ITALIA: June 17, 2007

Today—Todd’s last day—though we had grand plans involving visiting lots of people and spending time at il lago di Bolsena, we ended up spending most of the first part of the day sitting around the table on our patio and discussing Zuppa at large and our fall plans in specific. This fall’s show ties in so many elements and so much community involvement that it’s almost ridiculously ambitious. We’ll begin by teaming up with Marywood University’s theatre students (and possibly students from the Scranton State School for the Deaf, though finding sufficient resources for that is looking difficult) to teach them busking and street theatre. (Which we’ve never actually taught before. Heather is fond of quoting Kurt Vonnegut…approximately: I call all my workshops this, then talk about whatever I feel like.) After a week of this, the students will perform on Labor Day at a street fair held in Scranton. From that experience we go on to select the more promising performers to be cast in roles in Prohibitive Standards, and train them for the next week in our distinctive style of commedia dell’arte. “Distinctive” is a nice word, and I’m sticking to it as my catch-all adjective.

Our discussions of just what Prohibitive Standards will be will be posted to the show’s collaborative ‘blog in good time (read: when I get back to free interwebzitude), but in the meantime, here are some notes from the meeting (bear in mind that it ain’t over ‘til the commediani do their final pratfalls):

Style: Incorporating three styles—farce, seedy & bright commedia? Romance?

Devices/Settings: Vaudeville stage/cabaret appealing in that it gives an instant place for students with acts. The better can also interact with the main characters, perhaps evolve plotlines. Environmental seating for audience. Start with flashback to history behind scenario? Character who tells story, or backstory, who is unrecognized on some level. Masked? It’s a special place. Speakeasy? David inclined to no: too cliché, more interesting to acknowledge Prohibition as a law that just didn’t take. Well-funded refuge from the outside world? Train up and running in this time.

Plots: Coming of age amidst gangsters and vaudeville performers? The hard-bitten member of that world throwing him or herself in front of the train? Two brothers—Johnny Dangerously—living in the two worlds? Story of Jermyn (research)?

Todd’s involvement in the show at this stage is tenuous, bordering on completely impossible. I shan’t say much more about it at this stage, and hope for the best (for the show, selfishly) but we’re remaining open to a variety of possibilities. We will, however, have at least three central actors (I’m still hoping for four) plus whatever student actors we can effectively wrangle. I’m much more excited about the subject matter this year than I was for Operation Opera, and looking forward to the research that will be required of me for July and August. Hopefully I will feel more capable of the comedy by the end of that period as well. Something about my recent forays into drama and naturalism has me wanting to do something different with my comic performances. Not make them more serious, but somehow more nuanced, whilst retaining the absurd physical reality. How? Non lo so, ma forse…

Once we finally got off our butts, we were off into Orvieto to meet Andrea for a guided tour of some of the countryside. There’s a tremendous hike from the duomo to Porano that Todd and I wanted to make, but it would have been too much time, so instead we drove to a cappucine monastery on a hill opposite Orvieto. Andrea spoke with the padre, who then very kindly gave us a tour of the entire facility and sent us off with free postcards. Andrea took over as we marched up the mountain, admiring views and vegetation. We passed a middle-sized wheat field that whispered in the breeze, and farther along he took us into several Etruscan tombs. It was a beautiful jaunt, and further amplified my respect and admiration for Andrea as a person. Un molto gentile huomo.

We were fairly famished after our hike, and headed back into Orvieto for dinner. The restaurant we hoped for, Pizzeria Charlie (really—it’s good), was closed. In the nature of all things Italian we ended up at a restaurant we had all expressed a desire to get back to this trip, l’Antica Rupe (chiuso il Lunedi, per gl’informatzioni), with a beautiful terrace overlooking the duomo. There we learned the pope had flown by the city in his helicopter that day, which we just missed. (I want a helicopter I can call “my helicopter.”) Andrea left after a beer to attend to his pregnant wife, Natsuko, and after dinner we went to Piazza del Duomo for our favorite place for gelato. Sitting on the steps of the duomo as darkness fell, I thought about how blissful it would be to live in a place where the accustomed activity after dinner was to have a walk around to say hello to whomever you pass.

The night ended early in the interests of getting up early enough to get Todd to the train on time. My allergies were ballistic after all our time in the fields and woods, so I had a little of David’s Airborne® and retired to read some of Heather’s Coarse Acting scripts (if you’re in theatre and haven’t experienced Coarse Acting: go out, buy a book or two and lock yourself in a soundproof room to avoid irritating your neighbors with guffaws). I quickly drifted off, to wake suddenly to the sound of Todd’s packing, thinking I had already slept the night through and it was time to get up and out. But I was deceived. It was mezzonotte, and there were hours to go before goodbyes.

