One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This (book)

Pengo's 2025 Summer Book Club

On the first leg of my flight to Portland last month, I had a window seat. On the aisle, a very chatty white woman, about my age. Between us, in the middle seat, a younger man, on his way to Kashmir. He was concerned he might miss his connection in Philly, a non-stop to Qatar.

The woman was fascinated by the idea of his globe-spanning journey, and had many, many questions. Where? Why? What? Where was he from? What is Kashmir? Isn’t that place dangerous? He was very patient, and generous. I felt for him.

The word “halal” was introduced into the conversation and she didn’t know that word, know what that was. This is where we are in America today, your average Midwestern white lady doesn’t know what halal means.

So, as a matter of course he was revealed to be Muslim, and she became even more fascinated! An outside observer might think this was a pleasant conversation, but in spite of my efforts to keep things banal. She wanted the history of the partition of Kashmir, of Pakistan and India, all the while making sure she reinforced her open-mindedness about things, while successfully cramming the Iraq and Afghan Wars into the conversation.

He was on his way to Kashmir to see his brother whose wife had recently suffered a stillbirth. The white woman asked more than once how the baby died, so soon before the due date. He said he didn’t really know. She suggested twice that the baby was probably strangled by the umbilical cord.

I thought he must have either planned this journey weeks or months ago, intending to play uncle to a happily expected child, or last-minute due to the tragedy, I didn’t ask. I told him I was glad he was going, his brother would be very happy to see him, and that I was very sorry for his loss.

As soon as it was convenient and appropriate, I put in my earbuds to watch a movie. I could no longer deal with this mostly one-sided conversation and wanted to duck about before she brought up 9/11, which in its way brings me to my most recent read, One Day, Everyone Will Have Been Against This by Omar El Akkad, a concise and scathing take-down of Western Liberalism, specifically in the face of the ongoing atrocities perpetuated daily by the state of Israel against the Palestinian people of Gaza.

I read this book last summer, sitting on a deck on the coast in Maine. I pulled it off the shelf from a bookstore in Damariscotta and bought it without knowing one thing about it. I didn’t know what others had to say about it, if it was any good, but I was fairly certain I knew what it was about, based on the image on the cover, and on the title. Based on that title alone, I bought this book.

Just this past weekend, our elder child and I were discussing reading and I mentioned El Akkad’s book. They said they should read that and I said, “I don’t think it was written for you, it was written for me.” And by that I meant my child, both of our children, know what the book has to say. It is a lecture (lecture n. an educational talk to an audience) for the Western Liberal about the Western Liberal, and it asks one question quite plainly and directly, “What do you stand for?” Because it is evident that when presented with the unnecessary and entirely avoidable pain, suffering, and death of children, the Liberal will do nothing.

I know this, I have known it for some time. It has been almost thirteen years since Sandy Hook. That we could face the horror of that day, and do nothing. If the children of Palestine knew how we responded to the slaughter of twenty small children and six of their minders, each of whom were our fellow citizens, with weak words and absolute impotence, they should not be surprised that we wouldn’t do a thing to help them. Care about your children? We don’t care about our own.

At this late date, it is apparent those who lead the Democratic Party believe it will be enough at the mid-terms to say, “We aren’t him.” Not even we aren’t them, the Republicans, it will just be about the guy. And they believe this is all it will take to win seats, and perhaps they may. But having run on nothing, they can keep on keeping on. Because to stand for something is a risk to power. Yes, it is said and I have repeated it, you cannot do anything if you aren’t in the room.

But then they never do anything. We never do anything. About Gaza. About guns. About rights. About justice. There are things we believe. But as a man said, "Belief without action is dead."

Poochu's Productions presents "I Hate This (A True Story)"

Karthik TMK

One month ago, Poochu’s Productions produced my play, I Hate This (A True Story), at the Alliance Française de Madras in Chennai, India. Directed by Denver Anthony Nicholas and performed by Karthik TMK (and also by Abinaya R, more on her in a moment) this was not the first time these two men have presented this play about my experiences with stillbirth.

Four years ago, Denver, Karthik and I had a few email conversations about their producing the play in Spring 2021. They asked for a number of perfectly reasonable changes. The production would be performed in English (once referred to as India’s "subsidiary official language") and take place in America, but there were certain passages which would not be understood, culturally. Also, some of the names were unusual – a woman named Toni, for example – and could those be changed.

