Improved improv.

The Feminist Debutante Guild, an improv troupe of which I am the Zeppo, had its first show in about two years last saturday, and it may have been our best show ever! It was a variety format with several musical acts, all of which were terrif, and us doing improv and monologues. I'm usually the weakest link, and I think I was not particularly weak; meanwhile the others were in splendid form! So hurray for us. I dunno if I'll be able to do any future shows with them since I'm trying to dive back into theatre after my post-Kate break, but I'd like to see the troupe return to founder J'mel's original vision; actual long-form improv with no preordained structure. That's a gold standard for improvists, and the sooner we're willing and able to abandon preordained narrative structures the better.

Also I met a very nice lady after the show.

During the course of the show I was assigned the role of a "hard-core Republican," so of course I was rather mean to the Neo-Con artists, although if I'd been cast as a hard-core Democrat I would have been just as mean to the worst-case examples who seem to be setting the nonagenda for that party. I don't know if I was funny, but I do know I was mean. Anyway, I adlibbed a line that I've been thinking about ever since: "We're fighting them over there so they can kill us over there." I dunno how many audience members got the reference to the sound bite "We're fighting them over there so we don't have to fight them over here," but since then I've been pondering this cynical shadow side of that invasion justification. For the tiny minority of Middle Easterners who want to kill Americans, it's obviously easier to stay in the Middle East than to travel to America, so if America sends them a big batch of American youngsters it makes sense that there'll be few or no attacks on our turf. Is it really that different from sending a boatload of sacrificial Virgins to the Cretan Minotaur in order to avoid a war with Crete? Do some of the neo-cons think that it's better to let a bunch of low-income soldiers die at the hands of bloodthirsty terrorists if it distracts those terrorists from coming here and maybe taking out a plutocrat or two?

Not to turn this into a political blog, so let's shift to a subject on which I have greater expertise; my weight. Let's just say that I've got 205 flava. Oh help.

This weekend I'm doing the BATA (Birmingham Area Theatrical Alliance or something) auditions. I've got a funny monologue and a powerhouse song picked out; now let's see if I can sell them. There's a ton of local directors attending; most of them have seen me and know my parameters, but there are a few folks with whom I want to work but who don't really know me. Whether I'm doing cool theatre or doing nothing between now and the holidays will probably hinge on how I do Saturday.

Truths within Falsehoods.

I recently read an article about the poet Yeats, who, as a young man, apparently wanted to find proof that fairies were real. I can dig it; when I was a kid I was spellbound by The Neverending Story, movie and book, and I tried to find a book that could transport me to a fantasy land. In a sense I was successful; The Worm Ouroboros, A Voyage to Arcturus, and all those Oz books did the trick. But Yeates was frustrated by the fact that, while he knew logically that fairies were make-believe, he found the fairy tales of old country folk to have a realistic, authentic texture.

Alan Moore once said that "All stories are true," meaning not that they're all literally true, but that they all tell truths about the people who tell or listen to the stories. I think fairy tales, or rather stories about fairies, have the ring of truth because they are based on the aforementioned Irish country folks' observations about life. Folks had noticed that the natural world shared many characteristics with humans: kindness, cruelty, wisdom, caprice, beauty, ugliness. Fairies are the places where human characteristics and the natural world's characteristics flow together, overlap.

New subject: I got the soundtrack to the recent Broadway revival of How To Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, and it's quite good, but it cuts one of my favorite songs: Cinderella Darling. They probably thought it was too sexist, but there's a sexist streak running through the whole show. Start cutting the sexism, and where do you stop? I thought about this some during our production of Kiss Me Kate; it's full of dated gender politics that don't quite match the values of anyone in the cast or crew. How, then, do we justify doing the show when it seems to present values that we can't endorse? "It's just a musical" is an obvious answer, and while glib, I think it's basically on the money. Reviving old musicals is a kind of antiques restoration project; we're not presenting them as representative of our views, but as the views of our ancestors. The best way to treat sexism and such in these shows is probably to present them as relics, and perhaps to cheerfully upend them from beneath. A wink to the audience should be enough. After all, the dopey General I played had little to do with my actual estimation of real-world generals, and I don't think anyone was really confused about that-the joke was too broad to take straight.

Another Closing, Another Show...

