Smurfs

I voice Gutsy Smurf in this 3D film which hits cinemas in summer 2011

Sir Billi The Vet

I voice Gordon the goat, the sidekick to Sean Connery's Sir Billi in this animated Highland extravaganza from Glasgow Animation.

Feinstein's at the Loews Regency

I took a trimmed down version of my cabaret show (me, Lance Horne on piano and Yair Evnine on cello and guitar) uptown to Feinstein's, for the first of a two week run.

Initially I felt I wasn't the right choice for such a venue, and maybe I'm not, but what is the right choice anyway?! All I know is, I really enjoyed the challenege of taking my songs and my opinions and stories to a demographic that hadn't neccesarily sought me out.  It felt actually really exciting, and kept me on my toes both physically and intellectually.  So, another of those 'Don't judge a book by its cover, cos maybe it's not the book but they way you read it or the way it reads you, that matters!' learning curves.

I don't put quotes from reviews up on this blog, but please forgive me this once, as the New York Times called me 'a modern day Noel Coward'!  I mean, come on!. It doesn't get much better than that.

Almost In Love

Almost in Love was written and directed by my friend Sam Neave.  It's a film made up of two 45 minute shots. Yes, only two very long shots in the whole film!  He had shown me the first part -  set on a rooftop patio looking back at the NYC skyline - earlier in the year and I was really impressed, and so when he asked me to play a character in the second half of the movie, set a few years later, I jumped at the chance.

We shot in a beautiful house in the Hamptons, and the story picks up at the wedding party of one of the characters. It's late, everyone has been drinking and old buttons are freshly pressed.

What was amazing about doing this was that the end of the 45 minute take had to coincide with the sun coming up.  So we had a really weird working schedule: getting up at 1am or so and getting ready, having a few drinks to get us in the proper party mood (!) and then shooting till daylight. Then we'd stay up and have another few drinks before going to bed again.  Most days I had to go back to NYC to shoot The Good Wife or have meetings, so I was pretty exhausted by the end of the week.  But it's an experience I wouldn't have missed for the world.

Here' s a little film I made after shooting ended one morning...

Talk shows

Zorgamazoo

I read Zorgamazoo by Robert Paul Weston, for Penguin Audiobooks. It's entirely in verse and was really fun to do.

OUT magazine article

I wrote this article for the April issue of OUT

GLAAD Media Awards

I was the host of the GLAAD Media Awards in New York City. Here's a little film I made about the evening.

Masterpiece Mystery

I went to Boston and shot my third season as host of Masterpiece Mystery on PBS.

The Good Wife

I joined the first season of The Good Wife on CBS as a guest star to play Eli Gold for a few episodes. The show stars Julianna Margulies as Alicia, whose politician husband, played by Chris Noth, has been involved in a sex scandal.

Playing Eli is fascinating for me because he is a grown-up. He is a man in a suit. They even put grey in my hair, which is quite funny considering my hair was colored, so they were actually putting grey on top of color on top of grey! He is an image consultant, a reputation rehabilitator, and he is Jewish. He is a million miles away from me. Also I was filming in gaps between shooting Burlesque with Cher and Christina Aguilera, in which I play a club door whore with black nail varnish and Comme des Garcons outfits, so the whole experience was a little schizophrenic.

But I learned something.  Initially I thought I didn't understand Eli, he seemd so far away from me and I was unused to the process of TV series acting. But then I just altered my opinion of him and instead of thinking I don't relate to him because he has a life that I don't comprehend, I thought he is exotic like every human being and I can understand that.