Speed-the-Plow

THEATER 55
-winter 2001
At the Orpheus, i returned to Mamet, having found a three-actor piece that was just right for Amanda, Derek, and i. It was about Hollywood soullessness, a story of two mercenary junior producers who get a shot at the big time. One of them is seduced by a temp secretary (whom he thinks he is seducing) into producing an arty movie of no commercial value. The second producer reacts as he must, and the secretary is shown to the street. Brilliant, rapid-fire dialogue. Shane stage-managed, and Donna McDonald came onboard as assistant director. Mamet veterans all, we threw ourselves into it. Rehearsals were a delight. I played Bobby Gould, who is seduced by Amanda's character. I grew a goatee and mustache, and slicked my hair. As Charlie Fox, Derek was slick-tongued, soulless perfection. He bloodied my face (hidden capsules), and threatened to kill Amanda. The "big break" Bobby and Charlie are celebrating is the agreement of a famous star to be in one of their projects. Derek's unscripted Keanu Reeves impression was beautiful. Amanda is the "plow", the agent of change. The script that she is pushing is so esoteric (THE BRIDGE: OR, RADIATION AND THE HALF-LIFE OF SOCIETY - A STUDY OF DECAY), that it took Amanda a while to realize how actually not ridiculous it is. For the first time, we expanded into a new venue. I had made some connections in downtown Ft. Myers, which had a younger crowd, and we agreed to put on one show a week at a bar called Gotham Hall. I was especially happy with the show posters, which featured a vintage photo of a boy and girl kissing. Picking the show music was also becoming one of my favorite parts of the process. An Ethel Merman recording of "No Business Like Show Business", Tracy Chapman's "New Beginning", plus "King of Hollywood" by the Eagles…also Billy Joel's "Big Shot", which i thought was too lite, but the others pushed for it. The county's biggest reviewer came on opening night, when the show was still a night or two away from peaking. The review was uneven (largely due to me, i might add). The subsequent beach review was much more praising. It's a tough show to perform, and some physical obstacles didn't help. In a wrestling accident a few weeks before we opened, i tore my shoulder so profoundly that i couldn't lift my arm at all opening week. Another week, i lost my voice, requiring us to cancel two performances. The shows at Gotham were nice, but we had to cancel one due to a lack of crowd. It was normally my policy to cancel if there were no reservations by show afternoon, but i didn't do so that day, because i wanted to impress upon our new hosts that we would deliver what we promised. That didn't sit well with Derek, who was upset he had come out for nothing. Derek was also frustrated that my command of the lines wasn't 100% opening week. This saddened me, as i thought the world of him. On the occasions we did perform without undue obstacles, we had a wonderful time, and so did the audience. We never had large crowds. I was game to do another show in Gotham, but they took a pass (the owner never even came out to see us).