EDINBURGH DAY ELEVEN - BREAKING CUBES AND ADDING A FUCK YOU HARD

You blink your eyes twice, and time flies by. Two more shows to go. What happened? Didn't we just land? Somehow, it's been over a week. I've seen show, ran into old friends, eaten way too much haggis, laughed entirely too loud too often for anyone's comfort but my own.

I am a loud person. I am told that often. 

I can't help it. I don't mean to offend.

I just enjoy things. And when something is funny, I laugh. And when I speak, I speak.

No apologies. The world is full of much worse things than a person loudly enjoying their life.

Also, I may have kicked a hole in one of our cubes on stage last night.

We have this scene in the show between my character Ron, and his wife Denise, Played by aforementioned friend of blog, Tracy.

And we fight in it, and yell, and it gets ugly, and I storm off, and she sings this song "Only the Lonely" whose title always makes me think of that old Roy Orbison song but is a new one and a number I particularly love in this show, as it's dramatic, set up nicely by the scene going into it, and performed perfectly, and one of the moments in the show I think I directed well. 

A heart breaking work of staggering genius and all that. 

Nothing feels better than directing a moment and having an actor not only get what you're trying to do, but have them run with it. Soar. Transport the audience.

So the scene going into that moment is important.

So we're doing the scene last night. It's going ok. We're yelling. Doing the lines. Something feels a little different about the scene. We're playing off each other, but it's in some new zone. Usually Denise is more aggressive. Tonight, maybe it's my loudness, or the rain that day, but she's more leaning back, a little more of a slow burn kind of anger. 

Which fuels my character's/my anger. 

And we get to this point, right before I say "I want you to shut your fucking mouth..." and I stand up off a cube, and for some reason I kick the thing. 

I've kicked it a few times, both in rehearsal and in the show. But tonight, I have extra-kick mode on, and a kick it like I'm a field goal kicker and it's the Super Bowl.

And as I turn to say "Shut Your Fucking Mouth..." I notice a hole in the cube. About the size of a golf ball. And then, as I march off, where I'm supposed to say "Fuck you", I add a bonus "Fuck you hard."

I may be insane. 

Now, here's the thing. Part of me feels bad about this. 

But part of me feels good. I was playing the role. In the moment. And yeah, I kicked the cube and swore more. 

But that's live theatre. Shit happens. Actors go a little nuts. 

Or a lot. 

After the show, Lisa and I and some of the cast go Ceilidh Dancing, which is Scottish folk dancing similar to square dancing. You run around a lot, sweat your ass off, dance with strangers, and release all of the days worries. 

It's fantastic. I hang with cast mates and also old friend and fellow Fringe performer Katelyn Berrios, who was in the sublime How to Eat a Bear last year and has a great solo piece this year called The Basement Entertainer, which I saw in the morning and recommend. It's a new piece about trying to make it in the business, create some art, and somehow combine creative freedom with success. Definitely worth catching.

And now it's Friday. The day is clear to see shows and sights, then we perform, then I think as a group we are going to see a show.

Last year, on the Isle of Skye, I heard a tale of an Islander who married a faerie. They could only be together a year, then she would have to return to her world. Then spent a happy year together, full of love and magic. Then the time came, then walked to a bridge, kissed one last time, and she took the high road and he took the low, never to see each other in this world again. I feel like that now. Like the Fringe is my faerie, we'e had this grand time, but tick tock goes the clock, and the bridge awaits.

Now real life starts to creep into my mind. Now I start to prep for the next show, the latest gig. A bid for Rock of Ages. A new production of Rocky Horror Show I'm directing. Scripts that have been patiently waiting for me to get back to them as I have this adventure. 

Speaking of, time to head out, grab coffee, feel the cool morning air.

Loudly, of course.

Here's a song. Only the Lonely by Roy Orbison. 

A TRINITY OF LUNATICS

I was on a break at rehearsals the other night down in Parker for The Addams Family, looking for coffee. I walked to the usual spot, this awesome little joint called Fika, which is a Swedish word meaning a time to drink coffee and eat cake while hanging out with friends and strangers. Sadly, they were having plumbing issues, and I had to walk back to the theatre, jump in my car, and venture forth in search of coffee. I got to the Starbucks drive thru at 8:02, and the voice on intercom informed me they had just closed. I shouted Fuck, rather loudly, then asked the voice if it knew of anywhere still open. They pointed me to Dutch Bros. And off I went, found the spot, got the coffee, and headed back to rehearsal. 

