Crawling towards the next thing

Bad blogger. No treats.

I could tell you how exhausting the whole process of Moon Over Buffalo turned out to be. I could tell you how amazing it is when you get amazing actors playing realized characters. I could tell you how inspirational it is to sit in the back of a dark theater and watch those actors create moments you never thought of, never rehearsed. I could tell you how wonderfully painful it is to just let go of it when you sit back there and release all control.

I could tell you how we were supposed to operate at a loss. How we were told that it was OK to operate at a loss, it was expected. I could tell you how we eventually profited over a thousand dollars and that was almost what I wanted to happen. (I wanted at least two thousand.) I could tell you how we tried new promotionals to get younger crowds to start wanting to see theater again. I could tell you how all of that was rolling a boulder uphill. I could tell you how new ideas are not welcome, and directors who are ready to roll through inefficiency wears out his welcome. I could tell you how I never bothered to say, "See? I was right."

But the truth is I'm too tired, and ready to move on.

For all those reasons and more I'm stuck in this cycle of contemplation. Why aren't I doing more? Why haven't I done more? The concentration I fall into doing these things turns out to be a trap.

I had this image on my head last night. I was in some gigantic space, sitting on the floor. I was building something. Something small and beautiful and fragile. Something that needed nothing less than all of my concentration. My vision became tunneled, everything else swept away. I never noticed the gigantic machines rolling around behind me in the darkness. Giant steel doors with massive locks closed behind me, I never heard. I sat back finally, this thing I made finally complete. I watched it melt away, drift apart like it had to. I stood up and found myself cut off. Again.

(Apologies. We remove ourselves from the land of emo and return you to our regular programming.)

Anywho, houses were rocked, actors had fun, money was made. It was a winner in all respects. The next thing? Who knows. I still have a shitload of writing to do and now the time to do it. Maybe next year another thing (keep looking for good plays, suggestions are welcome). As a matter of fact, you tell me your favorite play and I'll read it, how's that?

Wow, what a time...

Hi...hopefully you're still around and checking this blog. I'd apologize to you if you aren't, but then you're not reading this anyway.

We're nine days away from opening.

Directing Moon Over Buffalo has been pretty much unparalleled in its positivity. I guess the early decisions, the tough ones, are the most important you can make. You put the best people you can in the most appropriate places and the ship basically runs itself.

I won't say there have been no frustrating moments. There have been a few. Differing opinions and all that. Most of it has been organizational or administrative. The cast clicks and works in a way I haven't seen pretty much ever. It makes me wonder, this show in the end will not really be a measure of my abilities as a director. There've been no difficult actors to work with, no obstacle that wasn't worked around relatively easy. If I can take any credit, I guess it would be for two things...

The first is scheduling. Most of the time in community theater you're basically told the few evenings or weekend times you'll be rehearsing. You're pretty much expected to be there for that time whether you're needed for fifteen minuted or three hours. When actors can't be there, someone stands in and the rehearsal proceeds. It works to a certain degree, but this is not what I did. I broke the script into 3-5 page segments, 26 in all. I took every actor's availability and which scenes they were in and scheduled them to be there for the hour that scene would be rehearsed. This might sound simple. It took three passes on the schedule, a couple hours each time, to build a workable plan that got each scene rehearsed twice, room to do full act runs, and leave room for the inevitable cancellations.

It ended up looking like a film shoot schedule, completely out of order. But in the end it worked. Each actor knew that when they walked in for that hour's rehearsal, the attention would be paid solely to that one scene, no matter how long or short. Some were trickier than others to eventually get blocked and designed, but there was always room to run it a dozen times before moving on to the next scene. The repeats were even better. Retention was excellent and eventually I could let them explore a bit in a script that doesn't allow for much improvisation. I thought the first attempts at running the acts would be a mess, nothing had been done in order. It was actually more consistent than I'd ever seen. The performances are already at show level.

