OLIVIA NEWTON-JOHN FEVER

Saturday I watched the documentary version of "When I Knew" part of Cinemax's Reel Life series. If you have video on demand through your cable provider, you can find "When I Knew" on Cinemax's VOD channel plus an extra clip "When I Knew: Miami" shot in a sort of filmic photo booth (I'm guessing at the Miami Gay and Lesbian Film Festival). Unlike the book, the documentary (by those fabulous World of Wonder filmmakers) was incredibly balanced between gay and lesbian recollections. Also different from the book, it featured a lot of younger people (plenty of 20 somethings) telling their stories. And for even more "When I Knew" stories, World of Wonder has a bunch of video booth interviews posted on their site. I noticed that actor/comic Jason Stuart has posted one there.

Sunday eve I went to the Pride Festival in WEHO.

Even the Pacific Design Center got into Pride by lighting up their building in the colors of the Rainbow Flag.


The first person I ran into was Jason Stuart, right after he had just won free round trip air fair at the Orbitz booth - lucky guy! Here's a shot of me and Jason.

Even though I'm still getting over a nasty virus, I just had to go to Pride on Sunday to see Olivia Newton-John perform on the WAMU main stage. Pride has gotten some big acts in the past (I've seen Deborah Harry and The Motels perform), but getting Olivia was pretty huge. I think she must have been there primarily to support the launch of the new LOGO TV series "Sordid Lives" where she has a recurring part. LOGO had a pretty cool "booth" in the form of a mock trailer park complete with Airstream trailer and pink flamingos!


Considering my energy was really low, I wasn't very into the Pride festival, but it was so worth going to see Olivia who sounded awesome and played all her big hits including Xanadu, Magic, Hopelessly Devoted To You, I Honestly Love You, You're The One That I Want, and Physical. Hopelessly Devoted To You was the most connected moment between performer and audience. The audience sang along with as much passion and pain as Olivia - I guess it's just one of those songs that everyone who's ever experienced a broken heart or unrequited love can relate to. Everyone was jumping up and down when You're the One That I Want Came On, but the most fun had to by Physical as many people in the audience started doing very eighties-esque aerobics as dance moves! It was hilarious. Even Olivia did some of her signature moves we all know so well from the Physical video. Olivia is turning 60 later this year, so it's amazing how great she looked and moved onstage. I was standing pretty far back in the crowd so my photos from my little point and shoot weren't so great.


Thankfully, photographer Brian Putnam is letting me show off some his great shots taken from in front of the stage.

photo credit www.putnamphoto.com

photo credit www.putnamphoto.com

photo credit www.putnamphoto.com

photo credit www.putnamphoto.com

I shot some videos too - and the sound is great - but I was too far back for any good details, so I'm sharing a few better videos taken from You Tube. Enjoy!

Hopelessly Devoted To You

Xanadu

Physical

...And going back in time, here's Olivia performing Physical on Solid Gold!