THEATER 52
-summer 2000
Even though HOOTERS had been a touch risque, it had actually been conservative compared with what was coming. Lee County was part of the southern Bible Belt - fairly quiet with many retirees, but striving to attract more and more tourists. Family-oriented, yet the most prevalent nighttime entertainment was alcohol. Most of our press was wonderful, but one of the shoddier moments in journalism came when one reporter/editor tried to get me to tone down our plays, saying that he and others had "soft-soaped" the coverage of our first show. And that was nothing compared to the acrimony our second show stirred up within the Orpheus itself. I had long been enamored of David Mamet, a Pulitzer Prize winner and one of America's premier playwrights for over two decades, who had never been produced in Lee County. I chose his most overtly funny play, which had been made into the lame Hollywood product ABOUT LAST NIGHT. It was a four-character piece about Dan and Deb, a young couple trying to stay together, often despite the efforts of their best friends, Joan and Bernie. Bernie is a misogynist blowhard, and Joan a man-hating ball-buster. I cast Amanda as Deb, and newcomer Leela Nolte as Joan. Leela had studied theater in Pittsburgh, and she made a wonderful impression. There wasn't a large turnout at auditions, but we got just exactly what we needed. A fellow named Michael Steen read for Bernie. He was a professional actor from Chicago who had come south to get his life together. Great talent and passion. Bernie had most of the funny lines, but i figured that i'd had 'em in the last show, so someone else could have them this time. And the chemistry was right for me to be Dan to Michael's Bern. Another auditioner was Derek Redd, a newspaper writer who had jumped out of his socks when he read that we would be doing Mamet. He was funny, and so enthusiastic that i had to find a place for him, so i created - Bob. Bob would be an office/drinking buddy of Dan and Bern's. I found a couple scenes where he could hang out with us. I shifted him a couple of Dan's lines, and had him take Dan's place altogether in the porno movie scene. It may have been just our particular group chemistry, but the fifth character added to the show immensely. I also did a good deal of splicing in lines and scenes from the movie. The play was better than the movie, and my composite was better than both. It took Derek and Amanda and Leela a while to grasp Mamet's use of language, as he writes the way people talk. When they finally got it, they were almost giddy at how good it felt. Things went wonderfully for a couple weeks, but then Michael didn't show up for a rehearsal, and i couldn't get him on the phone. This happened occasionally with Leela too, but i knew that she would always be at the next rehearsal, and would never miss a show, even if she were the last one to arrive (which she always was; if call was at 7:30, Leela would be there at 7:51). But with Michael, i had a feeling of dread. I knew he had been fighting manic-depressive demons. His next rehearsal arrived. No Michael. I let the other actors go, and later that night i replaced him. I thought i might have to take his place, as i'd had an easier time with the language than Derek and i judged that Bernie was the most important character. But i gave the part to him. If I kept playing Dan, it would be less disruptive for the girls, and truth be told, at that point i didn't want to give up Dan. I was falling in love with the character. Something told me that Derek would be fine, once it clicked. But i didn't want to lose Bob! So we cast Derek's roommate Will Graves. Michael had been more seasoned and maybe a little intimidating to some of the cast, but Derek quickly made us forget that anyone else had ever spoken Bernie's lines. He was less alpha than Michael, which made it easier to laugh at him. Will was a sweet addition, as talented as he needed be, and a good fit socially (he and Leela made a love connection). Amanda had always had a wounded quality, and during these months i fell in love with her in ways i had never experienced. We staged our bar scenes at the Orpheus bar. It was fun for the audience to not know where the next scene would come from. On our stage, we had many scenes to deal with (28) in many different locales, so i designed a minimalistic, fluid set. It became moreso as the play went on. The final scene was at the beach, and for the first week we used the burlap and blue sky from HOOTERS. We eventually realized that the audience didn't need the extra frills. When the show opened, it was like nothing i'd ever experienced. Everyone was so completely in love with what was going on. Not just with their own parts, but the whole thing. I've never done another show where all the actors backstage are CONSTANTLY mouthing and mimicking what's taking place onstage. Where the actors coming offstage are jumping up and down, trying to contain their jubilation...not just after opening, but after six weeks of production. Most actors go a lifetime without experiencing anything like it. The reviews were wonderful and the houses were full (we even squeezed in 45 one night, at $10 a head). VIPs came from professional theaters and the local college. A couple months later, the county's premier reviewer, Charles Runnells, asked me how i had achieved something so amazing. I told him that even with good people in a positive environment, group chemistry is a guessing game. But a lot of professional shows never achieve our level of excitement, as matters of "business" taint the dynamic. We didn't have separate dressing rooms, and i was proud of how relaxed the cast was with that. I chose not to do onstage nudity. Amanda wasn't ready as an actress, and i figured i'd wait a bit longer before springing that on the community. The show was more risque than HOOTERS, but i never heard a single negative audience comment. We almost never opened, however. It became clear early on that Tony was our champion, in the face of family opposition. They were old-world Greek, prone to emotional violence. Some of them were Orthodox, and the content of the play distressed them, particularly Tony's bother Timo and Timo's wife Dina. During tech week they threatened to shut us down, and did throw us out one night after Tony had gone home. After our final rehearsal, Tony and Timo came to blows. Opening night, we knew that Timo might try to stop us. I downplayed it to the actors, but didn't lie. The show went undisrupted, as did the rest of the run (except for the time a father with his kids stood up and shouted at us to stop using profanity). We extended the show two extra weekends, and the houses were just as buzzing our final weekend as they had been the first. One or two of the actors expected pay during the added two weeks, due to a miscommunication. Disappointing them pained me, and i learned a hard lesson about the need to make such matters precisely clear. In the third week, Will had a prior commitment, so we rehearsed a replacement Bob. I called on Jim Hawley, an auditioner. He was a jokester who fit right in. He performed three or four shows, and did much to add to his part...almost too much, the night he added a fart noise to his passed-out character. I told him it hadn't quite worked. In Jim's defense, it was the funniest moment of the run for stage manager Shane, but who can figure the humor of these Brits? Picking out specific moments is hard when every scene was a highlight. Every actor, every line, every gesture, just soared to a realm that was indescribable. Partly because Deb's anger came from a place Amanda knew maybe too well, she gave a performance that was years beyond her level of development. Derek was hysterical perfection, an absolute monster. We all were. I sensed that our performance was probably better than at least 90% of the professional SEXUAL PERVERSITY productions that had ever been staged. One night, a paper airplane i idly launch nosed through a ceiling chain, and stayed. We had an unscheduled appearance from actor #6...in the bedroom scenes, i wore boxers that had a button in the fly (this replaces one large opening with two smaller ones). One night, Amanda and i were doing a bed scene with her on top, and she looked down. I saw this brief look of startlement in her eyes, and suddenly knew why the stage had been feeling a bit breezy. She went right on, and in a few moments i was able to shift my contents back. The way Leela chowed down on Amanda's salad...Amanda's delivery of the line "You are a lousy fuck!"...Bernie and Bob's reactions when a canine appears in a porno film...the way Derek entertained us backstage with his Cosby and BRAVEHEART voices, riffing on elements of our show......my pride and love for this group were beyond words.
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