You might rightly judge that title to be half fib, depending on how you read it. The upcoming public reading of Philosophical Zombie Killers, happening on September 14 at 7:30 pm at Freehold Theatre, will certainly, and happily, not be the last public reading of a play of mine. The Sequence is scheduled to be read on October 12 at 2pm at the Bathhouse Theater at Green Lake. (More details here.) But Philosophical Zombie Killersis indeed my last full-length play. I have no plans to write another, and no great prospects for future full production of this, or any other play I have written. On September 15, the day after this reading, I will officially step away from the theatre. I have no plans to return. Of course threads of sadness run through this decision, but it is also interwoven with hope, and anticipation of new adventures. I hope you’ll wish me well. And if you can, I hope you’ll come see this reading. Here, below the fold, is the press release with all the info:
I promised myself and you, gentle readers, that Just Wrought was moving on from being a Seattle theatre bitch blog, so I am asking you to help a homey out and chime in below in the comments section to educate The New York Times and Intiman’s Artistic Director, Andrew Russell, about why his statement in that paper’s recent article on the Intiman’s Summer Festival is so woefully ignorant. The condescending carpet-bagging quote in question: “Few theaters in Seattle have ambitious summer shows.”
Here, I’ll prime the pump: every summer Balagan Theatre develops a brand new, original locally grown children’s show and puts it on free in Seattle parks. I had the immense pleasure of participating in the 2011 offering, King Arthur and the Knights of the Playground.
That’s just one example pulled from the myriad of amazing ambitious work getting done here each summer. Now you add one.
And seriously, New York Times, if you want to know what’s happening in Seattle, get on a plane and get out here. Your breezy phone interviews with Big House wannabe auteurs just don’t cut it anymore. And if your shrinking budget doesn’t allow for that sort of quality reportage, then do us a favor and STFU about Seattle theatre, ‘cuz ya know what? We don’t care what you think.
I'm am striking the above paragraph out, as it is based on my eroneous assumption. The fact is, the Times reporter did fly out to research this story. (Thank you, Brendan Kiley, for setting me straight.) I could wish that Mr. Healy had taken the time to investigate how rich and ambitious the Seattle theatre scene really is in the Summer (and every other season), but you know what they say about wishing.
I am here to assuage your guilt for falling behind on Sandbox Radio Live, because the sad fact is I too have been slacking. Of course, in my defense, I have caught every single show live in the theatre, just as you can and should catch the upcoming Episode 9: The Naked Truth on Monday, July 29 at West of Lenin in Fremont (tickets available here). I also usually listen to the podcast recording of each show as soon as it comes out. This time, however, between SOAPFest and vacation, I only got around to it yesterday. It’s brilliant; stocked full of goodies like:
Susan Corzatte, my recent SOAPFest cast-mate, reading poems by Dorothy Parker.
Another episode of “Cousin Katie” by Scot Augustson (featuring special guests Cliff Mass and Nancy Pearl! Favorite book recommendation: “Try The Pussy Brushers of Bristol”.)
Another all new super-fun, super-hard-rocking blues original from Charles Leggett. Listen to the tart, exquisite interactions of lead and back-up singers.
Then of course there’s my latest Markheim episode. Read along with the script below the fold. (Didge has joined the Seattle Super Hero scene, and Markheim’s realizing that the renegade clockwork’s more complex that he first thought.)
And absolutely do not miss, my very favorite of all these favorites, Wayne Rawley’s blast from everyone’s middle school past, “Portable 5 & the First Day of the Rest of Our Lives”.
I have not been on television since my brief, ill-fated appearance on Romper Room in Baltimore, circa 1972. Miss Sally was asking the circle of kids what their favorite drink was and when she got to me, I said, “Whiskey”. Even Mr. Do-Bee looked shocked. (In my defense, my dad had once given me a sip and I wasn’t as horrified by the taste as everyone expected me to be.) When the broadcast was done, my mom yanked me out of WBAL’s studio so fast I thought she was going to dislocate my shoulder. Oddly, I was not asked back.
Happily, last week I made my triumphant return, along with Amy Love, to talk about Sandbox One-Act Play Festival (or SOAPFest, as the kids are calling it.) The festival opens tomorrow night and runs for only this weekend. It features brand new plays by Scot Augustson, Emily Conberre, Elizabeth Heffron and myself , presented by some of Seattle’s very best directors, designers, technicians and actors.
Now that Amy and I are tv stars, tickets to the three night run are unlikely to last long. I recommend getting some while the getting is good. (Order tickets here.)
