Wow, I suck at blogging.
Anyway, here's the new video.
This set up is one that could spawn a lot of videos, as long as you don't let it get too repetitive.
Thursday, May 21, 2009
Saturday, March 28, 2009
Three weeks without an update what?
Thoughts-
One- I am now twenty five. I don't know what to say about this.
Two- All My Sons at Mainstreet Stage, 8pm. Thursday through Saturday. Matinee on the 5th.
Three- Not enough things are like chapstick. Chapstick is a short term solution which is also beneficial in the long term. Most short term solutions screw you over in the long run. Not chapstick.
Four- The Red Room starts up again in three weeks. Hopefully I'll post again before then.
One- I am now twenty five. I don't know what to say about this.
Two- All My Sons at Mainstreet Stage, 8pm. Thursday through Saturday. Matinee on the 5th.
Three- Not enough things are like chapstick. Chapstick is a short term solution which is also beneficial in the long term. Most short term solutions screw you over in the long run. Not chapstick.
Four- The Red Room starts up again in three weeks. Hopefully I'll post again before then.
Monday, March 9, 2009
Heroes Live Blogging
Oh look, it's Heroes
9:02- Didn't Sylar kill this guy? If we're randomly bringing back minor characters why not DL or Elle? You know, people we like.
9:03- "I don't want to control people anymore. Hmm, apparently the villain becoming a hero plot line didn't leave when Sylar gave it up, it just moved to a smaller character.
9:05- Senators can walk through police lines. I guess the police don't want to fuck with a guy who could cut their funding.
9:09- Red Wire, seriously?
9:11- The constant harping on parenthood in this series leads me to believe that the writing staff has some serious daddy issues.
9:13- I think it would be neat if Wireless (Hana from the comics) was Rebel. But I doubt they remember she exists.
9:15- Nathan's lieutenant is actually pretty badass. I suppose that comes with the territory when you're created solely to allow Nathan to escape responsibility for his actions by being evil. Which in this case means caring more about the safety of thousands of strangers than your whiney brother and a dozen people you've met once or twice.
9:23- Claire getting a job a comic book store. Yeah.
9:25- What does that exchange in the store remind me of, oh right.
9:26- "You have an ability?" No shit Sherlock. How did he think his dad killed his mom, harsh language?
9:28- Does Sylar's dad have the power to make Sylar interesting again?
9:34- Do any of these people ever leave the comic book store? They live in California, there are plenty of blondes to oogle elsewhere.
9:36- No wonder Bennet is the most successful Company agent. He's the only one who shoots the dangerous super-powered maniacs before talking to them.
9:40- Could regeneration fix cancer? Or would the rapid cell growth exacerbate it?
9:41- Sylar Sr. uses telekenetic arrows. That is just classy.
9:46- I'm kinda hoping Sylar Sr. kills Sylar and becomes the new main villain.
9:49- The way power battle seem to work in this show is that only power can work at a time. Otherwise it might get interesting.
9:51- Yeah, Danko pushed a US Senator out a window. On camera. Only he saw Nathan fly. Yet somehow this is going to prove him right.
9:58- Ummmmm... Are they just going to blatantly rip off The Incredibles now? And didn't they establish Matt's kid wasn't his?
9:59- Sylar gave him a bunny! That's... nice.
Yeah, that was... yeah. I think it says a lot about me as a person that I keep watching this show even though it's gotten painful to watch. I suppose it's a kind of penance for all my various sins. I could blog about a show I actually like, but live blogging Chuck or Sarah Conor Chronicles would just be an hour of "This is brilliant" over and over again. And no one wants to read that.
9:02- Didn't Sylar kill this guy? If we're randomly bringing back minor characters why not DL or Elle? You know, people we like.
9:03- "I don't want to control people anymore. Hmm, apparently the villain becoming a hero plot line didn't leave when Sylar gave it up, it just moved to a smaller character.
