APRIL IN SALINAS

April is coming to Salinas. So is Ahab and Moira and Jaypes. They're all being brought there by Norn- or Urd, as some call her. Or is it Verdandi? Or perhaps Skuld? Who can say for sure? What I am fairly sure of is that all those strangely named folks are characters in my new play. Mayhap they're all mad. Or we are. Or you are. Or I am. Or not. It all comes down to something in the end. Doesn't it? What appears to be happening- if indeed this reality is happening and not the dream of a butterfly about to waken, at which point this world will pass- is that my latest play April's Fool is slated to be presented as a staged reading as part of The Western Stage's Playwrights Festival.


The reading is on Sunday April 12 at 2:00 pm. Tickets are free, which I think is reasonable and shouldn't put anyone too much back.

Here's a taste. This is from the beginning of the first scene. It's late at night, and Ahab and April are about to break into Moira's apartment. At this point, they are standing offstage, just outside the door into Moira's place, where the scene unspools. Enjoy:

AHAB (O.S.)

Quiet! She’s probably asleep. Stand back, I’m going to break

the door down.

APRIL (O.S.)

What if it’s unlocked?

AHAB (O.S.)

Don’t be stupid! Nobody leaves their door open anymore!

The door opens, and we see April, late twenties/early thirties. She is wearing a harlequin costume, including a black mask over her eyes. In one hand she holds a bag full of tools, in the other a flashlight, which she points into the room. She takes a few steps in, followed by AHAB- same age, wearing a court jester costume, holding a crowbar.

APRIL

You were saying?

AHAB 

Your hair wants cutting.

APRIL

You should learn not to make personal remarks. It’s very
rude.

AHAB

Well, shit.

APRIL

So now that we’re in, what’s the plan?

AHAB

Grab the pinball machine Dickhead gave her, throw it out the window, and escape into the night!

APRIL

Quiet! (whispers) She’s probably asleep!

AHAB 

(whispers) Right. Flashlight.


April pulls another flashlight out of the bag, hands it to Ahab. He turns it on. They both point their flashlights around the apartment, revealing tasteful furniture, and also many empty glasses, half eaten bowls of potato chips and such, indicating a party was thrown earlier that night. There’s a door to the kitchen, and a hallway leading to a bedroom and bathroom. Ahab points his flashlight to a pinball machine in the middle of the room.

AHAB (cont’d)

Who gives his girlfriend a pinball machine?

APRIL 

I think it’s kind of cool.

AHAB 

It was a theoretical question!

APRIL

Theoretical?

AHAB

Rhetorical! You know what I mean! Not wanting an answer
‘cause it’s obvious that what I mean is that Dickhead is a dickhead. And it is not kind of cool!

APRIL

Have some wine.

AHAB

What are you trying to say?

APRIL

I think you know.

AHAB

Then you should say what you mean. 

If that whets your appetite, and you'd like to read the whole play, you can purchase it online- that's right, before it's world premiere later this year in NYC- at Indie Theater Now by clicking HERE.

The Playwrights Festival is part of a year long celebration of the Western Stage's 40th anniversary- which is a pretty remarkable achievement in the theatre world- or any other type of world for that matter. I have worked there both as an actor and a playwright, and it is part of the fabric of my soul- a place where I learned a bit about the stage, about art, about life and death and sex and drugs and rock-n-roll and the meaning of spaffles. As an actor, I had the distinct honor of being in the first two fully staged productions of Alan Cook's adaptation of John Steinbeck's East of Eden- a trilogy of plays that was in total nine hours long. If the list of shows I acted in was a discography, East of Eden could very well be my Sgt. Pepper's. Or Let It Bleed. As a playwright, they produced Burning the Old Man last summer, and the year before gave a staged reading of Riddle Lost.

Clearly, they have good taste in writers.

I AM A MYSTIC IN TRAINING

I think the universe leads me around the planet, and I happen upon certain things- pieces of music, people, events- at appointed times. Well, maybe not appointed, like "on March 1, 2013 at 10:15 am, while walking his dog Padfoot, he will hear a song on his Hawk and a Handsaw station on Pandora that will inspire him to write a scene between Jaypes and Norn as a hot dog vendor ala Ignatius from Confederacy of Dunces", but more like there are all these secret doorways to insight and spiritual tranquility that have are set all around the universe, and if I want to follow a certain path, achieve some sort of destiny, I need to find those doorways, those hidden Easter Eggs on the DVD of me. Maybe life is like whatever algorithm Pandora uses to figure out what music we would like, and the choices we make lead us to logical places. I read a book when I'm in fourth grade that turns me on to Norse mythology, which leads me to read other books on myths and fate, and over the years I accumulate all this seemingly useless knowledge, trivia really- until one day I write a play with Hela in it, which leads to another play with Hel and Raven in it, which leads to yet another play with the three Norns smashed into one character in it.

