F. Murray Abraham is soon-to-be unemployed from his soon-to-be unemployed Broadway musical “Queen of Versailles.”
Abraham told me: “While making ‘Scarface’ I got another movie role at the same time. I flew from Hollywood to Prague to shoot both at the same time. I’d study flying one way then the other script the way back. Four times.
“You may even see same gestures from those two back-to-back films — but you have to look carefully.
“I’m now in the American Theater Hall of Fame and my first job was playing Santa Claus at Macy’s and I had to say ‘Merry Christmas’ in different languages. I spoke Spanish.
“Being from El Paso I got a scholarship. My father wouldn’t pay for college for me to be an actor.
“The scholarship was for $100 and I was to play a Scotsman. Imagine the accent. I even wore a kilt.
“I’m in good shape but my knees and hearing’s slipping. I work on memory. I memorize sonnets to keep myself fresh. The other day I looked at [his “Queen of Versailles” co-star] Kristin Chenoweth onstage and I’d forgotten my line.”
What’s the “F” in your name stand for?
“Fahrid. It’s a tribute to my father. I didn’t think Murray Abrahamsaid anything so I added the F. It says something.
“Today audiences are different. They’re drunk, or staring at their phones.
“If necessary I just say from the stage — ‘Usher, throw them out. I’ll return their money.’ It’s an insult. Or they’re eating candy.”
Odd things
STUFF I’ve collected that I don’t know what to do with: Anderson Cooper to Details mag: “Going gray is like ejaculating. You know it can happen prematurely, but when it does it comes as a shock” . . . Age 5, Andy Roddick so certain of his future fame that he gave everyone in his family tennis balls for Christmas . . . Christina Ricci saw a therapist to overcome fear that she’d be yelled at by strangers if she left the house . . . Calista Flockhart: “If I had big boobs, none of this would’ve happened. Thin, you have it together which makes people mad. It pisses them off. Some are cranky because I’m skinny. I mean, who’d walk up to someone who’s overweight and say, ‘Ugh! You’re so fat.’ It just sucks. Nothing I can do about it.”
Little green men
ALIENS are among us. Not just from across our border. Things are now labeled unidentified anomalous phenomena. The new-ish “Age of Disclosure” has unearthed unearthly things. Marco Rubio, Kirsten Gillibrand, and Navy pilots who’ve seen things talk of phenomena whizzing past. Stuff even heavier than James Comey. Former UAP Task Force Director Jay Stratton: “We’re leading research and now know more than China and Russia. They spy on us, we spy on them. When Russian agents followed my family I had to leave my government job. Even President Trump wants to hear more. The film is revelatory — but more’s to come.” Thing’s on Amazon.
COMING up is awards season. So a movie star comes into the bar with a gorilla and orders two martinis. The bartender says: “What’s he do? Act, sing, dance, tell jokes . . . what?” The actor says, “He does nothing.” Bartender: “Then why’d you bring him into this bar?” The actor says: “He’s my agent.”
Only in New York, kids, only in New York.
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