God Bless the US

Last night, after a weekend's worth of rehearsals, I was involved in another staged reading of

Justin Warner

's play,

American Whupass

. (You may recall

my last encounter with this play

[and with the dude from

Clerks

]

over a year ago.) When last we left

American Whupass

, it was slotted to be performed in New Jersey in the fall of this year. Since I hadn't heard anything more about this production since, I thought to myself, "Aw. They found someone else. Aw. Poop." Exactly like that. I enjoy the play very much, and continually find new things to pursue in portraying "my" character in it, Terry Bowen, campaign-manager savant extraordinaire. To my pleasant surprise--and, I'm sure, Justin's extreme frustration--the play was dropped from production, which is why I hadn't heard hide nor hair since, until Justin emailed me asking me to audition for a new group producing a reading of it.

Theatre Resources Unlimited

is producing staged readings in the next month for a panel of producers to provide feedback, and

AW

was put up in this series last night.

The venue is an interesting one. By and large, the intention of

the reading series

is to give feedback on

producing

a given play; that is, getting it up in a venue, marketing it, etc. This means that for the first time we were performing the play without the intention of getting feedback for improving the script itself. We were hoping to present the best product possible, in order to win over producers interested in doing just that. It remains to be seen where the play will get next as a result, but Justin is a brilliant worker, and there's little doubt that he'll pursue its production to the last. Incidentally,

Friend Todd

is appearing in the third installment in this series, which is the conflict that prevents him from joining

Zuppa del Giorno

in Italy this month. Small enough, world?

I had a hell of a good time working on this play again. I always do, but this time was different in many ways. We've never had so much time to work on the play itself in prelude to performing it, and we had a very insightful and professional director in

Nancy Robillard

, who saw me personally through a lot of discoveries about my role. (To top it all off, we were rehearsing in a penthouse in Tribeca, which ain't half bad.

Bill Fairbairn

was amongst our cast, and his apartment ain't half bad, lemme tell you.)

American Whupass

is a play that deals in logical absurdities, yet it's all grounded in real-life examples and motivations. I've written about its unique quality before, so I won't go on at length, but I will take a moment to observe that it's strange that such a quality should be so unique. People love this brand of comedy, at once ridiculous, yet perfectly believable. It goes back to ancient Greece. Why should it be so rare these days?

It all went down at

The Players Theatre

, a cool space with a narrow seating area that was very evocative of a sense of depth. (Of course, no backstage space to speak of because we are, after all, talking about New York real estate.) I think the reading went well. We had some good audience reactions, and

Friend Kira

was in attendance to provide some complimentary words afterwards. It's just possible, though, that I played my role a little too close to the cuff.

Bowen is a duplicitous dude who starts out seeming very Johnny America, only to reveal more and more his win-at-any-cost perspective. I've played him variously over a span of nearly three years now (That's nearly like a quasi-successful sitcom [if said sitcom just featured the same episode with minor variations over and over again]!), and what appealed to me at first is still my favorite aspect: He believes in what he's doing, and that the results make him "the good guy." An actor can get down with that, man! It's also great to play him completely straight in the beginning, when he seems pure, with an awareness of his orchestrations behind the scenes.

However, the play has a kind of "avalanche of absurdity" effect, integrated not only into the writing but also into the dramatic action, and I think I missed the boat on riding that this time around. My affection for playing Bowen straight should have relented a bit more, and I should have let myself get a bit more wrapped up in the action. A classic example: When the daughter of the senator Bowen is trying to keep in the Senate enters the race against him, Bowen tells the senator, "You've got to stop her before it's too late, Wayne. There is no template for this. No template!" I understand this moment implicitly. It's best when "No template!" comes screeching out almost involuntarily. The man's career hangs in the balance, not to mention the public safety of hundreds of the senator's constituents. On Monday, I played the line very sincerely, but failed to allow my voice to crack, which is something that has happened in every other reading of the scene I've ever done. A small thing, to be sure. The devil is in the details.

To what do I attribute this change? I'm so glad I asked. I've been mulling it over for a little while, and have a few possible explanations. The first, and simplest, is just as I've said above: I'm enamored of playing the character straight. He functions well in this way and, oddly enough, feels more loathsome to me by the end (which I relish). The second is that I may be making this change in my performance in general these days; as I grow older, I'm looking for subtler cues and effects, ways of accomplishing the same things without as much noisy energy as I might have opted for in earlier years. This venerable-sounding choice should also be viewed in the light of fairly regular feedback I've received over the years that my choices as an actor need to be "toned down," or that I need to be "calmed down" for a straight play. In other words, the choice may not be all chosen. So we'll call that point of possible explanation "second-point-five." Third and lastly, it may just be my body feeling different. I can't deny that the sensations from my body are a huge part of my acting, and in recent years (be it a result of age or injury or what-have-you) I've needed to work more to generate that more-manic energy that drives screwball comedy.

