“Sir, sir,” one of the men from the religious side tried to get the attention of the guy’s friend who had been largely passive throughout the exchange. “Have you accepted Jesus as your Lord and Savior? It’s not too late. There is still time for you. You don’t have to be blinded and enslaved by the lust of the flesh. I, too, was once addicted to--”
The man turned and looked at his opponent dead in the eye and said with sincerity and compassion. “I have no problem with God. I just think he needs better representation. Are you genuinely the best he can do?”
He then turned and walked into the building on that note. Several people applauded, and I was impressed by the response myself. Vicki and I then reached the cheetah lady. She looked at me like she wanted to cue up her camera. I caught her eye and shot her a withering, condescending glare and I saw a hint of fear in her face, and she left me alone. She went on to harass the people behind us.
As we walked on, I heard the religious nuts launch into a chorus of Amazing Grace. We approached the door, and encountered a scruffy looking hipster sitting on the ground strumming a guitar and singing “Your Body is a Wonderland.” I smirked and entered the building.
Vicki and I finally got inside and into the Performing Arts Hall, and there were a couple hundred people milling about. The energy was a little higher considering the scene outside, but mainly it was Sedona’s upper crust out to enjoy an avante garde performance.
Like many buildings in Sedona, the PAH was geometrically shaped, this one was a giant metal triangle. The lobby, of course, had impressively vaulted ceilings as the arc rose, but the walls were disappointingly modern. They were simply painted cream, with flat screen monitors mounted every few yards. There were some unmanned reception booths, and the occasional contempo styled seating areas.
“I love this building,” Vicki gushed. “The design is so cute.”
“Eight months in Sedona, and you still think the buildings are ‘cute,” I muttered.
She smacked my arm. “I didn’t grow up here. I’m not a jaded and bitter cynic like you.
“I’m working on it,” I laughed. “I actually performed here a few times.”
“Really?” she asked. “Acting?”
I had been a star theatre student in high school, and had even been accepted into Julliard. But, I ultimately chose to pursue a legal career, much to the chagrin of my parents.
“Yeah,” I said. “My high school summers, I signed up for a youth community theatre. Most of the time we had our own auditorium, but we would sometimes do a matinee show here. I did The Importance of Being Earnest here, and Chicago.”
“You were in Chicago?” she laughed. Chicago was a famous Broadway musical that became a hit feature film starring Richard Gere, Renee Zelwegger and Catherine Zeta Jones.
“Yeah,” I laughed back.
“Please tell me you were not Billy Flynn,” she said. She referred to Gere’s character, a flashy, sleazy lawyer who manipulated both the media and the legal system to get his guilty client off a murder charge. I winked and smiled.
“Oh, my gosh,” she rolled her eyes, and then she launched into the character’s sensuous theme song. “We... want…. Bi-llly…”
She suggestively rubbed her back against me as she sang the rest of the lyrics. I was laughing right as Marvin approached us.
He cleared his throat and raised an eyebrow when he saw us. “Am I interrupting something?”
Marvin Ioakava was an intimidating man that looked and acted like he was in his sixties, although his online bio put him in his eighties. He had a full head of white hair, and wore a flashy three piece suit in bright purple, with white wing tipped shoes peeking out from under his overpriced pant legs. Tonight as always, he was not without his signature custom designed blue tinted glasses, both indoors and outdoors.
Vicki and I both laughed as we straightened and greeted our host.
“Hi, Marvin,” I said and offered my hand. “Good to see you.”
He smiled and shook it. “By all means, don’t stop on my account. Get your kicks while you can, is my philosophy.”
Vicki and I both blushed and laughed. “Thank you for inviting us,” Vicki regained her composure and offered her hand.
“It was my pleasure,” Marvin shook her hand. “This is a big publicity event for Starbright Media. I’m glad you could be part of what it is we’re doing here.”
“Is it really that big of a publicity campaign?” I said. “I didn’t realize that Ghoti was that much of a group.”
“No,” he smiled. “It’s not. They’re a small performing arts group out of Brooklyn. But, one of the women is originally from Sedona, and she called the Arts League to book a filler date on their tour. Starbright, on the other hand, is updating a lot of equipment, and we need to increase revenue to cover the cost. So, it all came at the right time. We took a small act that is dying for this kind of publicity, and we’re bilking the shit out of it.”
“How are you making that much money off of this?” I asked.
“Well,” he said. “A few ways. First of all, we’re running this as a paid event on all our websites. We’ve been teasing it for weeks, we’ve even created a competing price war between some of our websites and paid channels, and done exclusive packages. We’ve done feature interviews and behind the scenes clips online and sold ad space on it. We’ve made them enough of a local sensation that we can now run competing features in our print publications, and sell premium ad space on it. It’s all a media game. All we needed
