April in New York, but Not for Me

I managed to get my husband out of the house this morning. At 6:45 a.m. Len doesn't do mornings that early unless he sees them from failure to go to bed the night before. We're getting too old to do that any more. We dropped off Michael at his job on time for his 7:00 a.m. start, and then I drove to Van Nuys Airport so Len could pick up the shuttle to LAX for his 11 a.m. flight to New York. Taking the bus saves me (or some really good friend) the aggravation of dealing with rush hour(s) traffic and the nightmare that is the loop through the LAX terminal.

I'm stunned that he actually got his suitcase packed before we went to bed last night. He's got his tuxedo for his appearance on What's My Line Live on Stage on Monday night, April 21, at the Barrow Street Theatre (27 Barrow Street) at 8 p.m. His 90 year old uncle is going to get into New York to see the show, and we expect a number of other friends will also be there.

Len was extremely jealous to find out that this weeks' Mystery Guest was Dick Cavett and my sister kept him company for most of the evening. We're both big fans. He spoke to my sister yesterday and told me that she was Cavett's wrangler and that from the moment she met him to the moment he was finished for the evening, she never stopped laughing. Dick Cavett was absolutely charming and the funniest man she had ever met. I love hearing that my sister is having a good time helping out with the show. I've had a great time doing the stills out here and I'm sorry I can't go to New York with Len this week.

Len will also be attending New York Comic Con at the Jacob Javits Center from Friday through Sunday being "the famous Len Wein." I know he's doing a memorial panel for his friend Steve Gerber at 11 a.m. on Saturday, but I don't think he's got a firm schedule for anything else. It's been almost 20 years since I've been to the Javits Center. I hope the transportation out of there has gotten more reliable.

I've been thinking that I should ask Len to take the subway a little further up Broadway from my sister's place to Columbia University to pick me up a sweatshirt from Teachers College. I haven't had one in years. I'm also compiling a mental shopping list from Zabar's, but I imagine it might be harder to get food through airport security than it used to be. On my last trip to New York, I brought back a 14 cup Cuisinart from Zabar's. That was on September 7, 2001.

What's My Line Live on Stage

I've been in touch with my friends who open What's My Line Live on Stage tonight in New York at the Barrow Street Theatre. My sister's been giving them a hand with off-stage matters (she's an actress and director herself) and is escorting one of the guest/contestants to the show this evening. Betsy Palmer, a regular on I've Got A Secret in the 1950s and 1960s, is one of the panelists.

Our friend Mark Evanier had a clip which shows many of the "Mystery Guests" from the Los Angeles run, which I will try to link here. You'll see a shot of the panel as Greg Proopst guesses Wink Martindale. At the far right, with his face obscured by a mask that can't obscure his lovely head of hair, is my husband Len Wein.

If you are in New York on a Monday night over the next six weeks, go see the show. It's a fun evening and Len will be a panelist on April 21.

What's My Line Live on Stage in New York

I've written about What's My Line Live on Stage before because I've been photographing the show for some time now. The show is a great deal of fun and is done as seriously as the original television series was. I remember watching many an episode of it when it ran on Sunday nights during my childhood.

For anyone living in the greater New York area, WMLLOS will have a 6-week run at the Barrow Street Theatre in downtown Manhattan starting on March 24. WMLLOS has been done as a live stage show out here in Los Angeles for various-length runs at the Acme Theatre since 2005. It is hosted by J. Keith van Straaten, the original host of "Beat the Geeks" and directed by Jim Newman. They both produce.

Information about the L.A. show can be seen here and I am sure there will soon be information about the New York schedule.

Each week, the guests generally consist of someone who deals in a service, someone who deals in a product, someone who performs or demonstrates (like a musician, magician, dog trainer, etc.), and the Mystery Guest, a celebrity whose identity is guessed while the panelists are blindfolded. Out here, the Mystery Guests have included Grey Davis, Michael and Kitty Dukakis, Larry King, Shelly Long, Ed Asner, Camryn Manheim, Lorenzo Lamas, and Elliott Gould. They've had sword swallowers, saddle makers, guitar makers, a bell choir, a marimba band, a bubble expert, a cup cake king, and writers.

My husband originally went on the show and stumped the panel with his occupation of "comic book writer." As it happened, a number of people in the audience recognized him, including one Drew Carey, who was there because Greg Proops was on the panel and Kathy Kinney was the Mystery Guest. Drew, it turns out, is a huge comic book fan, shyly came up and introduced himself, and took us out for drinks afterwards.

Jim Newman is currently looking to book guests for the panelists to guess and if anyone reading this has an interesting job or knows someone with an interesting job OR has contacts with a celebrity who would make a great mystery guest, send me an e-mail and I will be happy to pass the information on to Jim. Please don't post the information in the comments, because my husband does read my blog and I wouldn't want to give him an unfair advantage. He's pretty good at the show as it is and expects to go to New York to appear on the panel on April 21.

