You are. And that is enough.
I was riding in the car with my mom yesterday and she wanted to switch into the left lane. She hit the turn signal, but before she could move over, some car sped up from behind us to cut her off. The driver couldn’t hear her, but she still told him, “Okay, fine, don’t let me in.”
A moment later, I burst out laughing and said, “Nope, you really are a dick!” Needless to say, she was confused. She became less confused when I pointed out the car’s license plate at the next stoplight:
2FST2H8
I can’t help it. When I read the line in my script, the name “Samuel L. Jackson” popped into my head. I’m sure slipping that into a performance would get some laughter from the crowd, but the Samuel L. Jackson version of the line? We could lose half the audience, easily. And for the sake of said audience, I’m going to keep the revised version off the main page via a “Continue reading” link. Continue reading “I know it says “Samuel Johnson”, but…”
It didn’t seem like it during Mind Over Matt, but I may have simply forgotten: that play was only almost three years ago. In retrospect, though, I might not have been out of shape back then. Or I might not have had to be “up” quite as often. Or I might not have needed to “act” as much.
The character Matt was a lot like me. There were a few personality differences that made it a lot of fun, but it wasn’t really a stretch. Bradford Winter? Not me. Not at all. I mean, he even likes wearing a tie, for God’s sake!
Regardless, everyone both onstage and off survived Opening Night, no one broke their legs and we’re looking forward to five more excellent performances. After that, well, I don’t know about waiting three years to be in another play, but I’ll definitely need a long nap.
Tonight is the final dress rehearsal; tomorrow is opening night for Everybody Loves Opal. (Oddly enough, I was having trouble sleeping last night, so we’ll see how tonight goes.) I think it’ll be a good show with a lot of laughs and we’ve got a lot of good performers… well, there are only six cast members, so maybe that’s not a lot… but it should be good anyway. Here’s some more specific information if you’re thinking about attending.
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It’s at the Lakeville Area Arts Center in downtown Lakeville (20965 Holyoke Ave, Lakeville, MN 55044) and it’s running from August 9-18.
August 9-10 & 16-17, 2013 at 7:30 p.m.
August 11 & 18, 2013 at 2 p.m.
Tickets are $14.50 apiece.
There’s a Facebook event page that has a description of the play plus the above information. (If you’re addicted to Facebook, that might preclude you from attending, but I suggest you tear your eyes away from the computer monitor for an afternoon/evening to come see it—I think you’ll find it worthwhile.)
This website includes all of that plus a separate link to buy tickets online and a phone number to preorder them.
You can also buy them on the date of the performance—if I remember right, they start selling tickets at the desk an hour before the show and the doors open up half an hour after that.
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I hope to see whole bunches of you there. Well, I’m not sure how many of you I’ll be able to see since I won’t be wearing my glasses onstage, but I hope whole bunches of you show up.
First off, a partial explanation for my prolonged absence. Over the last few weeks now, I’ve been focusing my attention on a play called Everybody Loves Opal, my third show with Expressions Theater here in Lakeville. I played Matt in Mind Over Matt a few years ago and my duties with Wage Warfare this spring included creative consultant (giving the director suggestions he’d usually reject), swing (filling other actors’ roles for rehearsals when they were absent) and “Smoke Machine Guy.” Yep, I got to operate the smoke machine backstage. And I was GOOD at it!
But now we’re preparing the summer show and things haven’t been moving quite as smoothly, in part because people are taking a break from acting for the summer. We didn’t have enough people audition, so we didn’t have a full cast when rehearsals started. I was supposed to be an assistant director for this show, but since we were short on male actors, I ended up being a swing again right away. No big deal, right?
Except we finished the first week of rehearsals and still suffered from a distinct lack of a male actor to fill a major role. I wasn’t really comfortable doing it because this upcoming Thursday, I’ll be heading to summer camp for a week.
Missing a week of rehearsals… not really comfortable.
Having no one to fill that major male role… even less comfortable.
There’ll still be a few weeks between my getting home and opening night, so I guess the kids will have to deal with me occasionally trying to learn my lines during free time at camp. (The fact that I’ve already been reading that role as the swing means I’ve got a head start!)
The other actors seem pretty awesome and it should be a good overall production. However, there’s a little bit of scar tissue in my memory banks because I’ve seen other actors who seemed pretty awesome, but they thought they were more awesome than they actually were. They thought they were more awesome than the script, the other actors, the director… those people drive me nuts.
(Note to the Grammar Police: Yes, I know I’m about to use the plural forms “their” and “they” to refer to a single individual, but it seems like the easiest way to conceal that individual’s gender. Or I’m doing it because I’m lazy, take your pick.)
The most recent example I saw was when an actor got some terrible news on the phone, then dropped their head on the table and cried out, “WHY ME?!?!” Three lines later, that actor provided the answer. When I mentioned it afterward, they replied, “Oh, that’s not so bad.” HEARING THAT MADE ME AN UNHAPPY CAMPER.
For those of you who have read this blog in the past, you’ll know that I’m very particular about how I phrase things, the words I use, etc. If you read an entry just after it’s posted, then refresh the screen half an hour later, you may notice some changes. I’m nitpicky like that, which means the Grammar Police might be even more pissed off at me for what I just did.
Being a playwright isn’t much different than writing blog posts. Well, aside from their needing to develop a plot. And characters. And making sure it doesn’t suck. Okay, so maybe it’s pretty different. However, there’s one thing that holds true for them as it does for me: they choose their words carefully. They are particular and nitpicky because what actors say onstage affects how the audience perceives their characters. If someone screws up a line or two, hey, shit happens. I can accept that. If the actor starts changing lines intentionally, IT MAKES ME AN UNHAPPY CAMPER.
And that’s what brought about the title of this blog post. When people are overacting and adding extra lines or even just “y’know” and “or something” to the ends of their sentences, yes, they get to say more and draw more attention to themselves. They also add chaff to the script. Shitty little bits and pieces of dialogue that would get wiped out by a halfway decent playwright. It rarely adds anything beneficial to the production and could potentially harm it (even if the actor thinks “that’s not so bad”), which makes me want to stab that person in the brain.
I don’t expect that scar tissue to affect our play. The fact that no one got overly anxious and demanded that we find someone when that major role wasn’t filled yet probably indicates that everyone wants to make it a good show (i.e., chaff-free). If that’s not the case, I don’t care what the title of the play is, Opal COULD MAKE ME AN UNHAPPY CAMPER.
I know, I know, backdating entries is usually a no-no, but when a man misses an anniversary… I gotta cover my tracks somehow, so I’m “posting this on June 1st”.
Why was June 1st a big deal? Because it marked the 8th anniversary of the premiere of Beauty and the Geek.
The date didn’t involve a romantic relationship, so maybe it’s not quite as important. It still boggles my mind that everything happened so long ago, but the fact that I missed the anniversary isn’t quite as important. That’s probably a good thing since the traditional gifts for an eighth anniversary are bronze and pottery, neither of which would make a couch more comfortable if I’d been stuck sleeping on one for the next few weeks.
