from the biography of Jean Genet we are reading

Paul Valéry is quoted as saying, "You mustn't hesitate to do what will lose you half of your fans and triple the affections of those who remain."

* * * * *

amen!

In Freedom,
Frank Moore

Re: milestones (Paul) IV

Franke,

Glad to hear that physical therapy and the talking book are helping you nap.

Sven the physical therapist (Swede farm boy with a fetish for farm animals)...

Please let him know I'm glad he is helping you.

Also, if the bottom drops out of the PT gig there are farms in the Midwest he might want consider for employment. This is after all America's dairyland....Beautiful cows!!

xo Paul

* * * * *

MOO!

In Freedom,
Frank Moore

Re: milestones (Paul) III

(Frank wrote:)

yes, but who has time to nap ?

In Freedom,
Frank Moore

* * * * *

Frankie,

I realize you are The Only Sex God and the Busiest Shaman in Showbiz.....

May I suggest (If you're not in the middle of a split-week a Caesar's Palace) a 40 minute snooze daily.

The health benefits are amazing..It feels good and costs nothing.

Since I've been taking one almost everyday my health has improved immensely.

Just my 2¢.

Paul

* * * * *

hey, baby, i usually nap when I am getting physical therapy nightly with Sven [a Swede farm boy with a fetish for farm animals] as the talking book lulls me!

In Freedom,
Frank Moore

milestones

the other night I had my first bath in the tub since I went into the hospital in May!

Last week I had my first session in my studio out back since the hospital! I haven't even been in the studio for over six months! I met with Maggie from the last performance for over three hours and I was still going afterwards! She is coming back tomorrow.

In other words, I'M BACK!

In Freedom,
Frank Moore

RE: Philip Huang commented on your note "last performance of the year" (Rafael) II

T'as raison,

But we're the 31th and I'm going to "jaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaam" tonight :P

Happy new years Frank :)

Rafael

* * * * *

love those hot jams!

In Freedom,
Frank Moore

RE: Philip Huang commented on your note "last performance of the year" (Rafael)

"I think our bodies are bacon cheese burgers. Our bodies are meant to be loved and play with, to have fun with. They are instruments of love"

Now, why don't I get any girl "Frankly" telling me that ?

Guess I don't know the right girls :D

You lucky beast, Frank :)

* * * * *

well, i never have believed in the concept of THE RIGHT GIRL... Or in RIGHT.... Or in GIRL... or in GETTING...

In Freedom,
Frank Moore

Philip Huang commented on your note "last performance of the year".

Philip Huang commented on your note "last performance of the year".

Philip wrote: "This is a very thorough account of the show. I keep thinking about what that man said, that our bodies are just meat, and what frightens me is my own reluctance to confront my own vanity and shame. He's right, we're just meat. And Frank's right--comfort is the ultimate means of control."

* * * * *

Philip, I think our bodies are bacon cheese burgers. Our bodies are meant to be loved and play with, to have fun with. They are instruments of love. They are the tip of the iceberg of who we are. But they are definitely a part of who we are.

glad that the performance made you confront whatever. Art should do that. I don't know what shame is. And I am too cute to be vane!

We shouldn't confuse real comfort with "zones of comfort," which really are prisons of fragility making people easier to control and to limit. Real comfort is extremely flexible and supple and absorbent and inclusive, warm juicy! It Sticks to your ribs when you journey outside of the margins.

In Freedom,
Frank Moore

Re: on xmas...

(Frank wrote:)

We have an extra copy of the Billy Bob Thornton movie, "Badder Santa". Would you like to have it?

* * * * *

HI Frank,

We don't need it but thanks for the offer! I enjoyed that movie more than I thought I would.

I hope you had a good Christmas. I survived mine, not my favorite holiday by any stretch. I still get bitter that being a Jew I have to do anything on Christmas but we can get into that rant later.