I really don't know, and I suppose in the grand scheme of things, and in the not so grand as well, it doesn't really matter. As Popeye, famous one-eyed sailor and lover of spinach would proclaim, I am what I am, whether by choice or fate, and all I can do it live my life as well as I can, try to find some sort of moral compass- be it part of natural law or of human construct.

Which is a long winded way of saying I am feeling connected to the world at this particular moment in time. I feel as if I am doing what I should be doing with myself in order to live the life I want to live. And a huge part of that is because I am happy with my latest play. At the same time, there is a loneliness when writing something- a feeling like no one else can see this brave new world coming to life in your brain, or alternate universe, or where ever it is that stories live.  Still, it's quite euphoric being me right now. And this feeling of well being urges me further- not only to work on the new show (working title: Don't Get Too Comfy, Pal), but to finally finish post-production of Strong Tea, get to work on a screenplay idea I have that mashes up the story of Edgar Cayce with all those reality/paranormal shows on cable these days, clean up Rose Red- which is having another production this June in Boulder and possibly more in Ohio and California- and on and on. Nothing inspires like inspiration.

Right now, I'm rewriting and rewriting and then rewriting Don't Get Too Comfy, Pal. At the same time, the first draft is being read and judged by the good people at the Fine Arts Center in Colorado Springs as an entrant in their Rough Writers event. So I want all of you to face Colorado Springs from wherever you are, and send a telepathic command to whomever is reading the play, telling them to put it in the festival.

I am fairly certain I am hoping to become, or already am, a mystic.

SABRINA

So now that we’re in, what’s the plan?

AHAB

Grab the pinball machine Dickhead gave her, throw it out the window, and escape into the night!

I COULD GO CRAZY ON A NIGHT LIKE TONIGHT

Man, how can it already be this close to the end of summer? What happened? Where was I? Who was I? Who were you? Did any of this happen, or was it all some sort of freaked out dreamscape, a vision a butterfly saw while drying its wings? On days like this, I feel like Billy Pilgrim in Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse Five- unhinged in time and all over the map.

Still, there were some really groovy things that happened, are happening, and will be happening.

First and foremost, this Friday at 7:30 at The Western Stage in Salinas, CA there will be a staged reading of the latest version of my new play, RIDDLE LOST presented by 2X4 BASH. I have this really good feeling about the reading- I don't know why, exactly, but I do. And whenever I get a good feeling about one of my plays, something amazing happens. Every time. I don't know if that means I'm psychic, or angels whisper in my ear, or I'm crazy. I only know this it is so. The cast looks amazing from the photos I've seen, the director Skot Davis is a smart guy and we had a a really solid conversation last week. The stage manager Melissa Woodrow is this awesome, positive force who really keeps things moving and I could go on and on and maybe  I will but I must say this: If you are anywhere near Salinas- it's in California just east of Monterey- get your ass to the reading on Friday night.

Here's a link to info about the reading, with more photos and other awesome stuff:
http://www.facebook.com/events/350972838316735/355955294485156/?ref=notif&notif_t=plan_mall_activity

Also, the contract has been signed, and my play BURNING THE OLD MAN is going to have a production in Sao Paolo, Brazil this March. Very excited about this, and will post updates. This will be the second language my play has been translated into- it has been playing in Czech in the Czech Republic for the past 3 years. And this is the fourth continent I'll have been produced on. Weird, cool thing to have people you've never met want to do your stuff. But I could get used to it.

What is funny, in a way, is that this play- by far my most popular to date, has only had one equity showcase production so far in the good old USA. There was a reading at South Carolina Rep earlier this month, so who knows?

As for the summer itself, which is about to go bye bye- it was pretty damn awesome. Moments pop into my head as I think about it. This kid in a production up in Boulder with a gigantic smile on his face during curtain call. The cast of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince rocking out at Slughorn's party to The Beatles singing Me and My Monkey.

