From: owner-chakram-refugees-digest@smoe.org (chakram-refugees-digest) To: chakram-refugees-digest@smoe.org Subject: chakram-refugees-digest V6 #19 Reply-To: chakram-refugees@smoe.org Sender: owner-chakram-refugees-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-chakram-refugees-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk chakram-refugees-digest Saturday, January 21 2006 Volume 06 : Number 019 Today's Subjects: ----------------- [chakram-refugees] Con 06 Juicy Lucy Lawless Part 3? [KTL Subject: [chakram-refugees] Con 06 Juicy Lucy Lawless Part 3? (I THINK it's part 3. Oh and by the way, I wasn't just exhausted. I was sick! Yay! ) Lucy was asked about working on Veronica Mars. She said it was what happens when "Somebody who you knew when is producing a terrific show" She plays an FBI agent. "She's hot on Veronica's tail about this stuff." Now if you've never been to a con, you may not know that there's a whole subset of sophomoric responders (and you know who you are!) who revel in in-you-end-oh type of humor. You know them, these are the grown bigger if not grown up version of the people who were the kids in kindergarten who used to go into ecstasies at any mention of underpants or good heavens, the word poop. "Poop" could keep them giggling for days. And reliably, at this cue combining the words "hot" and "tail", giggles were heard skittering around the audience. Lucy continued, "Hot on the case." More and louder snickers. I think Lucy responded with a slightly questioning "What's going on our there?" look. Because she knows us and also because the folks on stage often need comments or questions from the audience repeated to them, she did give us that look at times. I'm just not sure it was now. Finally she realized why people were laughing. She MAY have raised her eyebrows as she continued, "Hot on the case about, I think there's been some custody dispute about the baby. I loved working with them. Love Enrico, Love Kristin Belle." (Note: We heard during Lucy's stint on "Just Shoot Me" that she was friends with Enrico, who played Elliot on that show. I don't know if this is totally true or if it's fan generated gossip.) "It was really nice to go on another woman's show where you don't get the freeze put on ya." She told us she was surprised that she felt burnt out by the end of the year. She hadn't really realized how much she worked last year. Someone had a question. Over the last few years, we've gotten a lot more relaxed at the cons. So you can either come up to the mike to ask a question or you can sit in your seat and scream it out. The people on stage usually repeat the screamed question for the rest of us. (Well, using the mike, they don't in turn scream it back to us.) Lucy said, "She's wondering if I have any more bug movies planned. I loved working in New Orleans. We had dinner with three of the kids from that show last night." Two women at the mike told her they were from New Orleans and they thanked her for everything she is doing for the city. They had a little gift for her-a small, maybe two foot wide umbrella, colored and decked out for Mardi Gras. So it had panels of traditional purple and gold with green parts and sparkly bits on it. It was very nice. Lucy said thank you. They said, "No-thank YOU so much for doing this for us. You get how unique New Orleans is." As they talked Lucy began to lightly twirl the umbrella very slowly. Then she started to dance a little with it. While listening intently the whole time. Heh. They talked about how much they appreciated what Lucy did and was doing. Lucy answered, "Anything I can do." One of the women immediately piped up, "Give me a hug?" Cracked me up. Lucy smiled and said, "I'll give you a hug." I think they went up on stage to get them I don't think Lucy came down for it. Lucy continued to talk about the devastation from the hurricanes. "New Orleans is a gorgeous place filled with amazing people. Everybody was just shell shocked for an enormous time. They were flighty. It's unbelievable the things they have to do to prove they were in New Orleans. All their papers are gone." I believe that Lucy said she has a homeless person from there living with her for now. She laughed as she said, "There's a steady stream of actors and homeless people coming through our house." Someone asked how she felt about having to put a real rat in her mouth in "Locked Up, Tied Down". Lucy said, "Real rat!? They didn't give me a real rat. Renee did eat squid (Editors note: Ah, the endless was it a squid, was it an octopus debate) but it was not alive and people often eat squid. I would never put a real rat in my mouth. And they wouldn't ask me to. They're responsible people." (Note: You know, what other show would even have this as a serious discussion? Grin.) Then, "I had a spider in my mouth but it went in on its own. The spider had all the power. I'm lying there wondering, 'Would it just crawl out?' but it did come out on the other end." Again, some people in the audience began to snicker and chortle. Lucy stopped, looked around and then asked people in the front row something, presumably, what people were laughing at. Eventually it came out that the giggling was over her phrase, "It did come out on the other end." She was still not sure what the joke was, I don't think, but finally someone explained it to her, what coming out the other end might entail (so to speak.) She got this disgusted look on her face and then yelled, "Potty mouth!" at the woman in the front row. Who replied, "Well, you said it." Someone asked Lucy about working with Gillian Anderson on X-Files. "Gillian was cordial but remote. She