9:05- Senators can walk through police lines. I guess the police don't want to fuck with a guy who could cut their funding.
9:09- Red Wire, seriously?
9:11- The constant harping on parenthood in this series leads me to believe that the writing staff has some serious daddy issues.
9:13- I think it would be neat if Wireless (Hana from the comics) was Rebel. But I doubt they remember she exists.
9:15- Nathan's lieutenant is actually pretty badass. I suppose that comes with the territory when you're created solely to allow Nathan to escape responsibility for his actions by being evil. Which in this case means caring more about the safety of thousands of strangers than your whiney brother and a dozen people you've met once or twice.
9:23- Claire getting a job a comic book store. Yeah.
9:25- What does that exchange in the store remind me of, oh right.
9:26- "You have an ability?" No shit Sherlock. How did he think his dad killed his mom, harsh language?
9:28- Does Sylar's dad have the power to make Sylar interesting again?
9:34- Do any of these people ever leave the comic book store? They live in California, there are plenty of blondes to oogle elsewhere.
9:36- No wonder Bennet is the most successful Company agent. He's the only one who shoots the dangerous super-powered maniacs before talking to them.
9:40- Could regeneration fix cancer? Or would the rapid cell growth exacerbate it?
9:41- Sylar Sr. uses telekenetic arrows. That is just classy.
9:46- I'm kinda hoping Sylar Sr. kills Sylar and becomes the new main villain.
9:49- The way power battle seem to work in this show is that only power can work at a time. Otherwise it might get interesting.
9:51- Yeah, Danko pushed a US Senator out a window. On camera. Only he saw Nathan fly. Yet somehow this is going to prove him right.
9:58- Ummmmm... Are they just going to blatantly rip off The Incredibles now? And didn't they establish Matt's kid wasn't his?
9:59- Sylar gave him a bunny! That's... nice.
Yeah, that was... yeah. I think it says a lot about me as a person that I keep watching this show even though it's gotten painful to watch. I suppose it's a kind of penance for all my various sins. I could blog about a show I actually like, but live blogging Chuck or Sarah Conor Chronicles would just be an hour of "This is brilliant" over and over again. And no one wants to read that.
Sunday, March 8, 2009
My Son is Crazy but Promising-- Review
If I were Jeffrey Borak this review would be titled: “’My Son’ certainly crazy, lacks promise.” I’m not that much of a dick though.
Review Synopsis: A bunch of really solid character acting, several actors far beyond their parts, a few actors burdened with unnecessary and irritating voices, and no plot to speak of. So let’s get down to business (to defeat the Huns).
Play Synopsis: A former screenwriter buys a hotel in the middle of the Arizona desert in hopes of finding the fabled Lost Dutchman Mine. The hotel is full of zany characters. That’s pretty much it. Later on someone who might be a mobster shows up.
The play is full of problems and once again the two people to blame are Doug Jenkins and the writer.
Every time Doug Jenkins puts on a play I find myself writing the same review: weird play, bizarre directing choices, cast whose talent is wasted by the production. And, while not as vile as the infamous “Blood Wedding,” this play is no exception. Having seen the same play three times from Doug, I really have to wonder at why he does what he does. Perhaps he doesn’t see his plays as performances, perhaps he sees them as an acting class writ large, theater exercises that are meant to benefit the cast and crew more than the audience. I could respect that, sort of. But the thing is I think he’s just a bad director, perhaps willfully bad. The choices he burdens his actors with are often wholly detrimental to their performances. He persists in casting people as living scenery, a cruel practice especially in this play where the freshmen playing the aliens are added characters and covered in makeup. He treats the production like a middle school play, put on for grade school children. But most of all, he chooses crummy plays.
