Cold Head

Sorry, I'b a liddle buddled. I beant "head cold."

I am a wuss. I will admit it; I will declaim it with gusto . . . as soon as I feel a little healthier. When I get sick, there's nothing halfway about it. There's no "little 24-hour thing" for this boy, ever. I like to believe it is because--even on a physiological level--I maintain the courage of my convictions. Probably, though, it has more to do with having a Constitution score of about 2. (Yeah gamers: I went yon.)

Friend Patrick

(who has a much more admirable Constitution score) was right in his comment in my last entry. The past year has made personally known to me much illness and injury (for more detailed explanation:

12/31/06

). In the words of the Bard: I don't want to start any blasphemous rumors, but think that God's got a sick sense of humor, and when I die I expect to find Him laughing.

Meanwhile, the world marches merrily onward, oblivious to my suffering. Monday's rehearsal and showing of

The Torture Project

(v. 3.5.07) occurred. That's not to suggest it went poorly, I just never really know how it went until I hear back from the producers. I spent whatever of the day I wasn't in the Shabaq position lying on the floor trying to marshal my reserves. The showing was PACKED, the which I take some of the responsibility for. We had a small room to begin with, and there was more concern for surrounding the big-wigs with appreciative audience members than there was with actual space, so . . . mistakes were made. Which should be okay, what with it being a workshop presentation and all, but you never can tell. Some of the more memorable of these included:

• Tripping into an audience member in the first row because there was no light in which to exit after my first scene.
• Running out to strike a music stand and getting it nearly disentangled from the newly added Christmas lights on the ground before realizing I jumped the gun on its removal . . . all the while the next scene has already begun.
• Literally choking whilst trying to make drowning noises in a tub of water placed behind the audience because--due to the necessary additional seating--I was awfully worried about splashing the designer handbag just inches away.

I blame it all on the sickie. The response immediately following the presentation seemed positive, but of course that's what you do when locked in a room with about a dozen people who effectively told you, "I made this, and I think it's pretty and special." We'll get the real response when Ms. Laurie Sales emails us all to say either:

• Quit your day jobs! The Public wants to create an everlasting ensemble troupe comprised solely of us and the entire Schreiber family!

Or:

• Do you guys want to rehearse in New Hampshire again? At least we get free space there . . .

For the moment, I am merely glad it's over for a while, and merely hopeful that the next time we mount

whatever

version of it we have much more ample time and resources. Since the showing, too, I had my first rehearsal for

A Lie of the Mind

. I spent the day leading up to it resting, which is a significant sacrifice when one works an hourly job one already has to take some time off from for various theatrical endeavors. Sadly, I was not (and am not yet) cured by this respite. I did, however, manage to unbind and recycle countless

Torture Project

scripts into draft paper. So I've got that going for me. Which is nice. (And which is today's movie quote; name it, you freakin' namers!)

The cast of

A Lie of the Mind

is awesome. Just awesome. I was in no shape to socialize, but the work is so engaging there was very little impulse to, either. I've been lucking out on the casts I've been a part of the past couple of years. I can't be sure if that's luck, actually, or one of the occasional benefits awarded those of us who stick with this nutty craft long enough to build a bit of a community. In addition, I have to spout that I'm very impressed with the director, Daryl Boling. I've worked with Daryl in this capacity twice before, the first on a debut called

The Center of Gravity

(his directorial debut, I believe) and the second on a production called

Criminals in Love

. It's been three years since

CiL

, and in that time I've caught only two productions Daryl's directed: his

Black Comedy/White Liars

a couple of years ago and his

Miss Julie

about a month ago. I suspected, based on that last production, that he had really developed since I last worked with him. My suspicions are confirmed. He is approaching the text with a sensitivity and insight reminiscent of David Zarko, and I can't wait to be able to breathe through my nose again so I can rise to his work.

