Showing posts with label Taraji P. Henson. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Taraji P. Henson. Show all posts

Tuesday, August 4, 2009

Go Shawty, it's yer burfday.....



Today's Obama's birthday!!! YAY!! The chocolate silver fox turns a sexy 48 years old today, and I'm ready to go all Marilyn Monroe on his fine ass!

What do you think the security guards will do if I rock up to the White House and jump out of a birthday cake on the front lawn? Will I be tasered, or will they fall in love with me? I just feel like it'd be a good time to wish him birthday goodness, as well as thank him for my reparations, which finally came through. Holla!

What reparations? You may be asking. I got a scholarship to take FREE improv classes at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre (UCB), a well-known institution in NYC. Basically, some very liberal and bright member of Caucasia who interns there made a shocking discovery: improv is the realm of straight White boys. She decided to do something about it, and got them to implement a Diversity program. Thanks to Obama, black is the new black, and people are coming out of the woodwork to show some love to the Talented Tenth. UCB decided to jump on that bandwagon and offered up some freebies to 16 people of color.

No, no, I didn't just get it for being black--I got it for being young, gifted, and black, as well as the friend of an influential gay visionary. Comedian Jeff Hiller was telling me about the program and I was initially interested in recruiting, but without telling me, Jeffster ended up nominating me for it! Holla at a nomination--I feel like Taraji P. Henson, and this is my Benjamin Button!
Reason #256 that I love a gay man: They are not afraid to lift up a strong black woman.

I had my second class last night, and so far it's going pretty well. I'd taken a couple UCB classes before, but I could never really get into it--it's such a cult, and everyone there is into name-dropping who they've studied with, and all work really hard to be funny. Add to that the fact that it is indeed a boys club, and there just left little for the blacktress to desire. However, it is a great place to be if you want to make it in the comedy world, as anyone who's anyone starts out there. I see tons of UCB people working as talking heads on VH1 (you know, I love the 80s, Best Groundhog's Day Ever, stuff like that), and even see former teachers on "The Office" and "Parks and Recreation." I know that if I want to reach the masses, I gotta take some classes!

So I'm getting in it to win it. I'm making friends with established performers, and vowing to see more shows. Even though I'm a little rusty, my scenes have been pretty strong, and the teacher isn't calling me out, which is always good. The people in the class are all nice, and are grasping concepts quickly, but the humour isn't necessarily strong. That's fine by me, though. If they can at least not fuck up the scenes, then I'm good to go. My teacher is also so tender and smart. He's the Michelle Pfeiffer to my improvisational Dangerous Mind, if you will.

But let me bring this back to the man of the day: Birthday Boy Barack.
Without him, I might not have gotten these reparations. He's proving that 48 is the new 28, and without him I wouldn't even be blogging this right now.

Happy Birthday, Barack! I hope you like your jaunty bday hat!