By Brandon Voss

Originally published on Advocate.com February 04 2009 1:00 AM ET

Marking her first
Los Angeles stage appearance in 25 years, Rita Moreno
will bring her acclaimed one-woman cabaret act Little
Tributes to the Conga Room for a single night on
February 19. One of a very short list of performers to win
an Oscar, Emmy, Tony, and Grammy, the Puerto
Rico–born, New York–bred spitfire has
also won generations of fans with her portrayal of Anita in
the 1961 film version of West Side Story, plus
her work on PBS’s The Electric Company and
HBO’s Oz. Still sassy at 77, Moreno told
Advocate.com why she’s been cruising with the gay
community since her role as a bathhouse betty in
The Ritz.

Advocate.com: You most recently performed Little
Tributes at San Francisco’s Rrazz Room. Did
gay fans come out to show their support?Rita Moreno: They did, and it was great to see
them again. I played Norma Desmond in Sunset
Boulevard in London, so I do a big chunk from that in
the show, and of course gay people just love it -- gay
men, especially, but I get a lot of gay women at my
show too.

What will you be wearing at the Conga Room? Something you will want on your body but
can’t have. [Laughs] For starters, I
wear spectacular shoes. I get on top of the piano a lot, so
the shoes are on full display. And I have some beautiful
gowns. I’ve stopped wearing separates now, so I
have a burnt-orange silk velvet cowl-neck dress that
goes down to the floor, and that one’s a big hit
with the gay crowd. Oh, they go mad! Another is a Diane von
Furstenberg black-and-white print that fits like a
sausage skin -- they all do, actually. But gay men and
women seem to particularly love that I go bare-armed,
which at 77 is a bit of a feat.

Do you have a multitude of gay stylists? Oh, no, it’s all me, a team of one. I am
a multitude. Glamour is my middle name, and you barely
see it anymore -- especially in cabaret. So I go out
there dressed to fuckin’ kill, my dear.

Your show celebrates some unexpected and
underappreciated musical gems from Broadway classics.
Likewise, is there a lower-profile role on your
résumé that’s worthy of more attention? Yes, as a matter of fact. I played Vince
D’Onofrio’s mother in Law and Order:
Criminal Intent in three episodes and died in
the final one. It was a marvelous part. She's dying of
cancer, and she’s schizophrenic, so I look like the
wrath of God in it. After the first day of makeup, I
said, “Do not bring a mirror to me. I do not
want to see myself.”

Have you ever played a lesbian role? No. Isn’t that ridiculous?

Not even your guest spot as Coach Stone on The Nanny? [Laughs] Oh, you remember that one, huh?
She could’ve been. She was more dykey than
anything else. That woman was a guy!

If you were cast as a lesbian, whom would you pick
to play your on-screen lover? What a wonderful question. Who would I really
love to schtupp? I’d have to say Angelina
Jolie. But if I were to pick a Latina, then I would say
Eva Longoria. She’s just hotness.

I sort of hoped you’d say Chita Rivera. How do
you feel about the persistent rumors of your feud
stemming from the fact that, even though she
earned a Tony for playing Anita in West Side
Story, you got to play Anita on film? Oh, it’s gotten very old and boring at
this point. Chita performed at the Rrazz Room
recently, and of course I went to see her, and we laughed
and carried on a lot. And she came to see my show at
Feinstein’s in New York, which was really
delicious because she has the most raucous, dirty laugh
you’ve ever heard. In fact, in my show I tell a
wonderful Chita Rivera–Rita Moreno story, which
I’m not going to give away now because
it’s too good.

Growing up in New York, what was your earliest
exposure to gay people? One of my best friends in grammar school was a
gay boy. Well, I knew he was gay, but he did not. His
name was Eddie Lopez, and we used to have the time of
our lives. We drove everybody in our families crazy because
we couldn’t stop jumping around, singing songs, and
just laughing. He was such a campy Cuban kid with skin
the color of milk, curly blond hair, light blue eyes,
and a pretty little face. For me, it was never anything
complicated. It was the most natural thing. He was just a
terrific person.

When did you first become aware of your gay fan base? My huge gay following started with The
Ritz on Broadway [in 1975]. No question
that’s when they began to know me. On my
closing night in the show, after I’d played Googie
Gomez for about a year and a half, an enormous amount
of gay people came to pay homage. At the curtain call,
about 50 to 60 young men and women literally came up on
the stage, all holding bouquets, and laid them at my feet!
It was astonishing. I didn’t know what to do
with that many flowers, so I put them in the tanks and
in the bowls of the toilets in my apartment because I
couldn’t bear the thought of such beautiful tributes
dying. We couldn’t use our own bathrooms for
about a week! We had to use the neighbor’s
bathroom.

