CHAPTER THIRTY-0NE -- HARVEY FIERSTEIN ON BROADWAY

(Did You Sleep With the Models?)

In October 1981, shortly before taking the job at Modernismo Publications that would lead to my becoming editor-in-chief of Mandate, Honcho, and Playguy, I accepted a friend’s invitation to an off-Broadway play with the curious title Torch Song Trilogy. Is this, I wondered, an evening of songs made famous by such singers as Helen Morgan, Libby Holman, Julie London, Billie Holiday — ninety minutes of weepy, in-the-cups ballads like “Stormy Weather,” “Smoke Gets in Your Eyes,” “Cry Me a River.”