Serious Injury: Serious Option

There is a loverly BritCom benamed

Black Books

that covers the antics of a triptych of wacky friends and their exploits. The introductory episode presents us with the main character, Bernard Black, owner and operator of a small bookstore in London, faced for the first time with having to do his own taxes (as his accountant, it seems, is rather suddenly on the lam from

MI5

). About midway through the episode, Bernard discovers a helpful clause in the instructions for completing his "accounts," which states, in sum and substance, that if the filler-outer gets seriously ill or injured, he is exempt from filing his taxes. Upon reading this, of course, Bernard sets about on a series of failed attempts to irreparably maim himself. A ridiculous notion, and obviously a formula for comedy.

But I daresay this falls into the "it's funny because it's true" category.

Somebody make me unresponsible for finding my new apartment, for the underpinnings of an entire law practice, for putting my personal life in order (Is a personal life ever really "in order"?), for healing my body and for scheduling my theatrical commitments. Somebody hit me with a brick (

Patrick

?), kick me in the face (

Nat

?) or rerupture the frail hydrostatic pressure preventing my urine from invading my ballular region (

Myself

?). Actually, skip that last one; there's simply

got

to be a better way. But the first two I'll take! I actually thought to myself last night, looking for the subway in BedSty, "This neighborhood = not so great. Maybe I'll get mugged and I can retreat into a passive-aggressive hole for two weeks until this whole apartment hunting thing blows over." Alas, 'twas not meant to be. I still have the same finsky in my wallet, and my psyche remains arrogantly intact.

That last might fall into the "it's funny because it's blatantly false" category, actually.

I can feel the edges of my psyche curling up in retreat from all the B.S. of the hunt. (Trivia tidbit: My psyche is actually a

potato bug

.) Yesterday I saw two places, both of a goodly size for my modest needs. The first was in crap condition, however, and they wanted $650 there and then, non-refundable and unrelated to rent or an additional broker's fee, to secure it. Lots of promises for new windows (I lived for two years with windows with holes in them in Richmond) and a working intercom, the which I could always comfort myself with as I wrote out my $1,000 check every month for at least a year. The second was a really nice place, and could have been mine for a check there and then for a month's rent, which was lower than advertised: merely $875. But I felt pressured, and so didn't take it there and then. Which was good, because come to find out the reason all the new security had been installed was because the building's only (ginormous) neighbor across the street was a mandatory acceptance homeless men's shelter. Social conscience aside, not the sort of foot traffic I wish to submit me and mine to.

Tonight bodes more of the same. Leaping from inaccessible place to inaccessible place, calling to apologize for lateness and trying to suck up without falling into a myriad of traps and pressure situations. Tonight I am aiming for three places, which I tried but failed to do last night. Hopefully they will not all be wastes of time. Hopefully, all my problems will be solved by 9:00 PM tonight. But I'm not counting on it. There's nothing I'm counting on, at this point.

Except perhaps a friend with a hobbling post.

Tittering over the Taxing Toil

Dewds, oh my dewds: The taxes are done. Let there be much rejoicing.

That is to say, my taxes are finally done, and without the standard, combined period of days spent fretting over how they could possibly be so much, or how my computer could break down in the middle of them, or anything. Which makes me highly suspicious. Does this bode ill farther down the line? Can such ease of filing and abundance (HA!) of funds to pay city, state and country be merely indicative of some fatal error that will summon unto me the Gods of Audit some time in July? My suspicions, however, are at present overwhelmed by relief.

Not that the rest of the world has relaxed yet. In fact, there will be scattered days of panic, as though ripples through an otherwise still pool of fiscal calm, owing to the fact that the recent "nor'easter" has allowed for some (not all) an extension of time to file. This affects me, believe it or not, because my boss' clients (at il dayjobo) will have a few more days of manic question-asking. But I am done, and it is sweet.

We (I'm presuming a lot here [for a change] to include

absolutely every human being

) spend a lot of our time too busy to find comedy in life. I don't know if it's the relief of getting my taxes done (and laundry--simultaneously--

and for my next trick...

), the recent demise of Kurt Vonnegut ("Laughter and tears are both responses to frustration and exhaustion. I myself prefer to laugh, since there is less cleaning up to do afterward.") or simply gearing up for more work with

Zuppa del Giorno

, but this seems like a really awful crime to inflict upon oneself, this refutation of laughter for the sake of efficiency or accomplishment.

And lo, in one fell swoop he simultaneously achieves hypocrisy, condescension and over stating the obvious! I am such the multi-tasker this week.

