THE VOICE OF CHICAGO'S GAY, LESBIAN, BI, TRANS AND QUEER COMMUNITY SINCE 1985

A longtime fan of BETTY, I first attended a performance by the all-female trio, consisting of Alyson Palmer and sisters Amy Ziff and Elizabeth Ziff, when I lived in Washington, D.C., in the mid-1980s. I was instantly hooked by their live shows, which incorporated rock, pop and dance elements, comedic and spoken word segments and the gayest sensibility since Bette (Midler), and became a devotee. I own all six of their CDs (including the expanded edition of Limboland and the Kiss My Sticky EP) and recently added their seventh, the wonderful cast recording to their acclaimed stage musical BETTY Rules: The Exception to the Musical (BETTY Rules). More information about BETTY is at www.bettyrules.com .

New mother Alyson, with seven-month-old Ruby Lucca in tow, and Amy and Elizabeth sat down with me in the green room of Chicago's Lakeshore Theater to catch up on the last 18 years.

Gregg Shapiro: It wasn't planned this way, but this morning I interviewed SONiA, who, like BETTY, also performed at the March For Women's Live in Washington, D.C., at the end of April 2004. What can you tell me about your experience at that event?

Elizabeth Ziff: It was our fourth Pro-Choice March. We're sad to say that we have to keep singing for these. For me, it was an incredible experience to be around that many like-minded people. To be not only performing, but also to be one of the people that was counted, because there were so many people there and it's so clear now that there's going to be some kind of revolution in this country if the administration doesn't start taking notice of what the people actually want.

Alyson Palmer: The other thing that was fantastic about the Pro-Choice March was that it was basically a convention for feminists. It was so fun; it was like being in Las Vegas. All these people who hadn't seen each other, except on the frontlines, were able to get together and celebrate. We hosted an event the night before that had people from Kate Clinton to SONiA to all different kinds speaking and performing. There was a lot of love and support and hope and positive feelings, which I thought was great ...

Amy Ziff: People getting rejuvenated to keep fighting the fight.

GS: Which is so important, with the election coming up so soon.

EZ, AP and AZ: (together) Absolutely!

GS: BETTY Rules asks the musical question, 'When is just enough enough?' The expression on Alyson's face at one point during the song seems to say it all. And yet you stuck it out. Is it hard to believe that so much time has gone by?

AP: Yes, sometimes. And I think that's the true test of a great relationship. All of a sudden you wake up one day and you say, 'Eighteen years?! It feel like it was just last Friday.' And that's how it is with BETTY. Sometimes, when we're in the van together, driving a long way, it seems like 48 years. But, generally, it feels like even shorter than that. That's the great thing about our relationship, I think.

EZ: I think that to stick with any relationship that long is crazy. But, for me, it's gotten better. We went through therapy—everything in the play is true. We've grown as people and I we've grown together and separately as artists. It's been a really good ride.

AP: The tools that we've used to further this really intense creative relationship have helped us in other relationships, which is wonderful.

AZ: You just don't know whether it's co-dependency or challenge or love …

EZ: (laughs)

AZ: …or far-sightedness or near-sightedness or …

AP: …joy.

AZ: Joy.

GS: She's a little peacemaker.

AZ and EZ: Yes!

AP: Little Ruby Lucca is seven months old and it's really exciting to have a relationship as we've had for all these years, as a creative endeavor, and then have someone like Ruby come in with fresh eyes, fresh spirit and a fresh life.

EZ: And she likes our singing, which is helpful. That's a good thing!

AP: Whenever she's crying, if we harmonize it always makes her feel better.

GS: There has long been a theatrical edge to BETTY live performances. Is that how you arrived at BETTY Rules?

AZ: Yes. We did. We've always been theatrical. We've always been more than just a band. We've always done monologues, triptychs, and all sorts of things. But we wanted something that would be more of a document about our journey.

EZ: Actually, we didn't want it at all. (Director) Michael wanted it.

AP: Michael Greif, the director of Rent, saw us and said, 'You guys have to do your own story.' We wanted to do a different story. We had a kind of Austin Powers Super Diva thing in mind, which we think we're still going to do because it's fabulous, but he said, 'Bands don't stay together three times longer than your average relationship. There's a story there that you need to perform.'

AZ: Especially if you're independent.

EZ: And sisters and friends.

AP: Jewish and Black working together.

EZ: Gay and straight.

GS: You should be held up as an example.

AP: Exactly, right?

EZ: We are America.

AZ: (Sings) 'We are the world …'

GS: Amy, I'm glad that you mentioned the monologues, because another thing I remember from having seen BETTY concerts was the use of spoken word, something that is in more common usage these days. How does it feel to have been so ahead of your time?

AZ: I don't know whether that's a good thing or a bad thing. It certainly seemed fresh and people really enjoyed it. Maybe that helped or hindered us as far as being categorized in American visionless pop music. But, I'm happy that we did it.

