The LA chapter of ShortLived 3.0 featured two very different, but equally funny and witty writers James C. Ferguson and Thomas J. Misuraca. We chose a piece from each writer, having no idea that they were friends and writing partners who often collaborated on other theater pieces and even film.
Misuraca's piece, "Communication", about two friends who randomly run into each other, is just as much about their friendship as it is about the writing itself. It's one of those plays, with it's rapid-fire witty banter, that is chock full of hidden jokes, bits and clues into their questionable relationship (are they friends? lovers? ex-lovers?) that it is equally fun the first time you watch it as it is the second and third because you take away something new each time.
Ferguson's short, "Jingle Ball Rock", which also won the first round of ShortLived, isn't about people at all but, rather, Christmas ornaments. A red, blue, gold, white and hand-made popsicle stick ornament discuss, rather humorously, what Christmas means to them as they are hung, one by one, on a little boy's Christmas tree. Despite that performances would be in middle of spring, we couldn't help but include this piece that was so amazingly absurd.
As it turns out, these two writers wrote a film together, Happy Holidays, which will have its LA debut in the same building that housed PianoFight's ShortLived. I would imagine that their distinct brands of humor blend for some really fantastic story telling.
If you're in LA, go check it out. This Thursday, 8PM, at Theater Asylum.
The following is a post which makes the case that American Theatre Magazine, and a good chunk of its readership, hates technology and youth.
Exhibit A - AMT recently posted this status update on their Facebook page:
"Has theatregoing etiquette seriously declined in recent years? And if so, what's the cause, and what might be a good solution?"
Objection Your Honor, leading. Seriously this is the baseball equivalent of a full-count hanging curve lumbering towards a 280 pound steroid chomping salivating monster. Think I'm exaggerating? Here are some of the responses (WARNING: Lots of typos and vitriolic-ALL-CAPS-language directed at technology to follow):
"I'm gonna blame technology, stupidity, and the arrogance that the world revolves around you in such a way that you must constantly keep your cell phone on - since I opened a show last night and the HM told the audience TWICE to shut off their cell phones and not one, but TWO, decided a good time to shut off theirs would be after we had started the show. So a few lines, LOUD AS HELL SHUT OFF MEDLEY!"
"Etiquette in general has declined in recent years. Everyone is too busy texting or has a cell phone glued to their ear. You will find this annoying behaviour not only in theatres, but churches, doctor's offices, courts, restaurants...Ban cell phones. And start the shows on time with late - comers locked out! RESPECT."
"Yes there has been..cellphone use being the biggest culprit..as well as my own pet peeve..people not being able to go 50 min's w/out a sip of water, so right at some pivotal poignant moment in a play, you hear the chug-a-lug glurp glurp of someone w/a 32oz Poland Spring being brought up to their lips."
Oh yeah, and don't forget this guy ...
"There is absolutely a decline in theatre etiquette. Reasons: partly our narcissitic, entitled society utterly oblivious to those around them; partly our inability to disconnect from our technology for a couple of hours (why this compulsion... to respond to any phone, text,or email immediately? There are times I don't want to be found, the theatre being one of them); partly the inability to dsitinguish between manners appropriate in public and one's living-room TV manners (this ain't a DVD; if I miss something because you're jabbering, I can't go back. And it isn't American Idol; we don't need the excessive, overwrought "applause sign" behaviour of whooping and cheering nor meaningless standing ovations). I'm in favour of aggressively chucking out crass yobs and using the technology that is already there to block cell phone signals in theatres, restaurants, churches, and cars (make it legal in these cases). It should be like smoking...if your priority is to yak on the phone, go outside and don't inflict your bloody boring life and rude behaviour on the rest of us. I've already been chased out of the movie houses by boorish behaviour; I don't want it happening in the live theatre."
And you thought I was exaggerating. But if you still don't believe my thesis, that American Theatre Magazine and a large portion of their readership hates technology and youth, here is Exhibit B: They Don't Have an Online Version of the Magazine
If AMT wants anyone under thirty-years-old to peruse their pages, those 20-somethings need to be able to download that shit on the iPhone.