I mean it, nevertheless. Sometimes I get a little fed up with performing comedy, and begin to listen to those who claim (literally or suggestively) that comedy is fun, sure, but hardly important. Au contraire, you bastards. I argue it's one of the most necessary and noble of pursuits, both in terms of creating it and experiencing it. Further (you bastards), it's just as much a talent to be able to live in humor as it is to create it. I am blown away by people who can laugh at almost anything, and really feel it. I mean, given the wrong circumstances, sure: I want to eat their jugular vein without chewing; but more often than not such circumstances have more to do with my inability to laugh than with laughter really being inappropriate.

Because almost everything that is of a daily nature is funny. Historical events, geopolitical movements, cosmic uncertainties . . . not necessarily rich with chuckles, I'll admit. But even in these arenas there hides the secret giggle, and when it comes to just getting your key into the lock of your front door . . . well, you could spend days mining such comic richness. It's exciting to me, this limitless comedy, because I equate it with an interconnectedness (unleashing U.U. philosophy now...). "It's funny because it's true," comes of identification, and if we're open enough we can identify with just about any scenario or creature.

Not that comedy is easy to craft, by any stretch of the imagination. Good comedy is of a precise, yet instinctive nature, and how many can claim that? Whether it's

the latest block-busting Will Ferrell behemoth

, or Friend Adam working on his latest stand-up material, the comedy is difficult to build, and it takes someone rather obsessed with it to spend a good deal of time trying, someone prepared to fail just as much as he or she succeeds. Such a person also probably experiences on a visceral level an appetite for others' laughter, and to know that

and

accept defeat on a regular basis is no small task. Then again, there are also those who are funny in spite of themselves. The worst of these are those who never learned to embrace--in some fashion--their own lovable foolery. I long ago prescribed to a philosophy of defining life by my stumbles.

As with income, though, we face a trade-off between what we do and what we owe. Must we give to Caesar his due? Alas, we must. But we can do it smiling. No one can take that particular pleasure away from us.

A Love of the (Neo) Classics

After Easter they suffered a huge nor'easter.

I'm really digging the rain these past couple of days, actually. Sometimes one is simply in the mood to have their city look like something out of a noir flick, all sheeting greys and visible light beams. I'm prowling about in my grey trench coat . . . but with an umbrella. Which is not terribly noir, but I had to concede defeat years ago on the umbrella issue. In the right hands, umbrellas are a force for good, and for a lack of mildew-y smells.

The weekend was a strange blend of circumstance for yours truly, overlapping past and present, business and pleasure. My sister and her boyfriend Adam finally saw

A Lie of the Mind

Friday night, and it didn't scare Adam too badly, which I consider an accomplishment.

Chris Kipiniak

, of Torture Project and Spider-Man fame (see

3/8/07

) attended the same night, which was especially rewarding to me, having the respect I do for his work and knowing how busy he keeps his schedule. Saturday night

Friend Kira

made it all the way out from New Jersey, though she couldn't hang around afterwards owing to bus schedules. Perhaps the most surprising appearance, however, involved the return of Friend Christina and her fella' J.C. I reunited with Christina at Rachel's wedding (see

3/21/07

), and they both attended the opening weekend of

ALotM

. This weekend past they brought friends and family with them, and one other.

As I took my final bow Saturday night, I glimpsed a face in the crowd smiling with satisfaction, one that I recognized. I immediately, however, thought to myself, "Dang. I'm so Method. Frankie's delirium is bleeding over into the curtain call." Sure enough, though, when I had scrubbed my face and removed my bullet holes, I ventured out into the lobby and was ambushed by none other than Mrs. Rachel Lee herself. Which was

the weirdest thing that has happened to me in years

. She was up seeing friends, and Christina invited her along to see my show. A group of eight, we all went out afterwards, first to

La Lanterna

, then

Puck Faire

, and I had the opportunity to actually catch up with Rachel a bit, something that was impossible at the wedding and which in actuality we hadn't done in years. Mostly I was curious how things were for a person who came to the city with as ardent a passion as I for professional achievement, and who had since returned home and, shall we say, modified her own personal

The Third Life

(r). It sounds like she misses the more unique aspects of city living, but not the struggle to achieve. It sounds like she's very happy with her life now, which it was good to have confirmed. Most of all, it's wonderful to see in person that she's on her good path, and that I'm on mine. An unexpected fortune.