Len's Going on the Road

My best beloved husband, Len Wein, will be a guest of honor at Convergence, a convention in Bloomington, MN over 4th of July weekend this summer. Convergence is celebrating its 10th anniversary and has a number of returning guests of honor. I ran across this wonderful piece of art this morning. It falls into the category of comics cross-over. It was done for his Guest of Honor badge when he was last at Convergence in 2005 and (for you non-comic book fans) features his most famous Marvel creation, Wolverine, with his most famous DC creation, Swamp Thing. Swamp Thing is about 3 feet taller than Wolverine (Hugh Jackman notwithstanding.) Since both characters have their own form of regeneration, a fight would be a draw. Bernie Wrightson, who was the artist co-creator of Swamp Thing, will also be a guest at Convergence.

Len is also a guest at MidSouthCon 26 in Memphis , March 28-30, and he may have mentioned something in June, but I don't remember what. For anyone living in the greater New York area, Len expects to be in New York for New York Comicon the weekend of April 18-20, and is planning to appear as a panelist on the limited run of What's My Line Live on April 21 (about which more elsewhere.)

Back to the Future with WML

The double dose of What's My Line Live on Stage on Sunday as a charity event was great entertainment. Of particular fun for us was meeting Rose Abdoo, who was on the first panel of the evening, along with our friend Andy Zax. Rose played Gypsy on Gilmore Girls, the wonderfully written series created by Amy Sherman-Pallidino and a big favorite of ours. Rose will be in the new Sherman-Pallidino show The Return of Jezebel James. Rose stayed through the second show so she could have her picture taken with Len. She said there was a closet in her house filled with comic books he had written.

The fabulous Lea Thompson was the mystery guest on the second of the back-to-back shows Sunday night. Despite her faux French accent, her friend Elaine Hendrix guessed her after only four "no" answers were given to the panel. She looked just great. In addition to her acting work, she's directing these days. It turned out she had been in the audience with us on Saturday night at Falsettos watching her Caroline in the City co-star Malcolm Gets play Marvin.

The two panels each managed to guess half of their guests. The big reaction of the evening came with Bo Slyapich who catches rattle snakes--he brought one with him and had it out on stage as you can see in the photograph. I watched one woman jump out of her seat and had to keep the friend sitting next to me from doing the same. Len, who was sitting in the front row wasn't particularly thrilled with things either. Me, I'll handle non-poisonous snakes but I do worry about running across a poisonous one when I'm walking Ace out on the trails in the hills of Chatsworth.

Theatre Time

Last night, we went to see Falsettos in a benefit performance for The Actors' Fund. Len had seen it before, I had not. Virtually every word is sung, so being able to understand the words is pretty important. Unfortunately, the sound was a little harsh and I couldn't understand it all. I heard enough to get by, but I missed some great lines.

The show combines two other, shorter pieces the first of which concerns a married man coming out of the closet and the effect it has on his wife and son and the second takes place several years later with the rise of the unknown disease we know call AIDS. Len and I and the friend with whom we attended the show all talked about losing friends to the epidemic. Then our friend mentioned having a gay colleague who has never known anyone who's died from it. What a change from a short time ago.

Tonight we're off to back-to-back performances of What's My Line Live on Stage. Len's not on the panel, but I will be shooting stills from my aisle seat in the second row. Len will help wrangle the panelists. I can't wait to see who they got as mystery guests for this charity event.

What's My Line for the Last Time This Run

We finished the most recent run of "What's My Line Live on Stage" last night. Len, Michael, and I drove back from San Diego Comicon (about which more in another post) in order to be at the show. As always, it was well worth being there. Fred Willard, seen here standing with J. Keith van Straaten, was the very funny Mystery Guest. No doubt you have seen his Oscar-worthy turn as the commentator in Best in Show or in one of Christopher Guest's other mocumentaries. I do like it when I actually recognize the Mystery Guests without having to ask just who they are.

What's My Line Again?

My dog Muffin made her debut on What's My Line Live on Stage on July 22. The logistics of this were a little challenging, because Len was a panelist that night. That was the reason J. Keith van Straaten and Jim Newman were both desperate to have Muffin be the dog worked on by the dog masseuse who was the "demonstration" guest that evening. She did really well, except for almost dragging the hostess on stage. Len was bowled over--and I didn't get a picture of it. I was too worried about Muff to be paying enough attention.

Muff later upstaged our second Mystery Guest because Len didn't realize my son Michael was back stage to wrangle Muff. So Len thought it would be better to have Muff at his side for the rest of the show. She was quiet, but occassionally would walk around so you could see her from behind the desk while the second Mystery Guest was speaking. The second Mystery Guest? Bruce Jenner, 1976 Olympic (R) champion in the decathalon.