Showers later tonight, with a 100% chance of Brainstorms...

I'm thinking about that

unCommon Cause

assignment today, and you lucky ducks will receive the benefits of my brainstorming fragments. Feel free to comment with . . . er . . . comments. Yeah. Just bear in mind this is essentially free-writing (unlike the rest of the 'blog, the which is meticulously planned out months in advance).

* * *

Moment:

Five men stand on stage with their backs to us. All of them wear strange, black hoods that cover their faces but leave their jawlines exposed. At the sound of a sudden gun battle, the four to the sides scatter in different directions and disappear offstage. The battle sounds fade very slowly, the central figure remaining silent and still. There is a long moment of silence, long enough to invite a certain relaxation. Suddenly, a single gunshot, loud enough to startle. The man onstage doesn't flinch, doesn't seem to move. Gradually we begin to realize, however, he is moving. Extremely slowly, smoothly [

Butoh

/

Suzuki

slow], the man is collapsing to his knees, then his face, as if shot in the back of the head. It takes a good minute before he is still, face-down on the floor, head turned to the left. After a short moment, Captain Evans enters in formal dress. Unphased by what she sees, she advances to the body and begins examining it. After some time it becomes clear she is trying to view the obscured face. She can not see it, so she rolls the body over, which responds as if lifeless. She stands over the face, still obscured by a partial hood, and still, she can determine nothing. She sighs, takes the body's right hands and helps it to its feet. Once on its feet, the body does a smart salute to her, then about-faces and marches off stage. She turns to the audience and speaks:

"Inconclusive."

She closes her eyes. Her whole body shifts downward subtly in relaxation. Suddenly she gasps, her eyes fly open and her hands reach out, as if waking suddenly.

* * *

Hypothetical scene:

EVANS: Lieutenant Colonel Ainsley.

AINSLEY: Major Evans.

E: It's good to see you again, sir.

A: And you. Major. How was your tour?

E: About as brutal as they come, sir.

A: I'm sorry to hear that.

E: Don't be. It means I'm glad to come home, sir.

. . .

A: Patricia-

E: Sir, have you maintained contact with them?

A: At ease already-

E: Have you, sir?

. . .

A: I thought you didn't want any more news from Bethel.

E: I haven't asked for any, sir.

A: I get regular updates on their status and all major military decision-making regarding the family of Specialist Larkin still has to pass over my desk. But that kind of thing comes around less and less. And no, I haven't maintained contact with them, Major. It was agreed that would be confusing given your transfer.

We

agreed on that, as I recall.

E: Yes. We did.

A: They're all right.

E: I don't want to know. Really, Bill. I just wanted to know that they're still . . . that they're still there.

A: They are. They are.

E: Fine.

A: Is that all, Major?

E: If that's all, sir.

A: (

Relenting.

) Then you're dismissed.

E: Thank you, sir.

. . .

E: We're lucky they didn't destroy themselves over it, sir. We didn't belong there, but we had to be there. I remember sifting through hate mail directed at us, at this government, arriving in their PO box, weeding out anything that might crack Carolyn further or send Ed off on a rampage. After a while, it was easy to start to listen to those letters, those emails, those strangers at the end of a phone line and understand that they weren't telling us to get out of Iraq. They were telling us to get out of that house, that town. That family. I didn't leave because I loved them. I left because I had to, because they loved me. And I shouldn't have been there. . . . Sir.

* * *

WELL. I sure do seem to be loving the Evans action with this work, don't I? Didn't really explore any connections between her and Jake, and didn't necessarily create anything usable in the play as it stands. Still, that's part of the fun of all this work. Everything goes into the group mind (which I like to think is at least somewhat different from a hive mind) and one never knows when one will meet it again down the creative road.

Oh Man. This is Such the Bad Idea.

A departure for Odin's Aviary, here. I'm not even going to try to relate this to theatre. Over on

As If You Care

, Mr. Younce has issued a meme challenge, and I scoop forth the gauntlet. There is a glorious site called

TV Tropes

that catalogues in a wikish fashion various types and devices from television shows. (I love this because their tropes extend far back into theatre history [Look! I just related it to theatre!], but I am way too apathetic to try and influence the site in that direction.) As a feature on their site, they have a "

story generator

" that gives one new given circumstances every time the page is

refreshed

. So the challenge is to take a random generation of circumstances and devices, preferably the first you get, and create a pilot based on those givens. Try to think of it as relating to my acting work through improvisation or storytelling. That way I'll feel a little less cheap . . .

