Friday Mini Cat Blogging

Fewer photos than usual this week.


In fact, just one photo.


My flickr account is full for the month of October.


So, just the last one I haven't posted yet:





Back in the morning with more entries.

Friday Realtime Random Ten

For once, I'm actually posting here from Berit's computer with the iTunes playing, not just using it as background music while I putter about the apartment, working on something else, so I'll multitask between my Temptation work (making up one big list of everything left to be done for the show; actually not as big a list as usual) and comment on the songs as they go by this time.



1. "For Once in My Life" - Stevie Wonder - Hitsville U.S.A., The Motown Singles Collection 1959-1971

I sometimes dismiss Stevie Wonder in my head, for no good reason. Yeah, "Superstition" is one of my favorite songs (and one of the first singles I can remember owning), and of course there's "Fingertips" and "Uptight (Everything's Alright)," but I tend to associate him with mellow, syrupy ballads.

Last year, as we were driving to Wisconsin, Berit and I came into Chicago as a couple of local R&B DJs were having an on-air contest to determine who was better, Stevie or Marvin Gaye. I smirked and assumed Marvin (a favorite of mine) would wipe up the floor with Stevie. As the contest went on, it was clear that, even without using any of the "heavy guns" (the great classic hits), Stevie was kicking Marvin's ass, quite soundly. I somewhat had to reevaluate Stevie in my head after that, the man has a DEEP catalogue of great music.

(earlier this year, driving to The Brick, B & I came across a pair of NYC DJs doing pretty much the exact same thing with Gladys Knight and my BELOVED Aretha Franklin . . . and, well, they made a pretty good case for Gladys - they made Berit a believer - but didn't completely move me to "prefer" Ms. Knight, though "And The Pips" nearly tips the balance, Aretha didn't have a "And The Pips" -- Knight's "I Heard It Through the Grapevine" was one of the other first singles I remember having as a small child)

Anyway, this Stevie Wonder song is a mellow ballad, yes, but beautiful sung, written, produced, and arranged, and makes me feel happy to be up and awake this morning.


2. "Dream Lover" - The Packabeats - Highly Strung

This is a strange instrumental. Familiar tune, of course, but the melody is being played on an organ, and in some strange, dissonant way. It sounds like it's double-tracked by the same organ, slightly out-of-tune with itself on each track. Ah, there's a hot guitar solo in there . . . kinda buried, but it's there (this is supposed to be a surf guitar comp, I think). Strange humming in there, too. Odd production. Waitaminute, is this a Joe Meek production? Let me check . . . YES! of course this is Joe Meek. Now I get it.


3. "Beside You" - Iggy Pop - American Caesar

A pleasant ballad from the Igmeister, boringly produced, as most of his music has been since Zombie Birdhouse, but a good song, well-sung. moving. He's made plenty of great tracks in the last 24 years, but most of his ALBUMS tend to disappoint. Good for randomness selection, I guess.


4. "I Am Alone Today" - The Fruit Machine - Tektites Vol. IV

A long-forgotten "psychedelic" track from a downloaded comp of scratchy singles. Nice "heavy" guitar. Not bad. Then it just ends. Fine.


5. "Working Undercover for the Man" - They Might Be Giants - Mink Car

Favorite recent TMBG track, pretty, smart, funny, and slightly ominous (sung from the point of view of a government agent undercover in a rock band, spying on his audience).


6. "Abba Zaba" - Captain Beefheart and His Magic Band - Safe as Milk

Ah! Early Van Vliet! Chugging and fun. This is an upbeat mix this morning. I'm being forcibly put in a good mood.


7. "Just for Fun" - Jonathan Richman - Having a Party with Jonathan Richman

Hunh. And it's Jonathan Richman who adds a sad, mournful note? It nearly sounds like one of JoJo's normal happy songs, but it has a strange, past-tense feel, like the fun is long gone, but it's nice to think of it now. Oh, it's a live recording, too. Didn't remember that.


8. "I'm Gonna Run Away from You" - Tami Lynn - Golden Years 02

Another song from a downloaded comp that I don't know (I like adding music I barely or don't know into iTunes and just having it come up - like listening to the radio sometimes). Good R&B song. Almost girl group. Here's something I found about Tami Lynn.


9. "Because the Night" - Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band - Live 1975-85

I really like Springsteen's songwriting. I really don't like his arrangements/performances, but they're bearable for me in live versions rather than his usually dead, freeze-dried, overthought studio albums. Live, he's got one of the best bar bands in the world, with above-average originals. Patti did this one better, and Springsteen's alterations to the lyrics (or is it restoration to his originals before Smith changed them for her version?) are clumsy. In any version, a damned great chorus there.


10. "Centipede Boogie" -Chet Atkins - Chet Atkins and His Guitar

Man, this cat can play. Aggressively cheery guitar instrumental. Making me happier by the moment. Good way to go out on this list, though the music will play on . . .

Final Stretch

Resting at home, waiting for Berit to get home from The Ohio where she's supervising the techs going on there for The Havel Festival.


