Wednesday is fight night at King Lear rehearsals.
I realized tonight that I haven't kept up my weight loss goal.
Okay, bullshit. I didn't realize that tonight, i've known it for a while. I haven't even attempted at the weight loss goal. Something to strive for over summer, I guess. With two weeks to opening night, I don't think it's gonna happen.
It's sad though. I do these fight combinations (nothing too outrageous either), and after running through it once, i'm painfully out of breathe. I didn't use to be like that. Though heavy, I used to be able to do these fights again and again and again with relative ease. Not anymore. It's not an age thing (i'm 25, almost 26), it's an out-of-shape thing.
We're getting closer and closer to opening night. I tumble toward it like a cow that's lost its footing and is now rolling down a steep hill. It's true. My indian name is "Tumbling Cow". I'll regain my footing though. These shows always seem to just fall into place in the last moments. It'll likely happen before the last moments with this one. Our cast is pretty talented. And experienced.
Experience. That's a loaded word.
I'm considering taking on a new endeavor. It's a big one, to be sure, and one that most people would not advise without some level of "experience". The question is, do I have enough? Not only that, but do I have the right kind? How much experience is enough to get a job done? How do I calculate my level of experience? I didn't finish college. Does that automatically negate my experience? Most of my experience was gained on amateur stages. Does that count toward my experience quota?
It's a frightening thing. When will enough be enough? If you think about it, the answer is never. There will never be enough. Experience must be gained through the act of experiencing, I think. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe i'll pay for my wrongness. I still think though, that experience comes from experiencing. In order to make something happen, I may have to throw my experience deficiancy to the wind, and just jump. It might hurt.
That would be an experience. Hurt. It would be an ass-kicking of an experience. You know what else would be an experience? Fun. Fun would be a really good ass-kicking of an experience. You know what both of these experiences would do? Teach me to be ready for my next experience.
You know who doesn't ever have enough experience? The President. No candidate is ever experienced enough to be president. Only ex Presidents are experienced enough to be Presidents. They've been Presidents. At one time, they weren't experienced Presidents, though. They were candidates. Inexperienced ones, too. Still, they ran for President and got the experience they needed. They didn't wait to be President before running for President. Doesn't that support my opinion of an experience?
Doesn't that count toward anything? Does my understanding that the experiences will not always (maybe rarely) be fun make any difference? I hope so. I think i'm qualified for some of the journeys I plan on taking in life. Experienced or not.
Thursday, May 20, 2010
Saturday, May 15, 2010
Secrets Revealed: On Cheating in Theater
When I cannot find interest enough in a role to make it my own, I resort to a more hackneyed approach. I'm not proud of this, but I'm announcing it only to generate some interest, or maybe insight, to my methods of performance.
As mentioned in previous posts, I'm currently working on an amateur production of William Shakespeare's KING LEAR. I can't say that I've had no difficulty in developing the role of Cornwall. My major problem seems to be, seemingly simply enough, a complication in finding more than a two dimensional quality to the doomed Duke. This issue, I attribute to my own laziness, and fraudulent abilities.
The director orders a character, and I am the contractor hired to deliver it. It is up to me to make the character interesting to myself, and then (most importantly) to the viewer. Where the character lacks three dimensions, it is up to me to create new vantage points. It is not meant to be easy. The easy roles are the ones that should worry me.
Having come to this roadblock, I plan on restarting my approach to the Duke of Cornwall. I had earlier spoken of trying to work some comedy into the role. I don't know that this is the best way to approach him. I think I've found a favorite actor of mine, whose best-known character would lend itself to this role. I'll use this as a base, or starting point, and morph the role into my own from there. Think of it as using a cookie-cutter, and then trying to reshape the form of the dough afterward.
While this method is certainly viewable by many as a cheated, crutched, handicapped, or hack way of doing things, I think it's what's best for the production overall. We're getting too close now to production to still be completely confused on how to approach this guy.
As mentioned in previous posts, I'm currently working on an amateur production of William Shakespeare's KING LEAR. I can't say that I've had no difficulty in developing the role of Cornwall. My major problem seems to be, seemingly simply enough, a complication in finding more than a two dimensional quality to the doomed Duke. This issue, I attribute to my own laziness, and fraudulent abilities.