TV TROPE PILOT

Tropage:

Setting:

Ruritania

Plot:

Prodigal Family

Mandatory Narrative Device:

Road Show

Hero:

Broken Hero

Villain:

Scary Dogmatic Aliens

Mandatory Character As Device:

Camp Gay

Mandatory Trope 1:

Delivery Stork

Mandatory Trope 2:

Unpronounceable Alias

(Optional) Stock Phrase:

Little Did I Know

(Optional) Genre:

Home And Garden

Episodic narrative loosely based on tropifagia (not to be confused with tropophobia)(but, whoa, am I ever a tropophobiac):

Okay: Stay with me here. This show will be called "Setting the Stage" (thanks be to you,

Jason Morningstar

), and will be the first legitimate combination of reality television [Home and Garden] and live theatre. The show would alternate between the two formats between episodes, twice a week, so each week there is a reality TV episode, and a fictional, directed episode. The teaser for each would appear on the other, encouraging people to watch both at least in time to find out what happens on the other next. For the purposes of my take on this meme, this will be a breakdown not of the first episode per se, but the launch of the first season, over several episodes.

The reality is the staff and crew of a smaller-scale, regional theatre, who have shopped in a show by an acting troupe they believe to be incredibly prestigious, though they haven't actually heard of them before. This theatre believes, too, that a documentary is being made about the troupe. Hence, all the cameras. The acting is (again: stay with me here) the troupe. In other words, the troupe will be comprised of television actors

playing

actors in a theatre troupe. The episodes follow the development process for the production, leading up to a convergence of the two groups--the theatre staff and the acting troupe--on production week, whereupon the characters will merge with the real people in the final work of putting up the show. Prior to that week, the interaction between the two groups will largely consist of the director of the troupe [Camp Gay] making increasingly outlandish requests of the set-building crew, costumer, box office, company manager and whatever other theatre staff who have to prepare for their arrival.

The first run of episodes will concern a production of

The Cherry Orchard

[Ruritania], which the theatre will begin preparations for in good faith. They'll be sent regular set and costume plans one might expect for that story, and buzz will be big about how the prestige of this troupe and show will help the theatre get more successful (this is the perpetual state of regional theatres anyway). We'll receive introduction to the people of the theatre, whomever they may be.

Meanwhile, the troupe begins rehearsals, during which the episodes have more to do with what happens outside of rehearsals than in them. Our main character is Peter, the illegitimate son of

Sir Lawrence Olivier

, who is just a terrible actor, but full of the love of theatre that keeps theatre alive. [Broken Hero] The first actor-episode begins with his narration: "Little did I know, when I joined the Mountebank Players, that it would lead to one of the most real experiences of my pretended life." [Little Did I Know] The action focuses on the personal lives of the actors who are playing the more minor roles (Peter plays the Postmaster). As they contend with their director, Phineas Rhett, whose "concept" for the show becomes more and more outlandish, they bounce against one another, falling in love, forging alliances and making life-long enemies. Each character is a development of certain theatrical stereotypes, real and empathetic, but capable of absurd actions.

Meanwhile (back at the Batcave), the natives grow restless. Phineas has continued to make ludicrous requests ("Tell me again why the hell we need a giant X in the middle of the stage?" one of the set painters might complain) and the theatre management is hopefully fairly nervous about how it will all come together. There have been hints about Phineas changing the ending, a prospect that no one is eager to comprehend with regards to such a classic play. We follow the interplay of personal relationships as they get tested by this tug-of-war between hope and fear. I can't write that part; it's up to reality. Meanwhile, a familiar voice has been calling the box office repeatably, asking to be transferred to various departments and asking them about the preparations for the show. No one can figure out who it is, however, and when he's asked, he keeps saying his first name is John and mashing together names from

The Cherry Orchard

for his last name. I.e., John Liubovandreievnaranevskaya. [Unpronounceable Alias]

As we approach production week, the troupe travels to the town the theatre is in [Road Show], and reality and fiction begin to merge as the actors in the troupe (characters) are introduced to the town at large and

the actors playing them have improvisations with random townies

. (Stay. With. Me. Here.) We've established their characters and relationships amongst themselves, and now get to see them interact on the fly with non-actors, both satisfying our understanding of each character and setting up expectation for their coming together with the theatre staff, who we know quite well by now as well. Peter has had all kinds of misfortune--physical injury, overheard comments on his acting, rejection by the woman playing Dunyasha, Irina, whom he has fallen in love with and who refuses to fall for actors--yet he keeps his plucky attitude. He's the one whom even those who despise him turn to for moral support in their various soap-operatic crises.

