Whitey Bulger lived unnoticed for years as a fugitive; Hank Rosenfeld knows his barber. Mike Roe takes us to Comic Con. "Hogan's Heroes" in sock puppets.
Commentator Richard Schave laments closure of Downtown LA's King Eddy Saloon
Richard Schave is the co-founder of Esotouric--a group that gives weekly bus tours to the old, dirty heart of Los Angeles. He writes with a commentary on what the closing and planned renovation of the King Eddy means for a constantly self-reinventing Downtown Los Angeles:
The King Eddy Saloon is on the Northwest corner of 5th & Los Angeles Street in downtown Los Angeles, which some call "The Nickel," or Skid Row.
It occupies a corner of the former lobby of the King Edward Hotel, which the Architect-developer John Parkinson built and opened in the spring of 1906. At some point before 1919, the bar opened.
With the exception of the smoker's cage and the flat screen televisions, little in the King Eddy has changed since the Croick family took over in the early 1960s.
But as much as the King Eddy has remained sealed in amber for decades, the neighborhood has changed around it. Now there are lofts and cupcake bakeries, vintage stores and art galleries, and bars with dress codes and $15 organic cocktails. And now, at last, that tide of change is lapping inexorably at the walls of the King Eddy. The bar has been sold, and will be closed for major renovations in the fall.
When you walk into the King Eddy the jukebox is playing. You sit down and Irene serves you a drink, and you are glad to get it because you are in a lively spot where something is happening. Like the decor, the patrons have been around long enough to have some hard living and traveling behind them. Frankie, in his Stetson and cowboy boots, has lived upstairs for thirty years. The bar is his living room. The man called Pancake will tell you, hands down, this place is the genuine article.
So why should you care about the King Eddy Saloon and its impending transformation?
The King Eddy is a rare and precious remnant of old Los Angeles. It is of a time when Skid Row was a place where transient workers--from day laborers to skilled electricians-- could drift into town and live on the cheap before finding work at the job boards which once lined east 5th Street.
Both James M. Cain and Raymond Chandler were listening to these men in the flophouses, in the soup kitchens, and in the bars on Fifth Street in the 1930s. And there, both writers found great beauty and trained their ears to the uniquely American dialect which these drifters spoke. John Fante set part of his 1939 novel, "Ask The Dust," in the cellar speakeasy of the King Eddy. For just those contributions to American letters, you should care about the King Eddy closing.
The King Eddy's patrons are not the target demographic for the Downtown Businessmen's Association's annual awards luncheon. They are for the most part, among the last poor residents in an historically poor neighborhood. Yet the people of the King Eddy have been a part of Downtown for a long time, and the neighborhood would be less of a neighborhood without them. There are not many places in this city where very different kinds of people can mingle as freely as they do here. For that, too, you should care about the King Eddy closing.
You can not get a Pepsi-Cola at the Nugent Pharmacy at Third & Grand on Bunker Hill anymore. The city demolished that neighborhood. No doughnuts and coffee at the Victory Service Club of the Union Rescue Mission; it was shuttered decades ago, and the building razed. But the King Eddy will remain open for the next several weeks, and the drinks are cold and cheap. So here's to the penultimate round at the King Eddy, may the last one never come.
Event: Thursday, July 19, 8pm. Schave and the Los Angeles Visionaries Association will host a literature festival at the King Eddy Saloon. Guests include writers Dan Fante, Jonathan Shaw and Ruben Ortega.
Sock Puppet Sitcom Theater connects new audiences with old TV shows
It's dusk in Mark Hayward and Charley Knapp’s cozy duplex in Los Feliz.
Tonight, Mark, Charley, and the cast are preparing for the first read-through of the pilot episode of "Hogan’s Heroes." Before they begin, cast members study their lines, prepare their accents, and place googley-eyed sock puppets on each hand.