The play was written by Tim Kelly, an exceptionally prolific writer of schlock. In his 60 years on this earth he wrote 300 plays. That should tell you something about the quality of his work. That is, it doesn’t really have any. “My Son” lacks a plot. Or rather, it lacks a real plot. The plot changes randomly as if Kelly repeatedly changed his mind about the direction of the play, was pulling plot elements out of a hat or simply had ADD. First it’s about a down on its luck hotel, then spies, then a buried treasure, then gangsters, then hiding a murder, then aliens, then I don’t even care anymore. There are subplots that have absolutely nothing to do with anything else and nearly half the characters are totally extraneous. The play is essentially a two hour game of party quirks. One or two straight men are surrounded by a dozen wacky character actors. No plot happens; the characters just come on stage, act goofy and leave.
Looking over his work it feels as though it was written for a community theater troupe, written with a specific company in mind and a need to find a part for everyone, played for a forgiving audience in the mood for light fare if not small children. If that was the case it makes sense and works for what it is, except for the fact that it isn’t being played at a small community theater in Arizona. It boggles the mind that Doug chose this play.
Let’s look at the individual performances because that’s what the play has going for it. In order of appearance:
Ben Leahy plays a Russian spy named Dimitri Jones. He wants to stay in Arizona rather than get recalled to the Motherland. He confuses Bud Granger for an undercover agent sent to check up on his FBI counterpart and decides to step up his game, leading to a series of random bouts of physical comedy which his lanky frame is ideally suited. That’s a lot of set up for a plot line that goes nowhere; his character is completely extraneous to the play and only serves to run through at random intervals to punch up slow scenes. He also has an accent that I suppose is Russian. It’s sort of hard to tell, not because it goes in and out, but rather because it’s just weird.
Accompanying Leahy in this pointless subplot is last semester’s it-girl Elizabeth “Lily” Cardaropoli as FBI agent Susan Claypool. She is held down by a truly pointless character voice which doesn’t compliment the character at all. The unnaturally deep voice sounds like she’s just lowering her voice randomly rather than it being the character’s speech pattern. As such most of her effort seems to go into maintaining her accent rather than doing anything else. The voice was clearly forced on her by the director. She could have gotten a lot more out of the role if she could have used her natural voice and focused on the acting.
Michael Barry again turns in a solid character performance. His Sheriff Bates is, well, he’s a south-western sheriff. He serves to mention the law every so often and cause other characters to do stupid things because they’re afraid he’ll arrest them for something. The character is full of fully realized mannerisms that both define the character and add humor to the part. The man is a damn fine character actor, more so when you realize he played another sheriff in “Picnic at Hanging Rock” and the two characters are completely different. Many actors would have just changed the accent and played the same character.
Kelly Flanagan plays Gert Witherspoon, the owner of the hotel. She deals with money problems and acts like an old coot. It’s probably my favorite performance from her. She looks like a stereotypical Native American grandmother and it’s great. She also has a bunch of quirks and idiosyncrasies. Unfortunately the focus on the character traits causes her to miss some of her jokes. I could hear several funny lines that she simply dropped the delivery of and it surprised me that the director would let that slip. But given my opinion of Doug’s directing I can’t say I’m really surprised.
Liz McWhirk plays Cora Ames, a woman who believes she was abducted by aliens. I bet her performance is pretty divisive among audience members. I wouldn’t be surprised if a lot of people found her funny. I found her character annoying as hell. She’s a squeaky voiced space cadet who constantly moves her hands in giant, distracting loops to indicate spaceyness. The character wreaks of intentional humor that it kills the comedy for me. The kind of humor that says “look at me, I’m the funny one!” She also serves as, oddly enough, the main plot mover. Because she tends to move objects around randomly. Yes. Really. That’s where half the plot elements come from.
Jed Kravinsky is our straight man, Bud Granger. Bud is a screen writer of schlock horror films that moved out to Arizona to look for buried treasure. A quick glance at Tim Kelly’s Wikipedia page will show you that this character is clearly himself. Still, Kravinsky does an admirable job with a fairly bland author avatar. It’s good to see him get leading roles, even a mediocre one like this, because he has an understated charisma and everyman-ness that will inevitably get the audience on his side. However he isn’t taken too far out of his comfort zone here, in fact Bud is more or less his character from “Picnic at Hanging Rock” but through a comedy lens.