EZ: The three of us are very different creatively. We all have different styles and we needed to incorporate everything, and that took a while. We always thought, 'If a song calls for a cello and it sounds good with just the cello or the bass' or if somebody had written some spoken word, which has written the most of over the years by Amy, we felt we should be able to do that in the context of music, as well. There's a long history of that. We always call ourselves 'show-folk,' because we're much more than musicians.

AP: The most important thing to us has always been to be entertaining, to put on a great show, whether there are a million people out there or four people and Aunt Freddie, which unfortunately happens once in a while. We want those people to feel so rocked and entertained.

AZ: And take them away from what's happening in the world. Not so that they forget about their responsibilities, but so that for an hour and a half they're brought into another context, they see things a little bit differently, they're re-energized, they're galvanized and they can go back out to the frontlines of their lives.

AP: We're glad that we have those elements in BETTY Rules. It's exciting that people can laugh and they can cry; they can be moved. And then they can go home and have sex. That's very important to us.

GS: It was also great to hear Amy still doing voices and characters ... .

AP: Amy's been doing great characters all along and it was wonderful for her to be able to do characters in this show for us, because it's always been entertaining to do that.

EZ: And in a way that made the through line come alive more. There's certain things that we couldn't say as ourselves. To have the characters say them makes people understand the journey that we've been on.

GS: In addition to the songs written for the show, you have included previously recorded tracks.

EZ: What fit lyrically. 'Jungle Jane' explains the joyous part of the Michigan Women's Music Festival to us, and also to the director. 'It Girl' explains three people coming together and realizing their strength. 'Kissing You' explains when you get off the road and somebody's screwed you over, and 'Well, I don't really want to kiss you.' Contextually it worked, because of the lyrics.

AP: Although there were other songs that we tried to put in there, that just didn't fit (laughs). ... Then there were things actually written for the piece, such as 'Put It Off,' which is very specific to how you feel.

EZ: 'Mr. Music.'

AZ: 'Gravity,' 'Overwhelmed.'

EZ: There are a lot of them.

AP: We hadn't really collaborated with somebody else and [Michael] really had to put on his black-and-white striped shirt and be a referee, as well as being a judge in his robes, and a lot of other things in addition to being a director.

EZ: We were really lucky to be able to work together. We've been friends for years and had worked with him in other ways. But to be able to have somebody who is that good with insane women and also with storytelling.

GS: BETTY has been consistently building a following via music festivals such as Michigan Women's Festival, and you make reference to the fest in the show.

AZ: The first time we played (Michigan) was pretty shocking for them. We were very different from anything that they'd seen.

EZ: It was sort of at the beginning of the transition from folk to riot grrrl.

AP: They had a processing session after we left, because so many people were offended (laughs) by our show.

EZ: But you know what? So many people loved it.

GS: What do you think the folks out on 'the land' would think of your dig at the fest in BETTY Rules?

EZ: They saw us in New York. They loved it.

AP: Because it's not really a dig. It's not about how bad the festival is. It's about how these three New Yorkers with attitude respond to the loving festival.

AZ: And how you get acclimated. Elizabeth feels great kind of right away and is just energized. It takes Alyson a little longer, but she gets the whole transformation. And I get there, too.

EZ: It's just important because Michigan is a myriad of emotions. Not only Michigan—(the scene in the play) is supposed to represent all of the women music festivals that we played at.

AZ: We're lucky to have been part and parcel of the gay community for a while. To be able to support things that we really believed—to play gay pride festivals when nobody did it.

EZ: To do AIDS benefits when it was bad for your career.

AZ: When you were stigmatized. And people were really appreciative.

GS: In addition to an abundance of laughter, there are a couple of powerful dramatic moments in the show. You talk about seeing a BETTY Rules t-shirts on a panel of the AIDS quilt.

AZ: God, we'll never forget that day.

EZ: When we saw that BETTY t-shirt, I literally dropped to my knees.

AZ: Me, too.

EZ: It was one of the most effecting things that ever happened to me. It was the last time the quilt was shown because it became too big.

AP: It was between the Washington Monument and the Capitol.

EZ: We were able to perform for it, which was nice. We did a song that we wrote about a friend who had died of AIDS.

AP: Literally, it's the greatest thing that could happen to you in your career.

EZ: Being in D.C. when AIDS did hit, they'd have the obituaries every week in the (Washington) Blade and we would see it a lot. He was a BETTY fan, things like that. We all lost so many wonderful people, friends.

AZ: Senselessly, horrifically. These beautiful, bright, wonderful stars. But we'll find each other next time.

GS: The piece about mothers during 'Broken' is an especially heart-wrenching moment in the show. Is it difficult to perform that every night?

AP: Yes (laughs).

EZ: It really is. You can't just walk through it. You have to be brought into that moment.

AZ: You remember it. It's your life.

EZ: For me it was harder because I'm not really an actor at all. The first couple of times we did it, when we were showcasing it, I was sobbing.

AP: Sobbing every night. We're basically talking about our mothers, who were important to us, dying.

EZ: We're talking about how we've been through that together and why that's such a reason for us to also stay together.