the girly who shall end all girls

the most random thing that I found while sorting photos is that I did a show with Keegan-Michael Key when he was in grad school and forgot about it until I saw the pictures.

also plenty people at work are too young to have seen The Matrix in the theater.

scarlettina took me to see the revival tour of Les Mis on Friday evening. ultimately i enjoyed it a great deal, even though what i saw on stage was constantly fighting with my memories of the original Broadway production and the cast album. as we noted, we both knew the songs much better than we realized.

obligatory THIS POST CONTAINS SPOILERS for a 30-something musical and an 1862 book.

***

my first exposure to Les Mis was as a teen; it was my first national tour (I later saw it again during its loooong run in New York) and before i went all the way to Philadelphia to see it with my French class, my mom's boss made me a tape of the cast album and i listened to it obsessively in preparation.

my mind was blown by that show. hearing the music live was great, sure. but it was the stagecraft. i don't think it was the first play i saw with a turntable, but it was the most dynamic use i'd ever seen, where it wasn't used just for quick scene changes, but for motion within scenes to give a feeling of traveling and distance, and to change POV. then there was the barricades, where the revolutionaries literally pulled the buildings down and locked them together! Valjean's run through the sewers, with the slices of light from the gratings and the ripping reflections of water on the floor! Javert falling to his death, arms pinwheeling, center stage! at the time i didn't know that any of it was possible. seeing that production is probably why i have a theatre degree.

i then spent years singing arrangements of it in various choruses, etc etc as you do.

***
this production skips the turntable and the pivoting tower units in favor of projections and (i think) some sliding floor sections that are only used for set changes. the dynamism comes instead from moving the background behind the actors and it works well. projections are finally getting to the point where i don't entirely hate them.* it was especially nice for creating a sense of time and distance in the sewer scenes.

i thought the tempo was a bit too fast for most of the music - not just because i have an older production memorized, but because i could hear the orchestra leading the singers on several solos and was losing lyrics.

BUT there were some really lovely touches of business and lyrical interpretations. for the first time i genuinely liked Marius, who at one point let his voice crack in his duet with Cosette. it was easy to follow Javert into his role as spy. in Valjean's death scene, the voices of the dead are lightly processed to sound a bit unworldly and unlike the living, which sharpened the storytelling of the moment, as did the the bishop welcoming Valjean with open arms and hugging him.**

i still don't know exactly how Javert's fall is done, which brings me such joy. i think i might have caught his signal that his harness was secure, but i'm not sure. YAY.

over all it was a great trip down memory lane and a solid production of a show that's held up remarkably well.

***
over intermission scarlettina and i talked about our feelings about Eponine. On My Own was my first favorite song from the show, and i always hated the Marius/Cosette storyline. like, he literally sees her once and he's in love; he's been friends with Eponine for however long and she can't get the dude to see her as more than a friend or to understand her feelings for him until she's taken a fucking bullet for him.*** scarlettina always saw her as selling herself short - why hasn't this girl moved on? being a teen when i first heard the song, it was the perfect expression of my real-life frustration; the people in my life who i thought were right for me were romantically interested in people that they literally couldn't hold a conversation with (but who had a certain look).

I'm going to be thinking about me and Eponine for a few days.




*although i still think it forces under-lighting and the older i get the less i am able to enjoy that without strain. you have to be really careful of getting actors too close to the projection surface because you don't want to throw shadows on it or wash it out when you light the actors. and of course there are issues with resolution and getting the colors to match the set and on and on.

**maybe that hug was there before, but it certainly didn't mean anything to me mumble mumble years ago when there was no one i might hope to see in an afterlife

***is Eponine a "nice guy"? ultimately i don't think so. she doesn't decide to hate on Marius or Cosette and she understands that it's not going anywhere and that saying something at this point is going to make things worse.

the article about land use in Silicon Valley and San Francisco that i was talking about last night:
burrowing owls, vomiting anarchists