A row of sock puppets dressed in WWII-era German and Allied uniforms stand at attention on a round dining table in the corner of the room. There are sock puppet versions of the entire "Hogan's Heroes" cast: Colonel Hogan, Colonel Klink, Sergeants Schultz, Kinchloe, Baker and Carter. Each sock puppet's outfit it made of felt, pipe cleaners, buttons and yarn.
“We debated what to do with the Klink monocle because it’s such the signature of Colonel Klink, but we decided that going with the largest googly eye we could find was better than a monocle," said sock puppeteer Hayward. "This is the hardest thing we had to make, we had to make a helmet that’s sock-puppet size, a German World War Two infantry helmet. So, it's paper mache!”
Hayward and his husband, Charley Knapp, are co-founders of the Sock Puppet Sitcom Theater, a monthly live show that recreates pilot episodes of hit sitcoms using homemade sock puppets. Along with a stable of puppeteers and musicians, the couple has given the sock treatment to shows like "I Love Lucy," "Friends" and even the "CBS Evening News."
Hayward pulls out a plastic bin full of sock puppets, each individually wrapped in Ziploc freezer bags, then starts rifling through them, pulling out puppets from previous performances.
"We have the whole cast of three shows in this plastic bin. We've got Barbara Walters and Peter Jennings, Edward R. Murrow, there's Joey from 'Friends,' and Ross. If I dig down deepers there's Three's Company … Mrs. Roeper’s down in there somewhere."
Hayward and Knapp started with puppet shows five years ago, first performing at the Downtown L.A. Artwalk. They came up with the idea to turn sitcoms into a puppet show two years ago, performing one-off shows at Burning Man and around the Silver Lake area. This past April, the group earned a residency at Atwater Crossing, a gallery space and restaurant near Glendale.
For Hayward and Knapp, sitcoms and puppets were a natural combination.
"I've been doing puppetry since I was a kid I've always just loved how you can make an inanimate object seem like it's alive," said Hayward. "We were interested in the idea of taking this reduction of real life and reducing it one more time, like Xeroxing and Xerox copy. That was a challenge for us artistically. How do you take sock puppets, something that's childlike and try and raise it to a new level.”
Though the socks are as historically accurate as possible, for a great puppet show, you need more than just puppeteers and costumes. The group has a full band and foley artist on hand to take care of the various sound effects.
"I do quite a few sound effects that happen in the shows, like knocking on doors and doorbells," said Kevin Widener. "There are also rim shots and things, like the standard punctuation for a joke is the cowbell, and any kind of noise that comes up in the shows."
Widener and his band also perform the theme songs and commercial jingles from the TV ads of the period. Like a traditional TV network, the show is punctuated with commercials and newsbreaks. They even designed the stage to mimic a three-camera sitcom set. Only this one is mobile.
“The whole thing fits on one dolly, the entire show … Kevin and I both have Volkswagen Golfs, two doors and basically between musical instruments and all the sets, and all the puppets and everything we fill up two Volkswagens," said Hayward.
So why sitcoms, why socks, and why now? Charley Knapp says the communal aspect is key.
"Part of it is about reintroducing new audiences to these stories that for so much of us, it’s like people come and they don’t realize they remembered seeing this…it’s really a shared memory that so many of us have," said Knapp. "I like doing it in public because it brings us all together at the same time. It adds a nice boost to have that much energy in the room.”
But there's one more reason why the Sock Puppet Sitcom Theater works so well: "We just have a lot of creative friends and we aren’t afraid to pull them into our reindeer games," said Hayward.
The Sock Puppets perform "Hogan’s Heroes" on July 18. And they’re scheduled to perform "Roseanne" and "Golden Girls" later this summer. For more information on show times or to purchase tickets go to the Sock Puppet Sitcom website.
Bestselling author Rick Marin on when "Dad" became "Coach"
I was the world’s least likely sports dad, until my 7-year-old uttered the four most powerful words in the English language: "Dad, will you coach?"