Finally (I know

I'm

thinking "finally," so I can only imagine what you people are thinking) it comes to production week. The emphasis of coverage is still the interpersonal as the fictional actors interact with the real employees of the theatre, and there's the added twist of a closed-door tech rehearsal policy, and the troupe bringing their own "special effects" supervisor. No one's seen the end of the show.

The season finale is the production itself, liberally interspersed with reaction shots of the audience and theatre staff. Essentially, the troupe begins with a very standard, period production of

The Cherry Orchard

, well constructed and acted. As they continue, however, the play becomes more and more deconstructed until the dialogue begins to sound like . . . well . . . television cliche. In addition, the new bourgeois class (Peter playing such a role) begin exhibiting strange behavior, like wearing towels on their heads and lurching about, zombie-like. [Scary Dogmatic Aliens] If they get to the end of the show (and this being a reality-TV hybrid, who's to say?), we see the ending has indeed been changed. It ends with a white helicopter descending through the ceiling, from which

John Malkovich

(clearly the mysterious caller from previous episodes) emerges, playing Gorbachev and offering to take everyone to Moscow for milk and cookies. [Delivery Stork] All the characters depart, leaving an empty stage and the sound of copter blades threshing cherry trees.

The fall-out from all this is that the theatre is let in on the "real" situation, though they never interact with the actors outside of their characters or anything like that. The theatre is granted a large sum of money (plus allowed to maintain their modifications such as tremendous fly space and a helicopter) and gets to list Malkovich as being a member of their board. Peter realizes through this experience that his love of theatre isn't best met by acting, but by working behind the scenes. Malkovich gets him a job at Steppenwolf (as a sort of "postmaster") and Irina follows him there to act and let herself fall in love with him. This leaves two openings in the Mountebank Players, the which are filled by two aspiring actors from the regional theatre's staff. And next season, they will play themselves or some hybrid thereof, and thr troupe will travel to a different theatre with a different show and a different celebrity will contribute the deus ex machina.

Fin'.

So there's my trope-inspired "pilot." I don't know how I feel about it, except to say that I love working in this format. It reminds me of my theatre sports days, given numerous disparate elements and having to construct something satisfying from them. (The overall satisfaction of this particular assignment is fairly dubious.) This product is, of course, way too elaborate and expensive for a premiere of any kind, much less a pilot or pitch, but I'm pleased with some of the interesting ideas I got to play around with. In so much of my creator/actor (or "

creactor

," as

Friend Nat

coins) work I play with the dimensions between reality and fantasy, and this presented me with some new nooks and crannies. It was a buttery english muffin of a meme.

Good night, and good luck . . .

Stop Giving Me Paying Work. I'm Busy.

Wouldn't it be nice? (And do you now have that Beach Boys song stuck in your head?)(Well, you do now, don't you [And how many of you think instantaneously of the montage in

Roger & Me

when you think of that song?]?) I'd love to say that. More to the point, to be able to make a majority of my decisions based on something other than money. The common cure to capitalism leaving you cold is to make so much money that it becomes "no object." Apart from being common, this may be the only known "cure." Can you "sense" my "scepticism" by my use of

"

quotes

"

?

Sometimes I feel like the title of this 'blog should be "Don't Get Me Wrong": Now, don't get me wrong -- I'm hoping to win the lottery someday. (Without ever playing? Yes. Without ever playing.) I will not kick thirty million dollars out of bed. Mostly because I would be smothered to death by it, and what a way to go. I'd love to be rich and famous. There. I've said it. I've put it out there, universe. Now, according to The Secret(TM), I should be getting smothered to death any day now. (And for those of you who followed the link, I beg of you: Stop playing on the conveyor belt of the universe.)

The issue of income is a constant one, but perhaps not quite so piquant with the odor of fear as when a person of modest income (read: me) finds him or herself in a position of A) Needing to spend a large amount of money, and B) Likely to soon incur large expenses owing to a lot of work coming up. Now, for a lot of people (I nearly typed "most people"--a wicked assumption on my part) a lot of work equates to more money. Not so in the case of struggling . . . well, anybodies. You're struggling. That's the unspoken struggle. You're not getting paid (or not getting paid much) for the thing you spend the most of your time on. Actors, at least, can have a certain limitation on this poverty when they pursue their careers in the most conventional sense. That is, we have to struggle to actually get the work, whereas visual artists or musicians or comedians can pretty much plunge themselves recklessly into a continuing downward spiral of self-nullifying, non-paying struggle. Yet an actor can, if said actor is so inclined, fulfill the same prophecy on his or her self. They just have to self-produce. That's the fast lane to destitution, right there.