Here's Bruce with the panel and J. Keith on July 22. Len's on the seated row on the right. He broke his glasses just before going on stage. He managed quite well without them. I'd suggest contact lenses, but Len can't deal with the idea of sticking his fingers into his eyes intentionally. I've been wearing them for so long--and wanted them so much--that this was never a problem for me. (I would have a problem if I became an insulin-dependent diabetic who had to give myself shots on a regular basis. Needles. Ugh.)

It would ocassionally happen on the original television show, but this is the first time I've seen our stage version have two Mystery Guests. The surprise first Mystery Guest was Wallace Langham of CSI. Len, who is a huge fan of the show, identified him. Len got to visit the set for the last day of the past season's shooting, but did not meet Wally that day. Wally's invited him back for another visit, which I am certain Len will be happy to do.

Just One More Question

The host and producer of What's My Line Live on Stage have been promising that the mystery guest on July 15 would be someone special and they did not disappoint. The mystery guest was Columbo himself, Peter Falk. Comedian Frank DeCaro managed to guess him after asking "were you known on your series for a distinct item of clothing?"

In addition to Peter Falk, the wonderful cartoonist Sergio Aragones was the "perfromer" for the show.

Sunday Night Follies

It was another rollicking night at What's My Line Live on Stage at the Acme Theatre last night. In the first photograph you can see Host J. Keith van Straaten with Mystery Guest Budd Friedman, founder of The Improv, standing behind panelists Natasha Leggero, Graham Elwood, Kitty Felde, and J. P. Manoux. The fact that three of the panelist do stand-up (all except the lovely Kitty Felde, known for her radio work) contributed to them actually guessing the Mystery Guest on pretty short order.


The "Mr. X" guest turned out to be a huge hit with the audience and with the panel: major league baseball's "Sweet Lou" Johnson. Everyone wanted to be photographed with him, so he's in the second photograph with my husband Len Wein. Lou spoke of playing with the Kansas City Monarchs before making it to the big leagues and promoted the Negro League Baseball Museum in Kansas City, which Len had visited on one of his recent appearances at a convention in that part of the country. Lou now works for the Los Angeles Dodgers organization (he played for them in the 1960s) and his line of work for the show was "Teaches Baseball."



I have clearly developed a soft spot for the animal guests on the show. The Weimeraner is a stunt dog named Chalcy, trained by Kyra Sundance. Her trick was "reading" the numbers on cloth blocks. I'm pretty sure I know how she did her trick, but that's o.k. She was very entertaining, and extremely photogenic (just check out any book by William Wegman who has made a great career out of photographing these extremely expressive dogs.) After the show, Chalcy waved good-bye to the camera for my benefit.

What's My Line has extended its run until the end of the month. Rumor has it that there will be a particularly cool Mystery Guest on July 15 and Len will be on the panel again on July 22. We'll be in San Diego for Comicon and will probably not be there for the show on July 29, so I'm hoping it extends through August. I'd hate to miss the last show.

Bonus Celebrity Guests

Sunday night's edition of What's My Line Live on Stage had a couple of unmasked celebrities as guests in addition to the appearance of Oscar nominee Robert Forster as Mystery Guest. The panelists this week were Teresa Ganzel, Jeopardy champ Bob Harris, Suzy Nakamura, and my darling husband, Len Wein, shown in the first photograph with host J. Keith van Straaten and Mr. Forster.

The other guests were Mallory Hood, aka Mallory Lewis, daughter of Shari Lewis; Dorian Harewood, not there as an actor, but there as a Blackjack expert; and a nice young woman named Rachael Newman, who washes birds which have been in oil-spills. They are all shown in the second photograph, along with Lamb Chop, Mr. Forster, J. Keith, and a duck.

After stumping the panel, Mallory performed with Lamb Chop, the puppet made famous by her mother. My childhood memories do not include Lamb Chop being a political commentator, but I understand Mallory does adult shows and children's shows with her now. We got a sample of the adult show. The third photograph is of Mallory and Lamb Chop singing a duet of "Anything You Can Do, I Can Do Better," from, I think, Annie Get Your Gun. Isn't Mallory wearing a great dress and a fabulous pair of red shoes?


Much to our delight, Bob Harris joined us for the after-show gathering and it was like meeting a life-long friend.