Oh, and one more thing- I'm working on a new musical. I won't say anything more at this point. Just a head's up, if you will.

Okay, that's my babble for the day. It may be a bit discombobulated, but so am I. I'll let Raven have the last word.

RAVEN

We tell stories because we are stories.

RIDDLE'S IN THE DARK

Jefferson Davis Riddle wasn't always Jefferson Davis Riddle. Until he was about ten years old, he was a boy named Charka, which meant handsome youth in the language of his mother's people. He came from the Lost River. His mother was a Modoc, his father a white settler. He was born during the Civil War, and died as World War II was beginning. I don't know why, but the guy haunts me. So I wrote a play about him, and the events that twisted him into a riddle.

Well, that's not entirely true- but then again, what is?

I set out initially to write a play about the Modoc War of 1872-1873 that happened in Northern California and Oregon, which is mainly a story about Captain Jack, a Modoc chief whose story is Shakespearean in scope. His story is one of heroism and betrayal on a massive scale- and I do include that in my play.

But once I began writing, the play quickly became about Riddle himself, and what it means to be a mix of good and bad- to not really know what your roots are, where you come from, and where you're going. I think most of us here in America can relate to that. Seems like most of us have family trees that get lost in the mists of time. We all come from the displaced, the lost, the removed ones- and our family histories are mixed up collages of myth and mystery.



As I wrote the play, more and more characters who are lost, twisted, and/or crazy started showing up. First came Hel- Norse goddess of death who is half beautiful enchantress, half dead thing whose father is Loki- god of chaos, thieves, and madness and whose mother is an ice giantess named Angrboda. Clearly, she has some family issues of her own. (I also have a one act about her going speed-dating called Hela and Troy) Then along came Raven- trickster god of the Pacific Northwest who sometimes is his own grandpa- just like that stupid song. Raven was my own father's favorite mythological character- and as such, he carries a lot of weight.  Then there's Mimir, a chopped off head of a wise man that's still alive. In the play, I've made Mimir be a wise-woman whose sex has been misrepresented in the stories to both illustrate how stories change with time, and also to make the show have more female roles.  And then there's ghost of Pocahantas- after they changed her name to Lady Rolfe and shipped her off to England, where she died of a broken heart. She shows up in the third act, and I find her hysterical and really sad.

The play is just full of happy folk.

And it's got a lot of humor. Sounds weird, I know- but let's face it, we turn to humor most when things are going particularly bad- and it's been that way from Aristophanes to SNL. I think the reason the Irish and Russians have such dark senses of humor is because if they didn't, they'd go mad.

Anyhow, I'm telling you all this because this August 24, there's going to be a free staged reading of the play- which is called RIDDLE LOST, presented by 2X4 BASH at The Western Stage, directed by Skot Davis. That's in Salinas, CA. A beautiful place to spend a day in August.

I want you all to come see it. All of you. Now go.

MEANWHILE

So I'm waiting on things. Contests, projects, the proverbial ship to come in and all that. And while I do, the wheels of the world keep turning at great speed, as if all motion is perpetual, all moments continual, all threads connected somehow, in a way that I always understand in my dreams but can't quite remember when I wake up.

Guess Lennon was right- Life is what happens while you're making plans.

I got a reading of Riddle Lost coming up out in Salinas, California at the Western Stage- one of the many incubators of my artistic soul. I spent many summers there as an actor, working on some pretty amazing projects, including a nine hour, three part adaptation of East of Eden which was one of the seminal experiences of my life. It's run by Jon Selover, who I went to college and who taught me a lot about theatre.

Salinas is also where my first play, Last Call takes places.

The reading is part of 2x4 Bash, a project run by another old friend and fellow lunatic Mark Englehorn that also includes a reading of the play 8 by Dustin Lance Black- the guy who won the Oscar for writing Milk, and who was in a production of Peter Pan with me at Western Stage. So that's pretty friggin' sweet.

Riddle Lost is about a real life guy from the Old West named Jeff Riddle who's mother was a Modoc Indian and father was a settler and who lived through a really nasty war. It takes place in the after-life, and has a cast of characters that includes Norse death god Hel, a cigar store Indian named Ziggy, and Raven- the trickster god of the Pacific-Northwest. It's weird and funny and sad and I like to think kicks it in the ass. If you're near on Salinas on August 24, go check it out.