I’ve always been clueless about the one thing every guy -- blue-collar or banker -- has in common. Sports. When I hear “Final Four,” I imagine a quartet of apocalyptic superheroes. I lived in New York 15 years and the only time I set foot in Yankee Stadium was for a Pink Floyd reunion concert. I won't even watch the Superbowl for the commercials. But here’s the problem with parenting: it’s not about you anymore. And sports is all my son Diego cares about.
A typical week for him is four days of baseball, three days of tennis, two days of soccer and all the driveway basketball he can squeeze in. And yes, I know that adds up to more than seven days. So when he looked up at me with those big brown eyes and asked, “Dad, will you coach?” what was I gonna say? “No, I have to clean my iPad.” “I’m too busy watching old Peter Sellers clips on YouTube?”
I had no choice. Twice a week, I had to drive over the hill to Toluca Lake and park my Prius in a lot full of pick-up trucks loaded with baseball gear and fake it. Pretend I knew what the head coach was talking about when he said, “Protect the plate!” or “Ducks on the pond!” Steal bits I’d overheard other dads putting put out there: “Nose on the ball!” “Show me your number!” And wait for someone to expose me as a fraud, a guy who was way too small for his XXXL jersey.
Then one day, little Eli or Tanner or Seamus was at bat and I heard somebody yelling, “Elbow up! Protect the plate!” and, “Dig, dig, dig!” as the kid sprinted to first.
That someone was me.
Suddenly, I wanted to be there. We had nothing in common, me and the other dads. These guys weren’t writers. One was in finance, one was a contractor. I think. I’m not sure. I never asked what they did for a living and they never asked me. Turns out the identity you work so hard to forge out there in the big world is irrelevant in this little one. Here you’re not defined by status or money, just by, Do you show up? Do you volunteer hours out of your day? Are you part of the team?
I realized this wasn’t just about coaching. It was about how you live your life.
At the end-of-season party, the parents give the coaches little thank-you’s. Starbucks gift cards, movie passes. But the gift my son was most impressed with was a game ball inscribed “Thanks, Coach.” For the first time, I didn’t mentally bracket the word “coach” in ironic quotation marks.
I can now spend hours watching ESPN with my son. I’ll take him to Dodger Stadium at the drop of a hat. And when someone shouts, “Hey, Coach!” … I turn around.
(Rick Marin is a bestselling author and TV writer. This story is adapted from his new Kindle Single, "Keep Swinging.")
Barber: "I cut the hair of a fugitive from justice, Whitey Bulger"
UPDATE 6/12/2013: BOSTON (AP) - A federal prosecutor said in opening statements today at James "Whitey" Bulger's racketeering trial that the reputed mobster was at the center of "murder and mayhem" in Boston for almost 30 years, while the defense attacked the credibility of the government's star witnesses. Prosecutor Brian Kelly told jurors that Bulger headed the violent Winter Hill Gang that "ran amok" in Boston for nearly three decades, killing 19 people, extorting millions from drug dealers and other criminals, and corrupting police and FBI agents. "At the center of all this murder and mayhem is one man - the defendant in this case, James Bulger," Kelly said.
Bulger's lead attorney, J. W. Carney Jr., went after the prosecution's star witnesses, including hit man John Martorano, who admitted killing 20 people and has agreed to testify against Bulger. Martorano served 12 years in prison for his crimes, in what Carney called an "extraordinary benefit" for his cooperation with prosecutors. "The federal government was so desperate to have John Martorano testify ... they basically put their hands up in the air and said take anything you want," Carney said.
The government plans to show the jury a 700-page file they say shows that Bulger, while committing a long list of crimes, was also working as an FBI informant, providing information on the New England Mob - his gang's main rivals - and corrupting FBI agents who ignored his crimes.
Bulger, now 83, was one of the nation's most wanted fugitives when he fled Boston in 1994 after receiving a tip from his former FBI handler, John Connolly, that he was about to be indicted. He was finally captured in 2011 in Santa Monica, Calif., where he had been living with his longtime girlfriend in a rent-controlled apartment.