And if you’re wracking your brain for a gift to bring to celebrate these world premieres, just remember: whiskey’s still my favorite drink
I am cleared for PR take-off by my fearless producer, Leslie Law, and can now confirm that our special Seattle Celebrity guest stars for Sandbox Radio Live! 8 : Fools Rush In, one night only, this coming Monday, are . . .
Here’s the link to the latest episode podcast. And in keeping with tradition, I am posting the script below the fold, ‘cuz I know how you just love to follow along, right?
“I heard I had to see Sandbox Radio in the theatre to get the full experience.”
Hey, listen, as a playwright, let me assure you that I hate theatre more than you do, and in ways you have never even thought to think of; but just because Sandbox Radio Live! is recorded at West of Lenin’s intimate but fabulous black box in front of a live audience, that doesn’t make it theatre anymore than Mike Daisey reading from his notes in the Bagely Wright makes what he does a play. (You can delve more deeply into this distinction here.) The podcast of Sandbox Radiois the full experience. The bonus of going to see it live is like getting to watch Chef Tom Douglas cook your dinner at Dahlia Lounge. Witnessing the prep’s a super-cool extra that only a few people are ever going to get to experience.
“Another “old-timey” radio show? Been there, listened to that. Next.”
Uh… you’re high. Give just one of these podcasts a listen and you’ll see how far from Garrison Keillor our Mistress of Ceremonies Leslie Law takes these recordings. The band ain’t folksy, it’s thumpin’! And the dialogue is distinctly R-Rated. You can listen to Sandbox Radio Live! on headphones at work, safe in the knowledge that what you’re doing is secretly and securely NSFW.
It’s Too Late Now
“If I try to plug into Markheim at this point I’ll be totally lost.”
Admittedly, listening to a randomly selected episode of my noir-angel-detective serial is sort of like picking up a comic book mid-volume and trying to figure out what’s going on. In other words… it’s awesome!
Isn’t this a Seattle thing?
“I don’t live in Seattle.”
Congratulations. I wouldn’t wish living here on a roving band of Uruk-hai. Lucky for you, each podcast gives you ~90 minutes of rich Seattle experience while you can still bask in the sun and/or snow and/or hurricane conditions common where you currently live.
Isn’t this a Seattle thing?
“I already live in Seattle.”
Congratulations! Don’t tell anybody else how awesome it is here, please! If you need put-off material, I have a great little geeky LOtR-insider joke about a roving band of Uruk-hai you can use. But here’s the thing, fellow Seattleite: even if you’ve lived here all your life, you don’t know this city like the writers of Sandbox Radio do. We’ve found the places, stories and people that make Seattle—hmm, what’s a kind way of putting this?—“unique”, yeah, that’s it. Witness this delicious morsel of real-life dialogue captured and then re-staged from Seattle’s moveable epicenter of danger-tainment, the 358 metro route to Aurora. (All dialogue guaranteed overheard on the back of the bus.)
GUY ONE: You wanna talk about John Lennon? Shit, that shit wasn’t even meant for him.
GUY TWO: What?
GUY ONE: That bullet. S’posed to be Paul McCartney, yo. That’s who dude wanted to shoot.
GUY TWO: Really. McCartney?
GUY ONE: That’s a fact. And dude will never get out of prison.
GUY TWO: Well, you know, they were all Irish.
GUY ONE: Sure.
GUY TWO: And I always thought that must’ve been weird, growing up Irish in London. Must’ve been hard for them. Where the music came from, you know?
None of these writers are Davids Mamet or Sedaris.
“Sure, I’ve seen some of Sandbox Radio’s actors on Seattle’s Big House stages. But if this ‘Scot Augustson’ is so great, why haven’t I seen anything of his produced at the Rep.”
Uh… you realize that question answers itself, right? A regular and relentlessly versatile contributor to Sandbox Radio, as well as other great companies throughout Seattle and beyond, Scot Augustson is without question one of the best artists currently living and writing for the stage. (At least I think he’s still alive. Homey lives hard up in Rat City.) Scot’s always doing something new for Sandbox, ranging from an original poem, to a hardboiled detective story for forest animals to the new sure-to-be-a-hit Seattle serial, Cousin Katie from Ketchikan. The only reason I don’t consume myself with jealousy for Scot’s talent and accomplishments is that his stuff is far too much fun to watch, or, in the case of Sandbox Radio, listen to. Every time I want to hate him he makes me giggle. Giggling is death to hate. You’d think someone would have put that fact to good use by now.
It’s too hip.