I'd like to find a way in to that energy again for myself. Recently I've responded better to the clown work in part, I think, because it contains built-in silences and a sensitive response. Sure, it can be back-breaking and impulsive, too, but it feels essentially sensitive to me. Screwball is different, and it's something I can do very well. I don't ever want to lose that. In reading

Dan Rice: The Most Famous Man You've Never Heard Of

, I gained a new perspective on how our supposed definitions of high- and low-brow culture came about. As a young nation, we screwed that up pretty good, in my opinion, and have stuck to it. Redeem screwball, friends. Go a little crazy now and then.

Do Oh

Last night Friend Heather and I performed our much-performed clown duet (originally conceived and directed with

Friend Grey

),

Death + A Maiden

, as part of the same festival

I performed in the night before

. My hat is off to her. She came a long way, through difficult travels, to partner with me in all things theatrical this week, and me with virtually no free social time.

Fortunately, we had great company. There was no way I could have felt isolated this night, let me tell you. Friends

Jenny

and

Dave

were MCing as their characters in

The Maestrosities

, a clown band they developed together, and Friend

Anna (Zastrow)

was on the bill as well, playing her new clown, Hillemo (sp?). We even had friends in the well-packed audience!

Ed Chemaly

, our director for

Operation Opera

was in attendance, as well as Friend

Avi

. Friends

Kate

and

Leah

managed to make it, too, which is always great for audience reaction. Leah's laugh is in constant threat of upstaging any show -- loud and clear and uniquely hilarious.

Heather and I have done this piece many times, in a variety of environments, but there's always something to be learned from it. Without a doubt, this time through contained one of the most gratifying audience reactions to a specific moment that I've ever known. The scenario is that Death pays a visit to a Maiden preparing for a party, intending to dispatch her, but discovering that he loves her. They court, they dance, and about three-quarters of the way through the 15-minute piece, they kiss . . . which naturally immediately kills the Maiden. When we reached this point in our tale, the audience burst into my favorite kind of laughter. It seemed as though they were surprised not only by the turn of events, but at themselves for laughing. I have put forth for some time that laughter is ultimately born from self-awareness, from a fear of death, and this was a particularly poignant exemplification, if you are asking this guy. It was especially effective because it takes a while for Death to realize ("Think slow; act fast." - Buster Keaton) he's killed his new love, and when he does, he has a right heartfelt tantrum over it. The audience was right there with me when I did that scary, emotional bit, it seemed. I felt them pouring their grief in the same dish as mine. That, my friends, is a sharp contrast between the clowning we do, and the clowns most of America is aware of.

What's very interesting about the piece is that, in spite of it being a hit the first couple of times we did it, the ending hasn't satisfied audiences for quite some time. Which is rough for me, because I'm the only performer left on stage (and ostensibly conscious) by that point. When we originally set the piece, it was according to the guidelines of a particular comedy festival in Philadelphia, which specified that all performances must address love and death, and incorporate a

Wet-Nap(TM)

as a prop. This shaped our show, and naturally lent a certain distance to the story. Because the audiences were aware that 1) what they were seeing is a "comedy," and 2) it will involve death, they could take such elements as ingredients more than as profound, empathetic experiences. In processing this piece for other venues, we've used Heather's ridiculous bow in place of the Wet-Nap(TM), but neglected to revise the ending to accomodate our changed audience.

The ending consists of a five-minute sequence of Death failing to finish his job -- carrying off the body -- until he doesn't anymore and walks out with the Maiden over his shoulder, his scythe shoved down the back of his shirt and kicking his cloak along ahead of him. On its own: cute. After an audience has come to love Heather's Maiden, and empathize with my Death: not so much cute, or even awkwardly funny. So there's work to be done on the old stand-by! That's kind of cool.

If only we didn't have so much other work to do just now. But more on that later...

So Low

Last night was my solo clown debut.

Well, not precisely. I have done a number of solo clown performances in my time. Last night merely marked the first time I did so on an actual stage. Up until this event, my solo clowning was largely busked and/or filmic. In fact, I volunteered for the festival hosting clown and puppet events because I wanted to have a good deadline for adapting this particular solo routine to a stage. Plus I was desperate for work, at the time. Naturally, I completely ignored this opportunity to

work

on the piece, and found myself panicky all day yesterday, contemplating exactly what I was going to do up there that night.