The trial is expected to last three to four months.
-----
Some called him a Robin Hood, but the feds indicted him for 19 murders. Not a very good fella.
He was Massachusetts Mafioso James "Whitey" Bulger, and after a 19-year career as an FBI informant, he went on the lam in 1994. He wasn't captured until 2011, outside his apartment in Santa Monica.
But even a murderer needs a haircut, and Bulger, it turns out, used to go to a colorful barber in Santa Monica for a beard trim - his head being almost completely bald.
Bulger, says this barber, who has requested anonymity, was a gentleman, and gave a 100% tip for a $14 beard trim. Once, the barber remembers, he was cutting a cop's hair, and Bulger walked in and sat down in a nearby barber chair, cool as a cucumber, waiting his turn.
When asked what he thinks about Bulger's capture, the barber laments, "They took away one of my best customers."
KPCC's Mike Roe takes us to San Diego's Comic-Con
KPCC's Mike Roe is covering the biggest pop culture convention this side of the universe. San Diego's Comic-Con sold out in less than an hour, a record for the event. Thousands of fans are packing the San Diego Convention Center, making it difficult to get a spot for any of the events or panels happening throughout the weekend.
One of the most popular panels today was the cast reunion of Joss Whedon's cult show, "Firefly." Mike Roe reports he arrived four hours before the start time and still was not able to get in. His friends who did get a seat camped out over night.
My girlfriend & I bailed on Firefly line around 9:20. Goodbye forever, optimism!
— Mike Roe (@MikeRoe)
My girlfriend & I bailed on Firefly line around 9:20. Goodbye forever, optimism! #sdcclines #SDCC
— Mike Roe (he/him) #MaskUp (@MikeRoe) July 13, 2012
Roe, however, did attend the testosterone injected The Expendables 2 panel. The film is a sequel to Syvester Stallone's 2010 surprise box office hit. The panel included Stallone, Terry Crews, Randy Couture, Dolph Lundgren, and the ex-Governator Arnold Schwarzenegger.
“I am BACK.” - Schwarzenegger at
panel
— Mike Roe (@MikeRoe)
“I am BACK.” - Schwarzenegger at #Expendables2 panel #sdcc
— Mike Roe (he/him) #MaskUp (@MikeRoe) July 13, 2012
If you missed out on this year's batch of tickets, you can experience the event vicariously through Mike Roe's Twitter account. Roe will be tweeting all the happenings at Comic-Con throughout the week. You can follow him
.
No "kitschmaster" - Marc Haefele reviews Getty's Gustav Klimt drawings exhibit
One cultural snob called him "A kitschmaster glitteringly and preposterously back in fashion." But from Vienna to Brentwood, the rest of us are celebrating the life and work of Gustav Klimt. This spring, for his 150th birthday, Vienna was bulging with Klimt. From the Albertina museum in the old Imperial city center to the vastness of the Belvedere Palace, the streets were hung with yellow Klimt banners and streamers, and they were showing everything from his early drawings to his wondrously four-square Alpine landscapes to his masterpiece portraits of the grandest ladies of the old Empire in gold and oil-paint mosaic.
Long excoriated as a degenerate figure, then as a mere trend-marker along the developmental line of Art Nouveau, Klimt has finally won acceptance as a major art figure and innovator.
Along with Picasso, he is probably the most recognized modernist painter. His work is reproduced endlessly, in ads, posters, postcards, and the Internet. The legal battles to return his works stolen by the Nazis made world news a few years ago. And some of those works were then sold for well into 9 figures -- among the highest figures ever paid for paintings.
The big mystery is how over just 50 years Klimt evolved from being a degenerate representative of the twilight of a fading European empire to a multiversal artistic icon sprawled across 21st-Century human culture.