Most significantly, in my opinion, they asked if the several characters who I would traditionally have performed myself be performed instead by another performer, a woman. When we adapted the play into an audio drama in 2005 – was that really twenty years ago? I digress – I felt it would be easier to understand if every character had their own voice. But I always thought of it as strictly a solo performance.

Abinaya R

But that’s me. Theater is nothing if not an expansive art form. I was intrigued. And why not? They know best how to present this play to their audience, and I don’t. For this most recent production they cast Abinaya R, with whom they had most recently worked with in a production of Doubt by John Patrick Shanley.

Part of the design concept for this production of I Hate This was to emphasize the idea that while Karthik is telling the story now, today, Abinaya represents the past. He wears colors, she is monochromatic, dressed in black, her face and hands made white and gray. He looks at her, she never sees him. I was struck by this upon her first reveal, as the mother on the phone. She appears in a pool of light, far upstage. She looks so small compared to him in that scene, almost as though she is in a thought bubble.

When Denver and Karthik first produced this work, I was asked if they could change the title. This title, I HATE THIS, is the original sin of this particular work, as far back as 2002 it was suggested to me that the phrase might present a barrier to attendance. I took the risk. They were right, but I do not regret my decision. The show needs a content advisory and I believe the title serves that purpose.

Karthik TMK

As they strove to return to live performance following the first wave of COVID-19 infections, Denver felt that the original title would alienate audiences, and we agreed upon the much more digestible title What Happened. In the play that is asked as a question, as presented here it is simply a statement. This is what happened. For this new production, they decided it was now acceptable to use the original title, with the subtitle "a true story."

I have my own reasons for having written this piece, and why I keep returning to it. I am grateful to Playhouse Square and University Hospitals for producing the film (starring James Alexander Rankin) which continues to be used as an educational tool and an instrument of comfort for the bereaved. However, those few times (so far) that companies or individuals have inquired about producing the piece independently, I am always deeply curious as to their interest, or intentions.

Abinaya R

For Karthik, it is the opportunity to play something dramatic. Most solo performances for men are comic (I have heard this before, even from high school students seeking something different to perform for competitions) and he was looking for something which would allow him to be vulnerable on stage, and tell a story that would move people.

Denver told me about the first performances of What Happened/I Hate This, four years ago, when a young woman who saw the show was inconsolable and sobbing following the performance. A few years later, Denver’s company was holding one of their monthly Enter Stage events, a kind of open mic for artists to perform their own monologues. A young woman told a powerful and personal story of having suffered a miscarriage. When she was asked about this after her presentation, she said that it was her who had been so emotionally overwhelmed by my play, because of her own loss – and that the experience had inspired her to tell her story on stage, something she may not have done otherwise.

Director Denver Anthony Nicholas (center)
with Karthik and Abinaya

I have written several plays which have been published, rights for production handled by others without my participation. There’s a production of Sherlock Holmes Meets the Bully of Baker Street next weekend in Louisiana. It's going to be dinner theater and if the photos are any indication, I would love to get there for the food alone. I Hate This is not currently published, so there have been far fewer independent productions.

But when they come, when artists have found the script and reach to inquire about production, it means that our story, mine and my wife’s story of how we incorporated loss into our lives, that it is being told to an entirely new audience. And the fact that that story might have an impact on someone who lives and loves and grieves on the other side of the earth, that is truly remarkable.

Sources: 

Notification No. 2/8/60-O.L, Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India, April 27, 1960

"What’s in a monologue? Enter stage & find out" by Rupam Jain, Indian Express Indulge, August 18, 2023

How I Spent My Summer (2025)

Bridal Falls, Goat Island, NY

Three months. Summer has been ending earlier and earlier, this year it began earlier, too.

To celebrate our eldest’s graduation from college, we planned an international journey, a vacation in Spain. We hadn’t taken our children on a transatlantic expedition since they were very, very young, not since I brought I Hate This to the UK. They don’t even remember that trip, only in photos.