First my thoughts on the show, and I am still thinking about it. One of the things I thought about the most and afterward was the notion of uncomfortable. I found it interesting that nudity is one of the main things you use to get people uncomfortable, why do you think that is? While other people's nudity does not make me uncomfortable I know that I would not have been willing to get naked so obviously I have some major level of uncomfortableness with it. I would also love to see a show where people get just as uncomfortable without taking off their clothes. I would have liked to hear more from all the people there, it was very interesting to me why they came and how they were feeling. I loved the reading of the poem, to me that was the perfect example of someone feeling uncomfortable with what was happening around her but participating and getting really into it. Her reading was awesome. What made me most uncomfortable of all was that I would be asked to do something I didn't want to do, and that it wouldn't be ok if I didn't want to do it. I have generally avoided group participation activities for that reason, and in a larger sense have always felt like an outsider in this country for that reason. I don't stand for the national anthem because this is not the land of the free, and it should be my right not to, but that somehow makes me unpatriotic. But I realized at that show that I trust you, and even more that I am ok with myself so I did feel that uncomfortableness go away and I had a lot of fun. The reason I came was to see you perform. I would say that 90% of the people I work with don't get better, and in fact most get worse. It is really emotionally taxing to spend that much time with a group of people who know that they can no longer do the things they love and who are so sad. The opportunity to see someone who I met when he was recovering from some major medical catastrophes and came to care about back up on stage doing something he loves was the most fun for me. I also think that in a lot of ways doing therapy with you was a zone of uncomfortable fun. I struggle with the profession of swallowing for many many reasons. Here was this guy who if I listened to the textbooks, and to other colleagues, and to lawsuit happy America I would have believed shouldn't be eating. But I have always believed in quality of life and not giving into fear, and as I got to know you and be more comfortable with all of you it became really fun to challenge the naysayers and watch you eating. It was also fun to let go of my worries. You were also my first home trach, I have always worked with a team of nurses and respiratory therapists who are helping me monitor things. But I tell you, Linda and Mikee were the best team I could have asked for.

Please add me the e-salon email list! And I am glad I have become family. I hope things are going well, I will discuss movies in the next email.

Love Miriam

* * * * *

welcome to the e-salon, Miriam!

Hey, Bad Santa is a Jew, or at least his girlfriend is.

the nudity and eroticism are quick Tools [at least in this uptight country] to get under /beyond the casual, social, the normal, and other margins which keep people away from freedom so that we will start exploring, playing together tribally. And it works. People come to the "audience participation experiential performance " with that context clearly displayed. So they came for that, even if they don't know exactly what that means or includes. Not knowing exactly is the spice of life. Trust is the key to unlocking the "zones of comfort" [which really are prisons of fragility]. Really the trust I am speaking of doesn't have a subject. You trust me because you trust yourself because you trust life. That trust is a rugged comfort.

I am getting together with Maggie [who read my poem] Wednesday!

Well, if I didn't have you and Kerbavaz who are willing to go against the prevailing expectations, it would have been much harder for me to beat the curse of their expectations, judgments, projections. This curse is most certainly why I ended up in the ICU in the first place! [they couldn't ask me if I was breathing ok!] Of course I would be dead without my tribal body of Linda, Mikee, Corey, Alexi and Erika. And there are the hundreds of people who kicked my ass not to die and gave us what we needed to survive. Of course all of that came from a lifetime of living outside of the prevailing expectations, building tribal relationships, exploring erotically!

Hey, if they were so wrong about me, wonder how many of your other patients they are wrong about!

NO CAN NOTS

By

FRANK MOORE

Sunday, April 28, 2002

Talking to future healers

& teachers

& maybe future

muckrakers & troublemakers

Well,

Not really future

Because hopefully

You are doing IT

RIGHT NOW!

Hopefully

I’m not talking to the future guards

Of the corporate normalcy

Armed with can nots,

Limiting futures from birth,

Enforcing coloring only within the lines,

Enforcing doing everything

THE RIGHT WAY

THE NORMAL WAY

In Freedom,
Frank Moore

RE: L'idealiste II

:)

Invisible connection Uncle Frank ; my creative mind is like that big baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaall of fire right now ;

amazing how a single word can have so many sens, and taken out of a clear context, can create original thinking from people

* * * * *

at least, we try, don't we?!

In Freedom,
Frank Moore

Holiday Card

Frank, Linda, Mikey, Erika, Alexi, Corey

Just got your holiday card- what a delightful, simple message of love – compare to all the schmaltzy, garish gibberish on all the other cards that clog up our mailbox.

Thank you for being you – and for being there for us.