It went okay, rife with the peaks and valleys I might have expected from a debut work in a nurturing yet unexpectedly intimate environment of strangers. I didn't, of course, expect these variances in my experience. No, I find that when contemplating performance I'm usually surprised by the comparisons between my expectations and the experience. I expect complete victory or total failure; the median is difficult to imagine, the variable completely confounding. This is possibly because the more intense the stage fright or adrenaline, the more apt I am to think in absolutes. Or, it could be that the (utterly erroneous) stereotypical mentality of a struggling actor has infected my imagination deeper than I, er, imagined. In other words, the idea that

just one big hit

could change everything for me may contribute to the absolutes I contemplate. Either way, the product was, in some respect, just like every other. Some things went over great. Others, not so much.

I have yet to attempt any kind of monodrama, or extended solo performance as such. Outside of a few scattered soliloquies, I'm always acting with other performers. Last night I found a popular axiom to be doubly true and especially so for live silent comedy: When you lose the audience, there's no one to turn to but yourself.

Not so backstage. The worlds of circus, clown and other "gig acts" is a small one anywhere, I'd imagine. That goes double for New York, where you're just as likely to run into your babysitter from age 5 as you are to never see current friends who live just two neighborhoods over. I happened to get ensnared in this show's clutches through an email sent out by one

Ms. Jenny Lee Mitchell

requesting acts. I know Jenny through

Friend Dave (Berent [nee Gochfeld])

, whom I know through Friend Heather (whom I know from having worked with her in

Zuppa del Giorno

), but I also knew Dave as the more male half of

The Kourageous Kiplingers

, and vaudeville act he did with

Friend Rachel (Kramer)

. Dave and Jenny have also done shows with

The Northeast Theatre

(which is the home of Zuppa del Giorno). I did one of those with Dave, but not Jenny. BUT, I did do

A Lie of the Mind

with Jenny's mom, Emily Mitchell, long before I ever met Jenny herself. And finally, who was MCing last night, but the very same clown act,

Bambouk

, that was recently recommended to me by the good and fine people at

Bond Street Theatre

, whom I met through working with

Cirque Boom

(which is also where I met Rachel).

It would seem, after this assault of name-dropping and six-degrees-of-network-makin', that I had all the world backing me up as I prepared for my show. Didn't feel that way, though. Felt very, very alone. Each performers was doing his or her own thing, for the most part, and I was in an advanced state of freak-out. It reminded me of the intense stage fright I felt just before the first show of

Noble Aspirations

, Zuppa's first production. I stood backstage, the first to enter for that show, and suddenly realized, "I have no script. I HAVE NO SCRIPT! It's just

ME

out there!" I did all I could to dispel it, and I actually owe a debt of gratitude to one half of

Bambouk

,

Brian Foley

, who stood in front of me and asked, "So, could you use some distracting conversation, or are you better staying in the zone?" Thankfully I had the presence of mind to opt for conversation, and it made for smoother passage into the time spent along backstage.

The trouble in adapting the piece to the stage was in taking some of the fun of its original venue(s) -- places where people are relaxing and not necessarily expecting spontaneous fun -- and translating that into a stage setting, with an audience that had

no choice

but to pay attention. This is a powerfully appealing aspect: choice. It may go a long way toward explaining the historically recent success of cinema over live theatre, in fact. Theatre, in the conventional sense, is a gamble. A movie costs little (comparatively speaking) and can be voluntarily escaped in any of its forms. Walking into a theatre, you know very little about what to expect, and can get subjected to something confusing, unappealing, or just plain ill-executed. And there seems to be no escape. The space I was performing in last night had the advantage of being intimate, with very little audience/performer separation, but that was just about its only similarity to the piazzas I was used to doing the piece in.

What I did to adapt it was very much shaped by having to create an entrance. In the square, you just start acting doofy and see what grabs people, then mold your performance based on feedback and a skeleton. In the theatre, you need to put them at ease, to apply balm to their sense of disorientation at the beginning of any new piece. In public, you grab them, and they tell you where to go next. In the theatre, you have their attention, and then you have to justify it. (Speaking in generalities here, of course; much overlap between the venues.) Needing to create an entrance helped shape my given circumstances. Whereas previously the act was based on the idea of the character as a quasi-homeless, drunk reveler who interrupts a party, last night's incarnation was an awkward fellow

escaping

a party into the kitchen. This allowed for a less invasive characterization at first, and my hope was to put the audience a bit more at ease. Also, whereas previous incarnations took place amongst relaxed (often inebriated) party-goers, this crowd, at a relatively early show in a theatre, seemed to me more likely to be at the energy of such kitchen-clingers. It also allowed for my using a song I have longed longed to use in a show; it closed with the irascibly awkward "

You'll Always Find Me In the Kitchen at Parties

," by

Jona Lewie

.