“My tux is at the cleaners.”
This bon mot comes from friend and colleague, Mark Handley, best known for his play Idioglossia, which was later produced as the Jodie Foster film, Nell.
It’s okay, Mark. I just pulled your thong out of my dryer. You can wear that while you listen. We’re casual.
Listen to the most recent episode of Sandbox Radio Live!here.
You need to check out D.C. playwright Gwydion Suilebhan’s brilliant new essay, “Theatrical Biodiversity”. Seriously. Click here. Take the time to read it all the way through. It’s hard for me to express how gratifying it is to see a fellow theatre artist so effectively articulate why he is joining the locally grown theatre movement. Fresh and fierce, Suilebhan’s voice achieves an eloquence that has eluded me in these discussions. Witness him bring the rigor of science to his metaphors:
In the same way that all the corn we eat in America now comes from a small number of genetic strains owned by a small number of huge agribusinesses, we now experience theater made largely by artists from a small number of graduate programs who live in a small number of huge cities…. We have lost, or may be at least losing, our artistic biodiversity.
… That’s bad for a lot of reasons. … A mono-culture (either agricultural or artistic) is vulnerable. If a new pest or blight emerges to which the one predominant strain of a crop is vulnerable, we all starve. What then might happen to the American theater, then, if it’s threatened by a similar pest or blight? Or has it already? Has the accessibility and quality and ubiquity of television and film, for example, turned theater into a “gourmet” entertainment that only a few well-heeled diners can afford to consume?
And watch him bring even more rigor to targets that take us beyond the status quo:
…In a healthy theatrical ecosystem, one that doesn’t suffer from the weaknesses of a mono-culture, at least 33% of the plays on our stages every season will be… completely locally grown. That is to say: drafted, developed, directed, designed, dramaturged, and done by people who live and work within a reasonable distance — let’s say 100 miles, since that’s the locavore standard — of the audience members who are going to engage with it.
And maybe 33% isn’t enough.… But [it] is a start. Right now in DC — a theatrical community that’s considered fairly healthy, nationwide — we’re at about half that level…. New York, Chicago, and likely LA are almost certainly higher than that, but…is St. Louis — just to pick a city at random — even close? What about Mankato, MN, or Decorah, IA?… My guess is the numbers don’t look good.
And what about Seattle? What are our numbers? And what sort of future benchmarks for locally grown works can we get ACT, The Rep, Intiman, and all the houses in smaller tiers to commit to? I think Gwydion might agree that hothouse development workshops, from which scripts never see the light of full production, don’t count as a viable or sustainable source of theatrical nourishment.
However, Suilebhan’s admonishments aren’t reserved solely for feckless, floundering artistic administrators. We playwrights come in for some rightful tweaking too:
… We need to write plays that wrestle with the everyday concerns and the specific interests and particular longings of our audiences. We need to understand our neighbors — to be among them, to be members of our communities — in order to give them what they need. (Which is not the same as what they want. We all want doughnuts; we do not need doughnuts.) We need to start writing for the family next door, not for a nameless artistic director in Manhattan.
To you status quo clingers that clutched faith that I had given up and gone permanently quiet about the necessity of locally grown organic theatre, your prayers may be getting answered ironically. Others are coming to the struggle: smarter and better spoken.
.…We’d be establishing what the biologists call semi-permeable membranes between them in order to regulate what gets in and what gets out. In effect, if we embraced a locally grown cultural development approach, the American theatrical ecosystem would become less of a top-down hierarchical structure controlled by centralized authorities and more of a distributed network of peers. Just like, oh, everything else that’s succeeding in the world at the moment.
With folks like Gwydion joining the fray, the word you are now looking for to describe progress toward a locally grown American Theatre, exploding Manhattan’s hub-and-spokes model, is “inexorable.”
You’re not crazy. You’re just overdue. There hasn’t been a new episode of Sandbox Radio Live! in over three months!
Relax.
Episode Seven: Eye of the Beholder is on its way, packed with the sort of goodies you’ve grown accustomed to: plays by Elizabeth Heffron and Vincent Delaney, music by Jose Gonzales and the astounding Sandbox Radio Orchestra, my own noir-angel detective series, Markheim(word has it Sam’s due for a drop in), all tied together by Leslie Law’s expert, effervescent direction. Plus you can expect some brand new stuff like a poem by Elizabeth Austen read live by the author, or a brand new comic serial by Scot Augustson set in Seattle. (You’ll want to order your tix quick, since we always sell out.)