I've been a Jeopardy addict since the show began in the 1960s and watching it is a religious ritual in our house. I tried out for the show around 1972, when it was still in New York, and I tried out again about 10 years ago. Last year, I passed the first on-line screening they did and went in for the live retest. I missed out on an opportunity to actually be on the show because, when they called, a friend of mine was working on effects for Spider-Man, a Sony production, and Sony owns the company that produces Jeopardy. Sniff. Len's too much of a coward to actually try out. He's convinced the board will be things like "Left Handed Nuns' Shoe Sizes" and "The History of Lint" if he actually makes it to the show. We're both really good in the living room, but I've got to say that getting the timing on the signaling device is really tough.

I doubt we have missed a single episode of Jeopardy in the entire time we've been married. When we were dating, while I was in law school in Cleveland, I relayed an entire episode by telephone to Len, who was sitting at LAX waiting to go to London. I think he was paying for the call, but I don't remember for sure.

In any case, Bob Harris is definitely a kindred spirit and we look forward to including him in our circle of friends. We certainly enjoyed his appearances on Jeopardy and he has done commentaries on KNX, the radio station we usually listen to in the car. He's also been a writer on CSI and he's written a number of books. You can check out his website here.

It will be back to the show again on Sunday. For more information check out the website here.

Her Line's a Chorus Line (Sometimes)

Jasmine Guy was the Mystery Guest on What's My Line Live on Stage on June 24. Until she was interviewed by J. Keith Van Straaten (who came dangerously close to being taken out by that kick in the photo above), I had no idea she was a dancer before being cast in "A Different World." I didn't watch "Fame" on television, so I missed her there.

She was a most delightful guest on the show. She did stump the panel, which had a bad night over all--they only got one guest's occupation. But it was a very funny show.

My husband, Len Wein, will be on the panel next Sunday, July 1.

What's His Line? A Great Steve Jobs Impression

We lost most of Father's Day waiting for the carpenter who never showed up, thus denying Len his Father's Day brunch. Finally, we realized we needed to head over to Hollywood to do a day-late birthday get together with J. Keith Van Straaten (who was filming a still-secret project on his birthday), make a drop off to my friend Karen, and then head over to the Acme Theatre for What's My Line Live on Stage.

This week's panel is shown sitting in the photograph above: Teresa Ganzel (the "Tea-Time" hostess for Johnny Carson), Jimmy Pardo, Annie Wood, and Andy Zax. Standing is this week's Mystery Guest, Fred Armisen from Saturday Night Live, and WML host J. Keith Van Straaten. The other guests were the announcer for the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim and the Los Angeles Kings, J. Keith's father who is a forest ranger in Colorado (it was Father's Day, after all), and a dance instructor who did a demonstration of "The Hustle." When guessing the "Dance Doctor's" line of work, Andy asked "If you do this on Saturday night, do you get feverish?" I just keep asking "do people still dance 'The Hustle'?")

For information about next Sunday's show, click here. My husband Len Wein will be a panelist on July 1 along with the hysterically funny Ms. Ganzel, so don't miss it.

What's New on What's My Line?

Over the past three years, a group of people we know have put on a stage version of the old television series "What's My Line?" at the Acme Theatre in Hollywood. The latest run is scheduled for five weeks and started on Sunday night, up against the last episode of both "The Sopranos" and "The Tudors," as well as the second game of the NBA finals (I'm rooting for the Cavs, in case anyone cares.)

My husband was a guest during the earliest run of shows. No one guessed him, but lots of people in the audience knew who he was. Afterwards, one of the audience members came up to tell him what a big fan he was and invited him (and me) out for drinks. That was Drew Carey (again, go Cleveland!) Len was then invited to be on the panel. And again, and again. He usually gets one slot a month when the show is in production and he's very good at it.

After we'd been in attendance for a while, the host and producer realized that I was taking extremely good photographs of the show and the post show groups (well, duh.) They finally asked me to be an official photographer, instead of just taking photos for fun. I wish it paid, but it doesn't. Fortunately pixels are cheaper per frame than film is to process, that is, once you pay for the camera, computer, software, and so forth. This year I've made a huge investment in a MacBookPro and Adobe software and now I've got to upgrade to CS3. I'm getting quite good at Lightroom.

Anyway, even though Len was out of town being a guest at the Superman festival in Metropolis, Illinois, I had to go to the show on Sunday night. This involved avoiding the lingering traffic from the Gay Pride festivities and skirting the traffic jam at the exit off the 101 for the Hollywood Bowl. It was easier than trying to get to the theatre on a Wednesday night, which is when the show used to run.

As always, the host was J. Keith Van Straaten. This week's panel was Beth Littleford (formerly of "The Daily Show"), Eric Mullegan of "Bones," Elaine Hendrix (the mean mom-to-be in the Lindsay Lohan version of "Parent Trap"), and Gary Anthony Williams of "Boston Legal" and "Boondocks." The mystery guest was Sharon Lawrence of "NYPD Blue" and Broadway fame. You can see them all in the photograph at the top of this entry.