And it worked fairly well. I would say, all factors considered, I had the audience pretty well on my side throughout. They did best with bits in which I suffered and they weren't threatened. (This would seem natural enough, save for experiences I've had in which the only way you could begin to entertain certain audiences was to mix things up with them.) Keeping things simple, singular, and taking one's time is essential in clown work. The piece suffered the most at times when I got carried away with my energy, racing the audience and only pouring on more fuel if I felt myself losing them.

The scenario is that Lloyd Schlemiel (my noseless [or silent-filmic] clown character) is trying to quietly escape a party. He backs into the kitchen, all the while munching on Cheetos(

R

) from an orange bowl. Once he's cleared the doorway, he closes it, and the sounds of the party fade out. He breathes a sigh of relief, and raises another Cheeto to his mouth when he suddenly notices the audience. The Cheeto snaps in his hand. He races for the door again, but is too scared to return to the party, so turns to the audience and makes due. From there it proceeds along fairly typical Lecoq lines, with dabblings of silent-film comics thrown in here and there. He adjusts his clothing, thinking the audience will better approve of him. He decides he doesn't like his hat, and trades it for the "bowl" he was snacking from, which proves to be a mistake. The rest of the sequence involves his trying to escape this hat, which just won't leave him be. He tosses it away, and it returns to him. It clings to his head, despite acrobatic endeavors to remove it, and obscures his vision. He finally frees himself from it, but it's changed him into an extrovert. He performs a striptease (only down to undies, mind), puts the hat back on and rejoins the party.

It needs work, even in verbal explanation, but the performance was a tremendous jump forward for me in making discoveries about it. My hope is to break it out in Italy a bit, and play with it there. We can only pray that they sell Cheetos there. Hell: They end in an "o." They probably are Italian.

Baby Elephant Walk

Last Sunday I participated in a reading of

The Elephant Song

, by Nicolas Billon, at

The Workshop Theatre Company

. It was a one-day affair, in which we had four hours to rehearse, and performed it for a public audience only once, shortly thereafter.

Daryl Boling

, with whom I have worked severally as both director and actor (

A Lie of the Mind

,

Good

,

Center of Gravity

) directed the reading, and I was joined on stage by two actors with whom I had never before worked:

David Ian Lee

and

Letty Ferrer

. The reading went well, I think. The work was very different from anything I have done recently.

The Elephant Song

is a taut, quite literally psychological drama, sort of a mix of

Equus

and

Doubt

. The main action involves the director of several sanitariums (Lee) interviewing a patient in one of them in order to ascertain the whereabouts of one of his doctors. A nurse who is more familiar with the patient (Ferrer) intervenes regularly to make certain everything's progressing smoothly. And the patient, naturally, is an incredibly intelligent, incredibly disturbed little boy of 23 (bless Daryl's heart -- he's always seen me as a "young seeming" sort). Throughout this short piece -- we ran it in 90 uninterrupted minutes -- the patient makes the doctor jump through hoops as he ultimately gets what he wants, which naturally turns out to be something no one else had been able to guess.

So after months of not working, then more months of doing comedy and physical theatre, I dropped suddenly into performing an intense all-text drama, the likes of which I had not attempted since

A Lie of the Mind

(see just about the entire month of

April 2007

for my feelings on how I did in that play). Like many men, I worried about my ability to perform -- my ability to worry being my strongest, most at-hand ability. The script was daunting. The character could so easily vacillate between overwrought pain and irritating manipulation; in another word, extremes. I also tend to balk at characters who experience extremes of emotion. I know that must seem odd for an actor, but I mean to say that there are those who can summon great, sincere emotion from the ether, but I am not among them. I generally need a fully developed character, and to explore that character at some length, otherwise I feel fake. Usually.

