Jillian Lauren

Yesterday, I played a dead ballerina in Margaret Cho’s outrageous new music video. I can’t say too much about it, but I can say that it shocked even me. It was directed by my friend Liam Sullivan, better known as Kelly, of “Shoes” fame. Here’s a picture of Penny Starr Jr. and me as we waited for our big moment.

Music video sets can be dangerous, in that you sit around for far too long and sometimes wind up saying too much out of boredom. Kind of like a bar, without the drinking part. For instance, I sat down next to Ryan Heffington (only my favorite choreographer in the whole universe) and poured my heart out about all of my little girl dance-class-damage. Maybe it was the purple tutu that made me get emotional. Luckily, he was as lovely as can be and I walked away swearing to attend his legendary Sweaty Sundays dance class this week. And I will, darn it.

I’ll let you know how it goes.

I indulged in a rare night out and went to see my Lil’ Boo, Selene Luna, perform her one woman show Chiquita! at the Cavern Theater. She’s been honing her stand-up chops opening for Margaret Cho and she had the whole room wrapped around her finger.

When we hang out, the fact that Lil’ Boo is, well, little, usually only comes into play when I have to do squats for us to take pictures together. But when I see her on stage, particularly when she’s shimmying in a burlesque costume, the e.e. cummings phrase “intense fragility” comes to mind, though I’m sure she’ll kick my ass for saying it. I know my fierce friend is going to take umbrage with the word fragile, but I believe we look to performers to mirror our own fragility back to us. Selene always finds a way to do this that is both ballsy and hilarious.

Go see her. She’s performing with her comedy partner Nadya Ginsburg on October 14 at UCB.