Brendon Graffum and Amy Rosvally play a newlywed couple that adds absolutely nothing to the show. Their characters serve only to provide a reason for Oysters Rockerfeller[sic] to show up later (mixed up luggage) and they spend the rest of the play doing nothing. Rosvally complains about the hotel and provides eye-candy to contrast the horrible screeching Lucille Ball voice she’s forced to put on. The voice changes and softens part way through for some reason. Graffum (nee McKean?) does nothing with nothing and is forgettable in the part.
Meghan Zaremba, as Jed’s mother Tilly, is so far above her part it’s like asking Patton to plan your capture the flag strategy or Sherlock Holmes to find your lost keys. She turns in her usual exemplary performance but is clearly unchallenged by the role. It doesn’t help that the part doesn’t serve much of a purpose other than to allow Bud to voice his problems aloud. The character’s status as a washed up actress almost becomes a runny joke but not quite. It’s sort of strange that no effort was made to make her look old enough to be Bud’s mother. Zaremba is honestly wasted as another more or less straight man character. She really excels at comedic roles but almost never gets the parts she because she has the looks and talent of a leading lady. Which is, I guess, a bad thing?
Joshua Smith plays Oysters Rockerfeller, a possible gangster who shows up looking for his lost luggage. At first he seems like he’s the antagonist trying to cover up evidence of his nefarious misdeed but no, he quickly turns into yet another wacky guest and then promptly goes into a coma which causes Bud and Tilly to think he’s dead and begin a weekend at Bernie’s plot, despite the fact that he’s wearing a medalert bracelet. Smith seems a little too reserved for the part, he has the character down it just lacks the force it feels like it needs. His voice is too soft and whether that’s natural or because of his character voice I can’t tell.
Ellen Rosati plays Chi Chi Vazoom, an aspiring starlet and Oyster’s moll. From a strictly craft point of view it’s the best part of the show. Having seen Ellen in many shows in the past, her character work is so far removed from the earnest heroines or shrinking violets she usually gets. It shows a remarkable range that has until now has been hidden by typecasting.
Nicole Dunn plays Fay Armstrong, a reporter trying do an exposé on Oysters. The character serves no real purpose except to be someone for things to be explained to. The role is largely non-comedic which shows the play’s age. Her attempt to prove Oysters is a mobster could have all the comedy of Geraldo Rivera’s infamous opening of Al Capone’s vault, but doesn’t. It’s another wasted opportunity for comedy. Dunn struggles to come to grips with a role that doesn’t do much and turns in a serviceable performance that finds little to do.
Alexander Munoz plays Larry Lime, Bud’s sleazy agent, and his performance should be considered grand larceny because he steals the fucking show. Everything he does in his greasy exploitation film maker role is awesome and hilarious, the high point of the show. It helps that he also gets the best lines, probably because he’s meant to be an outlet for Kelly’s frustrations with producers and directors. “Anyone can direct,” he says. So we’ve learned.
Alison Barker comes on stage at the very end to announce that Cora has won the lottery, a deus ex machina for a play without a conflict. Her character speaks with a squeaky voice that I’m going to give her the benefit of the doubt on and say was a character voice so consistent that I thought it was her real voice.
Nicole Gelinas and James Dunn are two freshmen earning their credits by being living set pieces. Their characters are added into the play by Doug. They play the aliens that Cora believes are coming for her. They first appear on stage before the house lights go down and begin playing cards. This confused the hell out of the audience who weren’t sure if the play was starting or not (I just assumed the light board op was an incompetent drunk who’s also lousy in bed but we all have our knee-jerk reactions). The aliens peak their heads in the windows when Cora talks about them and at then appear in a highly unnecessary burst of special effects (though it does feature the theme from Close Encounters of the Third Kind, so props for that). I always feel really sorry for actors forced into these empty parts, though all of Doug’s shows feature them. It’s terribly unfair to an actor to expect them to continually show up for rehearsal when they don’t actually have a part. It’s even worse when it’s a show for credit which means they are actually paying to be there.