The festival opened last night at The Brick with the double bill of Mistake/The Garden Party from Oracle Theatre, Inc. A nice start to the whole thing. Edward Einhorn (festival conceiver-artistic director), Henry Akona (assistant artistic director), Karen Lee Ott (dramaturg), and I (member of the UTC#61 artistic board) were all there to see the festival in. Edward got there late, missing Mistake, as he'd been at a reception for Mr. Havel up at Columbia University. Got to shake his hand and exchange a few words with him, and wasn't sure if Havel quite knew who he was (his English isn't good). As Edward was meeting him, Havel was also being introduced to Oliver Sacks, and Edward got to talk to him briefly as well, so he was there with the two men who either directly or indirectly were responsible for -- between the Havel Festival and the NeuroFest -- most of his work for the past year.


I was at The Brick again this afternoon to work the tango sequence from Temptation with Tim Cusack and Alyssa Simon. Went well - still needs work but it will all be there before opening on Thursday. Stuck around to see the evening's companies come in and to clean up the space a bit before they did, and fix the sound system (a speaker had gotten unplugged), check if any help was needed, and so forth. Didn't stay for the show, as I wanted to come home and veg a while.


I spent a lot more of yesterday and today not working more than I intended, though. I needed a bit of a rest after the overworked beginning of the week, and to prepare myself for the killer period of the next 5-6 days. Most of what we need is in place, but the few things we need that we don't have seem to be well-nigh impossible to get with our resources.


Berit just walked in, which was my self-imposed cutoff point for this post. Think I'll just save it and come back with a few words on this week's rehearsals.


Okay, so this week in rehearsals. Over the weekend, we worked through the show as we could with an incomplete cast. Monday and Tuesday I spent all day at the space building set pieces with cast member/old friend Aaron Baker. We got the bed/bower and the bookcases made. I wanted to finish the screen frames, but my conduit cutter and two corner pieces had vanished from my space backstage (some things had been moved around by another company), so I lost $18 of stuff there and couldn't have the screens fully ready for Tuesday night, when I had to assign set change moves to the cast. I wound up with a half-built 10' long (but rolling) rehearsal prop.


Tuesday night we had the full 12 members of the cast, and we ran NEARLY the whole show -- with the set change work we went over the time I'd allotted. We did the run with only the practical lights on -- I'll be able to control them from the board (so I was told and am still assuming), and I am going to have to pump in a tiny bit of front light from the actual instruments to make the faces visible enough in some places, but I wanted the cast to get used to the stage with the actual lamps on. It looked great, if, of course, too dim in some places, but as can happen when you move from rehearsal room/lighting to the actual space/dimmer lighting, the show lost energy, got quiet, meditative, logi. The character work was good and clear and there, but the show was not an attention-holder.


Wednesday, rehearsal space at CSV, had the whole cast except Roger and Timothy, and started with the last scene, then the whole show. Great pace and energy. Funniest run we've done of the show yet (at times, maybe even TOO funny -- there are times when you shouldn't always go for the laughs you can easily get). Peppy.


So here's the note I emailed to the cast:


The difference in energy and pace between the two nights was huge. Tuesday seemed poky (and frankly, at points, quite dull), last night moved and felt full of crackling energy all the time. We took anywhere from one to four minutes off the run time of each scene, but more important than the speed was the ENERGY.

Now, some of this was changed from notes I gave last night, but I think a good deal of this comes from the use of only the practical lights in the space on Tuesday. There WILL be more light onstage in the performances - some more from other practicals, and a bit of fill light from the instruments to make sure faces are visible when they should be. But more than making the feel overly dark and moody in the house, one of the effects of using practicals this way (as I know from a LOT of experience in this) is to make the actors get quieter, less energetic, and more "meditative" in their performances. Sometimes this is wanted for the show. With TEMPTATION, it is very definitely not.

It sometimes takes a couple of run-thrus to bring the performances back up to "rehearsal space and light" energy, and I wanted you to be aware of that now. We will probably be working in the same, dimmer light on Saturday in the space, but I need to see the energy of last night in that moody lighting.

It's a very deliberate thing to light this show this way, to put the often extremely funny things Havel has given us to say and do in a non-"comedic" landscape and light. Keep filling the moments, and you'll fill the dark shadows around you - let the energy lag, and the shadows will eat you up.


Okay, small bowl of cereal and then bedtime. At The Brick at 10 am to set up for 11 am - 2 pm rehearsal.


Today's other important document:

THINGS WE NEED FOR TEMPTATION:

(sets/props)

typewriter (older and funkier the better)
chalk
globe
desk lamp for Foustka
“foliage” pieces (around bar/bower)
fake rose for The Dancer/Vilma
bandage for Neuwirth
incense burner and incense
smoke machine fluid
endtable lamps (Vilma's)
vanity/mirror piece for top of desk (or just a standing mirror)
bouquet of violets (fake)


(costumes)

FOUSTKA
needs tux shirt, jacket, and faust costume (red hat and cloak)

DIRECTOR
needs two different jackets and one tie and “devil” costume (black jacket, tie, pants, shoes, red shoes, tail, horns, shirt)

PETRUSHKA
needs uniform and “cat” costume pieces

KOTRLY
needs “wizard” costume pieces (maybe including white beard)

NEUWIRTH
needs black turtleneck for “skeleton” costume

THE SECRET MESSENGER
needs costume pieces pulled out from our collection

MARKETA
needs “PSYCHIATRY” nightgown

FISTULA
could use suspenders if we can find them

THE DANCER
needs “satyr” items for “witches’ sabbath"