I'm With the Band

Part of the fun of working with Shakespeare lies in the fact that though his plays have been produced for 400 years, we still have not run out of new ways to do them. I directed Midsummer over a decade ago (gasp!), but I have a difficult time remembering that this is the same play.

Don't get me wrong. I loved "my" version. I set it in the sixties, modeling Theseus after Hugh Hefner and making the palace the Playboy mansion. The fairies in the woods? Ken Kesey and his Merry Pranksters. I played with the strange dichotomy of that time: the starched straight-and-narrow and the tie-dyed kool aid acid heads. I lucked out with a fantastic cast- not only were all the actors superbly talented, but my Oberon looked almost exactly like Jim Morrison!

And I love Steve's version. The whole thing has a happily anachronistic feel... Robin Starveling's "Moon" holds a giant ultrabright flashlight instead of an old school lantern, some costumes read modern, some read turn of the century, and everything in between. Steve has also created a wacky musical vibe, including a fairy band.... in which I get to take part!

Our band met tonight to rehearse the song that will open the show. That orchestration now includes a bass drum played with a wooden spoon, a snare drum, a guitar, my ukulele, a concertina, and two kazoos. We have a lead fairy vocalist and two other fairies singing backup. Band practice consisted of a lot of furrowed brows as we tried to figure out who would play harmony, who melody, and when; a lot of tinkering with strum patterns, chord progressions, and timing; and a lot... I mean a lot... of uproar and laughter. In the end (under the guidance of our only "real" musician, the ever patient Jason, who also plays Robin Starveling/Moonshine), we now have a song set down. The result? Hilarious and yet oddly catchy. Our chorus, though, brought up a question:

Philomel with melody

Sing in our sweet lullaby

Lulla, lulla, lullaby;

lulla, lulla, lullaby.

Who or what is Philomel?

I came home, and being the good nerd that I am, researched it. Some sources cite "philomel" as being another name for a nightingale. In researching the etymology of that name, I stumbled upon the myth of Philomela. Tereus (so close to Theseus!) escorted Philomela, a princess across the sea. Along the way, he raped her. To keep her quiet, he has her tongue torn out. (Reminds me of Lavinia in Titus Andronicus!) They Olympic gods, then, turn her into... you guessed it... a nightingale.

Hm. Creepy.

It works, though. Our band definitely has a slightly off sound to it! (The whole show has a lovely sort of dark edge, in fact.) Hey guys? What should we call our band? I came up with "The Funkin' Fairies" but don't know if that's exactly family friendly.... ideas?

It's a Show

Our director for A Midsummer Night's Dream, Steve, spoke the words to us tonight after our first full run-through. "It's a show." My theatre peeps probably know just what he means. But for the rest of you, I shall explain. For the greater portion of a rehearsal process of any theatrical production, much energy gets spent on the micro things. People forget where to enter, when to exit, and what props to bring. People struggle to get lines memorized enough to leave the script behind. Then people think they remember the words, but really don't, and so the poor stage manager/rehearsal assistant goes crazy trying to feed lines to frustrated actors as the increasingly nervous director looks on. The general mood of rehearsal vacillates between boring, frustrating, and trainwreck in a repeating pattern.

Then, one day, you look up and realize that... well... you have a show. Yes, lines go missing, costumes still need to be sewn, confusion still trickles into some scenes. But suddenly, enough starts to go right, to get its rhythm that you can (if you squint through cheesecloth) start to imagine that this thing will work in front of an audience.... with a little tweaking, a lot of labor, and a ton of luck. You suddenly catch a brief glimpse of the macro.

Tonight, I saw it, too. We have a show. And it's going to be a good one. Steve has such fantastic energy- he's one of those high voltage people that seems to buzz and shock with an abundance of ideas. His bizarre and exciting vision embraces Rosebriar's mission to "to "Take the Fear out of Shakespeare"; under his sure guidance, the play moves quickly and includes moments of wackiness, quirkiness, sensuality, and just the right touch of darkness.

To whet your appetite-- let's see.... Picture Helena as a sort of dorkier version of Grace Adler. Imagine Hermia as the cutest thing you've ever seen-- then add sugar, whipped cream, and a cherry. The costumes for Pyramus and Thisby, the play within the play? I don't want to give it away... but they involve fur short shorts, dryer venting, and a fishing rod for one character. Puck, a puppet, presents at once as adorable and huggable, but also as kind of disturbing and dangerous, somehow. Titania and Oberon ooze with simmering sensuality. And Bottom? He's a perfect ass. And I mean that in the best way possible.

My role of Quince, the poor carpenter who gathers his fellow blue collar laborers to put on a show in the woods? Let's just say, I relate to the guy- especially given that I am preparing to direct Taming of the Shrew in a few short months. I feel so happy to be playing a comedic role... and one that does not ask for subtlety. Playing a scene that asks "some tears in the telling of it"- the one in which we all believe Bottom has died or been whisked away by black magic, we all worked to out-sob each other, blowing our noses in our hankies, wailing, blubbering, beating our chests. Just a lot of fun. J, the actor playing Robin Starveling remarked as we walked off, "Gee- I just don't think we played that BIG enough!" What fun to slip on the banana peels again after so many roles where I had to be depressed, neurotic, broken, and angry.