First, however, a snag. I thought I had a valid passport, and I did, but it was due to expire. We noted this days before our departure. Renewal necessitated an urgent drive to Buffalo, which was in its way a not unpleasant prelude to the season, which included a fine cocktail in the hotel bar, and a rainy day stroll in Niagara Falls State Park, waiting for my ID to be processed.

Fifteen, perhaps twenty minutes in the presence of Bridal Falls. I live for moments like this.

Bilbao, Spain

When folks ask what my favorite part of our Spanish vacation was, you will forgive me for saying it was the opportunity to spend ten, responsibility-free days in the company of the three people I love most in the world. Social anxiety issues aside, our kids are excellent travelers. They are not only open to interesting, sometimes unplanned experiences, unusual spaces and food, they are also very good communicators and check in when they need a break. I am also better at this than I was as a young person, and that is thanks to them.

Our eldest’s achievements inspired this excursion, so the emphasis was on art. We saw the Prado, and the Reina Sophia. We attended the Guggenheim Bilbao, and finally the Segrada Familia. However, we also took in a little jazz with the boy, happening upon a barside trio outside the Guggenheim, and the David Pastor Quintet in Barcelona. I tagged the bandleader on my socials; a brief interaction revealed the connection between him and the head of the boy’s department at UC. Small world, indeed.

Great Lakes Theater Camp

I am always seeking new and better ways to lead, instruct and create. This is as true at our annual summer arts camp as in any other arena, and not only did the team put on some pretty amazing performances, I was developing new ideas as how to best curate an all too brief playwriting workshop, and how best to showcase the work.

We had about a half hour, every day (which is to say, for only six or seven days) for a small cohort of middle school aged campers to write short plays, which then received staged readings by high school aged campers. Everyone agreed the work was good, and I have some powerful thoughts about how to make the experience more exciting for all involved next year.

Peter Voinovich
"Churchill at War"
Actors Summit Productions

The eldest and I turned out for the No Kings protest where I spotted Fred Armisen casually walking past om his way to the opening of the SNL exhibit at the Rock Hall. By his gaze he seemed either impressed or bewildered by the Free Stamp.

We’ve also been attending a lot of Guardians games. It’s been a season of ups and downs, for the time being I’m withholding judgment. I have also had the chance to meet up with old college friends (emphasis on old) including seeing my roommate Peter onstage for the first time since, well, college, playing Churchill in a solo performance in Akron.

Much of my mental energy has been focused on The Right Room, of course, and my physical energy as well. While rehearsals were taking place I was acting as de facto sound designer and also curating and even creating props for the production.

Zach Palumbo, Nicole Coury
"The Right Room"
In Rehearsal

The BorderLight Festival was remarkable. I posted about our performances last month, it was all up and over on the same day. The next day, a Saturday, I saw a half dozen shows. 

Highlights include Impact Award Winner Sincerely, (The Diary Play) by Bryanna Lee, She Was a Conquistawhore by Rachel O'Hanlon-Rodriguez, performed in The Snug at Parnell’s (where Give Me Your Keys produced my play Step Nine two years ago) and Eric Coble’s The Girl Who Swallowed a Cactus, masterfully performed by Tia Shearer Bassett.

Then we got the heck out of town.

Zach Palumbo, Nicole Coury
"The Right Room"
BorderLight Theater Festival
Photo: Daren Stahl

I try not to look forward to our annual journey to Maine. It will come, as it (almost) always does, but once it’s gone, so is the summer. This year, however, we were joined not only by the children but also their partners. It was a joyful and relaxing celebration of family and fellowship, replete with day trips and afternoons on the rock just reading, great food and drink and conversation.

Our last night on the road, stopping in Little Falls, New York, I had another chance to indulge in falling waters, writ small.

Now we’re back and home and at work and August has barely begun. But this weekend we’re going to Cedar Point.

On Writing; A Memoir of the Craft (book)

Pengo's 2025 Summer Book Club

TL;DR: Write more. Read more.

I brought a couple of books with me for the trip, but when we visited the local library I was determined to get something and finish it before we departed. Ideally, I would finish it, get another book from the library and finish that before we departed, but I don’t want to get ahead of myself.

It’s not a very large library (it will get larger, more on that in a moment) but it is packed with tomes, and bestsellers, books with big names (literally) on their spines fairly leap off the shelf at you. I may have been gazing at the plentiful offerings from Maine-and-world legend Stephen King when I overheard another patron ask the women at the front desk for a copy of Hillbilly Elegy.