I'm also doing a lot of children's theatre this summer. A lot. Tomorrow I audition 52 kids for a musical I'm directing up in Boulder in July, and on Monday I start a production of Lightning Thief here in Denver. And while it may be tiring as all hell, it's also really invigorating to do theatre with young folks. They still understand the power of the imagination, and there isn't much they can't do.

On top of that, I am super close to finishing my first flick, Strong Tea. Like probably a week. Then I leap into the land of submitting to film festivals- where I will live for the next year.

And on top of all that, I have two other screenplays I'm figuring out.

I think I need to take the wife and drive up to the mountains and watch a river splash along for a few hours, sing to the trees, and search for Bigfoot.

DO YOU HEAR THE PEOPLE SING?

I do.  I hear them all the freaking time.  Of course, most of it is in my head, a sort of movie soundtrack/music video to go along with all the images passing before me at the speed of life, but what can I say?  I've always been a sort of geek, musical theatre speaking- and there are often moments when I will see something, experience a feeling or observe people, and some song from one play or another pops into my head, and boom, the soundtrack/playlist continues.  When I was first seeing my wife, we would often take walks in the park early in the morning, and it felt to me like there was a bright, golden haze on the meadow, and the sounds of the world were like music, so I'd sing, loudly and probably not so much on key, Oh What a Beautiful Morning.  How could I not.  It's a great song.  Just ask Wolverine.

It made total sense to me.  And Lisa, my wife, smiled.

But I don't just hear and/or sing happy songs.  This very morning, I got news that the mother of an old friend passed away, and in my mind I Kristin Chenoweth singing to a green Idina Menzel:

"I've heard it said
That people come into our lives for a reason
Bringing something we must learn
And we are led
To those who help us most to grow
If we let them
And we help them in return
Well, I don't know if I believe that's true
But I know I'm who I am today
Because I knew you."

Geeky and lame, I know, but what can I say?  That's how it goes with me.  

And of late, the musical that keeps playing in my mind the most is Les Miserables, the mega hit show from the '80's that has been parodied, reviled, and beloved by people since it first opened.  What makes me think of Les Mis?  Occupy Wall Street.  

In Les Mis, the world is unfair, and the powerful don't really take care of the less fortunate- the ones who work in their factories and fields.  The rich keep getting richer, and the poor keep getting poorer.  The lower ranks, the 99% of pre-revolutionary France, sing "at the end of the day your another day older, and that's all you can say for the life of the poor... and the righteous hurry past, they don't hear the little ones crying".  Eventually, a large group of mostly students get pissed off and start camping out in the biggest city in the land, demanding equality and justice and a new way of doing things.  The voice of the law, a dude named Javert, thinks the lord is on his side, and that somehow Jesus wants the wealthy to stay wealthy and the poor to stay poor.  Can you imagine that?  Anyway, the students build a bunch of barricades, and sing "do you hear the people sing, singing the song of angry men?  It is the music of a people who will not be slavess again.  When the beating of your heart, echoes the beating of the drums, their is a life about to start when tomorrow comes".  

Why don't the rich and powerful ever pay attention to history and/or musical theatre?  Don't they get it?  People are angry, and if they don't change their nasty, greedy way, things are going to get ugly and uglier.  

Here's a suggestion for you, wherever you are.  Get a copy of Les Mis, listen to it, and then go to your local Occupy movement (seems there's one in every town now) and see if it doesn't provide the perfect soundtrack for what's going on.

That's about all I have today- please remember, if you're in NYC, I have a reading of my latest play RIDDLE LOST  Saturday Nov. 19 at 5pm at ART/NY.  For more info, go here:

http://boomerangtheatre.wordpress.com/2011/11/14/three-questions-for-kelly-mcallister/

Also, we're about 75% of the way to our goal for the short film STRONG TEA.  For more info on that, go here:

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/169962067/strong-teahttp://www.kickstarter.com/projects/169962067/strong-tea

I AM THE MOST OFFENDING SOUL ALIVE

So, as most of you know, I've been working on several projects of late.  A short film , a screenplay reading, and a new play called Riddle Lost.  As such, I've been busting my ass promoting, begging, borrowing, and stealing.  And there have been times when I've just felt tired and alone and confused.  I think most of us have moments like that in life- you know, those times when you think your only true supporter is your dog, and you're starting to suspect that his so-called unconditional love has more to do with you feeding him every day than with your inherent worth as a living being in this universe.  Those days when you keep checking your inbox- hoping that at least a couple of folks from the dozens you have emailed about whatever it is you're doing will write back telling you to be strong, fight the good fight, and to believe in yourself because they always have and always will.  It's pathetic, really.  I am one of the luckiest people I know.  To have something to strive towards, to have several projects ongoing in which I get to create theatre and film- my God, it's what I've always wanted.  Still, despair tries to get a toe hold.