wasn't putting the freeze on me. She was decent. I think she was just over it by then. She wasn't interested in another guest performer. I didn't take it personally. I have no complaints against her." "Would you work with Faith Prince again?" (Her co-star in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes.) "I always would. I learned a lot from her. She did have to rap my knuckles once." Lucy began to laugh in delight. "We were goofing off in the background. Faith made it very clear that that would not be happening again." I found this intriguing, because I noticed during GPB that Lucy was "acting" the whole time she was on stage. And wrote about it in a review of the play. That in plays, especially musicals, most often people in the background mostly sit very still so as not to detract from the singer. Well, this is what I wrote: "The fascinating thing about watching Lucy constantly was noticing that she was always Dorothy-she was always in character and always doing something to show what Dorothy was thinking and feeling. She didn't just stand around waiting for her cue to come to life. Not that she was mugging mightily or trying to steal scenes from the other actors-it was just that if you were looking at her, you could see from her facial expressions and small gestures, her shifting slightly in her seat, the tilting of her head, that she was Dorothy, reacting to the people and events happening around her." And apparently, she SHOULDA just stayed still like most people do. Of course, most of us Xena fans never took our eyes off Luce-no matter who was doing what wherever else on stage. Anyway, someone asked Luce about being crucified. "I hated it! I would rather go into labor than pretend to be crucified again. You're hanging on a meat hook for hours and hours. And it's always winter. You're always freezing." The fan told her what Katherine Fugate had said earlier about Lucy saying to her, "I hate you for crucifying me again." Lucy said, "I just always blamed Rob." The fan insisted that Katherine had told us that Lucy had told Katherine she hated her and that Katherine said she had replied, "But you die so well." Lucy looked at her for a minute, processing, and then said, "I'm not going to tell you what I thought you said because (and she gestured to the woman in the front row) Potty Mouth there. . ." We laughed and then Lucy explained, "I thought it had something to do with thighs." Then we had a little round of Lucy leaning towards the audience, yelling at us, "Who's your momma! Who's your momma!" And some in the audience yelled back, "Youse our momma!" An odd little moment. Grin. Hmmmm. Wonder how many times Rob heard Lucy channeling Mary Tyler Moore going, "Ohhhh, Rawwwwb!" "Another crucifixion Luce!"--Ohhhh, Rawwwwb!" "Rats again Luce!"--"Ohhhh, Rawwwwb!" Xena'll be dancing again in this one!"--"Ohhhh, Rawwwwb!" I'd LOVE to see Lucy do that. (Of course, I waited fruitlessly all through "Antony and Cleopatra" to hear Lucy suddenly put on her Rizzo accent and call the dude, "Ant-ny." A missed opportunity for sure.) Another woman in the front row said to Lucy, "You talked to me on a cell phone." They had a short exchange and Lucy suddenly said, "I remember! I was standing talking to you with one foot in the gutter." She turned to the woman she was teasing in the front row. "Don't make anything of that, potty mouth." She told us that the woman's husband had been working in New Orleans on Thanksgiving. "This hurricane is ripping up families. You see the terrible strain on the faces of the first responders. They've lost their own homes. They're working for little or no pay." And they're still there working. I saw only the back of the woman's head but I believe that I've seen her around the con for a number of years. It's amazing how Lucy has touched so many people. I mean, here's this fan who goes to cons and then there's her husband working with Lucy in New Orleans on Thanksgiving. And how kind of normal in the face of disaster, even though it's such a coincidence is it that Lucy talked to her on the phone-that the husband in the depths of the grueling, exhausting, never-ending work thought about his wife's feelings, "Hey, my honey would love to talk to Lucy." And it happened. This is another example for Lucy of her work as just an entertainer being valuable. That it brought a distraction and a joy to the relief worker and to his family. That's definitely worth something. A fan asked Lucy to sing. She said she would "If Sharon will accompany me." She told us she would sing for us later, a song that she had written herself. "I wrote it after meeting Lyle Lovett when I was on my way to Texas for Renee's wedding." Lyle and Julia Roberts had already broken up and he was traveling with his new girlfriend. Lucy said something along the lines of "I was so jealous", that if she'd realized that Julia was gone. . . My notes are a little confusing here, but it's something like, "It was something I said to him, I think because my kid Julius was such a live wire on the plane. They liked the way he was and the way I responded to him. They pressed their names and number on me. And I was too shy." She then put on her fan voice and posture and talked and acted all overwhelmed and totally goofy with excitement that she had met Lyle and his girlfriend and he had given her his number. (You'll have to see it on the DVD.) Then she became herself again. And said, "Get love when you can. I wrote it because he had been with Julia Roberts and this new woman was such a keeper. (Pause.) Not that Julia Roberts wasn't", she added laughing. She was asked about being on Oprah. "I LOVE