electrolytes

It is hot. Duh.

Here is my money making idea for Fringe...or any theatre that has shows that perform in a space that becomes a trifle warm in the summer (cough...Rorschach). They cost $.33 a piece to make, you could charge a dollar each. Put your season on it, your website, whatever. It keeps you cool and serves as a marketing tool. Folks would be happy to by them.




I walked through the muggy heat to H Street Theatre yesterday and sat in the hot, hot heat watching the beautiful Shadows, a dream within a dream. The puppeteers never broke a sweat, but not for lack of commitment. I think they were simply not bothered by the swelter at all.

Luna Moreno embraces their style of puppetry with deliberate and studied movement. Their piece is chock full of lovely moments, simple and powerful technical elements and fluid performance. I loved how they had the puppets recognize their puppet masters. The look shared between the puppet and its puppeteer was eerie and powerful. It gave more life to the puppet and established a relationship between the two that seemed as if they were of one mind. Which of course they are, but that convention allowed an escape - to believe the puppet a sentient being who understood that the world was beyond their control.

It is how I feel all the time.

negotiations

Small: You be the farter machine.

Smaller: No I am a burper machine, you are the farter machine.

Small: I don't want to be the farter machine.

Smaller: But you fart the most, and I burp the most.

Small: Your right. Let's get our machines ready.

ozone money

DCeiver discusses the Examiner's take on the $1.5 Billion dollar for Metro.

Briefly - the Examiner proposes how horribly wrong it is for the Federal government to give money to Metro, that it is elitist, and that it will force the states involved (Virginia & Maryland) to raise taxes to foot their end of the deal. DCeiver covers all this, with his own wonderful panache, much better than I could.

What I would like to add is this.

The Federal government should give $1.5 billion to Metro, because in doing so they will finally be taking a step toward funding that helps our environment.

As I have said before I will pay more taxes. Examiner needs to get over itself.

surry on top

Fringe shows that I am definitely going to see:

Lunch
Pretty Theft

Shows I will most likely see:

Bartleby
Luxury Lofts Coming Soon!

Shows that I want to see, but may not make it to:

Giselle Must (Not)Die
Suite Earth

shiny battered city

I have been tap dancing around the issue of the current mideast crisis. It is namely because with my family so involved, objectivity gets dwindled away at times to make way for numerous phone calls. So far, my family is ok.

The Muslim world is constantly struggling with its identity. It wants to be modern and conservative at the same time. The world gets caught up in this search for self and the south of Lebanon is in the thick of it.

It is excruciating to watch the toll that the Israeli attack is having on Lebanon. Hezbollah made such a massive error by the incursion and kidnapping that began this all. Where did this idea come from? This thought to take a hostage? Were they coordinating with Hamas? I doubt it. Now, as is the same with all forms of warfare, it is the innocent civilians that are paying the price.

Hezbollah should have been removed long ago. When Israel vacated the south of Lebanon, the Lebanese government, or the U.N. should have stepped in to fill the void left by the Israeli army. When they left Hezbollah moved right in and unfortunately they have wreaked as much terror on their own country as they have on their enemy. In an ideal world Israel and Lebanon would work together to get rid of a terrorist group that neither of them want. They would form a coalition to keep the politics of Syria and Iran out of their countries. But the age old feud between the nations of Islam and Israel will not allow this to happen. Lets not forget that within the Muslim/Jewish feud there also exists the Shiite/Sunni feud. This too, is so unsettling because of the amount of bloodshed that it creates within the nations of Islam.

It seems at times that the Sunni/Shiite struggle mirrors the history that Christianity went through. I could say that the struggles between Catholic and Protestant are centuries old, but Northern Ireland is only tentatively coming out of that only now. Man's struggles - Man vs. God, Man vs. Nature, Man vs. Man. They have it all covered. As if it is not enough work to irrigate the region, they have to keep blowing it up. How is one supposed to grow a grove of olive trees let alone an olive branch?

Is Islam's main identity crisis a question of religion? I think so, I think it ties in to the clash of modern and old world, of westernization, and of being cut off. Beirut had become a very modern, westernized city. With the opening of it airport less than a decade ago, Beirut was now a tourist attraction. Think of it, a beautiful, sparkling city, on the coast of the Mediterranean. A trilingual country, full of culture, amazing food, stunning history and with little reminder of the wars that plagued the area years ago.

It may be that the only way to stabilize the region is for Israel to get rid of Hezbollah. My fear is that they will kill so many civilians, they will scar the country, and when they are done, it will be an easy target for extremists to come in and exert control over the region - unless the country's own government emerges as strong and legitimate.