The former James David Hamel wrote one terrible book and became Vice President. It galls my kibe. I promptly turned away from fiction, faced biography, and found King’s On Writing; A Memoir of the Craft. It’s one of those books I have told myself I should read, and it was about damn time.

Here’s the thing; I’m a fan of Stephen King, the man, though not so much his work. But I like his writing. But I don’t care for horror or suspense. King was a constant presence of my adolescence; adaptations of his novels, films like The Shining, Christine, Cujo, The Dead Zone, they were on cable all the time, I didn’t watch them anymore than I watched any of the slasher films that were so popular at that time.

I did watch Creepshow, though, because it looked weird and I was delighted that it was funny. If I had given his work half a chance I may have appreciated King’s tremendous sense of humor in his fiction. And, of course, there is King’s own wonderful performance as Jordy Verrill in that film which made him an actual person in the world to me, and not just a name on a book.

It was my ex-wife, who loves all manner of fiction, who recommended I read The Stand, which I loved, but remains the only novel of his that I have read from the page. For long road trips, she and I would listen to the first three Gunslinger novels on audiobook, narrated by the man himself. It was because of this experience that I will never listen to an abridged audiobook. When possible, I prefer when it is read by the author.

I admire King. I should read more of his work. I am starting here.

"Jordy Verrill, you lunkhead."

Part of the book is autobiographic, “how I became a writer” stuff, but for much of the work he provides actual instruction (he has been an English teacher) not only on what constitutes good writing, but what and how makes good writing enjoyable to read.

King also advises the would-be writer – though you don’t need to be a writer to enjoy reading this book – on practice, which is very helpful. Much of this I know, or have my own personal opinions on, which I have come to in my own way and in my own time. But so much of what he says is true, practical, and useful.

He also repeats certain truths, because they are the most important, but so basic one might forget them in the details he also provides. You must read. You must write. You cannot be a writer if you are not reading and if you are not writing. If you don’t read, your writing won’t matter, and if you don’t write, you’re Fran Lebowitz.
 
“If you want to be a writer. You must do two things above all others: Read a lot and write a lot.” - SK

Keeping King honest is not only his own sense of humility, but he is also unafraid to, from time to time, call out those whose work he does not respect. He loves all kinds of writing, so unlike those who would call his work trash only because he specializes in genre fiction, he dislikes editing that is bad, regardless of genre.

He calls a few authors and their work by name (the book was published twenty-five years ago, so Hamel’s 2016 book is not included) because he believes you can learn by reading those, too, a cautionary tale on how not to write. Okay! I should read those!

King is also an arbiter of truth in writing. When asked about the origin of one of my plays, I said, something pithy like, “It’s all stolen, but it’s all true.” I don’t know how the latter justifies the former, but it seemed appropriate at the time. Making stuff up is what fiction means, but it needs to ring with honesty, and this, as the man instructs, is how you bridge the gap from “write what you know” to “here’s a story about swatting with a fungo on Jupiter.”

And this is as good a time as any to explain that while this non-fiction book was situated on a shelf at the Friendship Public Library opposite King’s fiction, I had to go to the woman at the desk to find it, I didn’t just turn around and see it. But I could have, and you would know, because it sounded true, took less explanation, and sounded like a boss move.

Tabitha & Stephen King

The big question, for me, was what lessons I may have taken from Stephen King for my playwriting. He emphasizes story above all else, and also that dialogue defines character, but in drama dialogue is story, dialogue is action. He says, “writing good dialogue is art as well as craft,” and that is certainly true, and never more so than in a play script.

One of King’s extended metaphors is the writer’s toolbox, and what is one each level of the toolbox. Vocabulary, for example, and grammar, on the top layer. Below that, the proper elements of style, like tense and adverbs (not adverbs ...) below that, structure – literal structure, like how to construct paragraphs.

As you can see, a playwright’s toolbox will be very different. It’s all a matter of which tools you use the most, and which you use less frequently. The first layer would be dialogue and character, the second layer stage directions – the necessary stage directions, which are different from the ones you write for the first draft of your script and later cut because they aren’t necessary and will only annoy the actor.

