Virtual Hyperbole

Kids, right? I am working on a show right now with a bunch of kids. Seriously … me and the guy who plays my husband are the only 2 full-fledged card-carrying grown-ups, and then 3 half-adults (read: 25 or under), and a slew of 10-17 year-olds. It’s completely daunting. I have no idea what they’re thinking, and I have no frame of reference to even guess. Am I even semi-cool? Am I a complete dork just like I was in high school? Am I standoffish and snobby like I used to think most adults were? Do they care? Do I care? Do I care if they care? Do they care if I care if they care? So … huh. Interesting. I guess I care. And what’s that they say about kids & dogs (& robots or something)? Never work with them because they’ll upstage you every single time? I’m here to tell ya … it’s the truth, the little hooligans! And that’s exactly why you should work with them, every chance you get. These kids work my ass off, and god(dess) bless ‘em for it. Ain’t no free ride in this cast, Gannon. T...

We’re snots. We are. We complain all the livelong day about reviewers … they’re so mean, they didn’t like me, they don’t support live theatre, they hate art. You know what? Call the wahmbulance. People in the biz are way worse than reviewers. We just don’t put our snotbag comments in print; we kibitz over beers instead. It’s next to impossible for us to go to the theatre with an open mind. This is a function of being in the biz, I’m afraid. We know too much. The magic doesn’t impress us anymore. It’s fringe theatre, so we assume it won’t be very good quality. It’s a professional house, so we assume it will be commercial schlock. We’ve seen this play before. We’ve been in this play before. I mean, jeez! At least the reviewers actually *see* plays — sometimes we don’t even bother to see them before passing judgment. I was at lunch the other day with a friend, and we were talking about shows we needed to see and what we’d seen that we liked, and what we should go see but probably were goi...

I had this audition today; it was an Equity general. I’m non-Eq, but a lifetime ago I got my EMC status by understudying at the Rep in the worst play I’ve ever had the misfortune of reading -- much less having to sit and listen to the piece of demon crap through the monitors every single show, 8 times a week. I had nightmares about this freakin’ play. Top of the show, I would start out doing a crossword puzzle in the green room, humming to myself (loudly), having frantic desperate conversations with anyone … anything to shut out this Chinese water torture of a play. Nope. Didn’t even make through Act 1 before I punctured my eardrums with my pencil, gouged my eyes out with the eraser, and ran naked and battered through Seattle Center begging people to tie me to the fountain and let me freeze there. Of course, that’s the only gorgeous, warm spring I can remember EVER in this weather-freakhouse of a city. But GOD BLESS IT! This was my first “real” job; a professional gig at a theatre wher...