Love you too

Suzy

Susan M. Block, Ph.D.
The Dr. Susan Block Show

* * * * *

shucks, Suzy! Ain't that why we are here ... To be here for one another?!

In Freedom,
Frank Moore

Re: Englishman in NY (Paul)

Frankie,

They do you mean 'they' as in Medicaid??

Okay, so you are to produce a written document dated before 1968.

Why that year?

Have you or your doctors brought to 'their' attention that medical science teaches CP happens at birth.

Ugh.

Paul

* * * * *

I am trying to collect on my Dad's social security so I can get Medicare years from now. I just googled definitions of Cerebral palsy. While most definitions say at birth, some definitions say up to eighteen. But dealing with THEM, it is not a question of science /medicine, but having the right papers that fit into their system.

In Freedom,
Frank Moore

Fw: Englishman in NY (Rafael)

No, no, no, no, non :

I'm not a kid anymore and saw some performances on youtube, and honestly, was curiously surprised and shocked as this was new to my understanding of human possibilities in our near futuristic world

"Artists and musicians come up to me today and say they saw the O.B.R. when they were kids and thought if we could do that, they could do what they dreamt";

This last phrase resumes it all:

the kid inside me still thinks he can do what he dreams he Will :)

Thank you Frank :)

Rafael

* * * * *

hey, I am just doing my job as an artist!

In Freedom,
Frank Moore

Re: Englishman in NY (Miriam)

Vernon and I just had a discussion about this actually. One of his coworkers catalogued some footage of you and she said she had a hard time watching it. I had to wonder, if it had been naked and erotic but not someone she perceived as "different" if it would have bothered her at all. Vernon and I decided probably not. One of the best people I have known in my life had CP, and people would literally freak out when he tried to communicate with them. What is it that threatens people so much? This I have not figured out. Is it fear that they won't know how to communicate, or do they actually think something bad is going to happen to them? I would love your perspective on this Frank. And I say thank you for challenging people's stereotypes.

Hope all is well,
Miriam

* * * * *

mmmmmm, the footage Parr didn't pay for!

Miriam, there are a lot of layers to it. did she say why she had a hard time watching? Can't imagine being so fragile... And then admitting it! Well, someone like me shouldn't be able to be on stage. So just me being on stage destroys the agreed upon reality of limitations. Then I am not THE SWEET CRIP ARTIST. Then I do confrontational art. Then I am happy, doing what I want, having a great life on every level. All of this destroys the excuses they use for not being happy, not doing what they want to do, etc. And I am sexy [it's the CP curse]! How can somebody like me be sexy, especially when THEY don't feel sexy. So they have to deny it. Maybe someone is forcing me, exploiting me, abusing me. Or I must be an extraordinary spiritual being to overcome my physical.... Well, you get my drift. Anything to avoid they can be happy, sexy, etc.

in the world, a lot of people use crips as Screens to project their own fears, limitations, etc upon. Then they relate to these projections. And the CP's innate sexiness just deepens these projections.

In my OUTRAGEOUS BEAUTY REVUE in the late seventies, there was a cast of thirty people, including four guys in wheelchairs [playing people!].

The show was in bad taste, was called "exploitive". What made it thus was not just what was done, but who was doing it...crips, women and other "untalented" unfortunates. The first assumption of the people who were offended was that these were able-bodied actors making fun of crips; then, when it became clear we were real crips, the leap into dumbness was that someone was exploiting us. When they got it into their heads that we had created our own acts, the new way to deny our power was to say we were exploiting our own bodies. Forget nudity. Forget being sexual. Just by getting up onto the stage we were exploiting our own bodies. Women share this hidden yoke of suppression. By breaking this yoke, by offending a lot of people, the show released, inspired, and liberated a lot more. Artists and musicians come up to me today and say they saw the O.B.R. when they were kids and thought if we could do that, they could do what they dreamt.

To be continued...

In Freedom,
Frank Moore

Fw: Englishman in NY

(Frank wrote:)

or don't threaten the personal isolation that produces the profits for the corporate combine and the imposed limitations which remove personal responsibility!

they [the people who freak out at my work ] are jealous of the joy and the freedom [which is erotic] that comes from the taking Of personal responsibility to risk to do what they really want.