Now Los Angeles is getting what's said to be its first exhibit of Klimt's work, a show at the Getty that takes us to the very roots of his genius--the fantastic draftsmanship that lies beneath all the great paintings, watercolors, murals and friezes. The 100 drawings at the Getty date back to when Klimt was in his 20s, making his name as a sharp young decorative artist limning colorful nymphs and satyrs on the interior walls of Imperial Vienna's museums, mansions and theaters.
By the 1890s, Klimt took to the mainstream of European art with his acute sensual sketches of women, some floating iconically, others in a wide range of erotic poses. He became the leader of the Secession movement that marked Central Europe's move toward modernity, symbolism and a sense of a portentous and ominous future.
Klimt himself, for years a darling of the Austrian establishment despite his increasingly erotic tendencies, hit the authoritarian wall with his1900s murals for the new university that showed Philosophy as a sleeping blind monster in a random universe, Law as a cruel force oppressing humanity, Medicine as a mere player in the game of life and death. The storm of opposition his visions evoked drove him from the public sphere.
For the rest of his life, his work consisted largely of gold-leaf and mosaic portraits of beautiful women, and singular, almost impressionist landscapes of the Attersee, his favorite Alpine lake. His later work also included immortal symbolic masterpieces like "The Kiss."
In 1918, he died with the Austrian Empire that nurtured him.
The Getty show includes many sketches and studies for the most famous works. It also includes, on a grander scale, studies for the notorious University paintings, works that were later burned by the Nazis. And, as a bonus, there's a version of his murals based on the last movement of Beethoven's 9th--perhaps his most monumental completed work, and the greatest surviving work of his imagination.
It's not kitsch, but he was a master.
("Gustav Klimt: the Magic of Line" is at the Getty Center through September 23. Marc Haefele comments on art, lit, culture, and life for Off-Ramp.)
Jim Meskimen makes good 1st, 2nd ... 75th impression with "Jimpressions" one-man show
UPDATE: Off-Ramp talked with impressionist Jim Meskimen in the fall of 2011. The latest edition of "Jimpressions" is July 21st at The Acting Center, 5514 Hollywood Blvd.
Off-Ramp host John Rabe talks with Jim Meskimen, YouTube sensation, actor and man of a thousand voices, including Robin Williams, Kirk Douglas, Charleton Heston, Woody Allen, Droopy Dog, President George W Bush and Harvey Keitel.
Happy Bastille Day, from Allan Sherman
In honor of Bastille Day - when angry French revolutionaries stormed The Bastille on July 14, 1789 - we present Allan Sherman's ode on the event. Enjoy.
Sing along!
Louis the Sixteenth was the King of France in 1789.
He was worse than Louis the Fifteenth.
He was worse than Louis the Fourteenth.
He was worse than Louis the Thirteenth.
He was the worst since Louis the First.
King Louis was living like a king, but the people were living rotten.
So the people, they started an uprising which they called the
French Revolution, and of course you remember their battle cry,
which will never be forgotten:
You went the wrong way, Old King Louie.
You made the population cry.
'Cause all you did was sit and pet
With Marie Antoinette
In your place at Versailles.
And now the country's gone kablooie.
So we are giving you the air.
That oughta teach you not to
Spend all your time fooling 'round
At the Folies Bergere.
If you had been a nicer king,
We wouldn't do a thing,
But you were bad, you must admit.
We're gonna take you and the Queen
Down to the guillotine,
And shorten you a little bit.
You came the wrong way, Old King Louie.
And now you ain't got far to go.
Too bad you won't be here to see
That great big Eiffel Tower,
Or Brigitte Bardot.
To you King Louie we say fooey.
You disappointed all of France.
But then what else could we expect
From a king in silk stockings
And pink satin pants.
You filled your stomach with chop suey.
And also crepe suzettes and steak.
And when they told your wife Marie
That nobody had bread, she said
"Let 'em eat cake."
We're gonna take you and the Queen
Down to the guillotine,
It's somewhere in the heart of town.
And when that fella's through
With what he's gonna do,
You'll have no place to hang your crown.
