April 9, 2003

Four months! Wow. I haven't updated this sucker in ages. Not that anyone cares. Except for Brendan.

Not too much has been going on, to tell the truth. Pretty busy working at the ImprovOlympic. Love my job, but it does get really stressful sometimes. The balance between art and commerce is delicate and I like trying to keep it even. In many ways, Charna is the Godfather and I get to be Tom Hagen, the consiglieri. I keep her hands clean, I sort and deliver information to her, I represent IO at different things that she's unable to go to, I give some advice, all the while running the day-to-day of the Training Center. It's a living. Sometimes it feels like I live there, but I'm not complaining (tomorrow, I work from 10 to 5, then I have shows from 10 to 1am.)

I've got a couple of scripted things that are coming along nicely. I'm working on a Halloween show again. It's not a Thriller Theater, it won't be at ImprovOlympic and it's not a comedy. Five years was enough. I was pretty proud of the Thriller Theater series. It wasn't highbrow, literate comedy, but it was fun and funny and goofy and I think people had a great time watching them. The casts were all incredible and, with the exception of the very first one, every cast was pulled from auditions that were publicly held. I think that's neat. This one is going to be a bit creepy and more of a, well, thriller. Some of the material was written a few years ago and I recently had a closed staged reading of the pieces that will comprise the show. Since no one else had ever read them and they're mostly thrillers with twist endings I had to have some outside feedback. Part of the aim of the "focus group" was to get people's reaction to the spoken words. It went pretty well and I got some great feedback from a terrific bunch of friends. I'm editing and re-writing some of the endings to be more clear now and I should get notice this week about the space I want to rent.

Instant Karma picked up a few shows for April. That's great. We had a show last week with only five people in the audience. It was one of the best shows we've had and we got a standing ovation! It was just great, wild fun. We're getting a poster soon, too!

I'm getting older and my body is starting to fall apart.

Movies I've watched for the first time in the past few weeks: Ringu (the japanese version of The Ring), Shaolin Soccer, Deliverance*, Spider, 13 Ghosts, Made, Swingers, and with probably the best title: Godzilla - Mothra - King Ghidorah- Giant Monsters All Out Attack!

*- I caught Deliverance on the local ABC channel and I was terribly disappointed. Discussing the film with some friends I complained about the overhype of the brutality of the film as "those guys just slapped them around a bit." I was met with stone faces and the phrase, "Are you fucking crazy? They rape the shit outta that dude!" So, I went out and rented the movie that very night. Yeah, uhm, there's a big freaking difference. As Burt Reynolds said in an interview about the edited-for-TV version, "it's just a movie about four guys camping."

Shaolin Soccer will be released in America by Miramax and will be dubbed in "American" voices (with the exception of the lead, who also happens to be the writer/director, Stephen Chow.) Bah.

It is illegal in that without compelling evidence, without UN sanction, without a full mandate from either the Senate or the American people, the United States has used its overwhelming military might to overthrow a regime it previously armed, funded and aided.

But, the rules of engagement have changed. The rules of evidence on a global scale are not the same as they are within our domestic legal system.

Saddam Hussein was/is a dangerous dictator and a threat to world peace. We know that. He had to be removed from power and the United States is the only power on earth capable of doing so.

I think it was right for the United States to attack Iraq, but not how and when we did so. But, it's like watching that crazy neighbor on your block come home from work every day with a different type of cannon, dynamite and dealing drugs to strange visitors every day. There are no cops. So what do you do? But the US reaction is kind of like sneaking into his house and shooting him in the head as he slept. Not so good, but should we have waited for him to kill someone on the block?

It's not over and it won't be for some time.

END OF LINE.

"We look forward to a world founded upon four essential freedoms. The first is freedom of speech and expression everywhere in the world. The second is freedom of every person to worship God in his own way everywhere in the world. The third is freedom from want... everywhere in the world. The fourth is freedom from fear... anywhere in the world." - Franklin D. Roosevelt

April 25, 2003

Things have been picking up lately… pretty busy…

Tonight (Friday night) is the last night for Instant Karma. I’ve really enjoyed this run and I’m a bit sad that it’s coming to an end. We’ll probably come back before the summer however. There should a copy of the poster on-line here somewhere.

