Christopher M. Walsh

Keith Olbermann Can Be Kind of a Douche Sometimes

2009-06-30T09:29:00.004-05:00

There is an ad campaign on New York buses encouraging atheists to come out of the closet. I suppose it is ironic, a little, that the donor who paid for the ads has chosen to remain anonymous, but I think calling him one of the worst people in the world is beyond harsh.

Greta Christina has already succinctly argued why a person might want to maintain his or her anonymity in such a situation:

Coming out as an atheist can have serious real-world consequences. Parents get denied custody of their children for being atheists. People get harassed and vandalized by their neighbors for being atheists. Teachers get suspended for being atheists. Teenagers get harassed and suspended from school for being atheists. Politicians whip up anti-atheist fear to try to get elected. (And that's just in the US. I'm not even talking about parts of the world where atheism is a crime, punishable by imprisonment or death.)

I like Keith Olbermann, probably for the same reason that conservatives love Limbaugh or O'Reilly. The man knows how to rile up the base. And perhaps I am being hypocritical; would I have noticed - or worse, agreed - if he were discussing another group? I don't know. It's possible.

The Olbermann segment is below:

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Clown Stigmata

2009-06-23T10:16:00.003-05:00

Clown Stigmata is the name of my fake band. I got the name from my friend Liz, who told me a story about a class she took in clowning. One day after class she discovered that she had an intricate pattern of bruises around her body. She mentioned it to her instructor, who congratulated her for receiving her first case of "clown stigmata." Upon hearing this story my first thought was, "That is a perfect name for a band!" And for some reason it stuck with me.

I call it a fake band because there is no band; there is just me, my guitar and my computer. It's a hobby. Were I taking it more seriously I might say that I am to Clown Stigmata what Trent Reznor is to Nine Inch Nails, except that I have never played a show or sold a record. And I suck at writing lyrics - the vocal distortion is partly to cover the embarrassing lyrics, and partly because I think it sounds cool.

I've had a MySpace page up for a while now, but I had refrained from spreading it around too much until now. Why the change of heart? Dunno. I'm just proud of the new batch of songs I posted, and I'd like people to hear them, and I'd like to get some feedback.

So, If you're in the mood for some industrial rock with a metal edge to it, head on over to myspace.com/clownstigmata. I'd love to know what you think.

So Method

2009-06-12T18:14:00.002-05:00

Busman's Honeymoon at Lifeline Theatre has been extended to July 26th. I'm having a fine time playing a Scottish douchebag named MacBride. It's a small part, but fun. I show up and act like an asshole. It's pretty great.

In one pivotal scene (pivotal because I am in it. Also, because it is the scene in which they discover the dead body) I have to sit on a couch and write some notes to myself in a little notebook. For about thirty seconds I amuse myself on stage by thinking of stuff to write. There are, I suppose, a few things that would be easier to understand if you were familiar with the show, which is why you should get down here and check it out.

I thought I might share a sampling with you, so that you might better appreciate what goes on in the actor's mind as he performs:

May 1
Holy crap. People here.
So far so good.
Butler = raccoon
What else today?
Lots of laughs
Missed a line.
Dead = Lame

May 10
Totally fucking up my
lines. What the hell?
Stupid press opening.
Still had trouble finding
notebook in case

May 11
Opening Night!
Pretty good so far.
Good house.
Working the briefcase better

May 15
I've got "Suicide Jag" by
Chemlab stuck in my head.
Opening reporter scene sucked
a little.

May 30 #1
WTF? Feeling weird on
this one. Timing's off. I
blame this diet. I'd kill
for a candy bar. I really
need to use the bathroom.

May 30 #2
Better this time. Almost
missed an entrance during
#1! Scared the shit out
of me.
Somebody brought cornbread
for dinner. Good stuff.

Fascinating, no? It's almost like haiku. Except, you know, not at all.

In other theater news, we had our first read-through for Treasure Island last week. I cannot wait to get started on this thing.