Tonight is another rehearsal for

ALotM

, and naturally I have mixed feelings about being there. This is what I want to be doing most in the world, but nothing is exactly fulfilling when one is in pain (see wuss comment above). It's one of those sacrifices--along with the resulting reduced income--that tests my resolve to be doing what I'm doing. So in at least one way, I'm coming out strong today.

PS - This Vick's nasal inhaler is

good stuff

. . .

PPS - Total sidebar: Amazingly excellent actor Chris Kipiniak from the

TP

is a comicbook writer as well, and today the first of his

Spider-Man series

arrives on the shelves. It's a series for youth. I so don't care, and am getting my copy right now. I know a comicbook writer!

I'm Ready for My Close-Up Now, Mister Strindberg

James Lipton strikes again (see 2/12/07):

"If you haven't yet seen the Manhattan Theatre Source's production of August Strindberg's Miss Julie, go directly out and attach your nipples to a car battery until you can smell the burning of your own hair. It . . . is . . . A DELIGHT."

Sadly, as I type this entry, they are closing the last show of this production. So if you didn't see it, you have officially missed out. For those of you not familiar with the play, it's an intense, three-character exploration of power, desire and class inequality. And it is funny as hell. I had no idea it was funny as hell before I saw this production. Without compromising the stakes at all, the director and cast made for some very funny moments, and they kept me laughing right up until the title character convinced herself to commit suicide. So yeah: It's dark. But definitely funny, and I wonder if this doesn't relate to some of my theories regarding humor (see 1/24/07). I must admit my bias here, when it comes to lauding the production. I have worked with the director of it three times before, twice directed by him and once acting with him, and I have performed with the actress playing the title character. Nevertheless, I like to be honest with my critique, in particular when my friends are involved. Laura and Daryl, in addition to being an amazing couple, seem to bring out the best in each others' theatrical work.

It was quite a contrast to sit in the audience for such a tightly woven live production last night, then act in the second half of the film class at NYU today. I had to switch mental gears, and it was a bit like the first time my friend Barbara tried to teach me to drive a manual transmission. Today the work was not about well-timed, crisp dialogue, nor drastic status shifts, but ultimate naturalism and hitting the marks. Yet somehow it was my job to make as much truth of that scenario. It's no less artificial than the conventions of live theatre, I suppose. But I've had almost twenty years of experience with those conventions, and virtually none with those of film and television. At its most complex, in a physical sense, theatre can have arena or environmental staging, which requires the actors to move in circles, face each other, make sure any group of audience can at least see somebody's face. Acting for three independently mobile cameras, alternately behind me or behind the person I was facing, reminded me of trying to learn how to use an PlayStation controller for the first time.

(That's not quite clear to everyone, is it? 'K: I grew up playing DOOM on my PC, mostly, which was [still is, in fact] a "first-person shooter" game in which I used a couple of fingers to navigate forward, backward, right and left. You could jump and climb stairs too, but as far as aiming control went, you were pretty much concerned with general direction--everyone was on the same plane. When I finally got back to exploring such games, suddenly I was faced with a controller that had more in common with a starfish than a remote control, and included two thumb joysticks in addition to about 74 buttons. Suddenly, too, my first-person shooter was a multi-dimensional world in which enemies could come at one from any ol' direction, and in which I had to use them thar sticks to pick one, specific point of a complete sphere of motion at which to fire. It was then that I surrendered any aspiration I still had to become the morally justified hit man of movie fame.)

I believe that amazing ability to track multiple movement points and still deliver a line as though one's life depended on it can be developed. In the meantime, I will provide nigh-endless amusement for undergraduates learning to operate their cameras. Today I had to deliver a line of great import ("I'm just dropping off my stuff..." [but you had to be there]) whilst getting a door closed and placing a suitcase and shoulder bag on the right place on the floor, all in time to look in a prolonged, meaningful fashion at one of my fellow actors. I got the door closed, I got the bags to the right place, and I engaged in the requisite four-second eye contact with my scene partner . . . and realized I hadn't yet let go of the strap of the shoulder bag. Perhaps that doesn't seem so bad. It was. I had at least half of the crew in stitches, presumably over the awkwardness it lent the would-be meaningful moment. Funny how such simple mechanics can influence that work. And here I am worrying that I'm using my eyebrows too much.