In Freedom,
Frank Moore

* * * * *

(Rafael wrote:)

Totally agree on that : you're a living example of it ;

a Movie will never replace this. Nor will any music :)

Hope it will give some people the curiosity to start a relationship with you, through the e-salon or by assisting your performances.

* * * * *

shucks, Rafael!

Btw, you can still watch the complete video of the NOTE performance at http://www.eroplay.com/Cave/thenote2009/index.html. I don't believe in Depending on sites like YOUTUBE to get the work out!

In Freedom,
Frank Moore

Re: Fw: Englishman in NY

(Rafael wrote:)

Can't believe those assholes !

* * * * *

absolutely true! Jack Smith said.." and the more tragic the artists
the more they dangle them in front of the public..because it
increases the vampire thrill"

dont die Frank because there will be so many movie of the week about
you it will make everyone heads spin...

xoxoxpenny

* * * * *

well, I could put in my will that you must play me in any movie about me, considering that you and I are the same person! But, yes, they are waiting until I am dead to do any movie, etc. about me!

Now they are making me find a piece of paper from anytime before 1968 that says I have cerebral palsy to prove I had cerebral palsy since birth in order for me to be able to get Medicare. They don't want a doctor to tell them that.. They need a paper trail!

In Freedom,
Frank Moore

Fw: Englishman in NY

Obviously , you are too sexy by yourself for YouTube! There is a song
in that! But look at the censorship climate that never goes sway! It
is 1990 all over again with the wojnrovic piece being pulled last
week..meanwhile lady gaga is having no problems!

Love penny

* * * * *

hey, Rod Stewart should do that song, Penny! Ain't that really why they didn't want you anywhere near that movie? You are too fucking sexy. You would have shown how flat, mainstream that film was just by contrast. But what were the reasons they gave for not letting you audition for the Penny role and for keeping the actors away from you?

In Freedom,
Frank Moore

RE: Englishman in NY

(Rafael wrote:)

Whatever could make money or goes in the sens of money generating industries, even if provoking, won't ever pose a problem, Frank: even profound and serious matters are too often prostituted into commercial venues, would it be to discriminate them.

I'd say too many are jealous of you having those sexual powers, man ! :D

* * * * *

or don't threaten the personal isolation that produces the profits for the corporate combine and the imposed limitations which remove personal responsibility!

they [the people who freak out at my work ] are jealous of the joy and the freedom [which is erotic] that comes from the taking Of personal responsibility to risk to do what they really want.

In Freedom,
Frank Moore

RE: Englishman in NY

(Rafael wrote:)

Can't believe those assholes !

Re: Englishman in NY

on a similar note... I have always said the eroticism and nudity is not the real reason why people freak out about my work. YOUTUBE has been taking down [aka censoring] my videos for years. There are a lot of videos up that have as much, if not more, nudity and eroticism as mine. YOUTUBE won't say why they took stuff down, won't engage in dialog. So last week they took down [or rather we discovered that they had taken down] the part one of a three-part video that had been up for a couple of years. It is of a thirty minute performance I did at THE NOTE THEATER in Hollywood a few years back. Keep in mind that they only took the first part down and left the other two parts up. Basically the first part was me sitting nude on the stage singing with my live band and beckoning to the audience. Ok, the three nude girls came out the last minute of the first part. But things got HOT in the second part [which is STILL UP!]. And in the third part [STILL UP!] a lot of the audience members [including a hot babe who took her blouse off and writhed on my lap] got on stage to dance with me and the three nude girls [this was before I saw your performance!]!

Now my question is... Am I, a nude crip, too sexy by myself for YOUTUBE?!

In Freedom,
Frank Moore

Re: Englishman in NY

hey you guys

Thanks for your funny spirited message re the film...The director would not even let me audition to play myself..and wouldnt let Cynthia or John hurt even see video of Quenti Crisp and I! It is too bad..QC and I were quite a trop togther!!!

Hope you are thriving!

xoxoxpenny

* * * * *

and it shows in the movie! A black wig doesn't make Penny Arcade!

They have to include us. But they want THEIR versions of us, all cleaned up and quaint. They can't wait until we die so they can make us into their image without having to deal with us.

In Freedom,
Frank Moore