Sounds familiar doesn't it?

bread and butter

I take no issue whatsoever with Bush saying shit in regards to the current crisis in Israel and Lebanon. I know that the entire mideast tumult makes me want to shout expletives on a regular basis.

My issue is with the attitude and tone of the conversation. As he blithely talks away while eating (and talks to a PM with his mouth full), he seems to dismiss any weight of the topic. He oversimplifies and seems completely unaffected by the severity of what is happening. He never really turns to face Blair at any point during their exchange. It is also fairly nauseating to hear the tenor of Blair's entreaty about what should be done. He seems like he is trying to please the playground bully, and Bush mollifies him with a 'I told Condi your idea too' wave off.

Blech.

five, six, seven, eight

It has been a great long while since I have been on the production team side of a show. I am choreographing a piece right now. It is good for me. I have not danced in about 6 months and my muscles had started to atrophy. After only one night of rehearsal my quads were screaming at me. So sad is my muscle tone.

I have taken mental note of the fact that I slid right back into my authoritative persona when working with the actors. When you are on actor side you get to have the multitude of little jokes, the half conversations between work and the ability to stray for a moment, because SM or Director or ...Choreographer will snap you to.

I warned the director, prior to doing it, that I was not 'fun hpmelon' when put in the role of choreographer. I said that I tended to be a lot of business. I try to keep it light, but there is always so little time and so much to get through, that I will eschew small talk for directness.

To top it off, the cast is funny - very funny and not just as individuals, the show is funny as well, so the ability to get things done is also at the whim of the gods of comedy. As it turned out, they were great. The pieces I was brought in to work on, look sharp and we accomplished them in record time and they made me laugh while doing it.

Short and sweet.

monday frivolity, or i can't talk about the war today

This past weekend I was rushing to and from my car to feed the meter and on my way back, to a rehearsal I was late for, I got stopped by two preteen girls who asked for my autograph. They were very giggly.

Girl 1: Excuse me, could we get your autograph?

Me: (completely confused) Who do you think I am?

Girl 2: I told you it wasn't her!

Girl 1: Oh my God, I am so embarrassed!

They run away.

Me: Wait! Stop! Who did you think I was?!


They kept running, and I was late, so I never got to find out who they thought I was. When I was young, people told me I looked like Melissa Gilbert. As an adult I have gotten the following:

1. Sharon Stone (when I was blonde)

2. Jullianne Moore

3. Catherine Keener

and, this past weekend, from one of the actresses at rehearsal I told about my mistaken identity moment...

4. Nicole Kidman

Does anyone else out there get compared to famous folk? This inquiring mind wants to know.

you talkin' to me mcarthy?

The Fourth of July made me feel exceptionally un-American. The only moment of note was when I was trying to edge my way through a crowd and the National Anthem started playing, at which point a security guard literally yelled at the crowd "Stand up!". It was not the slow rise of the crowd that offended me, but the militant bark from an armed guard commanding everyone to do so.

I also realized that patriotic songs have become a din that is so grating on me I cannot muster even a slight smile. It is bad enough that I have to hear I am Proud to be an American, in every musak, sappy remake they can think of, but I have to hear them, year round with the same frequency that holiday songs are heard from October through December, and it is all because we are post 9.11.

I am tired of the term 'Post 9.11'. I am mostly tired of it because it is being used to explain every ill of society. Like we , as a people, do not have enough depravity within us to create problems without terrorism as a catalyst?

It seems very en vogue to grapple with terrorism, to wallow in it. I want to smack the repective public upside the head and yell "We have no idea what terrorism is!" The past couple years have been a torrent of 'ripped from the headlines' television dealing with terrorism, but I only recently realized how saturated my theatre experience had become with this subject this past year. I have seen, or been a part of at least a dozen shows that have wrestled with the issue. Some were great pieces of theatre, but in my present frame of thought, the theatricality of it is paling in comparision to the realization that as a community we chose to set our artistic sites on being held hostage. Is it because we are in DC, the epicenter of fear mongering? Is it because, although we had a horrific induction into large scale terrorism, we just don't really know what it is like?

Modern day America has so little experience with terrorism, that it's constant use as an excuse has me disgusted. We are insulated. We take our one experience and keep it aflame. A new age 'never again'. But it is not like that. In Iraq, civilian deaths are numbered somewhere between 38,000 and 43,000. Civilian deaths. Current day America has no concept of loss on that scale. We have not lived through anything that remotely compares. I feel two faced for being American.

