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Judy Gold celebrates gay marriage ruling at her Geffen opening

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New York-based comedian Judy Gold is used to tailoring “The Judy Show” to shifting geography when she takes her one-woman show on the road. But at Wednesday’s opening at the Geffen Playhouse’s intimate Skirball Theater, she had more to insert than homey references to Palm Springs and Silver Lake -- the U.S. Supreme Court’s historic decisions to strike down California’s Proposition 8 and the federal Defense of Marriage Act earlier in the day.

And when the openly gay comedian said well into the show, “I have the most amazing partner who I can marry in New York State and now in California...” the audience whooped and cheered. “Even the federal government will recognize me. Thank you, Edie Windsor,” she said, referring to the plaintiff in the case that struck down DOMA.

Striking a poignant personal note, she added, “I have a mother who will be 91 in August. She said to me, ‘Mazel tov, Judith. When’s the wedding? I’m so glad that I could be here to see you finally happy and settled.’”

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At the after-party, a clearly delighted Gold, who describes herself as the “future wife of Elysa Halpern” on her Twitter page, said she noted an intriguing correlation between her show dates and new gay marriage laws.

“What’s so amazing is, the first time we did the show was in Washington, D.C., and the first week we were doing it, gay marriage passed in D.C.,” she said. “Then we did it in New York, and gay marriage passed one of the weeks we were doing it in June [2011]. It’s like the perfect storm.

“It’s such a joyous day and we really do need to celebrate, but there are 38 states left [that don’t sanction gay marriage] and we have a lot of work to do,” Gold continued. “Now I feel like I should open my show in every state that doesn’t have gay marriage.”

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