But before we get to all that, I need to make up for a deleterious omission. With all the crazyness of the holiday season, plus world premiering my first full-length play in four years, Ballard House Duet, I neglected my self-appointed duty of telling you the things I love about the previous episode of Sandbox Radio Live! - Something Wicked This Way (available for download here.)
Vince never disappoints with his sharp suspenseful writing, but this turn at modern horror would make Rod Sterling go goggle-eyed. All props to the Sandbox Radio sound fx team. Give a listen and tell me they don’t make it sound exactly like an airport. (This brings up a larger fascination for me when listening to these podcasts: how the live audience participates in and fuels the recording. There’s this extraordinary recursively looping sensation as you listen to them listening to you listen to the show in the future.) My favorite character in this one had to be Big Stu. Somehow Eric Ray Anderson manages to add 300 pounds through the sheer suggestive power of his voice.
Not much I want to say about these since I wrote them, except maybe that Kathryn Van Meter utterly nails the drunk chick. Oh, and also, the likelihood that there will be any new pieces in this vein is slim, given how King County Metro’s elimination of the Free Ride Zone has completely flattened the floridly diverse ecosystem that was once the back of the #358.
What do you get when Mexican kitsch culture collides with Austrian Alpine snobbery in a fairytale context? Something you can be pretty sure Scot Augustson conceived. Favorite line (impeccably delivered by the peerless Annette Toutonghi): “Gunter will think I’m a crazy clown gypsy whore.”
Please tell me this trip is almost over. If this woman punches or pukes on me, I’m gonna be highly irked. (Favorite line {which I can say in modesty because I overheard it}: “At least in jail I get three meals a day and someone to love me.”)
I raved about Emily’s first Sandbox Radio outing, “Sound Thieves”here, but who knows? She could’ve fluked her debut success. She didn’t. This piece seals the deal and is quite possibly one of the creepiest short pieces I’ve ever heard.
Again, don’t take my word for it. Go to the podcast and listen. And then get your tickets to our brand new show, available here through Brown Paper Tickets.
Sometimes when you risk a lot with a piece of art, it pays to find ways to risk even more. Or at least that’s the counter-intuition behind the newest wrinkle in the Custom Made Play Project. A couple days ago a box arrived at my house containing exactly fifty copies of my soon-to-world-premiere play Ballard House Duet. Given the unique circumstances of its development (which I blog about in some detail here), the idea light-bulbed to offer a published version of the play simultaneously with its world premiere production. After all, we custom made this play for two local actors, Hana Lass and Rebecca Olson: a Seattle story for Seattle audiences in the purest vein of locally and organically grown new theatre. What better way to underscore how we are trying to change the way plays are made than to offer tangible printed proof of the pudding for sale.
So I emailed my friend and colleague Jason Aaron Goldberg, president of Original Works Publishing in Los Angeles. OWP publishes acting edition scripts and licenses productions of plays by “bold, original, and adventurous playwrights from around the globe.” I currently have three plays in their catalogue: An American Book of the Dead* – The Game Show†, The Sequence, and The Good Ship Manhattan. Other Seattle playwrights have plays with OWP as well. For example, Elizabeth Heffron’s Mitzi’s Abortion received some strong productions around the country after OWP’s decision to publish it.
I think it is fair to say that Jason was less than enthused by my idea. He told me OWP had looked at simultaneous publishing before, but never pulled the trigger. They prefer for a play to have a production history in advance of publishing it. This only makes sense. Productions work the kinks and flaws out of a play, not to mention garner reviews from which you can pull quotes for the script's back cover. I, however, pressed my proposal. I agreed to absorb the financial risk of printing the scripts if OWP was willing to risk a bit of its institutional reputation on the experiment. Jason graciously agreed.
So now you get to vote on whether this experiment succeeds or fails. I have 45 scripts to sell, each individually numbered and personally signed by me. I have priced them nearly a buck cheaper than what OWP sells my scripts for on their website. If we do another publishing run of Ballard House Duet, they won’t be sold by me, won’t be signed by me, and won’t be part of a limited numbered edition: so why not buy one now while it’s cheap and special?
Here are the ways you can buy, in descending order from best to next next best:
Go buy your tix to the show now (click here), then buy a script at the door. (While supplies last.)
Ping me with a way to send you my snail mail address. Once I do, send me a check for $10, and I’ll send you back a script. (I’ll eat the postage on this option.)
Buy a script on Ebay by clicking here, for $10 plus postage. (This option allows PayPal.)
Vote now: the simultaneous publication experiment: success or failure?
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