I recognize that we must be wary of terrorism in the same way that I am wary of walking to my car alone at night. We have to be smart. We have to outsmart. We have to be cautious and aware. We do not need to bury oursleves in a hostage mentality, it feels cheap to do it in the face of those who actually live it. It is not ours and I hope it never will be.

pastey white men

Can someone please help me understand myself. Why am I fascinated by characters like Ignatius from Confederacy of Dunces? I just read about a man who could be his Russian cousin. Absurdistand follows Misha through his stumbling life while trying to gain access back into America. He is a fat, squishy, oily individual. He made me think so much of Ignatius. So what is it about these soft, lard like, greasy characters that I find compelling? Is it their inability to change? Their complete contentment with their fat, lazy selves? I am repulsed by their chins dripping in butter and their constant gas, their pathetic hygiene.

I try to find more meaning. It cannot just be me watching a train wreck.

I think they echo my thoughts of Americans. The side of our nation that gorges and gropes for everything that is easy and filling. The part of our country that imbibes without tasting, swallows without savoring. That section that is undaunted by how disgusting the action might be, or what refuse is created in the whirlwind of self gratification.

Is this why I have to keep reading? Because Misha and Ignatius are part of my home?

week end

I am a tad fried after the crazy week. The good news is that I am done with a monstrous website design I have been working on for a while. It is done. All the way done. I just archived all the emails pertaining to it and cleaned my desk off from all my notes.

The bad news is that I am not in NYC. I really needed a break and would have loved to see some great shows and see some friends. Not sure when I will have time to make it up there this summer but be sure NY bloggers I will let you know when that is and I would love to catch up/meet you then.

For tonight I am going to kick back and relax. I have Absurdistan, The Idiot, Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them, and Blind Assassin on the end table (not sure where I will start).

Did I mention Corona? I have that too.

sour summer so far

As it turns I will be stuck in town this weekend. Too much work.

Arrgh.

road trip?

So I would very much like to go to NYC this weekend. I want to see Dead City and Nerve. If you are in NYC and have not yet seen these shows, then go.

I have to get all my work done by Thursday if I am going to get out of dodge, and that is all I have to say about that.

tracking indoctrination

You may laugh, but only for a second...then you may cry.


Small: That lady says that Smaller and I look like nocturnal twins.

Me: I think you mean fraternal.

Small: No its nocturnal. I saw it on TV. They called these two boys nocturnal twins.

Me: Well they probably meant it as a joke.

Small: No it was not a joke.

Me: How do you know? Maybe you just didn't get it.

Small: No, if it had been a joke they would have told us to laugh.

Me: Who would have told you to laugh?

Small: The laughing people on TV. They always tell you when something is funny.

Me: Sweet heaven, read a book.

sky, periwinkle, slate, aquamarine

I've got the blues.

Post show blues, but so relieved we closed. It has been a long run.

Tomorrow, onward and upward.

railing

There is a great speech from Eduardo Machado, and discussion going on at Parabasis.

I love a good rant. I think there a should be more 'hold your fist to the sky and rail' happening sometimes. I agree with a lot of the speech, but there are a few key points that I would like to respectfully disagree with.

"And I beg you let us stop being afraid of the audience. They are supposed to be afraid of us."

Why does the audience have to fear us? Why can't there be an adventure together? I am not out to scare my audience, unless that is the intention of the piece or role. Sometimes I am part of something that seeks to embrace its audience, other times anger them. What is more important to me is that I make them want. Make them want for more, for answers, for love, for change, for something new.

"I don't feel we are brave enough. I feel the theatre that I see for the most part is watered down."

Maybe he is not going to the right shows. I have seen many pieces that take risks and challenge me this year. Maybe he is talking about the Broadway model, and if so then he is not talking about the majority of theatre in America.

"Finally I'd like to discuss one of our biggest problems: Education. By now I think we all know we train too many people. I am guilty of this more then most of you. I run the playwriting program at Columbia and I am required to let in ten student playwrights a year. When I first started working there it was only six a year. It should really be two.

But because the university wants money. Because even at the educational level they feel art does not have to be subsidized, ten playwrights graduate every year from my program. How can they all really be playwrights? They can't and they are not. And since when did theatre people need a master to be actors, directors and playwrights, designers and producers?

I barely graduated from high school.

I went to an acting school that was down an alley in Van Nuys. I learned about playwriting from Maria Irene Fornes in an abandoned building called INTAR 2 on 53rd street, and by having my first three plays produced - not workshopped - at The Ensemble Studio Theatre. No degree. Just what came my way. What I sought out. If we have so many students graduating every year then what happens to the self taught, the inspired, the different? They are buried under piles of graduate scripts, resumes and 8X10s.

There is a wall that is making the theatre a place for only those who can afford it. But who is being kept out? The voices of the hungry and unknown. Of those who don't fit in. Of those whose future is dependent on their ability to Scream."