I’m very excited to be part of the "24-Hour Project."
It’s an event over at the Theatre Building on Belmont this Monday (4/28/03) where writers meet a group of actors at 8pm on Sunday, they can write until 8am Monday. Then a group of directors show up to read the plays. At 8am, the actors come back. They and the director rehearse until 8pm Monday night and the play goes up on the stage in front of an audience at 8pm!
I’m one of the writers and I must confess I’m pretty nervous. What if I stink? What if what I write is just no good? There’s no time for re-writes or anything. Oy.
If you’re around and have the inclination, please come on by and check out the 24-Hour Project at the Theater Building!
Thanks to Meredith who got me into it.

Hey, Vidiocy was this past Sunday! It was great. About a million times better than I thought it was going to be. We had about 25 contestants with three either dropping out or disappearing. Around 8pm I went to make copies of the running order/playbill. As a general rule, if I’m making copies on a week-to-week basis, I make about 20 more than the size of the audience I expect. So, I made about a 90 copies. We had almost double that amount of people show up for a Sunday at 10:30pm show. The place was packed and full of energy. Charna surprised us all by ordering a ton of pizzas for us. That was very nice and unexpected (especially when I glanced at the bill!)
I couldn’t have been happier with the four finalists. We narrowed the field down to 12 and then judges voted on the top four and then the audience voted for First, Second, Third and Honorable Mention prizes. It all came down to "Heroes & Villains" by Bill Saveley, "Identity Theft" by Rick Rios, "Fever" by Adam Devlin-Brown, and "Scent" by Anthony LeBlanc. I loved them all, but "Scent" was such a fun, short musical tribute to your olfactory system reminiscent of the great Schoolhouse Rock shorts. Since it’s on DVD, I’ve watched it about five times since last weekend. "Fever" was one of those mainstream oddities; a truly surprising ending in that the religion is shown, not only in a positive light, but in a heroic and cool one.
After hearing people’s complaints and comments about this first installment, Jeff Griggs, Carrie Barrett and I met and revamped major portions of the contest/fest (I’m so tempted to just start calling it a "ConFest" but it really sounds like when The Simpsons mocked sci-fi conventions.) We should unveiling the version soon (uh, actually, when I get some time to write it all down in a manner suitable for public consumption.) We should be getting a website soon too. Like a real "Vidiocy.net" or something… dot com is already taken. Blast!

In Friday’s Instant Karma, Rich Sohn played Death and had a nice conversation with a young man. I misheard him and thought he was Deaf so most of the scene made no sense to me whatsoever. I eventually got it when he introduced his young sidekick, Crib Death. Also, to prove that he was actually THE Death, he waved his hands and all of the young man’s plants died. Then he waved his hands and his dog died. Then Rich walked over to the book shelf, said, "These books filled with irony?" and waved his hands. I, and about half the audience almost peed our collective pants. Some, like the young man onstage, said, "I don’t even get that."
Rich Sohn is a sniper. Some fire off as many shots as possible hoping to get a laugh with at least one of them. Like a sniper, Rich chooses his shots and then fires. One shot, One Kill, just like the Tom Berenger movie.

Registration Weekend. So. Tired. Must rest.

I saw Weaselicious over the weekend. Paul Grondy cracked my shit up with his portrayal of a Hulkesque John Merrick. "Merrick want food. Merrick hungry!" Gdfunny.

So, I work Registration from 9am to 3pm. I’ll get home around 4:30pm. I’ll have to eat and sleep quickly since I have to be at the Theater Building by 8pm. In most probability, you’ll be reading this when I’m taking a nap between writing all night and then running BACK OVER to ImprovOlympic around 10am.

THINGS THAT I WISH I HAD MORE TIME TO DO:
- savoring each hilarious and insightful word of Sarah Vowell’s "The Partly Cloudly Patriot"
- finally finish that infuriating "Dynasty Warriors 3" on the PS2
- finish watching AI
- clean my apartment
- organize my comics
- do laundry
- have a giant dinner party with the people I love
- finish the two plays I started writing in January. January!!!
- Clean out my MP3 library. It’s a mess.
- Fix my Mac Airport
- Update website. DONE.

END OF LINE

PS- Norman Borlaug is probably the greatest person who has ever lived. I first heard his name on an episode of The West Wing. Then Penn & Teller mentioned it on their great show, "Penn & Teller’s Bullshit!" Norman Borlaug has saved MILLIONS OF LIVES with little or no acclaim. I could write more, and I probably will on this topic later, but for now, please, if you have the time and inclination, type his name into Google and see read about this amazing, humble, ingenius man.

7am, Monday, April 27th.

Just got home from the Writing Phase of the 24 hour Project. So much fun. More will be written later.

Book of Jason!

new

April 9, 2003