This is a tremendous exercise, and one I need to think through before continuing. The Playwright’s Toolbox. A quick Google search tells me someone wrote a book by that title and just last year, but that doesn’t mean I can’t create my own.

The most critical part of the book – to me – is when he cautions the writer about backstory. To wit; “The most important things to remember about backstory are that (a) everyone has a history and (b) most of it isn’t very interesting.” I have also been told, more than once, that a good play is about what is happening, and not about what has happened. Story telling can make a decent monologue, but any entire play cannot be about rehashing the past.

And I wonder, isn’t that what I do? Doesn’t that describe a lot of my plays? How much of The Right Room is couples talking to each other about their lives? And yet, I have seen how it is effective, that there is present action in story telling. Isn’t that why we love The Breakfast Club?

Finally, I was touched by the credit he provides his mother, and also his life partner. His mother, who worked her entire life, raising her children on her own, was supportive of his desire to write fiction from the very beginning. He also name-checks his several mentors.

But it is his wife, Tabitha Spruce King, herself a novelist, and also a poet, to whom he attributes his success, and not in some abstract, I couldn’t have done it without 'er kind of way. He is very specific about how, without her work, he would not be this highly visible, let alone successful, author. Not without her belief, her criticism, and her actions.

The Friendship Public Library seeks $500,000 to expand their current facility. Check their website for more information and how to contribute.

The Right Room | In Performance

Charles & Mathilda
(Zach Palumbo & Nicole Coury)
Photo: BorderLight Theater Festival

The BorderLight Theater Festival is closed for 2025, and with that, so too our run of The Right Room in the Presidential Suite at the Crowne Plaza Hotel Playhouse Square. For those in the room, and for our young company, it was a once-in-a-lifetime experience.

The audience only saw the bedroom; the bed, a couch, a few armchairs. They, the audience, were asked to sit in one of eight, ordinary, cushioned chairs. They were also asked not to relocate those chairs, and to make sure their personal items were stashed underneath. They were also advised that though this play would be intimate, it would not be interactive; do not touch or speak to the actors, and they will not touch or speak to you.

Once they were settled, the characters entered through the same room the audience had. Throughout the performance they accessed the bathroom (lines delivered when folks were offstage in the bathroom were amusingly louder than those delivered in the room itself) and occasionally dipped into a closet – but it wasn’t an actual closet. It was a door into the adjoining suite, blocked by a curtain.

The suite (or living room area) was our green room, it was larger than the bedroom. The east end of the Crowne Plaza is rounded, with a view overlooking East 14th and Euclid, the Chandelier. The audience could see this as they entered, but most sat with their backs to the windows for the show. If you can imagine, the entire suite wrapped around the end of the hallway. The door to the suite faced the door to the bedroom itself.

Just as the actors were lining up for entrances at the top of the first performance, facing the suite door, ready to cross the hallway to the bedroom door, I was standing off to one side behind them. Suddenly, the actors playing Fanny and Mason both turned their heads to look at me. And in that moment I saw my biological grandparents, people I never had the chance to meet or even know about, young and attractive and with their whole lives ahead of them. I wasn't expecting that.

Their real names, by the way, were George and Martha. Truth is stronger than fiction.  

BorderLight show pages included the opportunity for audience members to rate and review the productions, and we received many wonderful comments. Here are just a few:

“Each character was incredibly human; in turns flawed, lonely, searching, funny, sad, excited, passionate, confused, and affected by people and a past they only partly understood.” - Amelia B.

“The staging was deft and I was never at a loss of where to look or what story was being told. A truly immersive theater experience that has to be seen to be believed.” - Philip F.

“Jasmine Renee’s direction was outstanding. Pulling off clear storytelling in such an intimate space is no small challenge, and she nailed it. Serenity Grace Tate’s costumes were spot on, and I was comforted to see that Julia Fisher was engaged as Intimacy Director... I hope his play has a life beyond the wonderful Borderlight Festival. We all need to find ourselves in the right room.” - Daniel H.

On a related note: Today is my birthday, and by tradition, I am on vacation. In the office, birthdays are celebrated with cake and ice cream, and about ten years ago they began celebrating mine in my absence. 

It started with a photo of the staff having ice cream at a place on the square, the gag becoming sillier with each passing year. One year they were all crammed into my office … with ice cream. During the quarantine, a picture of an empty breakroom with hats and noisemakers on the large table.