So there it is: another play beneath its cast. I think it could have been better if they embraced the nonsensical nature of the plot instead of treating it as a backdrop for wacky characters. At one point, Bud, trying to distract people from finding the supposedly dead Oysters, claims to have found buried treasure. He leads them outside, digs at random and actually finds a treasure chest. The sheer absurdity of that is hilarious but it gets dropped because the intermission happens in between his leaving and coming back. Perhaps addressing and accentuating the absurdity would have served better.
All that said, this may be the best Doug Jenkins show I’ve seen, which is like saying this is the coldest part of the volcano. Obviously anything is better than the staged abortion that was “blood Wedding.” “My Son” also clearly tops the endless shaggy dog story that was “Because Their Hearts Were Pure.” It is comparable to “The Doctor in Spite of Himself” though time has dimmed the memory of that show. Still, that is not an impressive list. Doug Jenkins is the Uwe Boll of MCLA Theater.
In the interest of fairness I should mention that the audience seemed to enjoy the show for the most part and my comments are mine and mine alone. (And those of several people I talked to about it).
Review Synopsis: A bunch of really solid character acting, several actors far beyond their parts, a few actors burdened with unnecessary and irritating voices, and no plot to speak of. So let’s get down to business (to defeat the Huns).
Play Synopsis: A former screenwriter buys a hotel in the middle of the Arizona desert in hopes of finding the fabled Lost Dutchman Mine. The hotel is full of zany characters. That’s pretty much it. Later on someone who might be a mobster shows up.
The play is full of problems and once again the two people to blame are Doug Jenkins and the writer.
Every time Doug Jenkins puts on a play I find myself writing the same review: weird play, bizarre directing choices, cast whose talent is wasted by the production. And, while not as vile as the infamous “Blood Wedding,” this play is no exception. Having seen the same play three times from Doug, I really have to wonder at why he does what he does. Perhaps he doesn’t see his plays as performances, perhaps he sees them as an acting class writ large, theater exercises that are meant to benefit the cast and crew more than the audience. I could respect that, sort of. But the thing is I think he’s just a bad director, perhaps willfully bad. The choices he burdens his actors with are often wholly detrimental to their performances. He persists in casting people as living scenery, a cruel practice especially in this play where the freshmen playing the aliens are added characters and covered in makeup. He treats the production like a middle school play, put on for grade school children. But most of all, he chooses crummy plays.
The play was written by Tim Kelly, an exceptionally prolific writer of schlock. In his 60 years on this earth he wrote 300 plays. That should tell you something about the quality of his work. That is, it doesn’t really have any. “My Son” lacks a plot. Or rather, it lacks a real plot. The plot changes randomly as if Kelly repeatedly changed his mind about the direction of the play, was pulling plot elements out of a hat or simply had ADD. First it’s about a down on its luck hotel, then spies, then a buried treasure, then gangsters, then hiding a murder, then aliens, then I don’t even care anymore. There are subplots that have absolutely nothing to do with anything else and nearly half the characters are totally extraneous. The play is essentially a two hour game of party quirks. One or two straight men are surrounded by a dozen wacky character actors. No plot happens; the characters just come on stage, act goofy and leave.
Looking over his work it feels as though it was written for a community theater troupe, written with a specific company in mind and a need to find a part for everyone, played for a forgiving audience in the mood for light fare if not small children. If that was the case it makes sense and works for what it is, except for the fact that it isn’t being played at a small community theater in Arizona. It boggles the mind that Doug chose this play.