Will Schutz

2009-05-25T23:04:00.003-05:00

Chicago actor Will Schutz died today after a battle with pancreatic cancer. I had the privilege of acting alongside Will in a couple of shows, and saw him perform in many others. He was a gifted actor, a complete professional, and a great guy to grab a beer with after the show. He was one of the people who defined, for me, the meaning of Chicago theater: Honest, fearless, and a little silly.

Good show, Will.

(My apologies to the photographer. I stole the picture from Will's Facebook profile. It's my favorite shot of him.)

Coming Soon to a Bus Stop Near Me...

2009-05-22T15:35:00.006-05:00

Courtesy of the Indiana Atheist Bus Campaign, we'll soon be seeing this lovely poster emblazoned on the sides of CTA buses:

Catchy, clever, and sure to piss off a whole lot of people. I cannot wait.

A Night With the Fights

2009-04-27T12:46:00.001-05:00

By Mary Shen Barnidge, reprinted from Moulinet: An Action Quarterly - Number One - 2009

SHAKESPLOITATION!

A punch whose knap follows several seconds after the swing, but several seconds before the receiver registers the impact, establishes at the outset the tone of author Andy Grigg's three Shakespeare spoofs, modeled on popular action-film genres -- the ghetto-and-car-chase Grand Theft Othello, the makeup-and-body-parts Apocalypse: Romeo and Juliet, and the chop-socko Ninja Hamlet: Burning Fist of Denmark. But fight choreographer Chris Walsh's biggest problem isn't living up to the show publicity's assertion that "The Bard is Baaadaass", but doing it on the Gorilla Tango storefront cabaret's stage -- an arena barely larger than a hostess-waitstation with front-row tables and customers' knees marking the boundaries of its apron.

Zombies of the Hollywood variety being uniformly big and hulking, the menacing creatures of Apocalypse are kept offstage (specifically, in the general region of the playhouse lobby -- a tactic not uncommon to low-budget Blair Witch Project knockoffs), while Grand Theft relies on hand-to-hand spectacle choreographed in the patently artificial manner of the evening's aforementioned opening sequence. Ironically, Ninja Hamlet presents the most ready solution to the safe-distance problem, thanks to the conventions introduced in the film Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon dictating that magic, not muscle, decides the battle. Thus, blows and kicks launched on opposite sides of the stage (with appropriate vocal accompaniment) are understood to be fully as efficacious as those connecting at close range. This full-cast (and most extensively-conceived) of the three sketches finishes with a burst of adrenaline to send us home -- or off to another Bucktown bar, anyway -- happy and exhilarated.

That Is All, Campers

2009-04-21T11:16:00.003-05:00

Another show is in the books. Camp Freedom! closed Sunday after a lengthy workshop and rehearsal process and a seven-week run. It was a rough one. The reviews were decent but not great, and we had a hard time pulling in audiences. We had to cancel a few performances due to a lack of paying customers. However, I was proud of my work, I think we had a pretty good show, and I got to work with a great group of people. In spite of the problems we encountered, this ensemble had enough fun working together that morale never wavered for a moment.

I pulled double-duty on this one, working both as an actor and as stage combat choreographer. I also contributed about eighty seconds of original music to score the big knife fight at the end. Perhaps the most important lesson I learned on this show was this: Never choreograph your own fights. This may not hold true for every choreographer, but it does for this one. I had a couple of problems with the experience: First, I went too easy on myself. My part was made up of fairly simple moves that just required me to be big, which I do without thinking about it. By way of comparison my main scene partner, Krista, had to do a cartwheel and flip over a table. She was a gymnast, so she was up to the task, and it all made sense in context. But I never really challenged myself, and I worry that I got lazy in performance as a result.

My other problem arose during performances. I was so distracted every time I was onstage and there was stage combat going on. I couldn't concentrate on what I was supposed to be doing because a part of my brain wanted to observe and critique the other performers. They were doing my choreography, after all, and I wanted to make sure they were doing it right. Never mind the fact that I was onstage with dialogue and choreography of my own for which I was responsible. And the music was just an added layer of distraction. Every time the opening chord of my piece kicked in I couldn't help but wonder if it should be louder, or if the drums were too bright, or if the guitars were too low in the mix. The next thing I know, there's Krista coming at me with a knife.