Two appetites battle in me. Perhaps they're not mutually exclusive. I hope not. Some part of me wants to have worked very hard on that relatively unobserved Miss Julie and just know in my heart that I did good work that had something to say. Some other part of me wants to have a job in television, with a crew I joke around with and stories that turn not on a series of lines, but on a glance, or raised eyebrow. The moral of this story? If you are reading this: I WILL TAKE ANY WORK. I AM AN ACTING WHORE. USE ME; ABUSE ME; CALL ME YOUR DOG AND MAKE ME RESPOND TO "ACTION!"

I am at this moment reminded of the immortal Mitch Hedberg:

"You know, I'm sick of following my dreams, man. I'm just gonna ask them where they're going and hook up with them later."

Car! . . . Game on!

Five bucks to the first person who can name the movie quote.

I'm here today, folks, to talk about an addiction. My usual methods of coping with an addiction are two-fold:

1. Keep all resources and enablement as far away from me as possible; or
2. Indulge it.

The first is what I do with cookies and ice cream. Most of the time. The second is what I do with things like theatre, circus, etc., which, though legal, are often more difficult to attain than certain controlled substances. I practice "TYPE 1" coping with a number of things, not the least of which is television. I have no cable service, and a roommate who is okay with that. I've never attached an antenna to my TV. The only thing attached to it is my DVD player, and I'm seriously considering locking my DVDs in a time-sensitive safe that only opens on weekend evenings. This may seem excessive to you, but I assure you, it comes of self-awareness. And it always surprises me when I am praised for my discipline; for anything, really. Because it ain't discipline

.

Nosce te ipsum

. That's my only "discipline." If I am successful in working out regularly, it has more to do with circumstances that I can manipulate to make it easier for me than it does with any great, internal control. If I am at all impressive in my dedication to pursuing acting, it is as much because I have made my life so it's harder without the theatre, as it is because I feel theatre on a deeper level than some. It's choices, hopefully wise ones. I suppose maybe that's all discipline really is--a series of helpful choices.

My point? I have no point. (Haven't you been reading my 'blog long enough to know that?) But my purpose is to reveal that I have accidentally tripped over TYPE 1 into TYPE 2 on an old addiction. My circumstance became less helpful, I wasn't vigilant enough, and one thing led to another. Thus, I am indulging, once again, in that most insidious addiction:

Games.

More specifically:

Video games.

I know.

I know

. Therein does not lie the most productive use of my time! In point of fact, it is an astonishingly effective time-sucker. If you play, you know what I mean. You sit to play, maybe an hour, and when you look blearily up from your electronic pursuit, it's dawn. Someone is poking you in the head, making sure you aren't in a reflexive coma. Your survival instinct has been channeled into a screen for half a day, in which time your Mom has called saying she's fallen and she can't get up, and you didn't hear it because you thought it was the aliens firing plasma at your sidekick. The last time I was this plugged-in to the gaming world was when I was about 14, playing a

D&D game

in the basement (you flew dragons; it was really cool) while listening to Nirvana on my grandfather's

single-speaker cassette player

.

How did I come to this prepubescent nexus? A variety of factors are involved:

1. Friend D. Younce started emailing me about a year ago about game theory.
2. I gave unto myself a chemical epiditymitus (see 12/31/06), rendering me unable to exercise with purpose for months.
3.  
4. Friend Heather loaned me "Catch-22" to read.
5.  
6. Friend Adam got an XBox 360.
7. Friend Mark started playing "City of Heroes" again, and had my account reactivated so we could play together.
8. Friend D. Younce got his own "CoH" account and created a character to sidekick my own.