I look forward to performing it in front of an audience!

When my cue comes, call me and I'll answer.

You've Seen One of His Balls, You've Seen 'em All...

On our way home from the 4th of July celebration with my family, Hubby and I made a brief dinner stopover in Chicago to visit with Hubby's Mom, nephew, and nephew's mom. On our way out of the Windy City, we grabbed our good friend, Arf and kidnapped her, bringing her back to Buckeye Nation.A little background information for you. Arf has always been one of my closest friends. And I don't mean "always" in the virtual sense. She has quite literally known me since birth. Our dads both went to Knox College together. In fact, they both were and are proud members of the Sigma Nu fraternity there. (I try not to actively consider that I may have, indeed, been conceived in a frat house.) Both Arf and I spent our first few years toddling around campus together, charming co-eds, and interrupting track meets with our antics.

Since the beginning, our lives have drifted together at times and apart at others. We had the kind of friends that let us drop out of each other's lives for a few years, but then pick up back together as though we had never been apart. I would always hear about Arf's triumphs, defeats, and adventures via my mother via her mother. She, too, kept up with my goings-ons through the maternal grapevine. Some summers I would spend with her in Texas, and some she would spend with me in California. How wonderfully odd when we compared notes our senior year in high school to find that we had both chosen the same college. How delightfully strange that we picked Knox. And if feels like I'm making this up, but we both ended up majoring in theatre. We also both got cast in Knox's production of Steel Magnolias: Arf as Clairee, I as Truvy. How fun that we got to paste pictures of ourselves as Knox babies on the set's makeup mirrors!

Our friendship has always been fueled by constant chatter and steady giggling. Poor Hubby can attest to this, as he stoically endured a five and a half hour super-fueled drive. Hubby wisely snored through most of the ride. He probably felt complete relief when he returned to work and left us to barrel around the Columbus area together, talking and laughing nonstop.

Arf noted that one of our days we spent practicing for our future as batty old women. We decided to breakfast at a local Amish restaurant Hubby and I had passed on a country road. Unfortunately, we awoke late (from talking until the wee hours), lingered over our coffee, and didn't make it to the restaurant until lunch time. Then, when we walked in, we quickly realized that every other customer in the place used a cane or a walker to move around. We were probably the only people in the joint with our own teeth, too. Our reaction? Giggles, of course. The lunch, in spite of its geriatric ambience, proved delicious. Next we headed out to a nearby nursery, A Proper Garden. Arf, who takes after her mother in this respect, loves gardening. Her beautiful balcony garden in Chicago's Hyde Park overflows with an astounding plethora of fabulous flora. She led me around the nursery, advising me which plants would grow well on our land and which plants I could rely upon to be indestructible, even when met with my deeply black thumbs. I fell in love with the many varieties of sedum. She has inspired me to start a little rock garden in one corner of our land.

Continuing our old lady theme, we visited the Franklin Park Conservatory. I had heard that the artist Dale Chihuly had his glass art on display there. As Arf is both a gardening enthusiast and an artist (she designs theatrical lights and sets, and has a love of all things design), I thought this combination would be perfect. I kept to myself that I had, years ago, gone to the Garfield Park Conservatory in Chicago when Chihuly had been on display there. I had remained silent while my friends (and the other patrons around us) oohed and aahed over his works. Personally, I had grown immediately bored of his stuff. I remember thinking (and let's face it- probably eventually saying), "Oh boy. Look. Chihuly's balls. AGAIN." I chalked up my eye rolling to my lack of culture and questionable taste, but I just couldn't rectify his bright and alien glass sculptures with the astounding show nature put on in the conservatory. I found myself feeling angry and annoyed with Chihuly; it seemed to me he put himself in competition with the plants.

Imagine the giggling glee when Arf remarked to me, about five minutes into our tour, "I like the plants. I don't know why HE'S here." I admitted my past hate of his presence in the Garfield Park Conservatory, and we spent the rest of the tour muttering, "Oh look. Chihuly's balls!" We found, however, the actual plants in the Conservatory to be astounding. My favorite part, which will shock my closer friends, had to be the butterfly room. (I harbor an embarrassing tendency to freak out when confronted with butterflies. I know. I know.) I overcame my freak-out-factor and just enjoyed the stunning array of magical creatures and their ability to camouflage themselves in the equally stunning array of amazing foliage.

To complete our day of old lady livin', we finished up at the Columbus Metropolitan Library. I had a meeting with Raconteur Theatre Company, and Arf entertained herself by finding great bargains at the Library Store (best used bookstore ever-- they sell books that have gone out of circulation for as little as $0.50!) and by using my card to check out some books on cd for her long car ride back home to Chicago. We really did have a great time!

I hope, in fact, that Arf comes back soon for another visit. Maybe we can find a local canasta game after we go mall walking.

** By the way, check out the upcoming Raconteur event at the library! More information on the right... Hope to see you there**