It's not as bad as all that, I must admit. I am adopting a cynical tone for the purpose of humor, but (and maybe this is just the weather, and a cold coming on) it is rapidly growing darker than I really feel. It's great to do what you love, in almost any context. It's a trade-off, a blessing and a curse, to make your job your love, and vice versa. It's a little chicken-and-egg, but perhaps that's why so many actors one meets seem to have something to prove.

The other day I plopped down $2,400 in money orders to secure my new apartment. I had thought, due to a misinterpretation of the ad, that it needed only to be $1,600, and so part of my time spent off the day-job clock securing this apartment involved running out to my bank and acquiring another money order for $800 (and acquiring one more service fee of $5, thank you HSBC). Thankfully, I had it in checking. Often times, I don't. My account balances are a dance of heart-warming delicacy, between the needy Checking and the generous--albeit nary well-endowed--Savings. (There's also a much-neglected IRA, but he doesn't feel inferior, just unappreciated.) I got it done, and keys in hand, and then it was off to spend money on van rental and cleaning supplies. And soon I'll be off to Italy, where it is not exactly clear--as the whole venture now must be bank-rolled by the artistic director--whether or not we'll receive any per diem or such. Between gigs this summer, I have probably eight full weeks of day-job money to fund an upcoming 12+ weeks of low- or no-pay acting.

But it is ever thus. Especially in the summer, when everyone gets inspired to work. Inspiration can take one a long way, and not just into credit card debt. I schedule my summer work regardless of budget--to a certain extent--assuming I can maintain enough liquid flow through discipline or fund-juggling to make it through, and then make up the differences and debts in the Fall. I do it this way because one never knows from where one's next job is going to come, because the work can fuel itself longer than I might imagine at first assessment and because it is freeing, which is a quality an actor really can't overrate.

This is my last full week of work at my day job before beginning the sporadic and varied travel involved in my real job. It's important that I work as much as possible in order to squeeze out as much hourly waging as possible, in spite of having a new apartment to adapt and writing homework for

As Far As We Know

and the big three-O coming in for a landing this weekend. I'll do it, all the while contemplating the experience of working with Italian comedians. Of course, the best part about working in Italy is that my cell phone won't work there.

There is absolutely no way that my boss can find me to offer me paying work.

Abandonment Issues

I know. Shh, shhh . . . it's okay. Everything's going to be . . . okay now. I'm back.

I am

so sorry

I left you for so many days without an update on my life and times. You must have felt hollow inside, devoid of hope and desperate for some word of me. Perhaps you even considered desperate measures in the interim, such as calling or emailing me. Well, I think we can all say with a sigh of relief that it did not, ultimately, come to anything so drastic as all that. Though some did text message me. I won't name names here. We all do things from time to time that seem reasonable at the time, yet in retrospect make us woozy. And I won't be held responsible for anyone's wooziness.

It is, in a way, apt that I abandoned the 'blog for a good four days. Not merely because my readership seems to

drop drastically

in the period between Thursday and Tuesday (What is it about midweek that makes folks flock to me weblog?), but because in this particular case I did nothing remotely theatrical. I didn't even think about theatre that much, if you can believe it. It's true. I would venture to say I made not one allegory betwixt theatre (or acting) and anything else. What could possibly inspire such aberrant behavior? Let me put it this way:

I have an apartment now.

Oh yes. The deed is done, if you'll forgive the pun. It's not exactly what I was looking for, but it's pretty durn close. A "cozy" studio (for $800 a month, it can be as cozy as it wants) on Flatbush Avenue in Brooklyn, just a hop and a skip (no additional jump necessary) away from southeast

Prospect Park

. It'll do for a year, and hey: It may do for a good bit longer, depending on how things go.

All that remains is to actually move. Then my thirtieth birthday will follow hard and fast upon. Then I'll be in Italy. Then Pennsylvania.

Hm.

Maybe I should get used to keeping up the theatrical allegory whilst doing a million other things. Like the training sequence (

gonna need a montage

) in

Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins

.

You know packing to move is kind of like acting . . .