There is no such thing as a typical theatre experience. No two shows are the same. No two performances are the same. Every script, every director, every company and every ensemble bring their own gifts and their own sets of challenges to be overcome. We grow as artists by finding ways to combine our gifts in order to face those challenges. Rarely if ever is every problem completely solved, but that's half the fun. You work around it. You roll with it. You take what you've learned and bring it to the table when the next project rolls around. I learned a lot about myself as a theatre artist while working on Camp Freedom! As an added bonus, I had a lot of fun, too. Perhaps in the near future I will post my contribution to our little cast song competition. It was... something.

There is, as they say, no rest for the wicked. This weekend I dive into tech for Busman's Honeymoon at Lifeline. By comparison this should be a nice, easy run after Camp Freedom! We start previews on May 1st, and open on the 11th. I have a lot of free time backstage on this one, so maybe I'll get a little writing done for once. We shall see.

Education, Education, Education

2009-04-14T09:14:00.001-05:00

I've known for some time that Joss Whedon rules. This is just more proof of it.

So Say We All

2009-03-24T08:30:00.002-05:00

There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy. - William Shakespeare, Hamlet, Act I Scene V

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. - Arthur C. Clarke, Profiles of The Future

The best TV show I have ever seen is over. I am a little bummed, but a story is not a story until it ends, and on Friday Battlestar Galactica came to a grand ending. However, a quick search through my Facebook friends reveals that not everyone agrees with me. The word "cop-out" comes up a lot. There is this insistence that the writers chose to chalk up all of the unanswered questions to "God did it." Accusations of lazy writing have been made. I would counter that with an accusation of lazy viewing.

The technical details of, say, Starbuck's resurrection are not what the show is about. If made-up tech-speak floats your boat then go watch one of the shittier Star Trek: The Next Generation episodes. On the flip side of that coin, I would argue that BSG made a specific effort to avoid any sort of definitive "God did it" answer to everything. The only thing the show would admit is that there is something going on that is beyond our current capabilities to comprehend. But BSG did not argue that we should stop learning, stop exploring, stop seeking the truth. Quite the contrary.

From the beginning, Battlestar Galactica has been populated by characters who held strict and unchanging views. Sometimes those views were religious. Sometimes it involved a faith in military discipline. Sometimes it involved assumptions about human nature. Much of the conflict in the show arose when one character would insist, perhaps even force, his views on others. But at the resolution of the series, the survivors had reached a place where they could accept the fact that they did not have all the answers. A pivotal moment in the final episode is a speech made by Gaius Baltar. I will admit that on the first viewing the speech rubbed me the wrong way, but the more I think about it, the more I realize that Baltar was not arguing for God. He was trying to get everyone to admit that their lives were influenced by forces at work in the universe that they do not yet understand. I will concede that it the dialogue is couched in some religious-sounding overtones, but the important part is that he is not arguing for, say, the Cylon God over the fleet's pantheon deities. He is arguing against the idea that any of the characters have a claim to the One Right Answer.

Some might argue that the fleet's decision to give up their ships and technology was an advocation of Luddism, but I think it was more an acknowledgment that what they had been doing wasn't working, and it was time to try something else. The whole series wrapped around the line, "All of this has happened before, and all of it will happen again." Our heroes won, in a way, because they managed to put off a repetition of the cycle for at least 150,000 years.

There were some things that I would have changed. The discovery that the Earth they'd found burnt to a crisp halfway through the final season was not in fact the real Earth was a bit of a fake-out, and there was probably a better way to do it. Whether it was planned in advance or not, it felt a little convenient. However, I loved the idea that the "Earth" they had searched for was not a real place but a Utopian ideal, and that the fleet would have to create it for themselves.

And the robot montage at the end was not great. I got the joke with the first glimpse of Asimo on the TV screen. I didn't need to be beaten over the head with it.