Oprah! When I was a new mother with Daisy, I watched it all the time. (Note: I didn't realize Oprah had been on that long!) "I was invited on the show and my (I thought I heard her say "my neighbor" but that doesn't sound right-though with Lucy, who can be sure?) said no, said wait until you're big enough that you're the only guest." Lucy had forgotten that she had been the one to turn Oprah down. She remembered it the other way. "I thought SHE had ditched me". So when asked in an interview about going on Oprah she said, "I guess she's more of a 'Touched by an Angel' type of gal." Lucy said that apparently word got back to Oprah about what she had said. Lucy figures she's going, "Who does she think she is!" Lucy added, "I do love her. And I think she's a great cause for good. She's an amazing woman. She came from great hardship as a kid and is now a force for good." Lucy was asked what role she'd most like to play. "Hedda Gabbler. Ibsen. A woman in moral peril. That's always interested me. Cool roles for women." Question: "What do you miss most about doing Xena?" "Renee. We don't get to see each other enough." Someone told her that Renee had been there earlier, doing photo ops in her Fairy Godsister outfit from Shoe. "With her tummy?" Lucy asked laughing. Then she said she would have liked to get a picture with her. Someone immediately yelled out from the audience, "Seventy bucks!" Now THAT was hilarious. Lucy said she thought Renee had been there yesterday and hadn't realized she was also going to be there today. She got kind of excited and asked Sharon if Renee was still around. She said something like, "I hope she's hiding somewhere and is going to pop out." Sharon said in a "sorry" voice that Renee had left already. Lucy got sad, kind of slumped and dropped her head down on her chest, her hair covering her face. We all went, "Awwwwwwwwww." I'm sure Sharon explained later that Renee had been there early in the morning and had been done her photo op by noon and took herself and her baby in the belly home. Lucy wasn't due on stage until 4 p.m. (? I think it was four-I don't have the schedule with me at the moment). That would have been a long wait for Renee. Question: "If you could play any other character on Xena than Xena, who would you be?" Lucy thought a bit and then said, "Autolycus. Because he was powerful. He was very funny, but also, I knew when Bruce came on the show that Xena was not going to be the boss anymore. 'Cause he could stick it to Xena. (Regular laughs and potty minds laughs start.) It was no fun sticking it to Gabrielle. (Greater regular laughs and MUCH greater potty minds laughs.) He was outside the rules." Note: Very interesting decision. But my favorite is still Kevin Smith's. When he was asked, "If you could be anyone on the show besides Ares, who would you like to be", without hesitating a nanosecond, he ripped out "Argo". I almost hurt myself, I was laughing so hard. He brought such joy with him when he came to the cons. Someone asked Luce about her theater plans. She said a new thing had been brought up. And to my confusion, I have a note about her saying, "Me and my twelve year old daughter". I remember hearing it and writing it but it makes no sense. Daisy is 17 or so. She said it was in Minnesota. Some audience members suggested it would be at the Guthrie Theater but she said that she wasn't sure where it was. People repeated, "The Guthrie! The Guthrie!" She kept repeating that she wasn't sure. (We are nothing if not determined. Grin.) I believe she said someone named Jamie Rockers???? (can that be right?) from Gentlemen Prefer Blondes was involved. But it's possible that if she did Battlestar Galactica, that "puts a crimp on it." She talked some more about being in "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes". "I never had so much fun as being on that stage every day, working things every night. Xena was fun but drawn out." I believe she also mentioned the charge of getting the reaction directly from the audience. (Lucy talked about that at the time, what a great time she was having. And it showed, it definitely showed in the performances. It sure looked like EVERYONE was having a great time.) Question: Is goofing around on the set of Battlestar different than on Xena? "You have to know your place on a set and give them room to be 'starring'." Lucy talked about becoming friends with the cast. She especially liked James Olmos. And her, James, Trish and Grace(?) became particularly close. "Takes a while to get there." She was asked if she would do Stargate. "Once you do one. . . I probably wouldn't do another genre. The critics would be all (and she adopted a whiny, pompous tone) 'Why are you doing another sci-fi? Shouldn't you be doing something different?" Either she or a fan brought up "Commander-In-Chief". Lucy said she loves Geena Davis in the role and added, "A woman who is older than me, starring in a show-I love it!" Question: Would you play Wonder Woman? (Laughter in the audience.) "Yeah, I would. The critics would ask, 'Why are you doing this?' Cause it would be so much fun." Okay, one more piece and that should do Lucy. (Snickers and giggles from the poopy-head crowd.) Grin. KT ========================================================= This has been a message to the chakram-refugees list. To unsubscribe, send a message to majordomo@smoe.org with "unsubscribe chakram-refugees" in the message body. Contact meth@smoe.org with any questions or problems. ========================================================= ------------------------------ End of chakram-refugees-digest V6 #19 *************************************