Buddy Beaverhausen's Goodbye to Bobbi Kristina Brown

Variety just announced that Bobbi Kristina Brown has passed away at age 22.

Miss Brown was, of course, the daughter of the late Whitney Houston and Bobby Brown. “Bobbi Kristina Brown passed away July, 26 2015, surrounded by her family,” the Houston family said in a statement to People magazine. “She is finally at peace in the arms of God. We want to again thank everyone for their tremendous amount of love and support during these last few months.” The family has endured much heartache over recent years.

On February 11, 2012, Whitney Houston was found dead in her bathtub. The memory of that night is still so vivid to me. I was downstairs, in my friend Kevin's apartment. A small group of us had just carried boxes up full of give-aways from Pottery Barn. I had only moved into my apartment three months earlier. We were celebrating in the living room when the news of Whitney's death came across the tv set. Needless to say, we were all shocked, sharing this together in disbelief.

Like her mother, Bobbi was found (by her partner, Nick Gordon) in her tub. She was unconscious and placed in a medically induced coma. Bobbi is from a long line of recording artists snd divas, starting with grandmother Cissy Houston. Her godmothers are Dionne Warwick and Darlene Love. Ms Love just celebrated her 74th birthday this past Friday.

Wrote Ms Love on Facebook: "Heart broken over the loss of this young, beautiful spirit. Rest in peace, my love."

Kevin Scott Hall Brings Back the West Village's Golden Days with Poetry at the Bar

The only thing missing from Kevin Hall's reviving the Village's bohemian days at the Duplex on Christopher Street were the bongo drums, babies! Maybe next time.

Seated at the bar in the packed room (thankfully an early arriver), I coincidentally sat next to a man who was a long-time Leave It to Beaverhausen lover! Wonderful to meet an actual fan at a club! Michael Dionne worked the upstairs Duplex bar diligently and gracefully. He and Kevin had worked together as bartenders at the old Rose's Turn which added a nice touch of comaraderie to the event. Happy Hour, a modern invention since the Village's beatnik days, added a pleasant remodeled feel to the event which was not presented in the cabaret room but at the bar room as in the iconoclastic days of yore. We were fellow rebels.

Kevin's Annual Pride Writers show brought together six talented scribes: her nibs, the clever lesbian comic writer Sissy Van Dyke (who said hers is "not just a name, it's a lifestyle"), poets Ricardo Hernandez who added 2015 flair by reading poems off his cell phone; Lee Leong Koh -- a Korean-born poet now a NYC boy; the very entertaining Kate Walter, reading from her memoir, all took turns at the mike.

Biographer James Gavin -- of Peggy Lee: Is That All There Is, which I reviewed last November -- was there and I got to meet him at last. I was very flattered to hear he'd read it when I published it and he said it gave him confidence in the book's success critically and commercially.

Kevin opened the show by reading a tragi-comic passage from his own novel, A Quarter Inch from My Heart.

All the writers assembled were amazingly dynamic in their recitals. Nothing wan; all were wonderful dramaturges. I encourage you to seek these artists out on the Internet.

So, thank you Kevin and The Duplex for bringing art and culture back to a Village bistro. Sipping wine and hearing writers and poets at the second-floor bar was a wonderful throwback experience, but one I hope will carry on. The show was a benefit for New Alternatives Advocates for LGBT Youth.

The Duplex is on the corner of 7th Avenue and Christopher Street, just two doors away from the historic Stonewall bar. What a fabulous experience for Gay Pride week in NYC! And what a retro-progressive new tradition in restoring literature as a lively art in this great city of ours!

Michael Dionne and Kevin Hall

Father's Day

Happy Father's Day!

Oh, My Papa! I'm here to talk about dads, both the idealized and the real. The ideal dad has been represented in the USA from the Andy Hardy films to Father Knows Best and Leave It to Beaver, on which Judge Hardy was an influence.

In the Fifties, Dad knew just everything! He was better than a child psychologist. At least on television.

Robert Young -- later to be Marcus Welby, M.D. -- was the perfect model of a perfect dad. Young, at the time, had a problem with alcohol. Well, I imagine you'd have to imbibe to play this part on tv.  He had a career on stage and film before becoming a star on this sitcom. Nonetheless, he assayed it very well indeed in his softly dominating performances. Dad always wore a tie and jacket, mom Jane Wyatt always wore pearls. Realistic? Not.

As a kid, I was more interested in The Donna Reed Show and had a fascination with stalwart dad, hunky Carl Betz as Dr. Alex Stone. He was kind of tantalizing and he was a doctor who could provide his family well.

My absolutely favorite tv dad, however, was Hugh Beaumont on Leave It to Beaver! Wow, he was so hot! Oh, papi!

Fred MacMurray also made a perfect single dad on My Three Sons. Another hot tv Daddy Long Legs!

I do agree that a lot of fathers in today's film and tv are represented as oafish and incompetent, unfortunately. In real life, I know and see plenty of great dads. A backlash against traditional media's "perfect dad"? Enough already.

John Goodman made an excellent and realistic working-class dad on Roseanne although Ray Romano fell into the "incompetent dad" slot, even though I generally enjoyed Everybody Loves Raymond. And now gay dads have joined sitcoms and print ads.

So celebrate dad today. He's much warmer and cooler than our idols from bygone television. Enjoy and appreciate him in your lives.