Pushing boundaries
Last Sunday I pushed myself far out of my comfort zone and into auditions at Bedlam for their annual Community 10 Minute Play Festival. I'd never been to a real audition before. The one at St. Kate's was a simple script reading and I knew everyone in the room. I'd taken classes with most of them. We're performing only once and the audience is pretty much going to be people from school and friends and family of the directors. Bedlam's festival is going to run for 5 days.
Bedlam's audition was a blast! We started by forming a large circle and introducing ourselves. We then did a group movement exercise. After that, we formed a circle again. Two at a time, we went into its center to perform a 4-line scene. Finally, we read from some of the scripts that are going to be in the festival. It was all over in just about 2 hours, impressive for the number of people who were there. Some had no theater experience whatsoever and others had been on stage often. It was a fun mix of people. I knew several of the auditioners and others looked familiar. During I break I spoke with them and realized that I had seen them in Fringe shows. I was cast as Mr. Scott who is the boss of an office drone. And I'm a pirate. This is going to be a fun role!
After the audition, I hung out at Bedlam for dinner and stayed to see the remount of the rock opera Idigaragua. Later, sillycecelia joined me for Massgraves, a hip-hop based musical. Both were excellent shows. I had already seen the former twice during its initial run last September. I'm happy to say that it held up to a third viewing. I may have to take a trip to the Montreal Fringe to see them perform it there.
I deliberately kept my home PC off last week so I would focus on making a dress for my friend to wear to Rusalka on Saturday. I put in over 20 hours working on it between Thursday the 10th and Friday the 18th. (I was up until 4:30am Saturday morning finishing it.) Prior to then I spent several hours designing the outfit, drafting the patterns and buying fabric. All the women who cut my fabric assumed that I was making the dress for a girlfriend. I wish. I learned that one of the cutters had been a research chemist for Eastman Kodak back in the 50s. Her area was photomicrography. I love conversations with fabric store ladies!
Speaking of photos, ten of my theater pictures are mounted on the walls at Bedlam. This is the first time my photos are displayed in public as part of an exhibit. (Several of my shots were in City Center a few years ago as promo for the Fringe.) The curator wanted to present a celebration of Twin Cities theater and had asked me to contribute some pictures. I had them enlarged to 10x15, 12x18 and a couple to 14x21. The prints look very good but my mounting job is for shit. (I didn't have time to mount them well and do all the work I needed to do on the dress.) The photos will be up at Bedlam at least through the end of May.
Tartuffe rehearsals have been moving along better than I had expected. We had our first off-book on Saturday and have 5 rehearsals until our performance.
Rick-rolling is officially passé. There have been reports about it on NPR's "FutureTense" and on the BBC World Service. Henceforth, anyone who Rick-Rolls is a tool.
Bedlam's audition was a blast! We started by forming a large circle and introducing ourselves. We then did a group movement exercise. After that, we formed a circle again. Two at a time, we went into its center to perform a 4-line scene. Finally, we read from some of the scripts that are going to be in the festival. It was all over in just about 2 hours, impressive for the number of people who were there. Some had no theater experience whatsoever and others had been on stage often. It was a fun mix of people. I knew several of the auditioners and others looked familiar. During I break I spoke with them and realized that I had seen them in Fringe shows. I was cast as Mr. Scott who is the boss of an office drone. And I'm a pirate. This is going to be a fun role!
After the audition, I hung out at Bedlam for dinner and stayed to see the remount of the rock opera Idigaragua. Later, sillycecelia joined me for Massgraves, a hip-hop based musical. Both were excellent shows. I had already seen the former twice during its initial run last September. I'm happy to say that it held up to a third viewing. I may have to take a trip to the Montreal Fringe to see them perform it there.
I deliberately kept my home PC off last week so I would focus on making a dress for my friend to wear to Rusalka on Saturday. I put in over 20 hours working on it between Thursday the 10th and Friday the 18th. (I was up until 4:30am Saturday morning finishing it.) Prior to then I spent several hours designing the outfit, drafting the patterns and buying fabric. All the women who cut my fabric assumed that I was making the dress for a girlfriend. I wish. I learned that one of the cutters had been a research chemist for Eastman Kodak back in the 50s. Her area was photomicrography. I love conversations with fabric store ladies!
Speaking of photos, ten of my theater pictures are mounted on the walls at Bedlam. This is the first time my photos are displayed in public as part of an exhibit. (Several of my shots were in City Center a few years ago as promo for the Fringe.) The curator wanted to present a celebration of Twin Cities theater and had asked me to contribute some pictures. I had them enlarged to 10x15, 12x18 and a couple to 14x21. The prints look very good but my mounting job is for shit. (I didn't have time to mount them well and do all the work I needed to do on the dress.) The photos will be up at Bedlam at least through the end of May.
Tartuffe rehearsals have been moving along better than I had expected. We had our first off-book on Saturday and have 5 rehearsals until our performance.
Rick-rolling is officially passé. There have been reports about it on NPR's "FutureTense" and on the BBC World Service. Henceforth, anyone who Rick-Rolls is a tool.