Seattle has different issues, but shares the problem of rising housing costs and an increasingly large well-paid workforce segment choking out the less affluent population, plus a vocal group of existing land owners. my neighborhood is a hot one. our rent will be increasing next month; right now the math says sit tight (can't find a rent that is low enough to make up for the costs of moving) while figuring out a new plan. that's the thing that really gets me - i feel like our rent is ridiculous, but newer buildings are charging more. other desirable neighborhoods and older buildings aren't cheaper. (desirable for us means frequent bus service and a grocery store, not necessarily hip. even "unsafe" neighborhoods are surprisingly close to our current costs.) from there we get into being forced back into car ownership and then the savings has been chewed up in car...and there's a loss of quality of life that can't be calculated. frex, getting rid of the dog is not on the table. don't get me wrong, i'm still glad to be able to call maintenance when the disposal acts up, i hate yard work with a passion, and the thought of dealing with a HOA makes me ill. trade offs.

Seattle remains beautiful and charming and the home of my heart. right now there is a project putting pianos in the parks. the one by our house is decorated with a dragon's head and a stripy sail. it's seen steady use and has been accreting a free library of music books and even some hand percussion.

last night we went to see Mirror, Mirror. it was a charming production, in a little amphitheater that is invisible from the street. there was a whole picnic plan that was slightly scuttled by the (unknown to us) preshow lecture by Mark Okrand and being on a concrete bench instead of the lawn we imagined. but we improvised successfully and even shared our snacks with the people around us. beet sandwiches! generic blood orange soda! clementines! mutant pretzels! cheese! i'm sorry that there wasn't much opportunity to chat with ethnomuse due to the lecture, but there were bonus joyful_storm and samildanach so i count the whole thing as a win.

i enjoyed Guardians of the Galaxy quite a bit. i don't know how i would rank it against the other Marvel movies...it's from a different place. it belongs in the Big Trouble in Little China and Hot Fuzz part of the Venn diagram. (i consider Hot Fuzz a masterpiece of its form. GotG isn't that good. i have now caused myself to wish for the alt-universe Edgar Wright version of the film.) anyway, there were several points that were so very close to moments from the history of my Friday gaming group. (most of the time i play Gamora, but there are definitely times when i am Groot.)

Equivocation has the sharpest ensemble acting and the best direction i've ever seen at the Rep. the writing is sly and funny, especially if you know the Shakespeare canon as a theatre professional or an academic.

yup, it's the best 9/11 truther propaganda out there.

1. Leave me a casual comment of no particular significance, like a lyric to your current favorite song, your favorite kind of sandwich, or maybe your favorite game. Any remark, meaningless or not. (scarlettina's codicil: You may not ask me directly. Be creative about the comment you leave here.)

2. I will respond by asking you five personal questions so I can get to know you better.

3. Update your LJ with the answers to the questions.

4. Include this explanation and offer to ask someone else in your own post.

5. When others respond with a desultory comment, you will ask them five questions.

1) Who hasn't visited you since you moved to Seattle that you'd love to show around the town?
my niece. she's in seventh grade this year. i think in a year or two i might be able to get my sister to put her on a plane to me.

2) How do you feel about Washington State having both Democratic caucuses and primaries, but only the caucuses counting toward delegate allotment?
my tax dollars are being wasted on this circus, and i blame both the Democratic and Republican party leadership for the situation. then again, it means that i can "change my mind" after the caucuses and do the Republican primary so that i can choose a candidate for each major party. back East your party was on your voter registration card, but here i can waffle my heart out.

3) Tell me about your favorite stuffed animal from childhood.
i was a fickle kid. i didn't love any one stuffed toy to death. i had a series of favorites, and i liked to sleep in a sort of fort made of the whole collection of animals for a while. probably my most beloved is a rabbit puppet i got in lieu of candy at easter, as a teen. i slept with him all through high school and college. i always thought of it as male, but my first college roommate dubbed it Vaginal Rabbit due to the labial folds of the hole for your hand. i went on to use him to carry bottled alcoholic beverages in public. one of my friends wrote a song about VR on his guitar, which was popular at parties. VR went to Perkins. he was a sort of mascot to the theatre crowd. Vaginal Rabbit still goes on trips with me when i don't take C.

