She So Funny

New York will woo you, whip you and leave you naked in the gutter. She crushes with potential and fulfills with irony. When you embrace New York don't give her your soul and sanity.

In a veritable blizzard of disturbing news stories, these two headlines shook me to my core.



The blatant violence made me all too aware that at any moment in this city that never sleeps, you can be vulnerable and assaulted. My heart broke for these victims of unsolicited violence.

The perpetrators of these hateful acts are enthralled in a degree of unhappiness and desperation I pray to never know.

Feeling some kinda way
In a Blues for Mr. Charlie
Or Dutchman kinda way
When you're trying
To not kill somebody -
Anybodies
Because of something said
So you paint the sky, sculpt,
Sing or blow a sax until it cries
Hurt into memory

I was in the company of aquaintances and got eyeball deep in my feelings.
"Principal?"
A one word question seared my soul. I had not said I had lines. I didn't even call it acting. I said I had spent a day walking around a cemetary and had used my car on a TV shoot.

Being an extra in a movie or TV show is a payday for me. I'd prefer to have lines and featured screen time, but I'm an extra by circumstance not choice. I'm background and grateful for a check.

"Cancer is deeply sensitive and easily hurt." 

Astrology and phases of the moon aside, I cursed and spewed witty cutting retorts back at him,
in my mind, for days. Stung even more because it seemed no one else at the table even noticed.

"Principle?" The question came from a person for whom no audition is necessary. His roles, he stated several times, are always a direct call from casting.

I'll admit, earlier that day, I felt some kind of way when TMZ reported the insolent 13 year old 

Planets, stars or nah, being asked if I was a principle, on what was a background payday, just put me all up in my feelings.

"I'm an extra on the TV
If you blink slow you won't see me
I add atmosphere, my voice you won't hear
I don't make a sound
I'm background.
I knew making movies wasn't easy
But being an extra makes my stomach queasy.
Give me the chance to show some panache
Oh you want me to sit and be a silent bit?
I've studied Chekov, Chayefsky, Euripides
Bullins, Baraka, Aristophanes.
Oh how I've cried for just a few lines
Oh how I pray for just one word to say, but
I'm an extra on the TV
If you blink slow you won't see me
I add atmosphere, my voice you won't hear
I don't make a sound I'm background."

I wrote I'm An Extra several decades ago. It's nobody's fault that it still rings true.
I'm alright now. I talked myself off a ledge. I live to be an extra another day.
In fact tomorrow, on Power, me and my car will be background.

Thank you for your eyes on this page. Your support is appreciated. BTW, I"m seeking representation.


When I do stand-up folks laugh, when I tell true life stories folks listen and when I direct theater it's interesting. Follow me on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and sometimes Periscope.

Director Debra Robinson's 1984 documentary, I Be Done Was Is profiles four women comics: Marcia Warfield, Jane Galvin Lewis, Alice Arthur and me; seen above in the poster for the BAM Rose Cinemas' Black History Month Film Festival,

I was the mother of a toddler and a new comic when this film was made. Last Saturday was my first in-theater screening of this exploration of women in comedy. The Brooklyn Academy of Music theater was packed. I was delighted to be in the company of thirty or more friends, family and fans who'd responded to my last minute invitation. If I hadn't seen a random post on the Women of Color Women of Comedy Facebook page, I'd never had known about the festival, nor the showing of I Be Done Was Is, a historical work in which I'm featured.