I went to go see Crisis Hopkins and Revolving Madness at the Climate Theatre last night. I didn't mean to become part of the show, but these things kind of happen. Contributing a location for one of their scenes was standard audience behavior, but then they needed a book to pull words from and I was one of the few people in the audience carrying a book around with me. I've just started reading the Devil in the White City, which got a variety of comments from the gang onstage. At the end, as the end of the freestyle love-contest, they were trying to get people up on stage. They eventually got one guy up who was a good sport about the whole thing, but they wanted more people.
I am not a rapper. I do not aspire to be a rapper. I have considered practicing freestyle rap improv as a skill builder, but have not done so yet. Still, you do not leave improvisors on stage, twisting in the wind. It was very clear that no body else was going to go up and vibe was getting a little uncomfortable, so I stood up.
I muddled through. People seemed impressed that I didn't completely fall apart on stage and had a good humor about it. I also seem to have acquired a new nickname: the White Terror.
Yo.
Thursday, January 31, 2008
Monday, January 28, 2008
Delayed reaction
Things have been good on this end. Sweetie Tanya closed to a jam packed, sold out, wedge them in with a crowbar show on Saturday. We'll be doing it all again in May, at the Exit Theatre Mainstage, so the usual bittersweet feeling of a show ending wasn't present. We're not done, we're just taking a vacation before making the show even better.
The next project is getting the CD made, and I go into rehearsal for "The Riches" in a month. I need to do some space negotiating for this fall as well so that I can work on getting the rights for a show that Dylan Russell will direct.
So much for my slow year.
You can stop laughing at me now.
No one believed me when I said that this would be my year for doing LESS, but I have turned down a couple of projects! I just didn't expect Sweetie Tanya to do THIS well and it's kind of gloriously ganked my expectations for 08.
That said, I had an odd experience last night. I was coming home after Radiostar, and on my little two block walk from BART to my apartment, I had a wave of fear crash over me. I had my pepper spray in hand, as I've done for the last couple of months, and the streets were clearly empty all around me. As three cars approached, though, slowing down along side me, I started to feel a kind of scrabbling terror. The word "drive by" popped into my head, even though we don't GET drive-by shootings in my part of Oakland. They were all approaching a red light, and I knew that. Still, my heart began to race. The light changed, and like a scared rabbit, I got home, eyes darting about and my hands clammy.
I got inside and pondered my reaction. A delayed reaction to the mugging? Certainly. I knew this would happen at some point. Irrational fear, triggered by walking home in the dark on the same street, at the same corner where I got assaulted. Totally logical, but I still don't like it. I've never had fear as part of my landscape. I've walked halfway up Manhattan at 2am, carefully staying to well lit streets, without even the slightest fear of my life. But now I'm getting it a block from my apartment.
Moving won't fix this. It's part of me now. I just hope that last night won't become a common occurrence.
The next project is getting the CD made, and I go into rehearsal for "The Riches" in a month. I need to do some space negotiating for this fall as well so that I can work on getting the rights for a show that Dylan Russell will direct.
So much for my slow year.
You can stop laughing at me now.
No one believed me when I said that this would be my year for doing LESS, but I have turned down a couple of projects! I just didn't expect Sweetie Tanya to do THIS well and it's kind of gloriously ganked my expectations for 08.
That said, I had an odd experience last night. I was coming home after Radiostar, and on my little two block walk from BART to my apartment, I had a wave of fear crash over me. I had my pepper spray in hand, as I've done for the last couple of months, and the streets were clearly empty all around me. As three cars approached, though, slowing down along side me, I started to feel a kind of scrabbling terror. The word "drive by" popped into my head, even though we don't GET drive-by shootings in my part of Oakland. They were all approaching a red light, and I knew that. Still, my heart began to race. The light changed, and like a scared rabbit, I got home, eyes darting about and my hands clammy.
I got inside and pondered my reaction. A delayed reaction to the mugging? Certainly. I knew this would happen at some point. Irrational fear, triggered by walking home in the dark on the same street, at the same corner where I got assaulted. Totally logical, but I still don't like it. I've never had fear as part of my landscape. I've walked halfway up Manhattan at 2am, carefully staying to well lit streets, without even the slightest fear of my life. But now I'm getting it a block from my apartment.
Moving won't fix this. It's part of me now. I just hope that last night won't become a common occurrence.
Saturday, January 19, 2008
oddly calm
It's been a very busy week at work, and socially as well. I saw Golden Thread's collection of short plays dealing with issues in the Middle East, and with being Middle Eastern. A mixed bag, but a very good evening for reflection and companionship. Game night before that, and then the show last night. It's been a week of excitement with the show, as the SF Weekly came out with a two page spread about the show. I was completely gobsmacked. We got a very positive write up in the SF Bay Times as well. Getting the call on Friday that the SF Weekly critic had just been on a local Jazz/public radio station, animatedly praising our show for two full minutes during rush hour pretty much sent me into orbit.