I believe I was pretty successful at this reading, however. I owe a great deal of any success to Daryl's sensitivity and communication skills, and the receptiveness of my fellow actors, and all mistakes were my own, naturally. As I often experience, the second run (sans audience) was much better than the final product for me. I felt most connected to the moment then, and didn't have to push in any scenes. There is a prolonged section of monologue for the character in which he talks about where his obsession comes from, then a short time after tells the story of his mother's death. It's intense; a real chance to go too far or accidentally not put enough of yourself in. I wish our audience could have seen the pitch I hit in rehearsal. I was fine in performance, I think. But it could have been amazing.

I love acting in drama, and I don't have as many ready opportunities for it. I don't suppose anyone does exactly, now-a-days, what with what shows are more easily marketed and sell more tickets. But in particular, I don't because I can get typed pretty obviously as "crazy physical-theatre dude" or "clown-loving goof." With good reason, and I love those aspects of my performance opportunities. Still, I yearn for drama -- even tragedy -- for its complex simplicity, its sincerity and particular catharsis. Working on

The Elephant Song

, even for such a short while, scratched that itch a bit.

Which is good. Because I've got nothing but clown headed my way for the next two months.

Carnie Corporation

The Women's Project

is a great organization that I was proud to be a part of for a short time this spring, helping to develop and performing in

Corporate Carnival

. (I also managed to accidentally lampoon their ideals while performing for them, which just goes to show that I am a consummate method actor. While playing a rather right-wing-inspired character, I complained of "sounding like a girl." THE CHARACTER complained of it, I should say. Yes. The character...) It was something of a unique experience, however. I entered a process with which I was ostensibly very familiar -- collaborating to create original material based on a few clear themes, using improvisation and incorporating circus and other "physical theatre" skills -- only to be surprised by how different my experience was from working with

Zuppa del Giorno

,

Kirkos

or

Cirque Boom

.

The first strangeness was getting the gig at all. I auditioned for

Corporate Carnival

way back in February, I think, when I was still unemployed. (Part of the reason I'm so crazy busy these weeks is my panic to book any and every bit of work I could find during that period.) I assumed that train had sailed, yet I heard back from them months later about my being a part of their "temp" squad. Judging by the email that offered me this slightly dubious-sounding position, that initial audition was intended to see if I suited their needs for the main cast, and they just kept me in mind for the sort of filler/choral needs fulfilled by the temps. Judging by my having performed in nine shows last week, I think we can safely say that I accepted their offer.

The greater strangeness came from becoming involved with the show at a later stage of its development, and being asked to contribute (in a limited way) to its further development. It felt strange to be included at this point because I had to play catch-up on the ideas that were feeding into the show's concept. Yet no one was actually talking about "the concept," because half of the people there were so familiar with the dialogue already that they didn't perceive a need for it. At least, that was my interpretation. I also found myself immediately confronted with this approach to play-building: "Okay. We need a commercial for a pharmaceutical drug that cures the 'Mundays'. Go outside the space, build one, and then come back and present it." This is much the way

As Far As We Know

gathered material, so I had to pause to remind myself that this was not, in fact, the same show. It's a good technique in a group with an established rapport, the members of which can enjoy and contribute freely to the work. It's a little, well, weird when you're a group of strangers who have little-to-no concept of what you're aiming for in terms of mood, idiom, etc. Still, we did all right, I think. It felt a little bit like the kids' table at Thanksgiving, our temp crew. But that was fun in its own way, too.

The ultimate strangeness, however, was how different it was to build what was ostensibly a circus-themed show with people who were predominantly concerned with the theatre. ( I believe -- and I could be grossly mistaken here -- that I and

Richard Saudek

were the only ones in the cast with previous circus performance experience.) I've gotten quite accustomed to running up to my fellow performers and shouting, "Hey! Let's see if I can throw you over this wall!" The accustomed response is, "Okay!" Now I tried on for size, "You mean, like,

representing

throwing me over the wall, in a clever pantomime?" Richard actually suggested a bad-ass assisted flip that he could do, that we demonstrated on the first try, yet it never made it into the show. I did get my little acro-influences in here and there. Some weight-sharing, a shoulder-sit. The rest of the actors also really incorporated new skills onto the bottom of their resumes, too. Just about all of them are way better at juggling now than I am (not hard, but still). It wasn't a lack of skill or eagerness to learn; just a whole different perspective on things.

The experience was good, however. Great, intelligent and talented people. Probably a little bit more intelligent and talented than the particular idiom in which they were performing, but what can you do? Work is work. It does compel me further to get organized and make my own circus/theatre show and/or troupe. God's winding up with a 2x4 on that one. I've gotta get in that . . .

Update, May 28:

Friend Sara has posted an

encyclopedic range of photos

from the

Carnival

! Peruse!