Dear Constant Reader,
(If you’re just joining me, read about Thursday here and Friday here.)
Saturday came way too soon for the weary Boston Babydolls because The Buckeye Burlesque Academy was in session and we were the professors. Scratch started things off with “Who’s Who in Classic Burlesque”, a talk about our glorious predecessors, and “This IS My Day Job”, on making burlesque your career.
Then it was my turn with “Classic Boa Technique”. I was surprised and delighted to see a familiar face — Ava, who played Blanche in The Wrathskellar last year. Her family lives about an hour away and she was home for the summer. The class was fun and we left feathers ALL over the stage.
I was really disappointed in the low number of students. I know at least one who couldn’t get to the venue because there really wasn’t any good transportation from the hotel. But it seemed like there wasn’t much interest in classes. I guess I’m more used to events like The Expo and BurlyCon where people attend because they want to improve their skills and take advantage of having teachers from outside their area.
Stella taught “Vocal Skills for Burlesquers” and then Devora & Betty arrived to teach “Warm-up…or DIE!” and “Choreography for One”, respectively. Scratch, Stella, and I slipped out for some lunch & sightseeing.
The one thing we really wanted to see was The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.
It was simply awesome. We were there for about 2 hours and only barely managed to see the ground floor. So many wonderful things, so much history! I think we were all struck most by the personal items, like hand-written lyrics or sketches. I mean Elvis’s gem-encrusted jumpsuit was amazing, but seeing Bruce Springsteen’s thought process as he jotted down ideas for an album title was mind-blowing.
As a trained museum person (really, I have the piece of paper from Harvard and everything), I was so impressed. The items were arranged so well in the cases. The labels were clear and the text was easy to read and informative. Occasionally I questioned their logic (why was Joy Division/New Order in the middle of an unrelated room?), but mostly it was a delight. I really liked the “Cities & Sounds” exhibit, highlighting the regional origins of musical styles.
We were running out of time, but we couldn’t leave without visiting The Wall.
Racing back to our hotel, we got ready for the night’s show. The theme this time was black and red.
Then we picked up the lovely Donna Denise and went to a soul food restaurant for dinner. It’s too bad we had a late lunch because that smothered pork chop was good, but I could only manage a taste.
Off to the Beachland Ballroom for a *long*, *long* show. Remember how I said yesterday that Scratch kept things moving along? That was not the case with the Saturday MC’s. They were really chatty. There were about the same number of performers, but the show was a least a hour longer. And we stood the entire time. In fact, many of The Babydolls were ready to call it quits if intermission ever happened.
Fortunately the last act before intermission was Red Rum’s spectacular mummy number, which energized us enough to stay through the rest of the show. I also want to mention Hazel Honeysuckle’s fabulous Cookie Monster and Chakra Tease’s impressive chair work as stand-outs. And of course, Coco Lectric was worth the wait.
There was one more thing that happened before we finally tumbled into bed, but that deserves a post of its own.
This is going to be a long missive, as it was one long day… The drive from Rochester to Cleveland was easy, although there was a *spectacular* thunderstorm as we passed through Buffalo. We got to the hotel with enough time to rest up before we had to be at the Beachland Ballroom. We were at the venue promptly and had time to run our number twice on stage, figuring out the proper blocking. I’ll get back to this later.
Since we were in the headliner block at the end of the show, we could relax and enjoy the whole first half of the show. Scratch was one of the MCs and really kept things moving along, as is necessary with a festival show. There were about 25 acts, plus handing out half a dozen 
We saw stalactites, stalagmites, flowstone, and the rare stalag-mouse (supposedly the calcified corpse of a pet mouse). After walking through the caves for a while, following the icy River Styx, we arrived at the Lake of Venus and got into boats. Our boat pilot was a gal whose name I never got, but gave us some fun insider dope about being a cave guide. She and her identical twin sister would sometimes switch groups if they didn’t think anyone was paying enough attention. The picture shows Stella and D.D. gawking at the rock formations. And yes, we were all bundled up in sweatshirts. It’s 52 degrees in the cave.
But this was fine, we stood around the Speakeasy Room, looking like fantasy saloon girls (except for Scratch, of course, and Betty who decided to wear an evening gown), welcoming people. The Speakeasy Room is all dark wood, dim lights, and comfortable seating. And a couple of really nice pool tables. We began a game in which I had a really nice start (sank a ball right off!), but never got back to it. Anyway, it was the first time the room was open so there were a lot of admiring guests.
Oh, The Glamourous Life! 