Perhaps you're wondering what Joseph Heller's immortal classic of war-time bureaucracy "Catch-22" has to do with my current plight. Well, I hate it. I am not enjoying it at all. This must be

my

problem, for it is widely acknowledged as hysterically funny. My feeling is that it excels with great vigor at telling the same joke ad nauseum.

War doesn't make sense, and neither do people, and we'll never, ever, stop.

I know: It doesn't even have a fart in it. Nevertheless, I am compelled to finish it. I only have 100 more pages to go. One hundred unrelenting pages, just sitting there, getting read four or five pages at a time. But oh, here's that

GameBoy Advance

dear Megan got me two years ago. So portable. So full of colored light patterns bent on my destruction...

So here I am, visiting Adam way up in Washington Heights to play "Gears of War," coming back home to sit at my laptop to play "City of Heroes," and during the subway ride I make Luke Skywalker my avatar for our journey through the only three Star Wars movies that matter. I am the addicted. I am the damned.

But it will pass (God, please make it pass). Because when all's said and done, I'd much rather be rehearsing a play or bettering my handstand, which is why the guilt. If I were "normal," and had a 9-5 job, and after I paid the bills could afford sections of time to save the virtual world, I doubt I would have this complex. But mine is not the "normal" life, and my "free" time is needed for a variety of pursuits, such as mailing resumes/headshots/cover letters, rehearsing audition pieces, networking and learning at long last how to do a kip-up. Hence: guilt.

But it's not rewardless. Sure, it's easy and artificial and time-consuming, but the game(s) has changed since I started wondering what it would be like to kiss a girl. Last night, for example, I signed on to "CoH" and discovered Youncey online. He lives in NoVa, and I see him maybe twice a year, if I'm lucky. And last night our heroic personae, Peppah (yours truly) and Salt Shakah (his, truly) got their asses whupped together for a couple of hours. Having a reason to see Adam more frequently than whenever the latest kung fu movie comes out is also great, and we end up talking about his stand-up comedy and my commedia dell'arte more than we might otherwise.

So all that remains (when my "discipline" kicks back in) is to sell my GameBoy on eBay. Maybe with the funds I can afford the Cliffs Notes on "Catch-22" . . .

Laughing in the Face of [BLANK]

So I have this theory. Well, I can't actually claim the theory for myself. Neither can I cite it specifically. I think I either read it in college or heard somebody espouse it on The Actor's Studio. Or I made it up, but I doubt that. So I

subscribe

to this theory, and "this theory" is thus:

Laughter--and its shy cousin, smiling--comes from a sublimated fear reaction. In the process of our intellectual development, an aspect of our fight-or-flight instinct evolved into an instrument that responds not only to immediate environmental threats, but to words and ideas, and in which we have learned to take pleasure.

The theory kind of hinges on the idea that most, if not all, of what we regard as "emotions" evolved from survival instincts. Ergo, the theory relies on you, dear reader, not being an adamant Creationist. So all adamant Creationists, please leave the room now. Go ahead; go. It's okay. We're not excluding you, we're just being considerate of your feelings and your God(s). We'll call you in again when we're back to discussing Kinko's and comic book characters.

...Are they gone? Thank God. Now we can start throwing feces at each other again.

I believe there's something to evolution. You got me there. I recognize it still as being a theory, yes, but it's a sound one in my opinion, and getting sounder all the time (like Radiohead). Me, I think if God is responsible for Creation, s/he/it is a pretty smart cookie and wanted to watch some changes over time. Like Sea Monkeys. And anyway, that's the beauty of a "theory" by the scientific definition. It's useful until it's contradicted by something better.

So: Laughter. Most studies into it, behaviorally speaking, find a strong connection between the response and being in a "play" environment. That goes for man and ape. For apes, "laughter" is more like a kind of involuntary heavy, rapid breathing. Tracing laughter through other animals is more speculative, because, well...they're other animals. Rats, for example, exhibit a behavior that might be laughter: a kind of high-pitched, rapid squeaking. But it might be that all rats share a predilection for singing Prince { O(+> } songs at karaoke. Hard to say. Hyenas are well-documented as laughers, but it doesn't accompany their play. Rather, it accompanies the threat of a food source being taken away from them, so many argue that this isn't laughter per se.

