Time for Tulsa Gridiron

I've heard it said a time or two, that I look something like someone else.

Sometimes I remind someone of an obscure relative, a friend from their high school days or their favorite checker at the grocery store. Every now and then people look at me and see Angelina Jolie. While these people should be sainted and given a lifetime supply of chocolates, fancy cigars and the priciest Scotch, I most certainly am not Angelina Jolie.

But go ahead and throw in gold-plated toilet seats for the lovely people in the Jolie camp. These people deserve luxury in exchange for their kindness.

Other times, though, some folks - especially Republican types (you know who you are) - see someone else. They see the giant, out-of-date hair and the librarian glasses and the vacant stare and see but who else, the lipstick bulldog herself, Sarah Palin.

Right. All I need now are Bump-Its, bangs and a few more episodes of Fargo for extra accent study and I am so there.

Unfortunately for my GOP family members (and in the four generations of my family still here in Tulsa I can assure you there are many, many), I'm happy to perform as the former Alaska governor and VP nominee in the 2010 Tulsa Gridiron show.

Let me be the first to let you in on what exactly Gridiron is all about: it's a musical, theatrical skewering of anything that made the news over the course of the past year. The stories that were splayed on the front page of local papers, on local TV screens and local airwaves are given particular attention, creating a show with all levels of appeal. All proceeds are funneled into scholarships for journalism students.

Because, let's face it, journalism students need all the help - monetarily and otherwise - that they can get. Not that I would know anything about that.

The show hits the stage in the Liddy Doenges Theatre in the Tulsa Performing Arts Center, 110 E. Second Street, March 12. The second show is March 13. Tickets are $25 for general admission seats. You can sit up front and close to the action at a cabaret table for $50. Tickets are available at the Tulsa PAC and Reasor's locations all the way up until showtime.

If you're hungry for a preview, get to the Tulsa Press Club, in the Atlas Life Building (you know, the one being remodeled as a Courtyard Hotel) at Fifth Street and Boston Avenue, Wednesday evening from 5:30-7pm for “That’s Funny!” the Tulsa Gridiron Sneak Preview and One-Night Ticket Stimulus Extravaganza.

This is your chance to see a live, musical performance from the show. It's also when you can snag exclusive, one-night deals on tickets to the 77th Tulsa Gridiron show.

Tiger Woods Special. Get general admission tix at the group discount price - that's $20 per ticket, or $5 off the regular price - when you bring hard copy of any news story, blog post or headline featuring Tiger Woods.

City of Tulsa Hardship Special. City employees, God bless 'em, get a discount on cabaret seating, tickets that are regularly $50 per. Current (or recently former) employees of the City of Tulsa are eligible for the price, which is $75 for two.

VIP Wine and Friends Special. Buy a VIP cabaret table Wednesday night and get an additional bottle of wine at the table and two general admission tickets for the same performance.

The Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin Experience x2. Here's a funny thing: Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin will be in Tulsa the same day as the March 13 performance of Gridiron. If you have tickets to that tea party of tea parties and you bring it to the Press Club tomorrow night, you get a deal on a cabaret-table seat for the show. Just show your advance-purchase ticket or receipt for the Beck/Palin show and get $10 off a cabaret seat for the March 12 or 13 performance.

You can count on "Glenn" and "Sarah" being on stage at the Tulsa Gridiron performance, too. You can also count on "Sarah" wearing a kevlar vest. "Sarah" hears the real Sarah is quite a shot.

Here's another bonus: If you're a member of the Tulsa Press Club, you're eligible for an extra goody. Your name is entered for a special drawing for a Flip Mino camcorder if you buy your Tulsa Gridiron tickets tomorrow night.

To steer clear of the hotel construction going on near the Press Club, enter through the lobby doors on Boston. You might just get to use the intercom. Don't be shy - the folks at the Press Club will buzz you right in.

I know that the preview isn't until Wednesday night. That's several, many, lots of hours from now. So, I'm going to give you a preview right now.

See the blonde? That's Kerry Malone. Kerry is producing the 2010 Gridiron. She's also director of communications at Williams - you know, that $19 billion oil and gas company for which the largest skyscraper in Tulsa is named.

Kerry is kind of a big deal.

The lovely lady receiving a swine flu vaccination at the hands of Ms. Malone is none other than Rebecca Ungerman, kick-ass blues and jazz singer extraordinaire and director of this year's Gridiron. Did you know Rebecca was named Best Female Vocalist by Urban Tulsa Weekly at its 2009 Absolute Best Music Awards? It's true. She was.

Rebecca Ungerman, too, is kind of a big deal.

This lovely lady is Sharon King Davis. She made her Tulsa Gridiron debut in 2008 when she sang about Tulsa’s rusty centennial gem, the Belevedere – the buried car. She exhumed the car herself as chairwoman of the Tulsarama Commission in 2007.

That Sharon helped to make a parody of her own pet project is so Gridiron.

Did I mention also that Sharon King Davis is a diva? Did I say anything about her smooth, strong, velvety voice? Did I mention, too, that she's always an absolute peach?

Well, she is. It is. And she is. She can sing about Tulsa's snowy weather with the best of 'em.

There in the middle is Pam Van Dyke. She's a great jazz singer, of course, but she can also crack you up without even trying.

Pam is hilarious.

Hi, Bob (Hendrick - you know, one Tulsa's original Forever Plaid). Hi, Randy (Krehbiel, a byline you know from Tulsa World; he's also chair of the Gridiron trust and our chief author).

Randy is also very, very good at texting. Just so you know.

These...

are attached to Meredith Lee Weger.

Meredith owns Theatre Arts, Inc. She also has something to say about Tulsa's own battle of the car dealers' daughters.

To know what, you're just going to have to buy tickets to this year's Gridiron.

We all know this man as Joe Kelley, host of the KRMG Morning News. It's a good thing his favorite word is interlocutor, because this year's Tulsa Gridiron, that's exactly what he'll be.

We Gridiron folks, we're a big, fun bunch.

And we're ready to help you laugh about everything from the state of Tulsa's streets to what's up with Don't Ask Don't Tell to what's shakin' with Sarah Palin.

You can't claim to be a news junkie and miss this show. It just ain't fittin'.

To be kept apprised of Tulsa Gridiron updates, be sure to follow along on Twitter (@tulsa_gridiron), on Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/tulsagridiron) and on the Web at http://www.tulsagridiron.org.

And stay tuned right here at TashaDoesTulsa.com - there's more Gridiron fun soon to come.

P.S. - That rhymed. I'm sorry.