"Messieurs et mesdames, est placé s'il vous plaît. Le spectacle est sur le point de commencer."
"Le signore ed i gentiluomini, è seduto per favore. La mostra sta per iniziare."
"Las damas y caballeros, son sentadas por favor. La exposición está a punto de empezar."
"Ladies and gentlemen, please be seated. The show is about to begin."
A sultry female voice, with a faint British accent, purrs these multi-lingual announcements through the club's sound system. A theme song that I don't recognize at first follows. As I am settling uncomfortably onto the top rung of the rickety step ladder and familiarizing myself with the hand controls for the spotlight, I suddenly determine that the tune is the opening music from 'Star Search', the weekly, nationally-televised, talent show hosted by Johnny Carson sidekick Ed McMahon. I smile at the cleverness of this.
A general murmur from the assembled audience below attracts my attention. I watch as the crowd, which has swelled to well over one hundred people, begins to instinctively re-orient themselves to face the far wall of the dance floor. The people closest to the make-shift stage sit cross-legged on the floor in a horseshoe shaped ring, leaving a small square of dance floor for the performers. Behind them, people sit on barstools and, behind them, a ring of onlookers stand around the perimeter of the room. The archways that connect to the bar area also fill with watchers. Thanks to the few steps up to this area, these customers are elevated above those standing on the dance floor. The electric buzz of anticipation and excitement is palpable.
"You ready?" Jesse asks me.
I nod that I am, but my hands are shaking a little and my palms are sweaty. I rub them on the legs of my pants. The mental image that keeps returning to me, is of those wonderful black and white Little Rascals re-runs I lived for on Saturday afternoons as a kid. Darla, Spanky, Alfalfa and Froggie, staging impossibly elaborate productions for the other poor children. Those were always my favorite episodes - when those inventive kids put on a show.
Jesse lowers the volume of the introduction music a bit to make his announcements over the microphone. "Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls and those of you struggling somewhere in the middle... welcome to Jesse's Place's and our fabulous Friday Night Follies!"
A surprising thunder of applause, whistling and yelling erupts from below me.
"Tonight we welcome our Follies regulars, Peaches LaRue and Robyn Banks PLUS... our very special guest from Space City USA... the incomparable talents of Sylvia Estrella!!!"
The applause surges at the mention of Sylvia's name.
"So sit back, relax and enjoy the show!" With that, Jesse increases the volume again and lets the introduction music play out for a few seconds, while he busies himself with the box full of cassette-taped music and a clipboard, where he has written the line-up of the entertainers and the music they plan to perform. The professionalism and seriousness of it all is both amusing and impressive to me. The introduction music ends and Jesse addresses the audience again.
"Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome, the mouth of the south... Peaches LaRue!!!' More applause and whistling.
I can barely make out a dark mass moving through the bar area, behind the audience members that watch from the archways. The first few strains of violin music from Madonna's wildly popular song 'Vogue' are instantly recognizable over the speakers in the club. I think back to the creature named Peaches that Javier introduced me to in the dressing room earlier - a three hundred pound man with belly hair that occupied two of the dressing room chairs. I turn on the spotlight and aim it at the back wall of the stage.
Peaches walks into the circle of light and turns his back to the audience. He is dressed in a long black grim reaper-style robe with a hood. He stands there, unmoving, during the first few opening bars of the music, until a loud snapping of fingers begins. A hand with long blood-red nails slowly rises from the side of the cape, snapping in perfect unison with that of the recorded music. Peaches' other hand emerges from the cape and begins snapping also. And then another hand emerges from the cape. And then another. And another. And another. The image of the six hands, all snapping in unison, is visually arresting. I realize I am holding my breath with anticipation. And then, just as Madonna's voice utters those first immortal words, "Strike a pose," the black cape whips off of Peaches with a dramatic flourish and my jaw literally drops open.
