subway preachers & showtunes
how fabulous — k. r. munson defeats subway preachers with showtunes:
(Note: This is not me. I just think it’s cool.)
This morning I had the most bizarre subway ride. I board the Number 3 train at Grand Army Plaza after 9 a.m. Find a seat, then settle into reading Henry James for class. I hear a woman’s voice gradually rising in volume. She is preaching the “Lord’s” word to the train car’s sleepy riders. Of course, I had forgotten the headphones for my subway evil sounds blocking device. The train stops and starts.
The words denigrating “gay devils” reach my ears. I stand up.Me: “Excuse me, but do you mind keeping your voice down, I am trying to read.”
Preacher Lady: (screams) “I got to testify.”
Preacher lady hitches up her skirts and tells me that I am going to hell for interrupting you-know-who’s word. Two or three OTHER Christian ladies on the train start shouting at me and discussing my prospects as the Devil’s prison bitch. The last straw was a 50 something red faced man in a suit slamming his Bible towards my face.
There was only one thing I could do.
Me: “If you all don’t lower your voices and cease calling me Satan, I will have to sing show tunes.”
The other straphangers look at me with stony faces.
I begin to sing.
“Its very clear, our love is here to stay. Not for a year, but forever and a day…”
Preacher lady and the Jesus police start mumbling and beseeching G_d to strike me down and boil me in molten tar. (I look better in silver.)
The train reaches Wall Street. Confused subway riders check out the scene. I begin swaying and feeling the music.
The slamming Bible man looks like he is going to pop a blood vessel. “I cast ye out, Satan.”
I go into jazz dance crouch and then spring up to belt out, “THAAAAAAT OLD BLACK MAGIC, HAS ME IN A SPELL…”
Bible man has to get off the train as I wriggle and shimmy. “That same old witchcraft when your eyes meet mine!”
Bible man exits. SHOW TUNES 1, FUNDAMENTALISTS 0.
“So when you walk alone and forlorn, and hear that Cadillac horn remember, love isn’t born, its made…and that’s why every window has a window shade…bad a biddle be bop…”
I try to discuss freedom of religion with the ladies, but all attempts at reasonable discourse fail.
By 34th street, the last of the Christian word warriors has left the train. 3 subway riders shake my hand and say, “I have always wanted to tell those idiots to shut up! Bless you.”
I am shaking. I don’t know what comes over me at times like this. I only know that I cannot stay silent. I wish that I had my ukulele with me.
At 42nd street, a woman strides into the car and starts PREACHING. The entire car bursts into laughter. I interrupt this new preacher lady and note that she is wearing a flowered straw bonnet.
Me: “Excuse me, Ma’am…but I must warn you that there has been a 12 subway stop donnybrook regarding the unwanted intrusion of religious beliefs into our morning commutes.”
Preacher Lady 2: “I got freedom of speech! And GOD TELLS ME THAT THE GAY DEVILS ARE CONTROLLING NEW YORK.”
Me: (standing up) “If you do not cease and desist fouling the air with homophobia, I must sing…SHOW TUNES.”
There are now 3 or 4 gay men on the train. They start laughing.
Preacher Lady 2: “The Lawd says you are going to …” (litany of punishments that would be fun with the right person).
Me: (sings) “The Girl that I marry will have to be, as soft and as sweet as a nursery… the girl I call my own, will wear diamonds and laces and smell of cologne…”
One of the boys on the train starts to harmonize.
Preacher Lady 2 makes her way down the car, pointing and exclaiming, “I have met the devil right here!”
Me: (sings) “Whatever Lola wants, Lola gets…”
Dancing around the subway poles and doing my best Gwen Verdon kicks, I feel the spirit in me.
I close with “Pennies from Heaven” and make sure to get the Jazz Hands in for good measure.
As Preacher Lady 2 runs to the next car at 72nd Street, the doors open, a perfect end of song button for my gay pointing gesture.
The subway riders break into applause and I bow. Rock on.
Several straphangers whisper, Happy New Year to me in Hebrew.
An Orthodox lady hands me an orange.
I don’t know if I should laugh or cry.
***************
This was written by K.R. Munson
Copyright 2004
Please give credit when quoting this material.
Please don’t steal my stuff.
algorithmically similar posts:
» unsex me — no, really, 2005-05-22 (score:23)» barking dogs != relaxation (or security), 2008-03-11 (score:12)
» christian conservatism — radical christ, 2004-10-27 (score:12)
» Bolivian Activist HipHop & Copyright, 2005-05-26 (score:12)
June 21st, 2005 at 11:59 am
[...] er I came across the showtune singing riders version of this encounter, which can be found here.
Leave a Reply [...]
April 24th, 2008 at 9:57 am
Holy shit! New York is either 10 times more fun than Boston, or you guys have 10 times worse a street-preacher problem!
I’ve seen plenty of lame preachers masquerading as “street/subway performers”, but never had those bastards actually get onto the trains and start their crapola. They usually get a permit to be a “subway station musical performer”, and then just preach with a minimum amount of actual talent or music. They end up being more annoying than anything. As soon as I see my first subway-car preacher in Boston, I’m going to definitely follow your lead, but instead of Show tunes, I’d have to do Opera or Tom Lehrer songs.
April 24th, 2008 at 10:11 am
I just did a search on this phenomenon, and apparently, NYC has an epidemic of in-the-car preachers! People are complaining about it in dozens of blogs! Apparently, there is a whole organized campaign by a large evangelical church group to do this, and they try to cover as many different lines as possible! This is nuts!
My advice — get as many people who want them out to use their camera-phone to get pictures of these people, and send them all to the transportation authority, so that they can do something to ban the activity. That’s at least what they do in Boston — there are signs posted in the cars that if anyone is behaving suspicious, lewd, or is harrassing or inappropriately touching women, that you can send your camera-phone snapshots of them to the authorities.
April 24th, 2008 at 10:39 am
Well, it was K.R. Munson that did it, but it was awesome.
… As for the trend: I saw a number of them during my time in NYC. Sometimes I muttered angrily or occasionally responded to an absurd claim. I could never quite get the courage to actually sing showtunes.
If this kind of behavior is on the rise, I wonder if the religios are particularly wrought up or excited about something? Some kind of full-moon effect for Christians? Or maybe the economic downturn is giving unemployed Christian fundagelicals more time to bother everyone else.
April 24th, 2008 at 2:42 pm
I just checked with the New York City Transit Authority, and they said that despite the first Amendment, it is unlawful to shout create a scene in a subway car, so these preachers are violating the law. if they shout and are persistant about shouting, they can be kicked off the train.
If you want to press this, tell the NYC transit police that the culprit is Rev. Frank Meyer from the Church of Christ, International. I researched this, and foudn that his ministry is specifically the one that organizes subway car preaching. He started his ministry in 1996, but I guess it grew recently.
The Church of Christ, international, is one of those extremist religious cults — evangelicals who live in communal homes, eating Ramen Soup and giving all their money to the cult, while a “shepherd” watches over the group home. They had some houses in the Boston area, where I’m from, and they still show up from time to time on street corners, but thankfully, no subway cars yet. Hope this info helps you, if you someday find that show tunes don’t shut them up. :)