Now what was of interest in that little jaunt was the world. First thing I noticed was how clear the sky was, how extraordinarily beautiful the sunset was, how there is still magic in dusk and dawn, in those moments of inbetween when the world takes on a purple pearl kind of color and a stillness seems to permeate everything and everyone.  And I realized it had been a while since I just took a step back and looked at the world I stand on, at the people and places and clouds and just let it be. 

And I wondered, what did we learn during the shut down? Didn't we all find parts of our soul we had misplaced? Didn't we finally figure out what was important? We we not all given the chance to tend to our own gardens? 

And if so, how did we forget it? More to the point, have we forgotten it? Can we? Or have we changed in ways big and small that we don't even realize? 

I think the latter.

So there I was, looking at the sunset, seeking coffee, driving around Parker, Colorado, listening to Spanish Model (the reimagined, Spanish version of Elvis Costello's This Year's Model that is a must listen to kind of thing if you are a human being), filling up with peace, love, and understanding (not on the album but another great Elvis song), wondering what the effects of the past few years have been, still are, and perhaps will be.

I think the big thing we all acknowledge is our sense of time. There is now sort of reason to it anymore. When someone says "a year ago", I have no sense of how long that is, what percentage of my life a year is, or who I was in that other time called "a year ago". 

None.

We are all unhinged from time, floating from dream to dream, song to song, face to face, seeking our home planet where things made more sense. 

But not necessarily in a sad way. There is this cosmic sort of peace at times. Isn't that strange? The world stops, starts again, over heats, has wars and uprisings and floods and inflation and whatever else... 

And there is this beautiful sunset, and Elvis Costello, and coffee.

I am the me I was, and I am the me I am, and I am the me I will be; a trinity of lunatics, each distinct, and each the same.

Here's a song. It's Like I Use To, by Sharon Van Etten and Angel Olson. Enjoy. Watch a sunset. Get some coffee. Reflect on your life. Don't reflect on your life.  

FLYING WITH FRANKENSTEIN AND NORMAN BATES

November already? Really? What the fuck has happened to time, in general? I get the whole as time goes by it goes quicker thing. It sucks, but I get it. But since the Lockdown, it's totally gone bananas. Like we are all Bill Pilgrim from Slaughterhouse Five, unhinged from time and bouncing back and forth, in and out of reality, places, situations, and even dimensions. Which November is this? Am I laying in my tiny studio in NYC in 1990, dreaming of my future, or have I lost it and am sitting in some home for people who have lost it, stuck in a memory? Am I five? Thirty? Sixteen? Fifty-five? Did I have too much candy last night and this is just that crash after sugar, delayed for some reason? Was it a mistake to fall asleep while watching Frankenstein? 

And when I say Frankenstein, I mean the classic one. The one we all think of, or should think of, when the movie version is mentioned. It's so good and weird and campy at points and full of a style of acting I do not care for, but Karloff. Holy shit. And the lighting and sets. That first scene at the graveyard, so creepy. It always freaked me out when I was younger. Something about the titled gravestones in the background, the stoic mourners at the funeral, the statue of death, also tilted, and the gravedigger who treats putting a human body in the earth like a job to be done, nothing more or less. And then Doctor Frankenstein and his pal Fritz peek out from behind a tomb, clearly the villains. That scene puzzled and intrigued me every time I'd watch the flick, which was at least once a year. 

Also watched Psycho yet again last night. I think the shower scene is amazing, but what is to me really frightening is the sequence after, when Norman Bates cleans up the mess. It's both hilarious and horrific and fascinating. He finds the body, and reacts as if he truly thinks his mother has just killed someone. Then he gets himself together, runs to the office. If this was the first time watching, you'd think he was running to the phone to call the police, or maybe keep running past the office to the house to confront his mother about what she just did. But no, he runs in to the office, and then runs back out, holding a mop, and it is clear what he is going to do. No dialogue. Just action, image, and terror. It shows us how it wasn't just an act of madness in the moment, a crime of insane passion. This is a person who can and does on some level understand what has happened and what he has to do to keep himself safe.

Truly frightening.

