my overcoat went until the next show that some of us do together. And now that I've jinxed myself by laughing so callously at the 11 mysterious strangers who've earned glow-tape tally marks and may have broken bones or lost teeth in the process, I'll probably earn the 12th hash mark before our run ends. And I'll probably be wearing the wrong preset pants when I do it.

Follies Flashback Friday: Parasols Edition

Last year I got to sing "Sunday" just two blocks from the blue purple yellow red Cedar River with these two.

This year I'm a backup gentleman for Joe's velvety "Luck be a Lady" and a -- duh -- dancing queen behind June's spacewoman-outfitted, discoriffic "Dancing Queen" trio. And then I'm the dancing king of the entire Pride Lands in our massive "Circle of Life" finale. The KING.

Do you want to miss these moments? No you do not. And you have only this Saturday and Sunday to see them before I put away my royal dashiki forever.

Get your tickets at www.crfollies.com!

Superstars!

Up-to-the-second runway fashion from backstage at Follies directly to you! Black-and-white adidas Superstars are what all the trend-right kids are wearing today.

Literally.

All. The. Kids.

Bonus fashion knowledge: adidas keeps its shoes affordable by not spending money on capital letters and then passing the savings on to consumers. Supply-side economics, baby!

[Sparkly shooting star.] The more you know.

Do NOT be accountable for your actions

Using one of the most cowardly and cruel weapons possible, Bashar al-Assad unleashed yet another deadly chemical attack on his own Syrian people yesterday.

Our petulant, inarticulate, puerile man-boy president immediately blamed Barack Obama, using words that are clearly too big for his demonstrated vocabulary by calling it "a consequence of the past administration's weakness and irresolution."

To wit: Instead of working to form a multilateral or even unilateral response to the chemical attack .. instead of providing or even discussing humanitarian aid for the victims of the chemical attack ... man-boy spent the day of the chemical attack at a building trades union conference and a CEO town hall promising to destroy "horrible" Dodd-Frank consumer financial protections that in his third-grade vocabulary needed a "major haircut" plus -- PLUS! -- bragging about the states he won in his presidential election. Which was five months ago, for those of us who are now focusing on his current failures instead of his past victory.

But back to blaming Obama: Not that anyone wanted man-boy's educationless opinion at the time, but after Assad unleashed one of his chemical attacks on his own people in 2013, man-boy repeatedly -- REPEATEDLY -- "advised" Obama via the time-honored diplomatic-advisory channel known as Twitter to "do NOT [his caps] attack Syria."

Man-boy went from advising "our very foolish leader" to "do NOT attack Syria" after a chemical massacre to another chemical massacre being "a consequence of the past administration's weakness and irresolution."

Nothing is ever man-boy's fault. Nothing of importance or value not relating to himself is ever man-boy's priority. Nothing is even ever worth man-boy's time and effort to fully understand.

There is nothing good or decent or honest or respectable or noble or even humanitarian about him. He is nothing but nothing. Nothing.

We have an orchestra! We have costumes! I don't have a dress shirt!

People still use sides?

Follies and Wally Womper are in production this week. And Victor/Victoria and Clam just got real for June. I'm NEVER gonna get this glitter out of my hair.

Some people have it all.

Some people have trouble keeping their rings from getting all crooked.

There are premature goodbyes in the sky

I guess this is goodbye, old pal.
You've been a perfect friend.
I hate to see us part, old pal.
Some day I'll buy you back.
I'll see you soon again.
I hope that when I do,
It won't be on a plate.

Leggo my logo

We have a light-up Follies logo suspended artfully in front of our gorgeously draped, merlot-hued, golden-fringed proscenium curtain. I bet Hamilton doesn't have a light-up Follies logo suspended artfully in front of a gorgeously draped, merlot-hued, golden-fringed proscenium curtain. Stupid Hamilton. Stupid dead Hamilton.

Follies Fosse flashback

Follies is five days away, and nobody is safe from my relentlessly jazz-handed posts this week. Nobody. Not even you.

Did someone say Follies? Because oh my god I have a Follies memory right here that I can share! Here I am backstage with my indefatigable swing partner Jill in the last Follies I did before I moved to Chicago and she eventually moved away to parts west but I came back so you could enjoy my Follies posts you're welcome. Jill looks all wholesome and ready to six-count her way into the hearts of millions in this picture while I look all awkwardly trynabe sexy in my Fosse black and never-did-fit bowler hat. But that's the magic of theater: decades-apart dance styles and a little bit too much boyblush crossing hurriedly backstage like two ships in the night who pause for a huggy picture even though ships don't have arms.

We have Fosse stuff this year too! Get your tickets already at www.crfollies.com

From the man-boy who's never at fault ...

If there's one thing I look for in a president, it's passive-aggressive grudge-holding. There is no greater tool for building bipartisan alliances in Congress or forging strategic diplomatic relationships with countries we want to keep as mutually peaceful allies.

And if you're a Trump supporter, "tool" has multiple meanings here.

Putting the bass in basement

Here's my decadently rococo Follies home for the next week. Come see our show for my delicately nuanced portrayal of Wally Womper, then stay for my delicately nuanced portrayal of a Jersey Boys backup dancer. If my masterfully crafted character studies aren't your thing -- haters! -- this show is bursting with incredible people creating some breathtakingly incredible moments. Like our transcendent four-tenor "Bring Him Home." And our gorgeously lyrical "Beauty and the Beast" pas de deux. And our take-no-prisoners "Jesus Christ Superstar" flygirls. And -- back to me -- what I count as the supreme privilege of singing "Luck be a Lady" and "Seasons of Love" with people who are both dear friends and powerhouse singers.

And if none of that entices you, the Paramount Theatre has seats of luxe merlot brocade -- brocade! -- velvet and a winding, statue-populated catacomb hallway leading to the downstairs bathroom lounge that positively captivated me as a kid. So if for no other reason, come see me in Follies so you can pee in the basement.

You know what you need to do: www.crfollies.com

Giggle. Hair toss.

So I discovered to my abject horror this morning that every pair of dress pants that I own but one -- that's EVERY PAIR BUT ONE -- no longer fits me. And not in the good way. So after my desperately extra-vigorous workout this afternoon I went to my friendly neighborhood JCPenney to upgrade to some big-boy dress pants, all of which are 60% (give or take) off right now in case you're in the market for new dress pants. Unfortunately, I needed new dress pants that were 60% (give or take) bigger. Which was a 100% (give or take) blow to my ego. But as I waddled up to the checkout counter feeling very dejected and frustrated, the very cute, very friendly, very too young to remember "Sunday in the Park with George" clerk greeted me with a huge smile and chatted my ear off and laughed way too enthusiastically at my feeble attempts at humor. And I'm either way too out of practice to tell for sure or for sure way too delusional to know better, but I think he was ... flirting with me. Which would have lifted my spirits but I'm old and cynical and now too fat for all my dress pants but one so I didn't buy one second of his couldn't-possibly-be flirting. Not one. Not even enough to write a huge post about it on Facebook. Nope. Not one. (Giggle. Hair toss.)

But! I went right from Girth & Flirt to get my hair cut and the haircut lady cut my hair exactly the way that I like it. Which is a concrete, measurable way to lift my saggy, droopy, every-pair-but-one spirits.

And there's no way I'm going back to Girth & Flirt seventeen more times this weekend to see if he asks to check my ID twice again. Because checking my ID twice for one purchase and saying my last name out loud is probably legally-mandated store policy. Besides, going back would just look desperate and awkward. (Giggle. Hair toss.)