Let’s look at the individual performances because that’s what the play has going for it. In order of appearance:
Ben Leahy plays a Russian spy named Dimitri Jones. He wants to stay in Arizona rather than get recalled to the Motherland. He confuses Bud Granger for an undercover agent sent to check up on his FBI counterpart and decides to step up his game, leading to a series of random bouts of physical comedy which his lanky frame is ideally suited. That’s a lot of set up for a plot line that goes nowhere; his character is completely extraneous to the play and only serves to run through at random intervals to punch up slow scenes. He also has an accent that I suppose is Russian. It’s sort of hard to tell, not because it goes in and out, but rather because it’s just weird.
Accompanying Leahy in this pointless subplot is last semester’s it-girl Elizabeth “Lily” Cardaropoli as FBI agent Susan Claypool. She is held down by a truly pointless character voice which doesn’t compliment the character at all. The unnaturally deep voice sounds like she’s just lowering her voice randomly rather than it being the character’s speech pattern. As such most of her effort seems to go into maintaining her accent rather than doing anything else. The voice was clearly forced on her by the director. She could have gotten a lot more out of the role if she could have used her natural voice and focused on the acting.
Michael Barry again turns in a solid character performance. His Sheriff Bates is, well, he’s a south-western sheriff. He serves to mention the law every so often and cause other characters to do stupid things because they’re afraid he’ll arrest them for something. The character is full of fully realized mannerisms that both define the character and add humor to the part. The man is a damn fine character actor, more so when you realize he played another sheriff in “Picnic at Hanging Rock” and the two characters are completely different. Many actors would have just changed the accent and played the same character.
Kelly Flanagan plays Gert Witherspoon, the owner of the hotel. She deals with money problems and acts like an old coot. It’s probably my favorite performance from her. She looks like a stereotypical Native American grandmother and it’s great. She also has a bunch of quirks and idiosyncrasies. Unfortunately the focus on the character traits causes her to miss some of her jokes. I could hear several funny lines that she simply dropped the delivery of and it surprised me that the director would let that slip. But given my opinion of Doug’s directing I can’t say I’m really surprised.
Liz McWhirk plays Cora Ames, a woman who believes she was abducted by aliens. I bet her performance is pretty divisive among audience members. I wouldn’t be surprised if a lot of people found her funny. I found her character annoying as hell. She’s a squeaky voiced space cadet who constantly moves her hands in giant, distracting loops to indicate spaceyness. The character wreaks of intentional humor that it kills the comedy for me. The kind of humor that says “look at me, I’m the funny one!” She also serves as, oddly enough, the main plot mover. Because she tends to move objects around randomly. Yes. Really. That’s where half the plot elements come from.
Jed Kravinsky is our straight man, Bud Granger. Bud is a screen writer of schlock horror films that moved out to Arizona to look for buried treasure. A quick glance at Tim Kelly’s Wikipedia page will show you that this character is clearly himself. Still, Kravinsky does an admirable job with a fairly bland author avatar. It’s good to see him get leading roles, even a mediocre one like this, because he has an understated charisma and everyman-ness that will inevitably get the audience on his side. However he isn’t taken too far out of his comfort zone here, in fact Bud is more or less his character from “Picnic at Hanging Rock” but through a comedy lens.
Brendon Graffum and Amy Rosvally play a newlywed couple that adds absolutely nothing to the show. Their characters serve only to provide a reason for Oysters Rockerfeller[sic] to show up later (mixed up luggage) and they spend the rest of the play doing nothing. Rosvally complains about the hotel and provides eye-candy to contrast the horrible screeching Lucille Ball voice she’s forced to put on. The voice changes and softens part way through for some reason. Graffum (nee McKean?) does nothing with nothing and is forgettable in the part.
Meghan Zaremba, as Jed’s mother Tilly, is so far above her part it’s like asking Patton to plan your capture the flag strategy or Sherlock Holmes to find your lost keys. She turns in her usual exemplary performance but is clearly unchallenged by the role. It doesn’t help that the part doesn’t serve much of a purpose other than to allow Bud to voice his problems aloud. The character’s status as a washed up actress almost becomes a runny joke but not quite. It’s sort of strange that no effort was made to make her look old enough to be Bud’s mother. Zaremba is honestly wasted as another more or less straight man character. She really excels at comedic roles but almost never gets the parts she because she has the looks and talent of a leading lady. Which is, I guess, a bad thing?