The director orders a character, and I am the contractor hired to deliver it. It is up to me to make the character interesting to myself, and then (most importantly) to the viewer. Where the character lacks three dimensions, it is up to me to create new vantage points. It is not meant to be easy. The easy roles are the ones that should worry me.
Having come to this roadblock, I plan on restarting my approach to the Duke of Cornwall. I had earlier spoken of trying to work some comedy into the role. I don't know that this is the best way to approach him. I think I've found a favorite actor of mine, whose best-known character would lend itself to this role. I'll use this as a base, or starting point, and morph the role into my own from there. Think of it as using a cookie-cutter, and then trying to reshape the form of the dough afterward.
While this method is certainly viewable by many as a cheated, crutched, handicapped, or hack way of doing things, I think it's what's best for the production overall. We're getting too close now to production to still be completely confused on how to approach this guy.
Sunday, May 2, 2010
Why
I'm enjoying this "blog" thing. I really am.
It's been years since I've done any kind of consistent creative writing. In high school and college I did a lot of writing. A computer crash caused me to lose everything I had written, and I never quite picked it back up again. This blog thing is pretty interesting though. It's fun.
I think it's the audience. I think it has to do with knowing that people will read the work, even if it's unfit for viewing. For the most part, the few passages I've entered here have been sort of "freewriting" exercises with very little editing or preparation. Despite not being ready for an audience there's something about letting people see the raw material. It's invigorating.
To be honest (to go out on a limb and be really honest) my ultimate goal here is to come up with some useable theatrical material. At least, I think that's my ultimate goal. In particular, I want to come up with Monologue material. I'm a big fan of the performance art that is the spoken word. Whether it be stand up comedy, character based monologue, or storytelling, I love the craftsmanship that goes into writing it, and the heart that goes into the performance. In fact, as I typed this paragraph, the word "monologue" ended up capitalized by some freudian slip of the pinky to the shift key. Now if that's not commitment on a deep mental level, I don't know what is.
I've noticed that the majority of the artists I really admire I not only admire for their performance ability, but for their writing talents as well. What I really enjoy is the mind behind it: the brainwork. The effort and thought that goes into shaping the words, and arranging the phrases. The careful art of rhythm in speech, and structure. Listening to their words is like listening to poetry. I want to practice and practice until I can write that poetry too.
I want to sit at that table. I want to sit at that big wooden table that all those other wordsmiths get to sit at. George Carlin, Eric Bogosian, Lewis Black, Kevin Kling, Mike Daisey, Spalding Gray, Lily Tomlin, Brother Theodore, Bill Hicks, Lenny Bruce: stand ups and storytellers, character actors and monologists. There they are, sitting at that table, each one content with a body of work. Each one with a stack of papers in front of them; a memoir of the sparks that have ignited from their minds over the years. They sit around that table, nodding at each other, happy to be in each others' presence, knowing that they belong at the table. A criss-crossed fellowship of artists.
There are so many kinds and types and each one uses his words so carefully. They all know these words can destroy societies, and they know that people can fear words with a kind of fear that's used to kill. It's not melodrama, it's history. Ask Malcolm X, Martin Luther King, John Lennon, and Alan Berg, just where their words got them.
When I listen to these artists spin their yarns I can taste those words. It's intoxicating. I can feel the presence of their punctuation in the air. Commas, colons, semi-colons. Dashes, slashes, parenthasis, periods. Question marks? Exclamation points! There they are, floating up into space, and the best part is that whether this punctuation is correct or incorrect, whether they're carefully placed or sort of jury-rigged and holding together one too many conjunctions, it doesn't make a difference. The text is meant to be spoken. The nuts and bolts, though detectable through pause, emphasis, and conviction, are ultimately invisible.
Most importantly of all, these artists are doing everything they're meant to. They are playwright and performer. The roles are perfect for these guys! They wrote them! The plays are telling the public exactly what the actors want to be saying. They wrote them! They get their messages across; their meaning beyond mere "entertainment". That's important. That's good. That's power, and I want that power, too. I want the tools to turn the gears, and the ability to create change and affect the thinking of another human being.
