THTGTSOTA

I saw Isaac and Dan's show on Thurs. It's innovative, a bit meta, a lot of fun (My favorite part is the mole people who sing to us with haunting green lights on their heads.) There are a surprising amount of songs in the play although I wouldn't necessarily call it a musical. I like Dan's description: "an unfair vaudeville" We're constantly being reminded that we're being told a story. Despite this, I was engaged by the story being told. I'm not sure what that says about my own religious beliefs. Something perhaps. Or perhaps it's a credit to Dan's storytelling and the talent of the actors and their director. It's a 90 min play that feels like a 60 minute play which is quite a compliment, in my opinion. I was hooked the whole time. Go if you can.

NE

Today I watched this. I recently went back to rewatch the old Northern Exposure episodes because I remember how much I enjoyed them but wasn't sure whether they would stand up still. Now that I'm on the second season the exciting things about the show are starting to kick in--that inexplicable stuff. In the episode I just saw, Chris, the radio dj loses his voice when a beautiful woman stops by the station to ask for directions. His voice was taken by beauty. Sounds like a Sarah Ruhl play, no? He eventually gets his voice back after Maggie, the most beautiful woman in town kisses him. The B story is that Ed is trying to find out who his parents are and a spirit guide arrives and tries to help him. Th fun thing about it is the clash of cultures--the New York Jewish doctor who is rational and scientific and the small town and american indian cultures who have different belief systems. Joel thinks both Ed is delusional and Chris can't have lost his voice for the reason he thinks he did. This is the episode for me when the characters finally became clear. Earlier, it felt like we (and the writers) were still figuring out who these people are but now, we have strong and clearly drawn characters. One of my favorite parts is Joel's increasing jealousy about Maggie who the town thinks is having sex with Chris to give him his voice back. The entire town waits outside her cabin to see if he will emerge with his voice.

petition to close guantanamo

https://secure.aclu.org/site/SPageServer?pagename=close_guantanamo&s_s=taf

post in response to How Theater Failed America at TCG

http://actorsguildoflexington.blogspot.com/2008/06/has-theatre-failed-america.html

F4F

I became aware yesterday of two upcoming productions of Food For Fish, the sixth and seventh productions. That is by far more productions than any of my other plays and it's a play that never really went through a development process. I brought it into class a couple times, got advice from friends, but as for Development with a capital D, it had none. And if you read it or see it, you can see it's a play that still contains ambiguities. It's messy in a lot of ways but at the same time it hasn't lost that spark. And it's a play I'm very proud of at times and also at the same time, it seems to have been written by a crazy person. Anyway, I'm glad it is having a life and I hope the same thing happens to the rest of my plays, or at least more of them. The ones I don't show people can die I suppose, at the bottom of the hard drive.

tonight

I'm going to this tonight. Will I see you there?

Kucinich tries to get Bush Impeached

http://blogs.villagevoice.com/runninscared/archives/2008/06/kucinich_introd.php

Now why won't this happen?