The next day I was up and out to attend the closing of

Friend Nat

's appearance in Moliere's

The Learned Ladies

, at

The Gallery Players

, just thirteen short blocks from my apartment. Acquaintance Alisha Spielmann was also in the production, whom I know from Nat's readings of

The Exiled

. Nat does quite a bit of classical work; I think I can say with some safety that it is his forte. He's tall, with a wiry, energetic frame and a deep voice, and he put it all to wonderful use in

TLL

. He played the villain of the piece, and I'm here to tell you: Nat does a delicious villain, especially when its one that can be as flamboyant as Trissotin. I met him on a show in which he was playing an undercover demon. His enthusiasm for mischief would make the role of Trissotin type cast, were it not that Nat is genuinely intelligent where Trissotin is merely conniving.

This is the second production of Moliere I've seen in the past few months (see

12/25/06

), and the prior experience was in a theatre of very similar dimensions and budget (apart from paying Manhattan rent, that is). I took issue with certain of the aspects of The Gallery Players production, the which may be a result of too close a comparison with the show I saw in the winter. There were little choices (among them, the decision to incorporate contemporary clothing into relatively period costumes to varying degrees--the young hero [played admirable by Marc Halsey] wore a belt on his jeans whose buckle distracted) that I can be free of with a little time to forget, but my biggest gripe was how the actors seemed to have, at certain points, been instructed to make choices of delivery that emphasized the rhyme scheme. It's hard to say if such a thing is the fault of a director, or a failing of certain actors, but in my opinion it is a big no-no. Moliere wrote specific ending couplets when he wanted the rhyme to take precedence, and his commedia dell'arte inspired characters deserve to spew their dialogue with more ease. In balance, and to the credit of Neal J. Freeman and actress Candice Goodman, her Martine--the only consistent servant character in this particular show--spoke with a great candor befitting her character and an amusing translation of her dialogue.

My overall favorite moment of the show, however, was a very naughty one, theatrically speaking. It should serve to take my criticism down a peg or two. At one point in the show, Trissotin and Henriette (played by Alisha) are left to their own devices whilst the other characters in scene wax poetic about Trissotin's, er, poetics. For this sequence, the two characters actually took seats at opposite corners of the stage (I have to imagine that in most productions this time is used to further illustrate Trissotin's intentions toward Henriette), she utterly bored and he arrogantly unlistening to his own praise. What ensued was a kind of ridiculous silent war of entertaining gesture. Nat had developed some business involving inspecting his teeth and snorting snuff, and Alisha was reaching new heights of boredom which led her to sprawling against the wall and vacantly inflating spit bubbles, all the while the three scholarly women energetically stroked one another's egos, oblivious to the unspoken commentary. It was hysterical, if possibly gratuitous. But in my world, what gets the laugh stays in the comedy.

I've written here before about the effects of past lives on the present, and it's a theme in my theatrical work. I seem to constantly be finding myself in memory plays, and

Zuppa del Giorno

is itself a tradition of finding the ancient roots of contemporary entertainment. Our next show,

Prohibitive Standards

(the which I also set up

the collaboration 'blog

for this weekend), is to be set in prohibition-era Scranton, and is likely to be influenced by characters from that era and centuries earlier. Perhaps it's a theme in theatre in general, as classic characters like Richard III or Trissotin continue to inform us about choices we're making on a daily basis. Part of the key to living and creating effectively is in learning from the past, honoring it as it deserves, but also being realistic about it and recognizing it is, indeed, passed. Similar to being alive in the moment on stage, one can't always base his or her decisions on what he or she has done (or regretted doing) before.

Sometimes the only answer is to improvise.

Dang. It. Dang it!

It's raining today. I mean to say, it is

RAINING

to

DAY

. I woke at 7:00, struggling to avoid over-indulgence in my snooze alarm, struggling in fact to remind myself to start jogging again today, when I heard outside my window the pitter-patter of raindrops--the most coma-inducing sound ever. I don't know why the raindrops sounded so pittery and patteresque, though, because when I stepped out into it on my way to the day job, it was a steady downpour, with just enough wind to keep it in your eyes. And I lent my sublettor my umbrella, because she's a girl and will apparently melt if she gets wet. It's science. By the time I got to work, I wanted to kill everyone. Violently. With a

broad-bladed bastard sword

.