We had a good, but not sold out show on Friday night. They were a quiet bunch, which I hoped was due to the exhaustion of seeing a 10pm show on a Friday night. I seem to have been right, as they warmed up as the show moved on and the applause was thunderous at the end of the evening. People keep telling me that this is a show that could "run forever". It's a bit frightening, actually, to be sitting on something with this much potential. I can only comfort myself that I haven't screwed it up yet, and to keep trusting my instincts.
Today I had a film audition that I very nearly didn't go to. This would have been a large mistake, as what I thought was a faux commercial by Academy of Art University students turned out to be a national commercial for the University itself. I spent a half hour with the director and his crew and had a lovely time with them. We'll see if I get the role or not, but regardless of that I'm very glad to have gone.
It also got me downtown to meet with a friend and walk around Chinatown like a couple of tourists. My movements through San Francisco's Chinatown have always been a "get from A to B" affair, and casually strolling and window shopping on what must be the most temperate day of the year has settled me into a deep and graceful calm. I'm attending laundry and dishes, and doing a general clean and re-organization of the house right now.
And I'm profoundly happy.
We had a good, but not sold out show on Friday night. They were a quiet bunch, which I hoped was due to the exhaustion of seeing a 10pm show on a Friday night. I seem to have been right, as they warmed up as the show moved on and the applause was thunderous at the end of the evening. People keep telling me that this is a show that could "run forever". It's a bit frightening, actually, to be sitting on something with this much potential. I can only comfort myself that I haven't screwed it up yet, and to keep trusting my instincts.
Today I had a film audition that I very nearly didn't go to. This would have been a large mistake, as what I thought was a faux commercial by Academy of Art University students turned out to be a national commercial for the University itself. I spent a half hour with the director and his crew and had a lovely time with them. We'll see if I get the role or not, but regardless of that I'm very glad to have gone.
It also got me downtown to meet with a friend and walk around Chinatown like a couple of tourists. My movements through San Francisco's Chinatown have always been a "get from A to B" affair, and casually strolling and window shopping on what must be the most temperate day of the year has settled me into a deep and graceful calm. I'm attending laundry and dishes, and doing a general clean and re-organization of the house right now.
And I'm profoundly happy.
Monday, January 14, 2008
Weird Weekend
I think I can officially declare this a really weird weekend. Good, but weird.
We had another battery of shows this weekend. Sweetie Tanya has begun to actually, literally sell out. For a small black box show in the Mission to start selling out during it's second weekend... it's pretty freaking awesome. There's lots of talk about our need to do a "bring your own venue" Fringe Festival remount. Whether we do something like that in September, or if I can secure us a theatre around June is unknown. But the consensus seems to be, this show is too hot to just let die after 8 shows.
To compound the weirdness, I was interviewed by some folks from Comcast before the show on Friday. We had to rapidly get the set on stage, and dress it while the camera crew set up. I had been alerted that they would be there by the fabulous Peggy Powell, but it's still very odd to rush to get your show ready, and then stop in order to get the microphone put on right and then get fed basic promotional questions. They seemed pleased and they remained to film the first half of the show, so if anyone sees "local event news" on a Comcast station and wants to tape it for me, that would be cool.
It gets even stranger though. As cast and crew Google "Sweetie Tanya", strange things have begun to come up. In particular, we've had TWO people post "missed connections" on Craigslist for people that they were checking out at the show. Call me strange, but a musical about sexual harassment is not someplace I would consider to be prime territory for scoping out your next lover. Then again, all the guys on stage are being so creepy, that maybe all the guys in the audience look good by comparison?
Before the Friday show, I was over at Zack Stern's for a round of "Rock Band". I've heard the hype on this game, and I have to say that I really had fun with it. I'm decent on guitar and bass, but I completely suck on drums. I mean, I played guitar back in High School, so fret work of the basic type required by the game feels pretty natural. Getting my hands and feet coordinated for the drum pads was a humiliating task. Still, I wish we had done it on a night I could have stayed longer. After the show I went out for drinks with Neil Howard, his fabulous wife Lex, and Eleanor Reinholdt. Normally, I'll go out for a single drink and then bolt for the BART, but with Neil and Lex out all the way from NYC, I decided to go ahead and make a late night of it. I don't do the $40 cab ride home often, but what'cha gonna do? We stayed until the bar literally threw us out... at 1:40am!
I love San Francisco, but that's just ridiculous.