You came the wrong way Old King Louie.
Now we must put you on the shelf.
That's why the people are revolting, 'cause Louie,
You're pretty revolting yourself!
Pasadena Conservatory of Music is Pasadena's best kept secret
The Pasadena Conservatory of Music could be the city's next iconic landmark. Hidden behind shady trees a block north of Pasadena City College, most locals have never heard the robust music inside the building's closed doors. But in the past month the Conservatory has raked in a cool million in just two grants alone and hopes to raise much more.
Students start studying early at the conservatory, sometimes as young as four years old. After putting in hours of after school lessons, they learn to turn the creaks and cranks of their violins into sweet, soothing music.
A few of these kids will study vigorously throughout their adolescence and leave the conservatory on a path to become classically trained musicians.
Like twelve year old Veronica Mansour, a student at Cleveland Middle School who started playing the cello since at just four years old.
Although she already sounds like a pro, Veronica is modest and sincere about her love for the cello. She says the sound of the cello is what initially drew her to the instrument.
"Well when I was four years old I heard it on a recording that my mom was playing in the house and I really loved the sound and I told my parents that I wanted to play it," said Mansour.
One could call that fate, I suppose. How many four year olds are there who are inextricably drawn to classical music? Very few, by my estimate.
The conservatory has called its present location home since the 1990s. It's a converted mortuary, full of floors that give way slightly as you walk down various hallways.
And as you walk up the creaky staircase near the entrance, you hear a bizarre, dark medley of noises. But despite the strange sound, the conservatory's vibe is fun. Younger siblings run around playing while parents smile in admiration and the older kids' cello ensemble practices.
Veronica's Mom, Laurie Mansour, says the conservatory plays a huge role in her kids lives.
"My kids started here when Alex was three and my daughter was a year and half so. I don't remember our lives before the conservatory and what it's done for them for their brain development, for their socialization, their musicality, the way they view the world I think has been completely influenced by the music and the teachers they've had here."
And all the students are pleased to be studying. And that's something I didn't get when I was 6, 12, 15, or really, ever! But where do these kids come from, and how do they get to study at the conservatory?
Beverly La Fontaine is the marketing director for the conservatory. She says that they don't use an applicant's talent as a gauge for admission but rather focus on the student's desire and commitment to studying music.
According to La Fontaine, the conservatory aims to raise 7 and a half million dollars. Even though that sounds like nearly impossible, the conservatory has already raised over five and a half million. The Conservatory serves about 1200 students right now, La Fontaine says that'll change, too.
"Quite frankly we're aiming for an enrollment of 1500 to 1600 students over the next, I'd say three to five years."
That means the conservatory will have to expand, because where are they going to put all those cellos, tubas and bassoons?
"Last May we bought the property next door to us which was formerly a church, and we're now in that property. And when we finish the entire project, we'll have a second story on our back building and that will give us additional classroom space and studio space. Much of the building is not going to begin until next fall, probably it will take another year and a half," said La Fontaine.
La Fontaine says that all parents see the value of music education for their kids and that studying classical music just plain adds value to student's lives.
And Laurie Mansour can vouch for that.
"It was just an amazing blessing that we found the conservatory and ten years later, thirteen years later, we're here three times a week four times a week, my kids study multiple instruments, I can't have any understanding of what it would be like if they hadn't been here."
So with all of this new cash raised, the Pasadena Conservatory of Music might go from Pasadena's best kept secret to its newest cultural epicenter by as early as this Fall.
Mom, activist, & LA trial junkie Linda Jay hopes to get her own justice in the courtroom
High-profile court cases can suck a lot of us in - heck, there's even a whole television channel devoted to broadcasting trials. We're drawn to lawyers' fiery words, jurors' sympathetic faces and the judge's strong voice echoing over them all, deciding a person's fate.
One woman goes as far as to call herself a "trial junkie." She doesn't just watch trials on T.V., she goes to see them in person.