See (ye non-New-Yorkers, ye princes of providences), when the weather does something this disastrous during a commute time, there's an interesting phenomenon that occurs in The Frickin' Huge Golden Delicious. The first symptom is a mass decision--akin to Jungian archetype--by every New Yorker who

drives

or

walks

into work to forego that, fearing that the rain is a sign of God's vengeance, and take the train. Side effects of this perception include a voracious increase in aptitude for careless acts, such as forgetting to say "excuse me" when the situation invites, or intentionally shoving disabled octogenarians into the tracks because they might contribute to oxygen consumption in the train car. The second symptom of the phenomenon is that everyone's intelligence quotient drops by at least twenty points.

At least.

People in suits, people accustomed to making decisions dependent on long-term thinking and strategy, become multi-pronged ballistic missiles when they have to carry an umbrella (inevitably right at eye-level [I am not in the upper half of height quotient in this city] leading me to believe that if I ever have to compete in illegal bloodsport in Canada, I'm taking my umbrella) and giant men who work with their hands all day long act like debutantes when faced with a curbside puddle. "I feel like I'm taking crazy pills!"

My bitterness may have preceded (hence colored) these gripes. I may have awoken in this frame, as last night's

A Lie of the Mind

wasn't quite up to snuff for me. (Terrible phrase: "Up to snuff." What does it refer to? Nasal inhalants? Illegal movies?) It was awkward being back in the penny loafers o' Frankie, and I had a strange time trying to balance a jittery nervousness and a rather tired energy level. The scene with Beth went fairly well, I thought. But I blew that damn final moment again.

That's not quite accurate. I didn't blow it. I managed to serve my function in it (whatever that may be), but the feeling behind it was not as intense as I would have liked, and as I had discovered last weekend. I'm not sure what went wrong there, being off my game in general, but I suspect it had something to do with nerves and forcing it. Have you ever tried

not

to think about something? I mean really tried? You tell yourself, "Don't think of an

elephant

," and for the rest of the day your thoughts are ambushed by elephants. This is what it is to try to avoid self-analysis on stage. The best tactic I've found is to focus on something immediate, and urgent. (Such as the action at hand.) But our body's defenses are strong, our minds labyrinthine and there's a minotaur named Disbelief that is hunting us at every moment.

"Was that over the top? I can never tell!" <-A hum-ding-er of a movie quote, if you ask me.

SOME SEVERAL HOURS LATER . . .

Well, the rain has stopped, and the world is a quiet, cool place. Once again I performed the show, and once again I experienced emotionus interruptus. It was baffling, just a frustrating shock to the system. I'm open as all hell! What's wrong with me now? I was contemplating it all the way to the subway, where I ran into fellow actor in the show, Todd d'Amour. He asked the obligatory "How was your show?" and I somehow managed to be both honest and brief (as the parentheticals may suggest, I have been having the greatest difficulty of late explaining myself in twenty-five words or less) and voiced my frustration with that last moment, actually referring to it as "my last moment." When I had said what I had to I could look in Todd's eyes again, and there I saw total recognition. Identification, even. He went on to say that he has struggled with that moment for himself, and felt, as I had, that he had broken through last weekend. Now it was gone again.

How much better that made me feel, and how much sense that makes. It's our moment, his, mine and Laura's, and we're each of us going to feel it in his or her own way if something's off. Now we just have to unite again, somehow, and lift each other up.

I wonder what the weather will bring tomorrow.

Projecting Torture

I can't recall whether or not I've written about this previously, but I have had a disturbing tendency of late to choose movies to attend at the theatre that contain torture sequences. Surely a lot of this is owing to a certain renewed relevance torture has come to attain in contemporary American media, but part of it feels almost comically fated to me. I mean, I went to a freaking

James Bond

movie, and the torture was there, and grisly, and . . . ugh. I should have known better when it came to

Syriana

, but James Bond? Couldn't you guys

just lay a titles sequence over that jonx

so I could choose to look at the pretty silhouettes instead?

The answer is, of course, no, they couldn't. Because that movie (

Casino Royale

) ruled, being all character-driven and fantastical at the same time. Torture should not be made part of a montage, or music video. It's irresponsible representation. It makes it sexy, or conjures memories of

Ralph Macchio

doing switch kicks on harbor posts. (Oh Macchio...you truly are

The Best Around

.) Torture is the most vile of human behaviors, if it can indeed be called a behavior. The word covers so many actions, referring more to the intention than the deed, that it is probably better described as an attitude than as a behavior.