Saturday night was another late one, as I went to Consumating's "Prom" after the show. I went to the first prom two years ago, shortly after discovering the site. I met a lot of great people that first night, so I had been looking forward to Prom 2. Arriving after midnight, however, was a bit anti-climactic. I didn't have the benefit of the hours of drinking that everyone else had, and the party was much thinner than the first one. Still, I got to see Nina and to finally meet Will. So for me the trip was well worth it. I got to meet a few new people who I had only experienced online, but mostly it was just nice to see some familiar but infrequent faces. I ended up crashing at Brian Schirmer's place afterwards, much more tired than I realized.
Sunday was characterized by sleeping too late on the couch, relaxing with brunch, devouring a book on the way home, taking a deliciously hot bath (while still devouring the book) and Radiostar. I got a show about a third edited before heading into the city with our new microphone stand for our weekly recording session. We haven't met over the last two weeks, and we decided to take our first experimental steps towards the planned Radiostar SERIAL. This involved the return of Jennifer Jajeh to our ranks, who has been MIA for months now.
My evening was just beginning, however, as I needed to get to the DNA lounge in order to catch Kurt Larson's return to the stage. I found out long after I met Kurt that he had been in the band Information Society, but as I was into "Contemporary Christian Music" at the time the band was at it's hottest, I failed to have more than a peripheral awareness of it. So, this was really my first experience of Kurt's showmanship. I had heard a good sampling of his work over the years, but never seen him perform live. It was a hell of a show, and jam packed.
It's always strange to watch people throwing their bras and panties at the guy who you've spent hours hunched over Magic: the Gathering with.
So yeah, all in all... a weird weekend.
We had another battery of shows this weekend. Sweetie Tanya has begun to actually, literally sell out. For a small black box show in the Mission to start selling out during it's second weekend... it's pretty freaking awesome. There's lots of talk about our need to do a "bring your own venue" Fringe Festival remount. Whether we do something like that in September, or if I can secure us a theatre around June is unknown. But the consensus seems to be, this show is too hot to just let die after 8 shows.
To compound the weirdness, I was interviewed by some folks from Comcast before the show on Friday. We had to rapidly get the set on stage, and dress it while the camera crew set up. I had been alerted that they would be there by the fabulous Peggy Powell, but it's still very odd to rush to get your show ready, and then stop in order to get the microphone put on right and then get fed basic promotional questions. They seemed pleased and they remained to film the first half of the show, so if anyone sees "local event news" on a Comcast station and wants to tape it for me, that would be cool.
It gets even stranger though. As cast and crew Google "Sweetie Tanya", strange things have begun to come up. In particular, we've had TWO people post "missed connections" on Craigslist for people that they were checking out at the show. Call me strange, but a musical about sexual harassment is not someplace I would consider to be prime territory for scoping out your next lover. Then again, all the guys on stage are being so creepy, that maybe all the guys in the audience look good by comparison?
Before the Friday show, I was over at Zack Stern's for a round of "Rock Band". I've heard the hype on this game, and I have to say that I really had fun with it. I'm decent on guitar and bass, but I completely suck on drums. I mean, I played guitar back in High School, so fret work of the basic type required by the game feels pretty natural. Getting my hands and feet coordinated for the drum pads was a humiliating task. Still, I wish we had done it on a night I could have stayed longer. After the show I went out for drinks with Neil Howard, his fabulous wife Lex, and Eleanor Reinholdt. Normally, I'll go out for a single drink and then bolt for the BART, but with Neil and Lex out all the way from NYC, I decided to go ahead and make a late night of it. I don't do the $40 cab ride home often, but what'cha gonna do? We stayed until the bar literally threw us out... at 1:40am!
I love San Francisco, but that's just ridiculous.
Saturday night was another late one, as I went to Consumating's "Prom" after the show. I went to the first prom two years ago, shortly after discovering the site. I met a lot of great people that first night, so I had been looking forward to Prom 2. Arriving after midnight, however, was a bit anti-climactic. I didn't have the benefit of the hours of drinking that everyone else had, and the party was much thinner than the first one. Still, I got to see Nina and to finally meet Will. So for me the trip was well worth it. I got to meet a few new people who I had only experienced online, but mostly it was just nice to see some familiar but infrequent faces. I ended up crashing at Brian Schirmer's place afterwards, much more tired than I realized.
Sunday was characterized by sleeping too late on the couch, relaxing with brunch, devouring a book on the way home, taking a deliciously hot bath (while still devouring the book) and Radiostar. I got a show about a third edited before heading into the city with our new microphone stand for our weekly recording session. We haven't met over the last two weeks, and we decided to take our first experimental steps towards the planned Radiostar SERIAL. This involved the return of Jennifer Jajeh to our ranks, who has been MIA for months now.
My evening was just beginning, however, as I needed to get to the DNA lounge in order to catch Kurt Larson's return to the stage. I found out long after I met Kurt that he had been in the band Information Society, but as I was into "Contemporary Christian Music" at the time the band was at it's hottest, I failed to have more than a peripheral awareness of it. So, this was really my first experience of Kurt's showmanship. I had heard a good sampling of his work over the years, but never seen him perform live. It was a hell of a show, and jam packed.