This year? A staff picture in a room at the Crowne Plaza Hotel with a note reading, "We're finally in the Right Room!"

In case you were wondering, I truly love where I work.

The Right Room | Final Dress Rehearsal

Bradley Hughes & Kayce Kvacek
as Leif & Lucille Larsen

Last night an invited audience witnessed the final dress rehearsal for The Right Room. Today everyone is taking a well-deserved rest — or scurrying about taking care of last-minute details — before tomorrow's ticketed performances at the Crowne Plaza Playhouse Square, presented as part of the BorderLight Theatre Festival.

I cannot adequately express how happy I have been with this experience. The acting company is ideal, the members of production working in tandem, attending to every detail, calmly addressing every challenge, and it all came together so lovingly last night as the show progressed without a dropped moment.

When first proposed, the script ran about 75 minutes. As BorderLight conditions called for an hour max, it was necessary for me to lose a not insignificant number of pages. The result is a tight, streamlined piece which nonetheless lost none of those moment I most treasured. It's a better script. If I were to later expand it to, say, an eighty minute piece, I'm not sure I'd just put everything I've cut back in.

Having eight audience members in the room with us last night, it became apparent just how intimate this piece will be; how close the audience is to the actors, and they to the audience. This may sound obvious, but these audience members are right there in the room with the characters, just as the characters — those who cannot see each other — are with each other. It's such a fascinating dance!

Rachel Gold & Cole Tarantowski
as Fanny & Mason

The post-rehearsal response was positive and generous, and none more supportive than my spouse, my favorite critic (no, really, she's an actual critic) who provided me with some welcome and much appreciated perspective. The company should be confident they are doing great work, she let me know it's a great play.

And here we are. The festival is open, and tomorrow this wildly talented team of artists is going to present this play that I wrote, The Right Room, three times in the same evening, in an actual hotel room. And I have to remind myself this is also the story of a story, a story I have spent the greatest part of my long life believing would never told, that I never knew could exist, let alone that I could actually tell. And to tell it like this.

I don't actually wish my parents could see it. But I kind of wish they could see it.

BorderLight Theater Festival presents The Right Room, a new play by David Hansen and directed by Jasmine Renee, July 16 - 19, 2025

DDT-V Hondel Scooters Ad (1985)

July 1985 was pretty epic, as it included such iconic, news breaking events such as Live Aid, the premiere of Back to the Future, and the most ambitious episode of the public access cable comedy program DDT-V.

Two major (and by major I mean somewhat tedious and overlong) segments included the opening sequence, which was a parody inspired by the recently released James Bond film A View to a Kill, and the avant-garde, subtitled, French horror film The Creature From Alsace-Lorraine, in which the entire company was required to speak French.

Not in French accents. In actual French.

By the third act (there were three acts) we decided it might be funny, and much easier, to speak in English with French subtitles. Easier, anyway. Like most of the bits on DDT-V, it was Fred's idea, and after its release, he said something I have never forgotten and have since kept as a important lesson.

He said, "I didn't hear any of you jokers telling me 'no.'"

We made an awful lot of commercials, and like so much of the work we did, they became dated very, very fast. Many of them were lampooning current events, or even other commercials, the kind no one remembers. My favorite, because I was featured in it, was the ad for Hondel Scooters.

Over Phil Collins' recent hit Sussudio, we see a frenetic, fast-cut mix of street scenes from downtown Cleveland, including one funky pigeon. Close up on me, as Phil Collins, on a motorbike, telling the viewer, "Hey. Get yourself a Scoo-scoo-scooter."

It has been so long since then, I had completely forgotten the inspiration for that bit. I seem to have told myself we were just riffing on Phil Collins again. 1985 was peak Phil Collins.

What I had forgotten, until it popped up on my social recently, was that it was a parody of an ad Lou Reed did for Honda. Using the song "Walk On the Wild Side," the spot features a frenetic, fast-cut mix of street scenes from downtown New York City, and then there's Lou, telling the viewer, "Hey. Don't settle for walking."

Selling out was once the least hip thing you could do, and often a subject of ridicule on DDT-V. But it isn’t anymore which is probably why I forgot it.