All that aside, I was very satisfied with the resolutions of most of the characters' stories. In particular, Baltar stating that he knew about farming was heartbreaking. And the end of Boomer's story was certainly appropriate. And I particularly enjoyed the moment when Tyrol, linked to the rest of the Final Five, discovered what Tory did to Cally - and then all hell broke loose. It was almost a scene out of a Quentin Tarantino movie. Really, the whole first hour of the finale was non-stop action and nerd awesomeness. The second hour was more somber, but in a good way. It was like the Grey Havens at the end of Lord of the Rings. A lot of goodbyes to be said.

I'm gonna miss this show. I wonder if Caprica will even come close to the quality of writing, acting and technical achievement reached by Battlestar Galactica. They've set a very, very high bar.

This Can't End Well

2009-03-22T16:56:00.003-05:00

I left the house at one o'clock today and headed toward the bus stop four blocks away. Halfway there, I approached a corner and saw a gentleman up ahead crossing my path. He was some distance away and did not notice me but it was hard not to notice him. His back curved a bit so his head thrust forward and his face angled slightly downward. He took long strides, ungraceful but full of purpose. His arms swung haphazardly, out of rhythm with the rest of him. The crown of his head reflected the sun, but the rest of his hair hung in long greasy strands down past his shoulders. His beard was gray and unkempt and grew as low as his sternum. He wore a navy blue vinyl jacket, unbuttoned, with a dark-colored shirt beneath. It had some sort of faded yellow lettering that I could not make out. His jeans were almost shiny with grime, and from the calves down both legs were tattered and frayed. He wore no socks, and his sneakers were probably white once but had traveled a long way down the gray scale.

And he carried a drill.

If I knew more of the story I would certainly tell it. No doubt it is a fascinating one, but my part of it ended there. I paused for a moment when I saw the drill and watched him pass and then continued on toward the bus. I would love to know where he came from and where he was going and why. But I wasn't about to get close enough to ask him.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

2009-03-17T10:25:00.000-05:00

Kings

2009-03-17T07:16:00.002-05:00

It's got Ian McShane being imperious and conniving. It's gorgeous, and the story is Shakespearean. Well, technically it's Biblical, which might get annoying. I feel I can let it go a little farther though because it is essentially an alternate-universe fantasy. I'd kind of like to see a map of this kingdom. The capital city of Shiloh is obviously New York, but after that the geography is pretty vague. The history, too. I'd also like a timeline.

I give the two-hour premiere episode three and a half stars out of four. Enough to make me watch the next one. Besides, Battlestar Galactica wraps up after this week and I will need to find something to fill the gaping hole in my life. It's too bad the show is on network TV; I'd really love to see the old Al Swearingen call somebody a cocksucker one more time.

Busy Busy Busy

2009-03-02T16:31:00.002-06:00

Writing has taken a backseat for me these past several months. You may have noticed by the diminishing number of posts on this here blog. I have often (too often) lamented my lack of motivation when it comes to writing, but this time I shall spare you my infernal whining. I do not apologize for my silence because quite frankly I have been too damn busy. I have not had a theater-free week since August 2007, and I have been having the time of my life as a result. The work has begun to overlap, which thrills me - although I will confess I miss the lazy evenings on the couch watching television with my wife. Right now I have her penciled in for late June.

While I have not written anything of note in many months, I am nonetheless satisfied with my creative output. This coming weekend I open Camp Freedom, a project I've been working on since the beginning of the year. I am proud to say I contribute to several aspects of this production: I am a member of the ensemble; I choreographed the stage combat; I even contributed a short piece of original music for the score. Also, I shaved my head. This week will be spent in tech. Tonight, Monday, is the one night the actors are not required. We'd really just get in the way. I suspect that most designers believe we do that anyway.

So, I have tonight off, right? Of course not. Tonight I begin rehearsals for Busman's Honeymoon at Lifeline Theatre. This will be my second show with the good folks at Lifeline, and I can't begin to tell you how flattered I am that they asked me to participate.

So I have little to complain about right now. I've got a day job I actually almost look forward to, and the theater work has been steady. If you folks are in town, come see Camp Freedom! running March 8th through April 19th, or Busman's Honeymoon from May 1st through June 21st. I will do my best to get some writing done between now and then, too.