It's always strange to watch people throwing their bras and panties at the guy who you've spent hours hunched over Magic: the Gathering with.
So yeah, all in all... a weird weekend.
Monday, January 07, 2008
let's hear it for the little guy
This from Neil's blog. It looks like United Artists is the first major studio to sign a new contract with the Writer's Guild.
This is the beginning of the end of the strike. Three cheers for the writers! And let's hope that nobody else needs to strike in the coming months.
This is the beginning of the end of the strike. Three cheers for the writers! And let's hope that nobody else needs to strike in the coming months.
Sunday, January 06, 2008
Press
Some amazing press is coming out for the show, so I thought I'd share a bit of it.
We have a lengthy article in Backstage magazine, which can be found online here.
An excerpt:
"In San Francisco's artsy Mission District, theatre experimentalists stage premieres in hole-in-the-wall spaces, mostly for youthful, adventurous audiences. One such company, Cassandra's Call Productions, is mounting an original musical "for people who don't go to a lot of musicals," says company founder Dan Wilson. The venue, a tiny black box called the Dark Room, is known for campy adaptations of films and TV shows.
Even so, "Sweetie" Tanya: The Demon Barista of Valencia Street is different. A modern-day Sweeney Todd meets Monster (the film about serial man-killer Aileen Wuornos), it departs from tradition in that writer-director Wilson engaged 13 songwriters, including himself and music director Dave Malloy, to create the score."
The article is more about the process, since all the interviews were done about halfway through the rehearsal process.
A full on review is offered up by Chloe Veltman of the SF Weekly.
"There's a ghoulish little musical by the name of "Sweetie" Tanya: The Demon Barista of Valencia Street playing at The Dark Room in San Francisco's Mission District and it's terrific black-box stuff for all kinds of reasons.
This musical is a spoof of Stephen Sondheim's Sweeney Todd, involving an unhappy San Francisco barista's bloodthirsty way of coping with difficult customers. But it takes on such a life of its own, that the relationship with the source material feels more like the seed of inspiration for the show than its overbearing shadow."
We have a lengthy article in Backstage magazine, which can be found online here.
An excerpt:
"In San Francisco's artsy Mission District, theatre experimentalists stage premieres in hole-in-the-wall spaces, mostly for youthful, adventurous audiences. One such company, Cassandra's Call Productions, is mounting an original musical "for people who don't go to a lot of musicals," says company founder Dan Wilson. The venue, a tiny black box called the Dark Room, is known for campy adaptations of films and TV shows.
Even so, "Sweetie" Tanya: The Demon Barista of Valencia Street is different. A modern-day Sweeney Todd meets Monster (the film about serial man-killer Aileen Wuornos), it departs from tradition in that writer-director Wilson engaged 13 songwriters, including himself and music director Dave Malloy, to create the score."
The article is more about the process, since all the interviews were done about halfway through the rehearsal process.
A full on review is offered up by Chloe Veltman of the SF Weekly.
"There's a ghoulish little musical by the name of "Sweetie" Tanya: The Demon Barista of Valencia Street playing at The Dark Room in San Francisco's Mission District and it's terrific black-box stuff for all kinds of reasons.
This musical is a spoof of Stephen Sondheim's Sweeney Todd, involving an unhappy San Francisco barista's bloodthirsty way of coping with difficult customers. But it takes on such a life of its own, that the relationship with the source material feels more like the seed of inspiration for the show than its overbearing shadow."
Saturday, January 05, 2008
Sweetie Tanya has come to town
We opened tonight. The day was fraught with 70mph winds, major power outages in the Mission, bridge closures, BART delays, and torrential downpours. I was convinced that no one would be in the house for our opening night.
Then, almost miraculously, it cleared. We not only had people in the audience, we had far more than I had hoped for.
And the show worked. It worked pretty much exactly as I had hoped it would. I was feeling pretty confident after our tiny test audience saw it the previous night, but I wasn't expecting the thunderous applause at the end of the show. I wasn't expecting the continual laughter throughout, and the gasps of shock, and the bloodthirsty delight that came from our small crowd.
We nailed it.
I'm so exhausted.
I'm so happy.
Then, almost miraculously, it cleared. We not only had people in the audience, we had far more than I had hoped for.
And the show worked. It worked pretty much exactly as I had hoped it would. I was feeling pretty confident after our tiny test audience saw it the previous night, but I wasn't expecting the thunderous applause at the end of the show. I wasn't expecting the continual laughter throughout, and the gasps of shock, and the bloodthirsty delight that came from our small crowd.
We nailed it.
I'm so exhausted.
I'm so happy.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