So now, November and I have some writing to do. Got a few good bites after Austin, and need to clean up script and get it out. I've given myself two week, told the biters I'd have it by Thanksgiving, to give myself a little bonus time should I need it. Nothing like having a deadline to get your ass in gear. Or onto the seat, to put it in writer's terms. Butts in chairs. That's the thing we have to keep as our goal. The rest is just leaning in, crossing over to whatever world we have created, and then playing God. Really sort of crazy, saying that I play God. But I sort of do. I determine people's fates, personalities, journeys. Then, when i feel like my creation is good, I rest and hand over the reigns to others, who are... other Gods? Celestial judges? Not sure, but certainly part of the process.

Okay. Must rise from the dead, clean up the bodies, and create, or to be more accurate, recreate, another world.

Here's a song. It's a live, early version of Steve Miller's Fly Like an Eagle, and it's sweet.

I WANT TO SEE MOUNTAINS AGAIN

Bilbo has gone over the sea, to be with the elves. I shall miss him. There is always a bit of sadness when someone who gave you joy, who made your journey a little more bearable, passes. And I feel that now. But with the sadness there is also wonder and gratitude. Ian Holm, the great British actor who played Bilbo in the Lord of the Ring movies, and Ash in Alien, and the coach in Chariots of Fire, and about a million other things, died last week. I shall miss him. I shall miss that feeling whenever he would show up in a film I was watching for the first time, and I'd think "this movie just got better!" I loved so many of the flicks he was in. Most, though, has to be LOTR. I have loved Middle Earth since first reading The Hobbit in fourth grade. I read the trilogy twice by the end of seventh grade. I even once sat down and read The Two Towers, cover to cover, in one outing when I was all of thirteen. I watched the TV version of The Hobbit every time it came on. And when the Ralph Bashki animated version of The Lord of the Rings came out, I saw it many times in the theatre, and many more on TV. The Bashki version was mainly the first two books, and I waited forever for the final installment. It never came, although there was a rather odd animated version of Return of the King made for TV. I recall it had singing orcs. It did not go over well with me at the time. For years after, pretty much my teens, twenties, and early thirties, I wished and hope for a good version of either The Hobbit of Lord of the Rings to come out. And then I read that Peter Jackson, a film maker from down under known mostly for quirky horror films, was making a trilogy based on LOTR. And I hoped. Finally, the first trailer came out. I was at the movies with my friends Myles and Chris. When the trailer finished, which was amazing and perfect and looked like what I always hoped a film about Middle Earth would look like, Chris turned to us and said "I wish I could hit myself in the head, go into a coma, and not wake up until this film is out". He didn't follow through with his plan, but the film did come out.

And it was all we had hoped and more.

And Ian Holm, as Bilbo, was perfect. He made me cry, right from the start. There is this moment, early on in Fellowship of the Ring, where Bilbo's old friend Gandlaf, with whom he had gone on the greatest adventure of his life, shows up at Bilbo's house after many years. Gandalf knocks on the door, Bilbo opens it, and is overcome with joy. The way Ian Holm played that moment made me cry. I had lived long enough by then to know what it meant to miss those you love. To have great people in your life, people you have shared time and tests with, who you grew up with, who helped you become you are; to have friends that own part of your soul who you don't see all that often. It is just part of the deal, I think. We make great friends, and then we have the audacity to have lives that separate us. So Bilbo opens the door, and his face is filled with both joy at seeing his old friend, and sorrow at the knowledge of time passed without him. The bittersweet feeling of love and friendship in the face of the insistent march of time.

I knew how that felt, but had not articulated it as such just yet. And that scene, that moment, that look on Holm's face, sealed it for me. I sat in the theatre, and for the briefest of moments, I was with Brian and Jay and Greg and Jack, with my friends at Strawberry Park Elementary, my cast mates from East of Eden, my Scout Troop, my family, my mom, my dad. And I was also in NYC, far from all of them, as far as can be, for there is no greater distance between to things than time.

And I am with them still, but the hall of memory grows daily. And now Myles, and Chris, Vinnie and Shannon, Dutch, my brother and sister, they all are there too, along with the good times and bad, the discoveries, the triumphs, the defeats, the brief moments when we realized we were alive together, and reveled in that miracle.

So thanks, Sir Ian. You helped me be me. You own part of my soul too. I hope you have a gentle crossing, that the elves sing songs that delight. And while I know it is the right and proper road we all must take, I can't help but feel a little sad.

Here's a song. It's The Shire, by Howard Shore, from the soundtrack to The Fellowship of the Ring.