And My Folks Wonder Why I Never Visit

2009-02-19T18:13:00.004-06:00

A letter from my hometown has struck the internets:

On the Feb. 8 "60 Minutes" program, we were captivated while viewing the Katie Couric interview of the crew and passengers of Flight 1549.

However, we were struck there was not one mention of God, who directs pilots of planes and secures the safety of passengers.

We have written CBS and asked them for more realistic programming. Help protect our freedoms. Write CBS about this.

I would be embarrassed if I were remotely surprised. But I lived there for about ten years; the place is lousy with folks like these. On the plus side, most of the comments seem to be from people with their heads on relatively straight, so it's not all bad.

What cracks me up is that this is the news this lady is talking about. I mean, I will criticize the level of realism in, say, one of the bazillion cop shows CBS has, but how much more "realistic" than the news can you get? If the flight crew didn't mention god, then they didn't mention him, and it would be UNrealistic to bring him up in that instance.

Besides, I'm pretty sure that if the G-man had gotten involved it would have gone much, much worse. That guy can be really clumsy with airplanes.

Dedication

2009-02-17T18:08:00.005-06:00

I've got a show opening in a couple of weeks. Camp Freedom! is set a few years in the future and tells the story of Jack, an average slacker who gets sent to a concentration camp for the crime of losing his job while being in debt. I play the villain, the commandant of the camp, who also happens to be a well known politician from our own era. (I won't tell you who it is. That would spoil the fun.)

I had to make a minor lifestyle change for the role.

Heh. I shaved my head once before, in college. It was harder this time, but still kinda fun. Anyway, you should come see the show. It's gonna be big fun!

For a Friend

2009-01-25T08:04:00.003-06:00

According to Ron Kuzava, Will Schutz is one of Chicago's two greatest living character actors. The other, according to Ron, is Ron himself. Apparently they pass the title back and forth. Ron is a very silly man. However, I cannot argue with the idea that Will is indeed one of the finest actors in the city, and simply an awesome guy. I first saw him in Defiant Theatre's Action Movie: The Play as one of the most over-the-top ridiculous Blofeldian villains I have ever seen on stage.

I finally met Will (and Ron, for that matter) in 2004 while working on Defiant's production of A Clockwork Orange. Will had a small role in the show, but it was the kind of part that you loved to watch from the wings because it was so damned hilarious every time.

I next worked with Will in The Hound of the Baskervilles in 2007. I could not help but admire his stamina as Watson. He never left the stage for the entire show and as the narrator carried at least three-quarters of the total load of dialogue. And his dialect was dead on.

A few weeks ago Will was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. Like so many of us, Will does not have health insurance. He is keeping positive and has vowed to fight this with all he's got. He could use, and certainly deserves, all the help he can get. A fund has been started online for Will, and a few events have been planned around the city to help out with expenses during this difficult time.

If you have a few bucks to spare, please go to willschutzpancan.chipin.com to help out.

The In-Blog-uration

2009-01-23T17:51:00.002-06:00

Barack Obama has been President for 78 hours now, and I am neither as rich nor as good-looking as I should be. What gives?

It seems to me that, as a person with a blog, I have some sort of responsibility to write something about the inauguration. I have put it off for a few days partly because I was busy, but also because I had little to say about it that has not already been said by faster if not more eloquent parties. Did I watch it? I did. Did I feel pride? Yes. Hope? Check. Relief? A little. And I must say that the headlines - from closing Guantanamo to loosening restrictions on stem cell research - make me feel better day by day. But again, you can read this stuff anywhere.

There was that one moment during the President's speech where he made reference to "non-believers." That gave me a bit of a thrill, I must confess. It seemed like a huge step. And it ruffled a few feathers, too. Joy Behar of the horrid "The View" made a weird joke about "you pathetic atheists out there." The Friendly Atheist has been trying to give her the benefit of the doubt - that she was in fact trying to be funny - but I frankly don't see the humor. As Friendly Atheist points out, the line would have caused a riot if she'd said "pathetic Christians" or "pathetic Jews" instead. The President's line even, according to some reports, drew boos from some parts of the multitude witnessing the event. Now that is impressive, to be the one thing that gets booed during Barack Obama's inauguration speech.

