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November 5, 2002
Another Halloween come and gone. Hopefully, I'll be able to scan in some pics from the party. There were some great costumes this year. The show was a great deal of fun and man, the performances were something else. Just great stuff. While everyone was funny with their roles, I think the entire Happy Days gang were especially dead-on with their portrayals. Who the F does a Fonzie imitation, much less a Ralph Malph imitation?! Also, Mrs. Cunningham, Potsie and Richie were eerily like their counterparts but I guess that's harder to recognize because you don't really remember those characters beyond their archetype on the show. BUT, after watching about 13 hours of Happy Days straight (thanks to Craig and Leigh Uhlir and their much coveted TiVo) through while writing the script, I can definitely say they got their roles down pat. (editors note: Fonzie- Jake Schneider, Ralph- Mike Burns, Marion Cunningham- Claire Claremont, Potsie- Chad Reinhart, Richie- Anthony LeBlanc)
Oh, and that was the very last Thriller Theater at ImprovOlympic. Five years. It's enough. Still, it's fun to come up with possible hilarious "Scooby Meets" combinations. I was just about to write that I thought that the Facts of Life was my favorite, but the Buffy one really spoke to me about the difference in crime-fighting teen shows over the decades. Check out the funky shit that the Hardy Boys wear on the cover of their books nowadays. It's weird. I think they dress them/draw them now so that they appeal to kids as opposed to when they first appeared and they were designed to appeal to adults.
The first Thriller Theater was just a collection of humorous or scary vignettes. The second one where the Scooby Gang teamed up with the Hardy Boys, Nancy Drew, and Encyclopedia Brown came after I was watching Murder by Death, one of the funniest movies ever made. I wondered who were the greatest kid detectives and teamed them up. I really liked that one and how it poked fun at all their conventions.
Dinner for Six is opens this week and I'm both nervous and completely calm about it. I'm nervous because, well it's a new show and it's our premiere, but then I'm very confident of the form itself and the performers are just wonderful. Part of the fun is that no one in the cast performs with each other any where else so the friction... the newness of each scene is fun. Click here for some cool photos that Dave Gilley took.
Alright, short, but, uh, short.
END OF LINE.
Man, where the Hell did this year go? It seems like it went by so fast, but upon reflection it's been pretty busy. I have exceptionally sharp teeth. My molars are very pointy and sharp. Why is this? I don't know...
I've been taking a few Aikido classes and the more research into maritial arts philosophies I do, the more applicable to improvisation they seem. Patience. The true warrior knows how to best avoid conflict. Discover your own weaknesses and use them to your own advantage before your opponent can. Relax. Use your "opponents" strength against him/her. Pay attention. Respect the room. Respect the space. Respect each other.
TJ & Dave are one of the Chicago Readers Critics Choice this week. Dinner for Six has a review in the same Reader. I don't know what we'll get... the critic and I spoke and he mentioned Critics Choice for Dinner for Six, but I actually think he was joking. I didn't have the what-do-ya-call-it? the piece of mind? the clarity of mind? wherewithal? Some such cliche, to ask him if he was kidding. *sigh* I don't know. I doubt if there will be two improv Critics Choice anyway. He was probably kidding anyway. *sigh* Every week for Dinner for Six I'm buying flowers and putting them in the theater. I don't know what effect it has on anything but I kinda like it. Smells nice, if nothing else. I love this show. I'm actually letting just about anyone come in for free because I want there to be an audience for these wonderful performers. Another show that more people should see is...
"If I Die Before I Live: A Sonny Kitchen Mystery." Wonderful show... just came from it actually. What a great job Eric Lindbergh has done with this genre. The style is just dead-on and all the major cliches/archetypes are well-represented. The cast is wonderful as well. Expertly cast and so well performed by everyone involved. It's not a rapid-fire parody-spoof; it's a hard-boiled detective story with lots of hilarious moments without breaking the fourth wall. It's a great story as well. So, uh, congratulations to everyone involved in the show! I don't normally go on about other shows (as opposed to going on ad nausem about my own), but this show is really terrfic and deserviing of every great review it has so far received.
I'm returning to the Pat Shay Dancers. I'm nervous... I haven't regularly performed with them for some time now. I'm really looking forward to rehearsing and playing with them again. I've taken sabbaticals before and I do reccommend them for anyone who feels they need one. Teaching and participating in Dinner for Six has given me a hankering for improvisation. I love it. Last week I had the wonderful opportunity to do a two person show with Jeff Griggs at the Playground and it was so much fun. That kindled the improv flame as well.
You know how some people get with a new pet? It's all they can talk about, they coo to it, they want to buy it toys and show it off to any and everyone? I'm that way with my new laptop. It's an iBook and it's so cute and powerful and fun to play with and useful and cute....
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That's what it looks like and I like it very much.
Of course, I've broken it already. Something happened... I don't know what.. but now the latch won't catch and lock it shut. It kind just sits there about 1/5th of an inch open. It's annoying. Can I ever have anything that works exactly the way its supposed to? Almost everything I have is jury-rigged or broken in some way shape or form. Even me. God Bless the Paxil.
I'm cooking a turkey for Thanksgiving. Love turkey. Love cooking. I wish I had a table. Like a big rectangular wooden table. For mead drinking.
Alright, if you like long-form improvisation and patient, smart scenework, please come see Dinner for Six! Thursdays at ImprovOlympic. Free if you mention this website at the box office.
I'm going to watch West Wing and Law & Order now.
END OF LINE
"You're not as dumb as you look." "Nobody's as dumb as I look." - Jimmy Lapinsko (played by Matt Chapman, in "If I Die Before I Live: A Sonny Kitchen Mystery")
"Imperial troops have entered the base! Imperial troops have entered ---skkkchchchc..." - a bored receptionist over the company "all-page" intercom
Hey. New Buffy, Smallville, Osbournes, Letterman. Hooray for cable.
I got to do an improv workshop with the Shedd Aquarium. It was a lot of fun. After the entire thing shut down, we talked a bit as we watched the Beluga whales cavort in their tank. It was really beautiful and worth braving the slush. I can't wait to go back and see the entire building. My favorite marine mammal? The Narwhale. It's a freaking whale with a horn for busting through the ice so it can get to the delicious air. It's like a unicorn except that it's a whale.
Getting some use out of the scanner. Added the scanned in article from Buffy the Vampire Slayer magazine about Thriller Theater 3. So it took two years... big deal.
First show back with the Pat Shay Dancers this Friday- excited about that. That'll be fun. We had a very fun rehearsal the other day full of ten minute real, hilarious scenes. Nervous. Nervous, that I'll screw something up.
Oh, Ozzy, will you never be able to work that television?
Alright, I wish I had some more to talk about... I suck.
Oh, we're off this week, but in December, please come see Dinner for Six on Thursdays @ 8pm.
END OF LINE
"Did you get my Thanksgiving card?" - my mom
So let's get this straight. At the taping of the MTV Video Awards there was a camera crew taping Jack taping his sister singing. The vikings said that when the World Serpent finally caught his tail and devoured himself the end of the world was nigh. Media keeps feeding upon itself more and more.
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