Too bad for despair.  My dog does indeed love me- I mean, look at him.

On top of my dog Padfoot, I have an amazing group of friends and family who have supported me time and time again.  I mean, I always cry at the end of "It's a Wonderful Life", when all the people of Bedford Falls come to George's aid in his hour of need, because I can relate- I know what it is to have friends and family like that- and it's beautiful.

The three projects I'm working on now are huge- daunting, really.  Let's face it, success in the arts, at least on the superficial but important level of finance, is tough.  And I have run into the occasional old friend or colleague who has doubted my chances.  Which can be a drag.

But then, I think of what good old Will Shakespeare said in Henry V, and I feel better.   In particular, I think of the St. Crispians Day speech, which in part goes like this:

If we are mark'd to die, we are enow
To do our country loss; and if to live,
The fewer men, the greater share of honour.
God's will! I pray thee, wish not one man more.
By Jove, I am not covetous for gold,
Nor care I who doth feed upon my cost;
It yearns me not if men my garments wear;
Such outward things dwell not in my desires:
But if it be a sin to covet honour,
I am the most offending soul alive.

I get that.  Who cares about money?  I want glory- to kick it in the ass and know I did something special and unique and real.  And if you don't want to get on board with me, then I proclaim:

That he which hath no stomach to this fight,
Let him depart; his passport shall be made
And crowns for convoy put into his purse:
We would not die in that man's company
That fears his fellowship to die with us.

I had the great fortune of playing Henry a while back in the fabled early days  of Shakespeare in the Park(ing) Lot.  It was glorious and fun and one of the experiences that has served me well these many years.  We were a rag tag group of lunatics and artists, with little to no resources.  And we shook the Lower East Side of New York.  

What I'm saying is this- to all who doubt- God bless you, and good luck.  

To those who believe, and you know who you are:

We few, we happy few, we band of brothers (and sisters);
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition:
And gentlemen in England now a-bed
Shall think themselves accursed they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day.

Last night, my screenplay Burning Man was presented in a reading put on by Harvardwood in NYC.  It was well received, and we shall see what comes of it.  This Saturday, Riddle Lost will be given a reading at ART/NY at 5pm.  I just did a mini-interview about it that you can read here.  Strong Tea, the short film I'm making, has a Kickstarter campaign that so far is doing great- to check that out, go click here.  

I have gathered my forces, and the sun is rising on Agincourt.

BOO

Twenty-one years ago today, I went to New York City for the first time in my life.  I had just finished a cross country trip with a friend I had made that summer doing summer stock at the Barn Theatre in Michigan.  He was from a little town in Jersey called Peapack.  We spent about a week traversing the country, and had gone to places like Ashland, Oregon to see the Shakespeare festival, and Twin Falls, Idaho to see where Evel Kneivel tried to jump the Snake River with his rocket/motorcycle thing.  I even saw my first moose when we drove through Yellowstone days before it closed for the winter.  Somewhere, there is an old box full of old photos of that trip- I don't know where, exactly, and hope to come across it before I kick- but until then, I have to rely on my mind's eye.  Anyway, we ended up in Peapack on October 30, and on the next day we took the train into NYC, crossing under the Hudson River and emerging from Penn station like ants crawling out of their colony.  I remember thinking of the Hopi, and their belief that when they were created, they came into this world from an older one via a hole in the ground.  Here I was, a neo-Hopi, coming out of a hole in the ground from my old world and into a new one.  It was exciting, strange, and a little scary.  We walked all over town, first going up to Hell's Kitchen, then down to the Village, ending up near Union Square where a my buddies girl friend from the summer- a drama major at NYU- lived.   We watched the Halloween parade, which to me looked like a cross between Mardi-gras and a zombie apocalypse.  It was glorious.  From there, we proceeded to Rock Around the Clock, and bistro near St. Mark's Place, and drank a lot of raspberry kamikazes.  A lot.  At one point in the evening, after things had become fuzzy, my buddy's girl made a pass at me- which was shocking and flattering and uncomfortable.  The three of us staggered back to her place, and crashed.  Well, I crashed- they got into an argument.   I was awoken at dawn by my friend, who informed me that he and his lady friend were breaking up, and it was time to go.  I was exhausted, somewhere between hung over and still drunk, and not in the mood to go anywhere.  But he was insistent.  So off we trudged, through now mostly empty streets, which were full of the remnants of the nights revelries.