Kiss Me Kate has ended, and I'm in the usual post-show glum phase. I feel like I've finally entered a world of signs, symbols and portants made manifest... as if the blend of elements that is the stock in trade of musicals is precisely the kind of creative expression I've wanted to participate in all this time. Much love to Andy for encouraging me to audition and for casting me, and to the cast and crew!

Michelle, our leading lady, was very encouraging, supportive and patient with this stumbling novice. We did a duet in which I mostly let her do the heavy lifting. Every night I took so much pleasure from hearing the singing... Frank, I hope you won't think I'm just trying to butter you up when I say that not only is your voice a treasure, but your deft comic acting set the tone for all that was funny in this production. Too Darn Hot lived up to its title, thanks to Michael's swinging singing and some all too exciting ensemble dancing.

I'm still exausted (more from the strike and the cast party than the production) but I aim to do more musicals.

Another Opening, Another Show...

Kiss Me Kate has opened! The first week (of two) is over, and although I don't have the benefit of knowing how it looks and sounds from the audience, I think we have a really strong show. I'm really proud to be associated with it.

My General's uniform includes authentic WWII officer's clothing, which I found intimidating. I felt like I didn't have the right to wear the uniform, but no ghosts have materialized thus far. I've also decided to get some contact lenses. I've never wanted the things; I like glasses, and I can usually fumble around the stage pretty effectively without them. But over the last few years it's dawned on me that my poor vision has a subtle but significant negative effect on my onstage interations with fellow performers. It's hard for me to make eye contact and communicate through the eyes if I can't see the other person's facial expressions except through a glass darkly.

If my lack of posts doesn't make it obvious, I've decided to live without a computer to call my own, and I've been very, very busy. I'd rather have too little time for blogging than too much, but I do want to make this a weekly thing at the least.

My Ducky, My Wucky

Kiss Me Kate is proving to be one of the most satisfying theatrical productions I've ever worked on; maybe it's because I'm stretching so far. Singing, dancing, good times. In working on my vocals I have discovered some odd things about how my voice works; it seems that I close up my nasal resonators when I speak or sing. I'm trying to figure out when or if I should open those resonators up; FLT, our esteemed male lead, has an astonishingly full voice, and it sounds like all his resonators are operating at peak effeciency.

I really enjoy watching the dancing at rehearsal, and not just because the dancers are cute. I have great admiration for people who know how to use their bodies; I often feel like a spastic robot. Precise, controlled movement is like a superpower in my eyes.

A friend emailed me at work to inform me that today has been declared a National Day of Sass, and that I should sass off to someone. Soon thereafter I got in trouble for NOT using wild-ass guesswork. Usually I get in trouble for using wild-ass guesswork. Who knew that the first time I took a strict construction approach to the rules that I would get in trouble for it? I firmly believe that this will be resolved in my favor; these situations usually play out in favor of strict construction. But I wrote a sassy email. And then I unsent it. What a coward.

That's one of the nice things about the company email system... you can "unsend" stuff if you have second thoughts. I learned this as a trainee; I sent a spicy email to a lady friend and accidentally sent it to a dozen other folks. One of them kindly taught me how to unsend. Another gave me funny looks for a while.

Was that enough wooly posting for now? I swear I'll get my computer fixed soon.

What Hath Babbage Wrot?

It appears that having a working computer is not part of God's plan for my life, so I won't be updating this too often for the near future. Things always seem to be better in general when I don't have net access though. The next few weeks are pretty much about Kiss Me Kate.

Strong suggestions: go snag a copy of the soundtrack (there's a couple versions) of Out Of This World, a forgotten Cole Porter show with some splendid songs. Check your email to make sure you didn't just get three different party evites. And don't drop an Ibook unless you want it to turn into a big paperweight.

Hanging Over Everything

Tonight we rehearsed the opening of Kiss Me Kate, and it just gets better and better! It's a complex scene, blending acting, singing and dancing; all the stuff you expect from a musical. It's fun to do, and I'm hugely fond of this cast, even though I barely know most of the folks.

Anyway, I watched from the sidelines as a few folks ran through a dance number, and the thought crossed my mind: "Someday every one of the delightful people in this cast wil be dead."

Mono no aware, the Japanese call it... Life gains a certain sweetness from the knowledge that it's only a temporary condition.

P. S. Why isn't my blog allowing UBB code all the sudden? I tried to post a link to an article about Mono no aware, but if I can't do it with a pretty UBB link then fergit it. I am about to pitch a big tantrum; the perfect antidote to wistful melancholy.