Maybe I'm not ready for it yet. Maybe I need to work more, or endure some great suffering, and through that suffering find enlightenment, and there my abilities will be. I'll have some huge revelation, an epiphany, and a tool-kit will just appear, seemingly out of nowhere, with everything I need to shape my words into something more than meaningless drivel and poor excuses for thoughts. There they'll be, hammer, wood, and nails, and I'll connect those words one at a time until i've built my shack. My house. My castle. My city.
My vast metropolis of material whose preservation might actually be worth considering, and whose fellowship extends beyond. Far beyond, to that table of wordsmiths who will welcome me, nodding.
It's been years since I've done any kind of consistent creative writing. In high school and college I did a lot of writing. A computer crash caused me to lose everything I had written, and I never quite picked it back up again. This blog thing is pretty interesting though. It's fun.
I think it's the audience. I think it has to do with knowing that people will read the work, even if it's unfit for viewing. For the most part, the few passages I've entered here have been sort of "freewriting" exercises with very little editing or preparation. Despite not being ready for an audience there's something about letting people see the raw material. It's invigorating.
To be honest (to go out on a limb and be really honest) my ultimate goal here is to come up with some useable theatrical material. At least, I think that's my ultimate goal. In particular, I want to come up with Monologue material. I'm a big fan of the performance art that is the spoken word. Whether it be stand up comedy, character based monologue, or storytelling, I love the craftsmanship that goes into writing it, and the heart that goes into the performance. In fact, as I typed this paragraph, the word "monologue" ended up capitalized by some freudian slip of the pinky to the shift key. Now if that's not commitment on a deep mental level, I don't know what is.
I've noticed that the majority of the artists I really admire I not only admire for their performance ability, but for their writing talents as well. What I really enjoy is the mind behind it: the brainwork. The effort and thought that goes into shaping the words, and arranging the phrases. The careful art of rhythm in speech, and structure. Listening to their words is like listening to poetry. I want to practice and practice until I can write that poetry too.
I want to sit at that table. I want to sit at that big wooden table that all those other wordsmiths get to sit at. George Carlin, Eric Bogosian, Lewis Black, Kevin Kling, Mike Daisey, Spalding Gray, Lily Tomlin, Brother Theodore, Bill Hicks, Lenny Bruce: stand ups and storytellers, character actors and monologists. There they are, sitting at that table, each one content with a body of work. Each one with a stack of papers in front of them; a memoir of the sparks that have ignited from their minds over the years. They sit around that table, nodding at each other, happy to be in each others' presence, knowing that they belong at the table. A criss-crossed fellowship of artists.
There are so many kinds and types and each one uses his words so carefully. They all know these words can destroy societies, and they know that people can fear words with a kind of fear that's used to kill. It's not melodrama, it's history. Ask Malcolm X, Martin Luther King, John Lennon, and Alan Berg, just where their words got them.
When I listen to these artists spin their yarns I can taste those words. It's intoxicating. I can feel the presence of their punctuation in the air. Commas, colons, semi-colons. Dashes, slashes, parenthasis, periods. Question marks? Exclamation points! There they are, floating up into space, and the best part is that whether this punctuation is correct or incorrect, whether they're carefully placed or sort of jury-rigged and holding together one too many conjunctions, it doesn't make a difference. The text is meant to be spoken. The nuts and bolts, though detectable through pause, emphasis, and conviction, are ultimately invisible.
Most importantly of all, these artists are doing everything they're meant to. They are playwright and performer. The roles are perfect for these guys! They wrote them! The plays are telling the public exactly what the actors want to be saying. They wrote them! They get their messages across; their meaning beyond mere "entertainment". That's important. That's good. That's power, and I want that power, too. I want the tools to turn the gears, and the ability to create change and affect the thinking of another human being.
Maybe I'm not ready for it yet. Maybe I need to work more, or endure some great suffering, and through that suffering find enlightenment, and there my abilities will be. I'll have some huge revelation, an epiphany, and a tool-kit will just appear, seemingly out of nowhere, with everything I need to shape my words into something more than meaningless drivel and poor excuses for thoughts. There they'll be, hammer, wood, and nails, and I'll connect those words one at a time until i've built my shack. My house. My castle. My city.
My vast metropolis of material whose preservation might actually be worth considering, and whose fellowship extends beyond. Far beyond, to that table of wordsmiths who will welcome me, nodding.
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