Linda Jay is 55 and she lives in South Central Los Angeles. She’s been going to high-profile court trials for 20 years.
“I’m a mother and just, your everyday housewife - or, I shouldn’t say that. Wait, I’m gonna take that back - every day person," she said.
Jay has lived most of her life in L.A. She was a court clerk, and loved the “judge shows” on T.V.
“I like Judge Mathis. I like Judge Maybelline. I like Judge Judy - all of ‘em," she said. "Basically, I’m hooked on anything having to do with the justice system.”
It didn’t take long before Jay’s enthusiasm for all things justice led to her first court trial as a spectator.
It was the case of the state of California versus Lawrence Powell, Timothy Wind, Theodore Briseno and Stacey Koon - four Los Angeles police officers charged in the beating of motorist Rodney King.
Jay said she followed the L.A.P.D. officers’ trial for months on T.V. and wanted to see it in person.
“I was just trying to see, were they going to give Rodney King justice this time because so many times in the neighborhood, back in the 90’s, we had police brutality. People were telling the community leaders and the politicians that we have injustice going on in our community, but nobody was listening," she said. "This was one time we had a tape to prove it. With the Rodney King tape, we felt we would be vindicated.”
Jay said she packed up her mom, sister and daughter to drive up to the courthouse in Simi Valley. Weeks of testimony were about to wind down.
“As soon as we got to the courthouse, we saw reporters run out there, coming to their cars, saying ‘we got a verdict, we got a verdict, the verdict is in, we’ve got a verdict!’ My heart starting pumping, adrenaline rushing and I said ‘I want to be in that courtroom, just to see what was going to go down,'" she said.
The jury ultimately found the four officers - Powell, Wind, Briseno and Koon - not guilty. Those verdicts weren’t just hard for Jay to swallow. They were the fuel that sparked the L.A. riots.
“Right after that verdict was read, when I walked out of that courtroom, I was so despaired, I felt so discouraged – dismayed -about the whole system that I didn’t want no one talking to me," Jay said. "I felt like me, being a black lady with young children, what do I have to tell my children?”
Jay said she didn’t let her experience at the L.A.P.D. officers’ trial stop her from attending more in the future.
“Just because one jury made a mistake or did not rule on a verdict that I believed in, I didn’t hold it against the whole justice system - even though that was a really infamous time and it was well known and the world got to see that verdict, I still like trials it doesn’t stop me from wanting to go to trials," she said.
Jay didn’t attend another trial for a few years. But when she did, she picked another biggie. It was the murder case of O.J. Simpson in 1995. A jury found him "not guilty" of murder.
You can see Jay in old T.V. broadcast reports of the trial. She wore a sparkly gold and black top hat and shook up and down in the back row.
Next up, she sat in on Snoop Dogg’s murder trial in 1996, and then Michael Jackson’s molestation trial in 2005.
Jay said she stood in a screaming crowd outside the courthouse where a woman released doves every time a "not guilty" verdict was read.
The last time Jay attended a trial was last year’s trial of Conrad Murray, the doctor found responsible for Michael Jackson’s death.
“He has absolutely no sense of remorse. Absolutely no sense of fault and is -and remains - dangerous," said Judge Michael Pastor after the jury read their verdict.
Jay says she remembers Pastor's words vividly.
“When the judge was kinda chastising Conrad Murray, 'you was negligent' and this and all. I enjoyed being there, listening to him, looking at him - not through a television - just looking at him pretty much give him the third degree and I could just look around the courtroom and see the looks on people’s faces, and that, to me, that was exciting," she said.
Jay said she probably won’t be going to any more high profile cases any time soon because she has to attend the trial of the man accused of killing her daughter, Brittany.
“She was murdered in 2007 - gang violence, my 16-year-old. And they just found the murderer, four or five months ago," she said. "So that’s coming up and that’s going to take a lot of me, but I’m gonna be there.”
The trial’s set for this summer and Jay hopes a jury will help her get her own piece of justice.