But that'll NEVER happen because apparently their readership is actively engaged in coming with newfangled plans to disable and destroy cell phones:
"Cell phone scramblers in public performance venues!"
"Ban cell phones."
"I recommend lead-lined theaters."
"All theaters should have Cell Phone Blockers on their rooftops so no phones work in the theater."
More Evidence:
Just from earlier today, a status update from AMT reads: "What (theatrical) topic would you like to discuss on Facebook today?"
Cue the chorus of bitching and misspellings ...
"The annoying prevalence of microphones snaking down the sides of actors' faces and millimeters from their mouths, often obscuring their expressions. Why does every show end up looking like something out of a Madonna concert? It's especially anachronistic with costume dramas. Whatever happened to the time-honored tradition of teaching DICTION and PROJECTION? Really? In this day and age of technical theatrical marvels, how have we become so sloppy?"
"The downward spiral of theatre photography, brought about by every Tom, Dick and Harriet owning a digicam, making them erroneously assume they are now able to produce stellar publicity images, even though they barely know how to press the shutter button, let alone know how to make a representative image that will fill the theatre's seats."
"The death of interpersonal communication from the use of social media sites."
And of course, this guy again ...
"you have hit on one of my great laments of today's theatre. Miked actors. Are we just not teaching diction and projection anymore in theatre schools? I've ranted about this at length on my blog: http://poguespages.blogspot.com/ , under "Where did you get your training?" And while we're looking for topics, how about: Why can't actors write a proper professional programme bio anymore? They all sound like acceptance speeches for those Tonys they've yet to win."
What I think these folks are failing to realize, is that they sound eerily similar to the stodgy old curmudgeons who railed against new media and furiously claimed it would never replace print ... right. The world has changed, and it's on us to keep up. Till AMT realizes its need to catch up, I recommend reading http://poguespages.blogspot.com - from what I can tell, this guy is a real hoot.
Saturday Night Special - JC + Shots: Post show talk back with playwright JC Lee - Before he heads off to Julliard for Grad School, do some shots and get silly with this awesome new voice in American Theater.
We've updated the Low Shoulders blog, which chronicles the creation of PianoFight's first short film project. Check out the new post on sex and violence as it relates to our film, Low Shoulders, and others here.
We're having a fundraiser movie night to raise money for Low Shoulders, PianoFight's first short film project! Date is Saturday, August 7th, doors at 7pm.
Check out more info about it, see the flier, scope some raffle prize potentials, at our blog, lowshoulders.wordpress.com.
PianoFight homie and occasional collaborator Dan Burke is putting together a 25 part behind the scenes video series on kick-ass metal gurus Devil Driver. Dan has been shooting video for Devil Driver since they got together in 2003 (his brother, Dave, has also been galavanting around the world with the band on tour as a guitar tech for a number of years now), so I've had the opportunity to see these guys play live a few times and they are friggin unreal (also had the opportunity on more than one occasion to get tanked with the band which I am positive I enjoyed much more than they did).
What's incredibly cool with the first two chapters of this series are that much of the footage is from seven years ago when the band first formed as Death Ride. Burke then splices that footage with recent interviews to create both an oral and visual history of the band that's artistically insightful, funny, endearing and TOTALLY METAL!!
The next chapters of the series are focused on each member of the band with candid clips and interviews where other band mates rag on the video's star. It's all great, and the first two chapters on how the band formed are embedded below. Enjoy!
The last paper I was tasked with writing in college was supposed to be on Ancient Greek Theatre, the topic of the class I had been loathing all semester long. Having dragged my feet for a month it came down to 24 hours before it was due, and I hadn't started. After thinking about the paper for, really, the first time, I quickly decided that instead of an essay I'd write a one act play, and that play would be a sophist debate on the relevancy of Ancient Greek Theater today. I drank tons of coffee, spiked that coffee, smoked a ton of cigarettes, got kicked out of the library but finally turned it in on time ... I got a C ... and I totz passed college homies!! Now I could straight party ALL THE TIME!!
