Off-Broadway LGBT Drama to Star Kathleen Turner and Deborah Cox

A transgender-themed drama is currently scheduled for off-Broadway starring two divas who have long been known to be friends of the LGBT community: screen, tv and stage star (two-time Tony nominee) Kathleen Turner and singer/stage star/recording artist/ Grammy nominee Deborah Cox. The world premiere is coming to New World Stages, just west of Worldwide Plaza, it was announced yesterday by the Associated Press.

The play, Would You Still Love Me?, is written by John S. Anastasi and will be directed by Nona Gerard. Previews begin the 26th of this month.

No, Kathleen does not play Caitlin Jenner, though she did guest appearances as Chandler's transgendered dad on tv's Friends, and gender-bending is very much in vogue nowadays. She, in fact will play the mother of  a daughter, in a lesbian relationship, who decides to change her gender. Holy Chaz! We'll see how Kathleen compares to Cher under those circumstances.

I have previously seen Ms. Turner on Broadway in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? and High, and she is just astounding on stage. I saw Ms Cox a few years ago, on the pier at Pride when she opened for Cher. She, too, was amazing.

Don't hesitate to reserve, as tickets are currently on sale for previews and it will be a limited run.

Cine Beaverhausen: Dumb and Dumber To

Making a sequel to a hit film twenty years later may be as bright as Dumb and Dumber's two protagonists. I imagine the target audience for this film is no longer the youth market but those who were young in 1994 and still have a penchant for low-brow humor. At that time, this film was a guilty pleasure personally and the antics of Jim Carrey and Jeff Daniels had me in stitches. So, I expected Dumb and Dumber To to be a laugh riot and to pull me in, as a character says at the outset of the film, "hook, line and sphincter!"

Look, we all get tired twenty years down the road and, at their current ages, this sort of sophomoric comedy may just be a little age-inappropriate for the Farrelly brothers' two stars. Robert Riggle is a nice addition to the buffoonery, however, and Kathleen Turner adds a little class, turning up in a small but pivotal role. There is, of course, the joy once more of watching Jeff Daniels Dumbing down, making a complete ass of himself with Method abandon.

Might I just add that the art work for D&D To's publicity posters is just the worst, most Skid-Row poster graphic I've seen in ages! More likely to turn potential audiences off rather than entice them to come revel in the dumbness of it all.

In the end, a few snickers, points of interest here and there, and an excuse to kick back and have some popcorn, surrendering to the insanity of this extremely broad farce. Again a road movie, the creators of Dumb and Dumber To may have believed that, if Melissa McCarthy could have big box-office success with Tammy, then the time was right for this sequel. But, honestly, many moons have passed and Dumb and Dumber To arrives a little long in the chipped tooth. Bringing Carrey and Daniels back as Lloyd and Harry, at this point in time, may be the dumbest thing about this film.