Of course, those few voices of dissent really had very little to complain about. As Greta Christina pointed out, the inauguration was saturated with god-talk. It required no less than two ministers to see the thing through, plus two Bibles (one each for the President and Vice President), and more references to the Christian God than you can wave a cross at. Granted, Rev. Joseph Lowery's closing benediction was a hoot, but it was still full of Lord this and Almighty that.

But what did I expect? This country is full of Christians. Our new President is a Christian. You can't swing a dead cat without hitting somebody who believes in the Abrahamic god. Our brief, token shout-out was more than any of us could reasonably expect.

Now before you go thinking this is another whine-athon, please know that that one phrase was not the only thing I took away from the President's speech. What has stuck with me the most, what has been rolling around in my brain for the last few days, is this idea of responsibility. I will confess, responsibility is a thing I have striven to avoid. It always sounded like way too much work. There's something different about it now, though, and I can't put my finger on it. "Responsibility" has always, in my mind, seemed like an anchor preventing me from doing what I really want to do. There seems to be more to it now, though. Maybe it's just that I'm not used to hearing this stuff from a truly gifted orator, but there is suddenly this sense of nobility surrounding the idea of responsibility. There is a sense of community about it. You want to go out and make it your own. It's a good feeling, really.

I don't know. The truth is, I've been busy. I started a new job, I'm working on a new play. I haven't truly processed everything that has been going on. To use a cliche, it has been a blur. All I can say is that things feel different, and I am really very curious to see what happens next.

In Arabia is Jeff Recommended

2009-01-17T09:19:00.004-06:00

My most recent theatre gig was as fight choreographer for Steep Theatre Company's production of In Arabia We'd All Be Kings, directed by the amazing Joanie Schultz. This is the tenth show Joanie and I have worked on together. (I think I miscounted when I wrote my program bio and said it was the eighth show. My bad.) In Arabia is a great show with a fantastic ensemble working from an excellent script. You should all go see it - but don't take my word for it. The show is also Jeff Recommended.

Congratulations, everybody!

Wheelchairs, Walkers and Peg Legs

2009-01-05T11:07:00.002-06:00

About a year and a half ago I and several other local fight choreographers took part in a round-robin interview with Mary Shen Barnidge for an article about disabilities and stage combat. The interview originally appeared in the August 2007 issue of the stage combat quarterly newsletter Moulinet, which sadly does not publish online. This particular article, however, has found its way onto the website Total Theater. It's an interesting discussion, and the other choreographers, all wiser and more experienced than myself, had a lot of great input into the subject. For those of you who are interested you can follow this link to read the full article.

Bragging Rights

2008-12-22T12:59:00.002-06:00

Journey's End, the show I did last January with Griffin Theatre, has been named as one of the ten best shows of the year by Chicago Tribune theater critic Chris Jones. I am particularly proud of this one, in spite (or perhaps because) of the hideous mustache I wore for two months. Congratulations to everybody involved!

photo by Jonathan Berry

Um, Awkward

2008-12-03T23:48:00.003-06:00

I haven't had to do a monologue audition in quite some time, so when a string of them got scheduled I kinda had to scramble and dig up some stuff from my school days. I felt fairly confident in my ability to execute the monologues well enough, having used most of them before, although frankly I could probably use a refresher course for these kinds of auditions. Then again, I don't know what kind of class could prepare me for the faux pas I pulled off this evening.

One of my monologues come from the play Those the River Keeps, by David Rabe. I like the speech a lot. The character is a former mobster discussing the incident that made him realize he was not cut out for the lifestyle. The event he describes involves him punching a dog, and accidentally killing it. The description is vivid and detailed, enough so that I actually have to cut it down some to make it an acceptable length for an audition piece. Still, it's moderately violent, and somehow the fact that the violence is directed toward a dog makes it a little more . . . something. You know what I mean?

Tonight I needed two monologues, contrasting. I've got this dog one, plus another that is funny but straight-laced, and a third that is straight up silly. Given the kind of plays this company was known for, I figured I'd hit 'em with the dog speech first, and then give them the straight-laced comedic one. I was a little rough on the lines for that one, but the combination seemed right. At least, it did until I walked into the audition room and saw an actual, honest-to-god dog lying there. I didn't say anything aloud, and the auditors were making a few preliminary notes and therefore did not notice my double-take.