4) What destination comes next after your Grand European Tour?
we're only hitting three countries, so probably the UK or more Europe. i want to see more cities, more museums, more old "Western" culture. i want to return to places i love (like Saint-Malo) and show them to C. i'm also interested in some more national park time, here or in Canada.

5) You have the opportunity to stage manage for one of Seattle's theater companies at an astonishing pay rate and benefits that would make Microsoft feel inadequate. (This is a fantasy, okay? Stick with me here.) Which one would you choose and why?
(there is no fantasy stage management gig anywhere, because i got into stage managing to learn the ropes of directing. i often enjoyed the work when i did it, and i was damn good and highly regarded by everyone who worked with me or worked for me. i still don't care to do it again.)
Seattle Children's Theatre. i love nontraditional staging, and i love new works. SCT has both, regularly. they also dabble in many styles. (and puppets. but good puppets and not evil marionettes.) while their shows are aimed at families, they don't use child actors (as far as i know). young audiences are a challenge to start times and intermissions, but SCT is designed from the ground up to handle it, and their front of house staff is excellent. they never do A Christmas Carol. they've got great tech, and dreamy budgets. sometimes the TYA schedule is a grind, but it also guarantees short run times, early evenings, and the summer off. (and word was, when i was in the market, that it was so nice there that most of the staff had been there for over ten years. there certainly weren't any openings.)

ETA: somehow this post got piped through the Rich Text editor and i absolutely hate it. i now know it uses tags that don't work well with screen readers. i felt guilty about using bold instead of strong when composing and they're using freaking i instead of em? grrrrrrr.

okay, so i can adjust a c-wrench one-handed while my legs are wrapped around the top of a ladder and the other hand is holding a lighting instrument. but this would still be mighty cool.

i was addled enough from my headache Monday to have completely forgotten that i saw Taming of the Shrew at Seattle Shakes.

Shrew is one of the "problem plays" these days. Kate's final speech makes audiences choke. (i find Measure for Measure much less palatable, but whatever.) so we are moved to couch the play in a concept that will connect with the audience. i'm generally in favor of the concept approach, as an illumination of the text and an invitation to the audience. for example, Richard III as a Hitleresque fascist pre WWII gives the audience a familiar handle on the military and political situation so that we can get on to the storytelling. this production was all male.

i admit that i was looking forward to some slashygoodness. (featuring the delectable Beethovan Oden as Bianca!) this production (a remount) is completely sexless. it's also not a power play. it's closed, so i can do all the spoiling i like. the play is done as a male rite of passage, a guy wraps up his workday, joins his friends, and they begin chanting an invocation and dressing up, do the play together, and then Kate puts on a tux and apparently heads off to get married.

the concept was seamlessly and faithfully executed. the movement and voice work was outstanding (lots of singing, chanting, and stomping.) the cast was full of explosive energy, and they kept it very clean, asexual without tipping into homophobic stereotyping. except for some dialogue spoken too rapidly (a common Shakespeare complaint of mine - saying it faster will not make it easier to follow) and some tacked on business, it was a good play.

i don't know that it was a good Taming of the Shrew though. i had a hard time following the story in the text and connecting all the relationships. of course, i've read the play, and worked with scenes from it as a student and seen several other productions. i've been trying to figure out if it left me dissatisfied because i had certain expectations, but i think i was disappointed that the director had a cool story to tell and had to hang it on an entirely different play. i wish that perhaps she had written her own. the best dialogue in the play was lost to an excellently rendered high school wrestling match.

my biggest problem though, was the stripping of all the joy from "what, with my tongue in your tail?" no sex, no power struggle, and nothing at stake. in the final speech, Kate breaks character for a moment, and then (for the first time) reverses pronouns, having been taught a Great Lesson about how men should treat women. in all the playing and grandstanding, i completely failed to observe Kate's humiliation and struggle...the cap, for example, carried no symbolic value in this world. there was no journey - Kate was always a willing, if not enthusiastic, participant in the process.

rather than taking on the difficult task of creating depth and believability in the characters and situations, director Shine skillfully sidestepped the entire play.