OK, back to the crazy Greeks. I mention the story above to give a context from where I have viewed Greek plays, namely, "Yeah yeah, they're great, very smart and necessary and blah blah blah, but do they really mean anything to people today?" I'd say most of that hang up was due to the language - even well translated versions of those ancient plays read like they were translated about 2,000 years ago. I have the same problem with Shakespeare or Chekhov - the language is so out of common use, that it is simply difficult to understand and follow. Not saying it's impossible, it's just tough, and a lot of audiences, including myself at most times, don't have the patience to focus so intently for three and a half hours to make sense of The Oresteia.
No Nude Men describes The Olympians Festival thusly,"Twelve new full-length plays written by fourteen local writers, each one focusing on one of the twelve Olympian gods of Ancient Greece." Essentially, they put out a call for scripts explaining the concept behind the festival, then picked 14 writers to create brand new plays about each of these totally awesome Greek gods. Remember in elementary school when you read all about Zeus and Poseidon and Hera and that rascal Hermes? Remember all their shenanigans and crazy adventures and fighting monsters and falling in love and generally being larger than life, vaguely incompetent and thunderingly mighty? The Olympians Fest has hired local playwrights to re-imagine those tales in a way that audiences young and old can very easily relate to. I was lucky enough to catch Artemis by M. R. Fall (the festival has been almost entirely sold out) with a rowdy and engaged crowd intent on every word and move of these characters who, in all likelihood, that audience hadn't really thought of since third grade.
Theater Pub has managed to do something very similar. With programming which encompasses both re-imagined classics and new plays, mixed with well selected musical guests, and a price point and location which are alluring to everyone (free and at a bar, specifically Cafe Royal on the Tendernob), Theater Pub has packed 'em in for each show with great success. Ben Fisher, a local playwright/actor/director/producer and co-founder of Theater Pub, recently said this about the company:
"In our brief tenure, we have produced a number of totally obscure plays with great popular success. Our first event was a reading of Euripides’ Cyclops, a play that is almost never performed by established theater companies and relegated to the sort of academic curiosity file of the Greek canon. Our reading drew a crowd of well over 100 people and everything that might have made that play so unsavory to a theater – its short length, the extreme darkness of the comedy, its crassness, and the fact that it is all but unknown outside of scholarly circles – made it such a success in the bar. Moving forward, we have performed other off-the-beaten path classics like Aeschylus’ Seven Against Thebes or Havel’s Audience, with a similarly enthusiastic response. The draw of free theater in a bar is certainly a key factor, but really what these elements do is remove the level of pretention or self-importance that is often attached to the classics. The audience is drawn to them not because it is “good theater” but simply because it is fun. It becomes responsive to the community because it is about the communal experience of going to see something with other people, hanging out afterwards, and supporting what is generated locally."
That last sentence above from Fisher (who also wrote and directed "Hermes" for the Olympians Fest), also I think, applies to the Olympians Fest. Both Theatre Pub and the Olympians Fest have managed to dust off texts and stories that are today most commonly reserved for an academic setting, and made those stories wholly accessible to an audience that may not have a degree in theater studies, ancient religion or philosophy. In an incredibly smart, successful and fun way, they've lowered the access point to creating, watching and participating in the Classics.
One of the coolest aspects of life is the ability to change your mind or change another person's attitude towards something. At PianoFight, one of the most common responses we get to our shows is something like this, "Gosh, I haven't been to a play since high school and I didn't know theater could be like this, you know, fun!" We've flipped more than a few non-believers into solid theater-goers. And for me, personally, Theater Pub and the Olympians Festival have done the same to me in regards to the Classics. It was incredibly difficult for me to imagine how Aeschylus and Alfred Jarry could be fun and engaging. By lowering the access point, removing the often pretentious nature surrounding such work, and engaging the local community of artists, audiences, and businesses on meaningful levels, SF Olympians and Theatre Pub have, for me anyway, made those Classics relevant to my everyday life. Had I been exposed to this style of work a bit earlier in life, I might have just gotten a B on that last college paper.
The Olympians Festival continues through July 31 at The Exit Theater and Theatre Pub takes over Cafe Royal in August with "Pint Sized Plays" (full disclosure: I play Queen Mab in drag and a drunk llama in that show).