Au contraire, say I, in my snootiest French accent. I consider the definition of laughter, as science would have it, as being a bit too narrow. (That's the way it is with science--one day your friend, the next your nemesis.) Combine it with the feature of the smile (which seems a pretty acceptable association to me) and you've got more to consider as to its origins and relationship to our environment. Specifically, when else do we bare our teeth? When we are threatened.

Apes do this as well. Just about any animal that is willing to bite its way out of a problem will bare its teeth in a social interaction in which violence is imminent. In just such situations, the pulse quickens and the breathing becomes quicker and deeper. Tension mounts, and in an instant is released in one of two directions: fight, or flight. Moreover, there is one overriding fear that dictates this response. It comes with an awareness of the possibility of death.

We have to laugh in the face of death. It is the ultimate ungovernable aspect of our lives, and what else can we do with it? Religion provides answers to our minds, and hopefully our hearts, yet our bodies are still somehow aware of death's finality. And we don't get to face death in absolute scenarios anymore. Even our soldiers tend to be fighting amidst chaos and invisible forces of annihilation, such as falling bombs and super-sonic bullets. Without the possibility of high-stake, fight-or-flight scenarios, a peculiar catharsis is missing from our lives. It's provided for by comedy.

I'm losing some of you, I realize. Sure, there's plenty that we laugh at that has nothing to do with the threat of death. Puns, for example. (Though some are truly deadly.) Also, funny faces, or cartoons.

There will I ask you to hold the phone. Please: hold this phone. Thank you.

Perhaps you can understand the connection between a fear of death and watching a Buster Keaton pratfall. We vicariously experience the possibility of finality when Keaton falls two stories.Maybe it’s only subconsciously.Maybe the pratfall is just a trip.The point is that it introduces a moment of uncertainty into our assumptions, and the mother of all uncertainties, or unknowns, is The Great Beyond.Cartoons continue in this tradition, making the stakes two-dimensional (in most cases) but the threat astronomical.But what of someone making a funny face?Still the unknown, I argue.The more unidentifiable or unexpected the face is, the better the laugh.Because for a moment, we don’t understand.There’s that taste of death, the “little death” of French fame.

I have no explanation for puns.

We don’t laugh only because of fear, but I’m certain it plays a larger role than is immediately apparent.Certainly accessing this fear is the most direct way to make people laugh. The laughter that arises from tickling, or from just enjoying being with someone, that might have other explanations.Then again, tickling takes control of our body away from us; a singularly unnerving experience, that requires one to acknowledge that he or she isn’t absolute.And good friends?Avoiding shock humor, or pratfalls, and still yucking it up?It’s play.It’s why we play games, intentionally and unintentionally.Games simulate the need to make decisions.The tiny or grand oscillations we make toward and away from people, even with people we have no conscious desire to ever be apart from, are tests of our connection: to others, to ourselves, to the world at large.The stakes are there.We are playing with death.

There you have it.Jeff explains it all.No applause, please; just throw money.And hey, disagree with me!I’d love to argue this out.Though I should warn you:

I may just laugh it off.

Film Debuts and Saving the World

I am having myself a lazy weekend, people. How lazy, you ask? Two words, people, two words:

1. Pan.
2. Cakes.

Oh yeah. That bad. If I have the presence of mind and heartiness of spirit to invest time and eggs in making (baking?) pancakes, it is a time-taking weekend indeed.

This may simply be fall-out from the end of my week, and energy-storing for the start of the next. Monday Heather and I are driving off to Philadelphia to teach a

three-hour workshop

in physical theatre to actual, really-real professional actors like ourselves. (Possibly entirely unlike ourselves, potentially higher-earning, better-looking professional actors...but I'm trying not to linger on such possibilities.) All this is to serve the goal of

In Bocca al Lupo

and its endless hunger for virgin souls. Our students always think it's a joke, or some Suzuki-inspired training technique ("I saw Bogart make her actors do this once!") when we tie them to a giant stake and run away. Oh no. When we say "into the mouth of the wolf," we're being more literal than you imagine, and we don't want to be around when the beast emerges to slake its thirst for actor sanguine...