Satan's^* friend scored tix to 21 Dog Years on Thursday, and since that friend got them from the Mike Daisey, we went out with him afterwards. nice guy, fun show. he talks about how on internet time, the old timers have worked at the company for six months. i was at work this morning (still catching up from illness) and having a talk with my new minion, who is taking over my most annoying client; here i was indeed, explaining how we did things a whole five months ago and how we've come so far since then. also of note was sharing that longing with Mike for a "regular" life with "regular" hours and health insurance. no human experience is unique.

C and i went to Seattle Cooks! and threw ketosis out the window. we had tidbits of everything from avocodo oil to raw oysters to apricot jalapeno spread to earl grey chocolate truffles. i don't think it was quite as big this year (no whole octopus), but there were ample samples of the best. ice cream cake. ever. i wasn't entirely thrilled, until we sat down and watched a chocolate demo with Chef Gabriel from Culinary Communion. not only is he a good teacher, but he was tossing out where to buy all the ingredients for cheap in Seattle. AND he was talking chemistry (chocolate hardens when the molecules align, marble is endothermic, etc), WHICH I LOVE, and explaining how to temperature test chocolate by feel rather than with a candy thermometer. i absolutely adore Williams-Sonoma peppermint bark, and he showed how to make the stuff ($25 the pound) for about $4 in materials and 15 minutes of labor. *sigh* and afterwards we got to walk up on stage, ask questions, and eat. i'm all ready for someone to buy me one of his classes.
we got a deal of swag too, but many of the take homes were carb-o-licious (bags of rice, potatoes, two slice packets of bread) so we mostly got brochures and recipes. and a sweet Cafe Vita sticker.

i was hoping to finally see Dracula tonight, but it was all sold out, so Ticket/Ticket man hooked us up for tomorrow's matinee. (i refuse to feel guilty about my discount tix because it should have been free, passes for volunteers my ass.) it'll be a busy time between that and Sneak Film, but that's okay. C is going back to writing and i have the new Matt Ruff to dig into.

^*he felt that i resented him after the Tibetans took over Cinerama on pay-what-you-can night. i was fine, really. but i'm glad i saw the play and it's hella fun to tease him.

we hung last night, and finished the hang and did circuiting tonight. goddamned everything i got assigned had to be yoked out (so i was holding a lighting unit over my head with one hand and wielding a c-wrench with the other, while standing at the top of a rickety ladder and looking up at what i was doing) my arms ache, my hands are covered in graphite and sharpie, my eyes are crusty with dust from the pipes - i feel great. i wasn't as fancy and speedy as i wanted to be...damn job, taking up my valuable time and energy...but i think they don't think i'm stupid, and the LD hoped to see me at previews or opening night, so yay. i hung the backlight, and the hand special, among other things, so i do have the i joy of saying - "i did this."

must complete insurance forms and shower before collapse.

i will be assisting the lighting designer for Jonathan Harker's Journal (no D-words here, it's my Scottish play) on sunday and doing more lighting work on monday. again, "i can wire a plug" means more than "i've got vision." story of my life. book-it, man. i'll take it.

frabjousdave is trying to stir up interest in measure for measure (and the cabaret after, which i don't think i can afford) and i'm trying to decide if i want to go. i need to see more companies of moderate size work, but that bitch isabella is just going to choose her chastity over her brother again, and then decide to get married at the end. on the other hand, C points out that if it isn't great, i won't care, and can only be pleasantly surprised. maybe i can get down to ticket/ticket saturday and be less conflicted.

i had a good time working with the mailing on sunday; the box office guy is one of the founders of theater schmeater (still my favorite company name ever) who left town to recharge in grad school and then became a parent and had to entirely revise his life. we had a great chat that brought me back to the thing about how you have to be an artistic director to get in an MFA program. if i had my own company i don't think i'd be skiving off to school, i'd be in rehearsal, or writing grant proposals, not feeling all artistically drained and mopey and in need of escape. take a vacation, because you don't need education, you schmuck. nice guy though, had some similar opinions on playwrights and he encouraged me to get involved in a short play festival he sits on the board of. can't direct though, cause they've got to have seen your work. still, it's kind of rare that i get to talk shop, and i liked it. hope to see more of him.