That's NYC to me- dramatic, strange, and intriguing.  She's been very good to me over the years.  I've had the great fortune of having most of my plays produced there, and for several years wrote reviews for nytheatre.com - one of the best sites for theatre in the country.  I can't think of another city in the world where you can go to a show every day of the year, and never repeat yourself.  

And this November, Gotham is treating me kindly again, with two readings.  First, on November 14, Harvardwood NYC is presenting a reading of Burning Man, a screenplay based on my play Burning the Old Man, at 6pm at Solas 232 E. 9th St.  And then on November 19, Boomerang Theatre Co. is presenting a reading of my latest play, Riddle Lost, at 5pm at ART/NY 520 8th Ave. 3rd floor.  If you are around NYC, I really hope you can make it.  I don't know if it'll be as amazing for you as that first day in Manhattan was for me, but it just might be.

HAPPY ACCIDENTS

I think the Occupy Wall Street movement is amazing, and exciting, and historical.  And on top of that, it has a shining example of how Necessity is the Mother of Invention- something which I hope every theatre artists recognizes as fact.

I'm talking about the whole method of the group acting as a chorus, repeating what each speaker says, as a way to work around not being allowed to use bullhorns or amplification by the NYPD.  As I understand it, they have what is being called a General Assembly everyday, where people are given two minutes to speak.  Whomever is speaking will say a sentence or two, then the crowd nearest the speaker repeats what  was said in unison- sort of like a Greek chorus or something.  I've seen several snippets of them doing this on different news shows, and it's fascinating.  And by the look on the people's faces, it seems to be unifying them in their cause- which is probably not what the NYPD had in mind when they said no to any sort of electrical amplification.  It also makes what is being said more important than any individual speaker.

I have seen, in my experience in the theatre, so many examples of brilliance coming out of necessity- times when "happy accidents" occur which necessitate some quick thinking resulting in  better work.



I once worked on a screenplay for Zeuss' Thigh Films written by a group of writers called "Places".  It was a sort of Rashomon like story about the final week of rehearsal of an indie theatre production in New York City, told from various viewpoints (Mick the actor,  Kate the actress, Jason the writer, Whitey the director, and Damiana the director).  Each writer was in charge of one of the viewpoints, and as such had final say in what their character did in all sections.   I had the section dealing with Mick, and in my first draft, I had Mick get yelled at by Damiana during rehearsals.  And Damiana, in that first draft, swore.  A lot.  Now, this bad case of potty mouth did not fit with Katharine Clark Gray's vision of Damiana, and as that was her main character,  I was told I'd have to change it as per the rules of this writing experiment.  What to do?  At first, as sort of a joke, I went through my draft and replaced all Damiana's bad words with the word "golly".  And it seemed kind of funny.  What if a person in this day and age, and in the vulgar land of indie theatre, used words like golly as opposed to words like fuck?  I kept the golly, and it was funny, and cool, and one hundred percent the product of dealing with an obstacle.

Here's some of the script:


Damiana goes through her notes, while the cast listens, jotting notes down in their script, nodding in agreement, looking at each other.  She looks at her notes, which are a jumble of hieroglyphic sketches.  Her eyes comes to a large skull, with the words “ WE’RE DOOMED!” written underneath.

DAMIANA
Ah, yes. Listen up, people.

Damiana looks out at the cast.  Mick, late twenties, looks up from his notebook.  

DAMIANA (CONT’D)
I think we have something pretty special here. Know that this is going to be a great show.  Own it.

Mick writes in his notebook “worst show ever”.  He looks over to Kate, mid-twenties, and when he catches her eyes, makes a face, which makes her laugh.

DAMIANA (CONT’D)
Feel free to listen up, people.  Mick, what happened in the skeleton monologue?