The other thing was a new marketing approach. I might be repeating this rant, but no one comes to see community theater anymore. There was a time when each show was well attended, big events that drew large audiences. That was done by the time I arrived in the area. Sure, people will come out for the big ones, Oklahoma, Grease, Jesus Christ Superstar, they're all big productions that people love. In the case of Oklahoma, I have no idea why. But no one takes chances on something they don't know. So our job is to introduce them to it. That's why I shot a trailer...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=av2uGxrfEik

If you search the internet for theatrical trailers, the first thing you'll see are poorly produced high school plays. Then you'll find some community or small professional theater doing something similar. Usually they take rehearsals (uncostumed, no props, sets, etc.) and give you a slice of them. Or if they're further along in their production they'll do something on their set. The problem with a theater set is that the closer you get, the more it's obviously artifice, and cameras pick that up. We went for a less conventional approach, and that's what you see here.

I don't have any more time at the moment. Directors get busy!

More on MOB

Before I get into the play, a few things...

Top Chef still isn't off the hook for that stupid two minute thing in between commercials. It just means more commercials.

Gran Torino is totally worth seeing even though Clint is the only one who can act in the movie. What makes me sad is knowing that there are great, subtle scripts out there by the dozens. But you can't have those get made the way they are without having the juice Eastwood has. I see movies that had such potential that you can almost feel how they were ruined by rewrites.

If the Pink Floyd Experience is coming through your town, go see them. With a $2.5 million light show, it's worth it. The music is spot on, the atmosphere. Dude.

So tonight is the first official rehearsal. For some reason I scheduled the real first rehearsal during the Superbowl. Oops. So that didn't happen.

What we've got done so far is to have the opportunity to have the cast sit around and talk through the script. We've worked backstories, made connections, and gave everyone an opportunity to see what everyone else is doing. It was really important to me to do this. I always feel that this process happens at the last possible moment in rehearsals, when it's kind of late to make any significant changes to the show. The first time around folks seemed a little nervous, unsure of what we were actually doing sitting around and not rehearsing. Eventually we all warmed to it and conversations started happening. The second time around we jumped right in. My hope, or my belief, is that those few times we had to just talk without needing to move forward will give everyone a better idea about how we're going to do this, and how I want to work.

We'll see starting tonight, I guess.

MOB Madness begins

Tonight is the first read through for Moon Over Buffalo. I'm terribly excited, anxious, nervous, amped, and mildly nauseous all at the same time.

My experience so far has been about half wonderful, half terrifying. Prepping for getting into rehearsals, in essence really getting the show moving, involves a lot of what-ifs, 'oh shit' moments where some small but crucial detail needs to be written down RIGHT NOW before I forget it. (Like a production staff. I keep needing to write THAT one down.)

The board of the group has been unconditionally wonderful in dealing with me and letting me know that there are plenty of people who are experienced and willing to help. In fact, they keep reminding me. Throughout the audition process there were always several board members hanging out in the theater office just in case I needed something.

Speaking of auditions. Woa. MOB has eight parts, four men and four women. Over two nights of auditions I had twenty three actors read.

I was hoping for six.

Out of the twenty three, easily eighteen could have been cast. In fact, most of the actors were so good I went home the last night with a raging headache and a burning need for a stiff cocktail. I realized I could pretty much pull names out of a hat and assign actors at random. Admittedly, in terms of crises, this was pretty low on the terrible scale. It did mean disappointing a lot of people I really respect, if not consider friends. Hard choices had to be made, and as a new director I chose the cast I could be most comfortable with, that had the experience or talentto hit the ground running. In essence, a cast that could cover where I make mistakes.

Thankfully, everyone is thrilled about doing the show. Even those who weren't cast liked the audition process, which was different than most. People are already getting themselves off book, and ready for an absolutely crazy rehearsal process.

One unenvied job of being a director is scheduling the rehearsals. What's often impossible is taking ten adults who have jobs, children, volunteering, and whatever other obligations that naturally supercede theater and putting them all into one room at the same time. This script also has no great stretches of three or four actors. Lightning entrances and exits, separated by enough time that rehearsing all of that would be difficult. So I took the script and diagrammed all the actors entrances and exits. Then I sliced the script into twenty five segments. Yes, folks, twenty five. Combining the two I carved out a schedule that actually might work. Then I did it again.

This is what it looks like...