Joshua Smith plays Oysters Rockerfeller, a possible gangster who shows up looking for his lost luggage. At first he seems like he’s the antagonist trying to cover up evidence of his nefarious misdeed but no, he quickly turns into yet another wacky guest and then promptly goes into a coma which causes Bud and Tilly to think he’s dead and begin a weekend at Bernie’s plot, despite the fact that he’s wearing a medalert bracelet. Smith seems a little too reserved for the part, he has the character down it just lacks the force it feels like it needs. His voice is too soft and whether that’s natural or because of his character voice I can’t tell.
Ellen Rosati plays Chi Chi Vazoom, an aspiring starlet and Oyster’s moll. From a strictly craft point of view it’s the best part of the show. Having seen Ellen in many shows in the past, her character work is so far removed from the earnest heroines or shrinking violets she usually gets. It shows a remarkable range that has until now has been hidden by typecasting.
Nicole Dunn plays Fay Armstrong, a reporter trying do an exposé on Oysters. The character serves no real purpose except to be someone for things to be explained to. The role is largely non-comedic which shows the play’s age. Her attempt to prove Oysters is a mobster could have all the comedy of Geraldo Rivera’s infamous opening of Al Capone’s vault, but doesn’t. It’s another wasted opportunity for comedy. Dunn struggles to come to grips with a role that doesn’t do much and turns in a serviceable performance that finds little to do.
Alexander Munoz plays Larry Lime, Bud’s sleazy agent, and his performance should be considered grand larceny because he steals the fucking show. Everything he does in his greasy exploitation film maker role is awesome and hilarious, the high point of the show. It helps that he also gets the best lines, probably because he’s meant to be an outlet for Kelly’s frustrations with producers and directors. “Anyone can direct,” he says. So we’ve learned.
Alison Barker comes on stage at the very end to announce that Cora has won the lottery, a deus ex machina for a play without a conflict. Her character speaks with a squeaky voice that I’m going to give her the benefit of the doubt on and say was a character voice so consistent that I thought it was her real voice.
Nicole Gelinas and James Dunn are two freshmen earning their credits by being living set pieces. Their characters are added into the play by Doug. They play the aliens that Cora believes are coming for her. They first appear on stage before the house lights go down and begin playing cards. This confused the hell out of the audience who weren’t sure if the play was starting or not (I just assumed the light board op was an incompetent drunk who’s also lousy in bed but we all have our knee-jerk reactions). The aliens peak their heads in the windows when Cora talks about them and at then appear in a highly unnecessary burst of special effects (though it does feature the theme from Close Encounters of the Third Kind, so props for that). I always feel really sorry for actors forced into these empty parts, though all of Doug’s shows feature them. It’s terribly unfair to an actor to expect them to continually show up for rehearsal when they don’t actually have a part. It’s even worse when it’s a show for credit which means they are actually paying to be there.
So there it is: another play beneath its cast. I think it could have been better if they embraced the nonsensical nature of the plot instead of treating it as a backdrop for wacky characters. At one point, Bud, trying to distract people from finding the supposedly dead Oysters, claims to have found buried treasure. He leads them outside, digs at random and actually finds a treasure chest. The sheer absurdity of that is hilarious but it gets dropped because the intermission happens in between his leaving and coming back. Perhaps addressing and accentuating the absurdity would have served better.
All that said, this may be the best Doug Jenkins show I’ve seen, which is like saying this is the coldest part of the volcano. Obviously anything is better than the staged abortion that was “blood Wedding.” “My Son” also clearly tops the endless shaggy dog story that was “Because Their Hearts Were Pure.” It is comparable to “The Doctor in Spite of Himself” though time has dimmed the memory of that show. Still, that is not an impressive list. Doug Jenkins is the Uwe Boll of MCLA Theater.