Did you catch the 2007 Broadway revival of The
Ritz with Rosie Perez in your role? No. Rosie invited me, but I was working on the
series Cane. It’s very much a period piece
now. But have you seen the movie version? Because
remember, I am the original Googie. I actually coughed
up the character one day when we were in rehearsals of
West Side Story. Gypsies do two things on
their two-minute breaks: They light a cigarette and they do
crazy bits. One day I said, “OK, here’s this
Puerto Rican character who can’t sing or dance
auditioning for the bus-and-truck of Gypsy.”
We all laughed. Many years later, Terrence McNally saw
me do this crazy character at someone’s party, and
he flipped. I did [in a thick Puerto Rican accent] “I
had a dream, a dream about ju, baby,” and
Terrence fell off his chair. He thought it was the
funniest thing he’d ever seen. A year later he wrote
a play called The Tubs, which later became
called The Ritz, and he wrote a wonderful part
in it based on the character that I had invented. A lot
of people don’t know that. In fact, when I told Rosie
she was surprised.

I’ll bet Mr. McNally isn’t wild about you
sharing that story. [Laughs] I don’t think I’ve
heard him say anything about it, but that’s how
it happened. It was one of the great joys of my life, and,
of course, I got the Tony Award for it.

Did you visit any baths for research? No. In fact, Bette Midler came to the show one
night and thought that it was based on her, and I
said, “Not at all!”

Have you worked with many closeted actors over the years? Oh, I still know certain ones, and it pains me
because they suffer terribly. There’s always
this terrible secret between them and the rest of the
world, and it makes me very sad. In fact, one of my happiest
experiences was in 1979 when I did an RSVP gay cruise -- the
first gay cruise with entertainment. What my husband,
Lenny, and I loved most about the experience was that
there were no secrets on that ship. On a gay cruise,
it’s all out in the open; everyone is relaxed and
having a terrific time. People were what they were,
and that was so unusual at the time. They had a big
reception onboard before the ship even left port with
wonderful music, champagne, and big purple balloons, which
became their symbol. I’m wandering around, and
I’m a very gregarious person, so I’m not
shy about saying hello to people I don’t know. I
remember asking one guy, “So do you cruise
often?” -- not knowing what I had really said.
And he said, “Darling, all the time.”
[Laughs] And I remember they had a big bowl on
the purser’s desk, and I said to Lenny, “Oh,
isn’t this sweet of them? They’re
offering chocolate mints.” I stuck my hand in and
picked up a handful of Trojans! Later, when I did my show,
half of the audience showed up in white ties, winged
collars, and nothing else except a towel, because of
The Ritz. It was really delicious. And I
remember running up the back steps to get to the showroom,
and there was a guy coming down the steps. He took one
look at my earrings and shrieked! I said, “No,
you cannot have my earrings. Get out of my way.”

Which other entertainers were on that cruise? That was one of the last trips Wayland Flowers
did with Madame, and Quentin Crisp, that idiot of a
man, came to give a talk in the showroom. He was
terrible. He said, “All this business about AIDS,
darling, it’s just a fad.” The audience
started to hiss and boo. They were ready to lynch him.
I did one of the very first AIDS benefits at the Hollywood
Bowl, and it was so unusual then -- can you imagine? -- that
so many news journalists showed up to stick
microphones in my face, asking, “Why are you
doing this?” What a ridiculous question.
[Laughs] I remember saying, “Well, why
wouldn’t I do this?” Apparently it was
considered risky at the time. Then, about a year
later, Elizabeth Taylor got involved and gave the
cause a national face and identity, which was
wonderful.

Had you been personally affected by the disease? Not at all. If someone had said they were doing
a benefit for homeless people, I would’ve said,
“What time and where?” That’s just what
a responsible person does: Help out in any way that
you can. My way, as a performer, is to perform. It
didn’t take any great thinking or deep
soul-searching.

What are your thoughts on the passing of Prop. 8? That’s so scandalous, and I’m so
saddened by it. But I can’t help feeling that
some of these old farts who are still living in another
century will die soon, and then we’ll have
these younger people who don’t care about
sexuality. Because it’s your life. You’re
entitled to marry who you love. It’s as simple
as that. How two gay people getting married can somehow
taint someone else’s lives or the lives of their
children is absolutely beyond my understanding.

Finally, is there any other award out there that
you’d still love to win? Haven’t I won all of them?
[Laughs] There’s some great stuff on my
shelf, but I have never done something and thought, Hey,
this might get me an award. My grandsons have
always loved looking at all my awards, and they used
to walk around the house wearing my medallions like
the Library of Congress Living Legend medallion. But the
oldest one, Justin, just loved “the little gold
man” -- the Oscar. One day he came to stay with
us, and he’d gotten a soccer trophy -- one of those
tacky plastic statuettes. He said, “Look,
Granny, look what I got! I feel so proud, I really
feel this should sit right next to the little gold
man.” [Laughs] So to this day, my Oscar
is accompanied by a little gold soccer player.