And, of course, Friday was the last day of my classes up at

Validus Preparatory Academy

, in the Bronx. Our film-making students showed their work (well, their film...Alex and I [and ultimately: Alex] ended up editing their work together) to the rest of their school and visiting parents and funders. My bosses,

Wingspan Arts

, were there as well. All-in-all, it went well, though it went long. Every "community class" showed something, from karate, to poetry, to fiction, to hip-hop, African drumming,

capoeira

, etc. We sort of kicked it off, though, and I think got everyone into a good mood for the rest. During the semester, Alex divided the class into two groups--fiction and documentary--since I was there for coverage. Her group of four documentarians showed their film first, an interview piece about the decision to have sex. Next was my group of anywhere-from-six-to-ten, depending-on-who-managed-to-slip-out-of-their-other-community-class, who made a "feature" (read: random capturing of celebrated moments) about sports; specifically basketball and football. It was a hit, I'd judge. Five minutes of hero-worship and good-natured foppery. Yes, my Freshmen managed to get comfortable enough in their own skins to even fop a bit, and have it shown to their peers.

But it was five minutes. The movie, when it left my hands at 9:00pm Wednesday night, was about fifteen minutes long. I knew it was going to be cut down drastically. Alex informed me earlier in that week that we didn't have the time for the whole thing. She also told me that the administrator of Wingspan wanted her to do the final edit so the two would be "stylistically consistent." I buy this for one minute not, says I, but I'm new here and frankly already worked on the film harder than someone getting paid $35 a week ought. So I complied, simultaneously informing Alex that I didn't believe the excuse of stylistic consistency. What's done is done. I tried to make my film about conflict resolution, including a real fight between two boys in my class (with the participants' consent) and ending in their playing happily with a whole other school. What was shown on Friday was probably more what everyone wanted: a playful sampling of boys at play.

And so this weekend I did work, but honestly, played more. This past week my

City of Heroes

account was reactivated (thanks be to you, Hubbardses) and, though I'm now sharing it with a person or two, that means I have yet another fantasy world to escape into when I'm at home amidst all my facilities. Which isn't necessarily a helpful thing (and rarely ever productive) but this weekend I just didn't care. For the un-indoctrinated,

City of Heroes

is an online game in which one creates a superhero and busts heads (you can also make a character who heals heads and guides heads but...come on), all amidst a very realistically rendered world (apart from all the freaky superheroes running about) and in time with other players. It's a geek's paradise. I don't even get all the various game controls and menus. It's

that

geek chic.

Incidentally, did you know the word, "superhero," is shared under joint copyright by

DC

and

Marvel

comics? No joke. So whatever you do, don't pay me for this article.

Perhaps there's a certain hypocrisy to my intentions of making a student video about conflict resolution, and then going home and giddily blasting the snot out of "criminals." In

CoH

(you are in on one more useless web abbreviation), the generic criminals at large are designated by wearing hats and orange/red signature clothing. You don't have to find probable cause, you don't have to read them their rights or understand their feelings, you just find them and ambush them. But the relationship is simple in this way, and that can be refreshing at times. Neither of you is trying to get money from the other without being direct about it. Neither of you is circumventing notorious artistic temperament with excuses steeped in aesthetic issues. Neither of you wants anything more than to kill the other. Okay. Go.

Speaking of which, I have to go. I have to return the hard drive I bought for the film project to Circuit City. (Store motto: "We won't call it 'renting' so we feel better about it.") I've burned a DVD of my original film; there is a record. Then I have to get to Kinko's to place the order for brochures for our workshop in Philadelphia.

Then I've got a date with Adam to kill lots and lots of aliens.