I got through it. What else could I do? Afterward one of the auditors told me that the speech didn't really work for him. I was too frazzled to explain that I had just done a speech about killing a dog in front of a dog.

There is a part of me that feels like I should have known about the dog. Like I should have remembered, oh yeah, there is a good possibility that there will be a dog in the room. It was a nice enough dog. Black lab, very well-behaved. It just laid on its little doggie mat the whole time. I had to fight hard not to keep looking at it as I worked. I think it was watching me, and judging.

Oh, and that second monologue? The one I was a little rough with on the lines? I scrapped that. No way was I gonna remember that thing. I went straight for the silly. Probably not what they wanted, but at least I got an amusing story out of it.

A Slight Break In the Action

2008-12-01T16:56:00.002-06:00

My sincerest apologies for the lack of posts, but I swear I have a good reason for it: I’ve just been too damn busy. I had just enough time off to enjoy Thanksgiving with the folks up in Michigan. But I am not complaining.

The Mark of Zorro just closed last Sunday, bringing to a close the longest run I’ve ever had on a single show, as well as the longest streak of non-stop theatre work in my career. I was sorry to see Zorro end. It was a huge amount of fun, and Lifeline Theatre is just a great group to work with. Fingers crossed, I’ll get another opportunity soon.

This week, I dive back in and try to get a new streak going. Tonight I have a small role in The Strange Tree Group’s holiday party, The 12 Grave Errors of Christmas. I also have auditions lined up for this Tuesday and Wednesday, as well as next Sunday, plus two more the Saturday after that. I am a little stressed about the auditions for this week. They are all monologue auditions, which I have had to do very little of for the past several years. In fact, since 2004 I have done exactly two monologue auditions, total. My success rate is fifty percent.

I also have a small stage combat gig lined up: I will be choreographing the violence for Steep Theatre Company’s production of In Arabia We’d All Be Kings by Stephen Adly Guirgis, directed by one of the best directors I’ve ever worked with (and one of my best friends), Joanie Schultz. She’s usually good enough to give me a call whenever one of her plays requires a beatdown, and I am always happy to oblige.

There is other stuff to report regarding books I’ve read, albums I’ve heard, and jobs I may or may not have gotten. More on all that coming up. Stay tuned!

Atomic Nerdery!

2008-11-06T12:02:00.004-06:00

This Saturday is the second (and possibly final!) installment of Atomic Nerdery at the Playground. Once again the hour of dork-based comedy features swashbuckling duo The Gentleman Rogues engaging in mortal combat, their fates decided, literally, by the roll of the dice. Last time I (that is to say, the 8th Level Lawful Good Human Fighter, Orlando Cabanban) defeated my arch-nemesis, the foul Chaotic Evil Thief, Sinister Pinch (Ryan Zarecki). Who shall prevail this time? Come to the Playground, 3209 North Halsted, this Saturday at midnight to find out!

Progress

2008-11-05T09:20:00.002-06:00

Last night was a punch in the face covered in Awesome Sauce.

I am ashamed to admit I was unable to get down to Grant Park in time to take part in the historical event, but I doubt I was missed. I made it home from rehearsal in time to see MSNBC call it for Obama, and just seeing that blue number jump above the 270 mark sent a thrill up my spine. As an added bonus, the Democrats picked up five more seats in the Senate, including Elizabeth Dole's. This will be the first time in three decades that neither a Bush nor a Dole holds a seat in Congress or the White House. Huzzah!

The night was not perfect. Michelle "Joe McCarthy" Bachmann kept her job, as did Norm Coleman, Saxby Chambliss, and (inexplicably) Ted Stevens. And worst of all, California passed Proposition 8. I have a few friends in California that I just want to hug right now.

Still, I woke up this morning feeling like anything was possible. When was the last time that happened?

Vote!

2008-11-04T07:31:00.000-06:00

That's all. Just go vote. See you at the rally!