I can’t recall the last time I was bombarded with as many quotable lines, as I was at Monday night’s opening of Never Sleep Alone.  A mix of performance art, sex therapy, and bawdy comedy, with a heavy level of audience participation; NSA features “sociosexual scientist” Dr. Alex Schiller - a postmodern mash-up of Dr. Ruth Westheimer, Demi Moore, and Patti LuPone – in a limited-engagement in the Spiegeltent (home of Absinthe) at Caesars Palace, that ends with a special Valentine’s show, at 12:30am on Sunday morning (or late Saturday night, if that’s the way you roll).

Dr. Alex is the founder of the NSA Method; and as anyone who’s ever been on Grindr or Tinder (or whatever the kids are doing these days) can tell you, NSA is an acronym for No Strings Attached.* The NSA Method incorporates a number of acronyms.  Some that had me rolling in the aisles include: CMA|MBO (Confident Movement Attracts Mind-Blowing Orgasms), BFF = UCB (Best Friend Forever = Ultimate Cock-Block), BDSM (Be Direct, Seem Mysterious), GDGH (Go Down or Go Home), LGBT (Leave Grindr Behind, Tonight), and my favorite, MSM (Miss Saigon Mentality) summed-up as “Be all you can be, and get on the goddamned helicopter!”

One of the first words of NSA advise uttered by Dr. Alex (performed by the show’s creator, Roslyn Hart, who’s not a real doctor) came when she asked the audience “Why wouldn’t Kermit fuck Miss Piggy?”  (“Because she’s a puppet – controlled by the strings of her expectations, and thus unfuckable.”)  This got my attention, but quick.  Another pearl of wisdom was to “Stop hanging-out with cock-blockers who find you sexually irrelevant.”

One particular gem that had many in the audience chin-wagging was “Oral sex is like working-out at the gym; if you just keep going for ten more minutes, people will think you’re hotter.” 

In between all of these life lessons, audience members were brought on-stage, and thrown into such activities as a raunchy game of Twister; as well as a lesson in oral sex that found a woman shoving a guy’s face into a wedge of watermelon held in her crotch, followed (in a brilliant example of what’s good for the goose being good for the gander) by the woman proceeding (with gusto) to devour the peeled banana that he held in the area my grandmother might’ve referred to as “south of his pipik.”

The show’s brilliance is that Hart is so method about inhabiting the character of Dr. Alex (once she dons the wig, the heels, and the power-suit – not to mention the sexy lingerie – she is Dr. Alex) that you can’t help but be caught-up in the whole thing.  Not only is there an actual book (Never Sleep Alone – Gallery Books|Simon & Schuster, 2015), but Hart (as Dr. Alex) accepts clients for one-on-one life coaching!  (For reals!)  She's even started her own nonprofit, We All Win (committed to hooking-up blind people with ugly people).

The soundtrack of the show – the lyrics for which are displayed on a large screen, karaoke-style, to encourage the audience’s participation – includes such seemingly disparate (all of which, upon closer inspection, are linked by sexual overtones) songs as “Like A Prayer” by Madonna, “Smells Like Teen Spirit” by Nirvana, “Moves Like Jagger” by Maroon 5, “Closer” by Nine Inch Nails, “Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)” by Eurythmics, “Let’s Get It On” by Marvin Gaye, “Glory of Love” by Peter Cetera, “Medley: Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In (The Flesh Failures)” by The 5th Dimension (although it was originally in the musical Hair), “Billie Jean” by Michael Jackson, and “Gimme Everything Tonight” by Planet Hollywood resident, Pitbull – all played with flair, by the band, led by musical director Adam Rhodes.

As the show ended, I felt wonderful.  Not because I’d hooked-up with another member of the audience (that’s what the SINGLES section was for; while I was comfortably ensconced in the VIP VOYEUR section); but because I’d laughed my ass off, with this smart, clever, witty woman who’d not only treated the audience members like puppets, but called them that, as well.  That takes balls, and I’ve always loved a ballsy gal (which probably answers all sorts of questions about me).  Thanks, Dr. Alex!

Never Sleep Alone
The Spiegeltent|Caesars Palace
Click HERE for info and tickets

Get into it!
#NeverSleepAlone

[* Editor’s Note: When I first saw the acronym NSA on one such app, I was absolutely flummoxed as to how the National Security Agency figured into hooking-up.  Nor, for that matter, could I imagine why all the people looking for a LTR wanted someone to write them a letter. Oh well...  Live and learn!]