OK - so a) he was trained by Fornes. That hardley constitutes a lack of education. It may be true that colleges are letting in more people than they used to, but that does not lessen the importance that education holds for an artist b) I am a believer in the education of artists. It hones the talents you have, exposes you to a breadth of theatre knowledge, gives you the opportunity to perform in a place that is solely about education, about the experience of the theatre itself, with no mitigating factors. Also, in addition it serves as the first weeding out for many artists. I watched as many of my counterparts began to realize that the theatre was not for them, just as I watched as the training affirmed for many of us that this was our calling. c) To say that theatre training is available only to those who can afford it is nowhere near accurate. I went to school with mostly starving artists, who are still paying back their loans. Lastly, d)if someone who is not trained is driven enough they will overcome the hurdles and make it anyway. There are plenty who have done so and many more to come I am sure.

strangers with candy

It's not fair. I used this phrase, not just when I was 5, but yesterday as well. I think it with too much frequency. I was brought up to not use it. Taught that, life is not always fair, so quit your whining and move on. But I still revert back to 5 when life is not fair.

The massacre in Haditha was again in the Post this week. It sets me on the edge to think that this story is not causing riots in this nation.

Imagine, please, that due to the dislike of our leader and the fact that we have nuclear weapons, we are invaded. Our streets turned to rubble, our families shattered, economy ruined, but more; we no longer have running water, cannot use electricity, have no access to gasoline, not that we would want to drive, because their is gunfire wherever you go. The insanity of it is that those bombing you are claiming to be there to help you.

They give you candy. They lure our children out with sweets making them targets. Has anyone thought about the utter perversion of this? Men with guns giving children they don't know candy. We preach to our kids to never accept candy from strangers, let alone ones holding guns. How are sweets going to cover the acrid taste of loss that is gripping an entire country?

Now imagine that during the injustice of this, men who may or may not be the same ones who gave out candy come back without the treats, but now only with their guns and shoot one by one the children that took the bait and then kill their mothers. We can only hope it happened in that order. What if it was opposite? What if those little ones had to watch their parents die first? What if they were left alone in those last jagged seconds?

The injustice of it is beyond scope, but it does not seem to be ruffling many. Is it our insensitivity to those far away? Are we a desensitized nation? Do we believe that other races do not grieve or feel loss like we do? I think the answer is yes.

It is not fair.

head rush

Smaller has been standing on his head for years. Smaller is happy upside down and can hold entire conversations inverted. While standing on his head, Smaller can eat, burp, fart, sing, watch television, do modern dance moves with his feet, relate the pertinent news from his day, and add sums in his head. Smaller spends much of his life doing the tripod or a full headstand with legs gloriously outstretched straight to the sky. Hence why this was a victorious day for Smaller.

While playing with other random small person (ORSP)...

ORSP: Let's race to see who is faster.

Smaller: OK

(They race, they tie.)

ORSP: I win. Now lets see who can hop on one foot the longest.

Smaller: OK.

(They hop, they tie.)

ORSP: I win.

Smaller: No you did not.

ORSP: Yes I did, and you cheated.

Smaller: No I did not.

ORSP: Fine then lets do another. Let's see who can stand on their head the longest.

(A choir of heavenly voices erupt from the clouds, and a strange glow is emitted from Smaller's chest and, as he slowly turns, the wind ruffles his hair.)

Smaller: OK.

(They stand on their heads. ORSP falls over. Smaller stays on his head, perfectly straight, not wavering even an iota. He stays there for several minutes while ORSP continually attempts to attain the perfection that Smaller has, but ORSP keeps falling over.)

Smaller: I WIN.

someone is living my fantasy

I love that there are actors with enough clout that they actually can get away with scolding an audience. I have dreamt of the moment when I can turn on the rude loud talker, cell phone ringer, or concession challenged idiot and say in my best actory voice "DO YOU MIND, I AM ACTING HERE!"

I would have applauded Griffiths if I had been in the house. Let's hear it for the boys!

over the swag

I love that this step has been taken. I am not sure what good it will do, but all the same, I am glad it is being addresses. The buying of votes in this country is grotesque and the practice of it has spread like a cancer. Now the idea of buying votes is considered acceptable.

I wish that the Oscars would adopt a similar practice. It may be that money does not buy a vote but I am sure it can sway it. You disagree? What about when Cuba Gooding won instead of Ed Norton or Judy Dench losing for Mrs. Brown, but winning for Shakespeare in Love or Annette Benning not winning for either American Beauty or Being Julia. Most stupefying was Gwenyth Paltrow winning over Kate Blanchette.

But lets look at the bigger picture. How about George Bush getting to be president instead of Al Gore. The biggest election buy off ever.

It's all a trickle down people.