There is a sudden hush in the room.  Everyone looks at Mick.  He feels the pressure.

MICK
Uh, I’m not sure.  I just wasn’t feeling it.

Damiana stares at Mick for a moment as if he were an idiot.

DAMIANA
Golly!  That makes me angry!  Golly, Golly, Golly!  Feel it!  Feel it, for Pete’s sake!  How can you say you didn’t feel it?

The cast and crew laugh.  Kate draws a picture of a witch in her notebook screaming “FEEL IT, MUTHA FUCKAH!”.


DAMIANA (CONT’D)
This isn’t a joke, people.  It’s serious business.  Mick- no more excuses.  Find you’re feelings.

By the way, the other writer's on Places were Mike Folie, Steven Gridley, and Francis Kuzler.  These are all outstanding writers, and I encourage you to look up their stuff, see it on stage or screen whenever possible, and write them long, full of compliments, fan letters.  Yeah, and hand write them, so that the Post Office can get some work.

Also, looks like the date for the reading of Riddle Lost in NYC by Boomerang Theatre Company is going to be Saturday November 19.   I'll post more info when I have it.  I have to keep this short, as I am heading down to the Denver capital to witness Occupy Denver firsthand.

WHY IS A RAVEN LIKE A WRITING DESK?

So my latest opus is going to have a staged reading this November as part of Boomerang Theatre Company's First Flight series, and I thought I'd tell you a little about it.  It's called Riddle Lost.  The reading is going to be directed by Philip Emeott- who originated the role of Earth in Burning the Old Man.

About ten years ago, I read the book Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee by Dee Brown.  It's basically a history of what happened to all the native people here in North America after the Europeans arrived and said "Hey, this is our land, provided by God, and you all have to go away".  It's brilliant, depressing, and should be required reading for every citizen.  Let's face it, we stole this country from other people- and were pretty nasty about it.  I have always been fascinated, saddened and inspired by native American culture- not that I am by any stretch of the imagination a specialist on it.   I just think they were and are a group of people who got the short end of a very large, dangerous stick.  And that's putting it nicely.

Anyway, one of the chapters in Bury My Heart is about the Modoc War of 1872, which took place in Northern California.  The central figure in that war was a man called Captain Jack by the settlers, Kintpuash by his own people.  And the story is amazing- Shakespearean in scope, full of characters and situations that don't seem quite real but which, according to the history books, were.  Aside from being history, it's a story of one person sticking to what they believe to be right, when everyone around them, on all sides, do bad things.  Like really bad, killing babies, betraying your people, murder under a flag a truce bad.

I started researching online.  Found a book, The Indian History of the Modoc War, written by a guy who was half Modoc, half Honkey.  The author had lived through the war.  He was a Riddle, and not just in the figurative way.  I mean his name was Jefferson C. Davis Riddle, which seems perfect.   Actually, when he was a boy his name was Charka.  But his parents, a Modoc woman named Winema and a white settler named Frank Riddle,  changed it after the war.

I thought I'd write a sort of historical play, an American Henry V or something.  But that's not what came out.  Often, when I write, I set out to do one thing, and something entirely different comes out.  I've learned to just go with it, not try to force my original vision on what comes out when I'm at the keyboard.  I think my subconscious is a better writer.  Either that, or I'm hearing voices, spirit guides who tell me what to write and I don't really have a say in my work.  In any event, when I finally found that first scene which let me into the world of the play, it was nothing like the historical tale I originally envisioned.  No, it was a metaphysical hodge-podge set somewhere in Limbo, and populated with characters like the Hel, Norse Goddess of Death;  the trickster Raven; an animated cigar store Indian named Ziggy;  and the decapitated head of Mimir, another figure from Norse mythology.  Basically, the play is populated with historical and mythological figures from both Europe and North American, all hanging out in a side show tent run by Hel.  Into the tent walks Riddle, who has just died, and the story begins.  It's big and weird and totally different from anything I've done, and exactly like everything I've done.  I used the Goddess Hel once before- but that was when she went by the name Hela- in a one act called Hela and Troy, available from Playscripts, inc.  I liked her in that show, and I think she wanted to stick around for awhile.

If you are in the New York City area in November, I really hope you come to the reading- I promise it won't suck.   And not only will you hear a new play, you might just learn the answer to the age old riddle, why is a Raven like a writing desk.