In the interest of fairness I should mention that the audience seemed to enjoy the show for the most part and my comments are mine and mine alone. (And those of several people I talked to about it).
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
Huh, yeah
Apparently there is a species of cabbage called "Dwarf Essex Rape."
Yeah.
I don't know what to say about that.
Yeah.
I don't know what to say about that.
Monday, March 2, 2009
Driving Ms. Helen
I just re-found an old article I wrote a few years ago while interning at the Media Giraffe Project convention during summer 06. Helen Thomas was the guest of honor and after she gave her address or what have you she needed a ride to Newton where she had an interview with a Boston TV station. It turned out that only one of the interns was of sufficient age to drive a rental car. Guess who. (I suppose they didn't trust a national media icon to my 93 Geo Prism)
So here's the article about the experience: Driving Ms. Helen
It's weird to look back on the story now. Like just about anything I have ever wrote I;m rather displeased with it. I talk too much about myself for one thing. I think that may be because I put off writing the article for a few weeks and thus didn't retain more useful details about things she actually said. In fact I remember thinking to myself "Remember this, damnit! Remember this!" all the while knowing I wouldn't retain half of it. Perhaps that's why I stick to writing fiction. The other weird thing about this article is that, more so than other things I've written, it really takes me back to that summer. Perhaps because more of the stuff I was doing then appear in the article. I didn't end up following up on interning with NECN, instead I went to Europe for the rest of the summer. Interning probably would have been a better idea in the long run, though I can't really say I regret the choice.
So here's the article about the experience: Driving Ms. Helen
It's weird to look back on the story now. Like just about anything I have ever wrote I;m rather displeased with it. I talk too much about myself for one thing. I think that may be because I put off writing the article for a few weeks and thus didn't retain more useful details about things she actually said. In fact I remember thinking to myself "Remember this, damnit! Remember this!" all the while knowing I wouldn't retain half of it. Perhaps that's why I stick to writing fiction. The other weird thing about this article is that, more so than other things I've written, it really takes me back to that summer. Perhaps because more of the stuff I was doing then appear in the article. I didn't end up following up on interning with NECN, instead I went to Europe for the rest of the summer. Interning probably would have been a better idea in the long run, though I can't really say I regret the choice.
Sunday, March 1, 2009
Goals for 09
I'm currently housesitting, and on the refrigerator door the two kids of the household have posted lists of their goals for 2009. Oliver's seem to be a list of things he wants to make out of Legos, but Charlotte's are neatly divided into goals of Mind, Body, Heart and World (as indicated by a small crayon drawing to the left of the three items in each category).
Rather than get shown up by a ten-year-old again, I think I'll post my goals for 2009.
Mind
1. Read more non-fiction
2. Write more frequently
3. Blog more or less, I'm not sure which
Body
1. Exercise at least once
2. Eat at least two meals a day
3. Fume less (stress reduction)
Heart
1. Forgive somebody for something- probably not going to happen but worth a shot
2. Make fewer jokes about killing prostitutes
3. Plot fewer murders
World
1. Say bad ideas aloud less frequently, people enact too many of them
2. Go somewhere, do something
3. Make the perfect Youtube video, the one that unites all of humanity
Rather than get shown up by a ten-year-old again, I think I'll post my goals for 2009.
Mind
1. Read more non-fiction
2. Write more frequently
3. Blog more or less, I'm not sure which
Body
1. Exercise at least once
2. Eat at least two meals a day
3. Fume less (stress reduction)
Heart
1. Forgive somebody for something- probably not going to happen but worth a shot
2. Make fewer jokes about killing prostitutes
3. Plot fewer murders
World
1. Say bad ideas aloud less frequently, people enact too many of them
2. Go somewhere, do something
3. Make the perfect Youtube video, the one that unites all of humanity
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