A few days before, I remembered that one of my college friends, Nolan, now lives in NY. I emailed him and we arranged to meet for lunch on Thursday. He hasn’t spent much time in Manhattan so it was up to me to pick the place for lunch. Momo Sushi was nearby and rated high on a restaurant webpage, so that’s what I suggested. We met at the restaurant at 11:30am and ate and talked for over an hour. He had to get back to work, but we decided to see a Broadway show once he got off of work (he had yet to see one). I figured I should take him to the best one I’ve seen so far, so I told him I’d buy tickets to The Producers. After he left, I walked down to Rockefeller Center to see if I could get in to a taping of Late Night with Conan O’Brien, but all they were offering were tickets to the Jane Pauly Show... no thanks.
The TKTS booth didn’t open for another 1.5 hours, so I was going back to my hotel room to chill for a while. But on the way I realized I was still hungry, so I bought a falafel from a street vendor. The thing was only $3.50 and it was HUGE! I ate it in my room and by the time I finished it, I was stuffed! And tired. I laid down and ended up sleeping until 5pm! I got up in a hurry because I still didn’t have the tickets. As I walked out of the hotel and headed down the street, I saw Richard Kind (the dumb guy on Spin City, he’s currently playing Max in The Producers) talking on his cellphone and walking straight at me! I smiled at him and we sidestepped in opposite directions and kept walking. My first run in with a celebrity!
Got down to Times Square and I realized that I was still pretty groggy from my nap. I felt kind of like I was dreaming as I walked through the busy streets with all the bright lights shining in my eyes. Bought the tickets and headed back to the hotel to wait for Nolan to call. On the way back, I realized it was lottery time for all the shows, so I put my name in for Avenue Q. I figured if I won, we’d go to that instead and it’d still be less than full price with the wasted Producer tickets. Nolan showed up and he put his name in the lottery as well. 6o’clock came and they started calling names. Not our names, then the guy said “ok, one more name” and grabbed into the bucket for a piece of paper. He unfolded it and looked down at it, then frowned and looked closer, and that’s when we knew we had lost. Obviously the name on the paper was a little harder to pronounce than “Jake” or “Nolan!”
We had two hours before our show started, so I took him to the Irish pub I found on my second day here. We ate dinner and talked some more about work and school and future plans. Went and watched The Producers, this was my second time in 3 days and it was still TONS of fun! There were parts where I was laughing so hard that my vision was blurred from the tears in my eyes. It wasn’t as shocking this time, but it was more fun because I was there with someone else. I think, after seeing it twice, I can say that The Producers is the single best piece of entertainment that I have ever watched. You MUST go see this show, regardless of cost or inconvenience. It really is that good.
After the show, Nolan had to catch a train home and that was the end of that day.