Last Thursday Joint Stock Theatre Alliance held a meeting to discuss changes to our ongoing work on

The Torture Project

. How significant are these changes? Well, significant enough to warrant the change of the name of the producing company (though I don't know if that was motivated one by the other). Goodbye, JSTA; hello Uncommon Cause. As I've mentioned previously (see

4/7/07

), one such change is that they may be dropping me from the roles as an actor, in need as they are of someone who looks the correct age (19) for my character. But there were many more changes already made, and I suspect dozens more to come.

In the first place, there was a lot of serious talk about making decisions about exactly what kind of show we are trying to make. Historical account? (Most likely not.) Dramatic re-enactment? (Closer, methinks, but perhaps too close to what

Tectonic

did with the ever-famous

Laramie Project

.) Fiction inspired by true events? (That's what it's mostly been until now, and I suspect is going to change.) The director even presented us with a brand, spanking new "organizing principle" (Thank you, Moises.), which . . . I really wish I had written down at the time. Because it was too long for me to memorize. This is all for the best, as far as I'm concerned. I've been craving a sort of ruthless focus in this process for a little while now, so it is at least dramatically apt that such a change in direction might mean the end of what I came into it for in the first place: to collaboratively create a world and perform in it. Some part of me is crushed, sure, but it is rapidly over-ridden by the excitement for the

TP

becoming its butterfly. Its war-inflicted, quasi-grieving butterfly.

But the family of our inspiration, real-life soldier

Keith "Matt" Maupin

, does not grieve. They believe. We (dare I say we [hell, I dare say it a second time]) We will get a big second-hand dose of just how everything progresses in his hometown of Batavia, Ohio when Producer/Director

Laurie Sales

and Producer/Actor

Kelly Van Zile

return from there. They have spent the weekend--and today, the third anniversary of Matt's capture--in his hometown. One has to presume such an experience would be revelatory anyway, but already we've gotten hints at just how affective and effective a dose of reality can be. A couple of days ago Kelly wrote to inform us (amongst other things) that the town they live in isn't actually Batavia. It's something else, skirting Batavia. She did not go in to detail. Presumably an explicit explanation of that will be included in whatever information they return with.

And this, as far as I know, is how the rest of us stand: poised for intensive listening upon our heroes' return. I would be surprised if any of us had any expectation less than that our worlds, theatrically and personally, are about to be rocked. Imagine imagining a world for two years. Then imagine arriving there suddenly, and not recognizing it at all. That's what I imagined, anyway. Kelly also wrote to us about some amazing sympathetic coincidences between what we created and what was really there, which only goes to show that the only thing one can count on in life is being surprised.

Amongst such surprises arising (phoenix-like) from the Indian food and conversation in

Faith Catlin

's apartment on Thursday, was one that makes my tenuous position in the company seem downright comfy. Namely, one of the characters we've spent a lot of time and interest on in our process had been cut, meaning in addition that the actress playing her was cut. I'm sure many factors contributed to this decision, but the primary cause was that the character (the "girlfriend" left at home) was decided to be tangential to the story we were trying to tell. A rough call. We all knew, I think, that things would eventually play out this way. We even signed contracts about a year ago solidifying our rights to back-pay and creation credit. Still. Good work hurts.

Many of these tough decisions were the result of a meeting held between our producers and the good people at

The Public

, following our last presentation. The feeling at our meeting (and I may not be well-tuned to this, leaving early as I had to for that night's call for

A Lie of the Mind

) was that we were collectively interested in advancing the project. Not just finishing it and getting it produced anywhere, but doing what had to be done to make it a valid bid for a place like The Public, or

New York Theatre Workshop

, etc. It's an important topic for us, and obviously very important work, and we want it seen.

For those of you who think context unimportant in comparison to good work, who believe a project of any kind will be appreciated in its turn no matter what kind of exposure it gets, I beg you to read this article I was led to by Anonymous:

Pearls Before Breakfast

. One could argue of this article that it only solidifies the value of the artistic struggle within a generally unappreciative environment. Such a one, however, would be both stupid and wrong.

What does it all mean? Nothing yet, silly. It's a work in progress. But it's all dreadfully exciting, and I mean that expression very specifically. I was reviewing my entries up until this point that addressed

The Torture Project

, for fear that in my 'blog-enhanced sense of self-righteousness I had somehow cast it in a negative light. Whether I have or not, it's clear that I've been frustrated and uncertain about where we were headed, and how much longer it might take to get there. Now there's a charge to the work that's almost threatening, and I have the experience of both being very excited for it, and dreadfully concerned about whether I will continue to be involved in it.

I want to be. It's when it gets scary, the stakes raised, that things like this get really good.