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| Providence, RI |
For the past several years I have taken a moment before the school year begins to reflect upon the fleeting days of summer. What does "summer vacation" mean to adults? Well, we do have school age children, and are each professionally tethered to the academic clock. We work, but we also play, and enable play.
The opportunities during warm weather months are great, and we endeavor to take advantage of them. This year my wife and I celebrated twenty years married, my daughter and I watched all of Stranger Things 3 over the course of two days, the boy and I went fishing. And there was so much more.
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| Beck Center for the Arts |
Feels like a million years ago now, but the summer began with a five weekend run of King Lear at the Beck Center, directed by Eric Schmiedl. Performances were only three a week (Fri, Sat eve & Sun mat) and there was something about that schedule which made performance much less of a struggle than a traditional, non-professional four show a weekend schedule. Just that much more manageable.
And yet, the focus I needed to exhibit, the hyper self-awareness, to conduct myself as this stoic, wound-up character. At times it was maddening, walking out in the lead, having the first line for this three-hour ordeal. One night, I cannot even comprehend how this happened, my tongue lost control and I stuttered my first line, in its entirety. It was through a supreme effort of will not to lose all confidence right then and there. I do not know how I was able to remember the rest of my lines.
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| Contemporary Youth Orchestra |
Working as an actor in a play (as opposed to writing or directing one) is that you are compelled to attend every performance. This is one of the reasons I don’t like acting, but only one of them.
As a result of this selfish commitment, I missed out on the opportunity to see my daughter perform with Jason Mraz. As a violin player with the Contemporary Youth Orchestra, she had been working on his catalog all spring, taking three days of rehearsal with this incredibly charming pop star culminating in two sold out performances at Severance Hall.
I was welcomed to one of the rehearsals, which was a delightful consolation prize.
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| Great Lakes Theater |
Teaching middle school students to improv can be very challenging, and for a very good reason. Young people can be emotionally abused for making themselves look silly.
A: Help me to milk this water buffalo!The basic tenet of improv is YES, AND which is to say, agree to what is being offered and then add something to it. This year during Camp Theater! we had a camper who was not only very good at this, he raised acceptance to a new level. Shaun and I noticed that whenever someone made him a suggestion, he would not only agree, he would say, “Excellent!”
B: Uh, no.
A: I have created for you a new dress made entirely out of termites!It was the introduction to an inspiring summer of discovery.
B: Excellent, they will go so well with my new maggot boots.
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| Culver City Public Theatre |
While I have had a number of my published plays produced in other cities, this was a first -- one of the works I wrote for Talespinner Children’s Theatre was being revived, and on the west coast, too! Culver City Public Theatre produced Rosalynde & the Falcon. Not only that, but it was an outdoor performance, offered for free to area families! And you know I love free.
ROAD TRIPS
July was an odd month, in that I shared a bed with my wife for perhaps one out of every three days. This is no sign of marital tension or anything like that, we were simply not in each other’s presence. She spent a week on silent retreat in Kentucky, we traveled separately to and from Maine, and I took my daughter on an extended weekend to New York City.
We visited potential schools on that journey, something we also accomplished driving home together from our Maine vacation by way of Providence, RI. My son and I drove there the week before, enjoying authentic Buffalo, NY buffalo wings and spying fancy cars.
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| Come From Away |
For three years we have been subscribers to the KeyBank Broadway Series at Playhouse Square, and in all that time I was never so unprepared to be completely delighted and moved by a musical like Come From Away.
Come From Away is a magical illusion, with songs that still echo in my head, a small company, their everyday wear belying the speed and specificity with which they assume dozens of characters, to tell a story of tragedy without leaning into the tragedy (we all know the tragedy) instead focusing on what the best people do for each other no matter who the other people are.
One of our dates for the evening pointed out how refreshing it was to see a cast of characters who were entirely adults, and I have to admit I hadn’t noticed. Was that it? I polled my friends on Facebook, wondering if younger audiences preferred, for example, the teen-directed Dear Evan Hansen, but I received almost universal praise from all ages for this special Canadian musical … which did not win the 2017 Tony Award for Best Musical, whereas that other play did.
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| Story Board |
Just the other day, Missy asked me about my writing process, and I have had a number of different processes, which is only correct. I am a creature of habit, but breaking them is as significant as adhering to them.
To complete the new touring script, I spent just one working week away from the office. I gathered all the notes I had made, then went into the attic to find an old cork board so I had a place to post them. I used drawing paper to create a “story cloud,” connecting one plot point to the next and filling in all of the details in between, with lists of actors and characters and who would be available to do what when.
It was all mapped out before I had created a single word of dialogue. The entire thing was drafted in three days, completed just before heading out of town for two weeks.
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| Barnstable |
Actually, I spent only seven days in Flood’s Cove this year. Sometimes that happens, but it felt even shorter as my wife and daughter (and mother-in-law) were flying in on a Monday, only to have their flight cancelled at LaGuardia. They did not arrive until Tuesday evening, and their travel drama troubled me for the better part of those two days.
There was an interesting collection of folks, so much coming and going, and the weather was hot. I missed cool weather, mornings by the fire, a slow pace, and perhaps most of all my father. His absence has been felt the past several years, this time he was just absent.
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| Hofbräuhaus Half Marathon |
Last week I ate something which tried to kill me, or rather my body tried to kill me for something I ate. I’ve never had an allergic reaction, to anything. And yet, something in that sushi made my heart race, and my skin turn beet red.
I’m fine, but it was scary in a manner in which I am not used to being scared. The week that followed was one of dragging my ass from place to place as I coped with the side effects of medication meant to ensure that whatever was in my system had run its course.
That also meant not exercising for the better part of a week, so ironic following my time running the Hofbräuhaus Half Marathon just the day before my attack.
Which is where I am left today. Hotter days of summer are behind us, the days already noticeably shorter. I am currently training for the Chicago Marathon, October 13. Have been all summer, and raising money for the Crohn's & Colitis Foundation.
Preparing for New York in 2006, and for the Twin Cities four years ago, August is when the training is supposed to be ramping up, pushing further across the city in preparation for the big day. Instead, I have had to take the better part of a week off, and it is discouraging.
But then, has it ever been easy? And isn't that the point.
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