Author Archives: melissahillman

Jan 23 2013
7 Comments
Personal Nonsense

Ew, Gross, GET A ROOM

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My handsome husband

Today is my husband’s birthday, and I can’t even begin to say how grateful I am for him. Through all of my surgeries, my chronic pain, my massive neverending self-doubt, my layoff, my ten million rehearsals, he never once wavered in his rock-solid support, love, and encouragement. I am so lucky to have him.

We met as undergrads at Cal State East Bay and dated for a few months. We broke up (entirely my fault) and eventually married other people. We made the kind of predictably poor choices you make when you’re young, and both learned the hard way that when your closest friends and family think you shouldn’t marry someone, THEY ARE RIGHT.

We never completely lost touch. I would run into him from time to time when I was a grad student at Cal and he was working in the scene shop there. (He later told me that when he saw me walking his way on campus, his heart would skip a beat, a story that melts my heart all over again every time I think about it.) A few years later, when I was teaching at CSUEB, he would bring his high school students to our (now long gone) spring Shakespeare Festival. It was at one of these festivals that I asked him to play my Dukes in the CSUEB summer production of As You Like It. I was already crushing on him, of course.

It was during As You Like It performances that we finally got back together, 16 years after our first date. We were married August 15, 2006.

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He’s a wonderful man, sweet and supportive, impossibly attentive, beyond patient. We exacerbate and encourage each other’s nerdiness. He’s working the irresistible combination of tall, smart, funny theatre tech, which is my kryptonite. His faith in me makes me want to be a better person so I can deserve him. I can’t imagine what my life would be like without him. I hope I never have to.

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See that TIE fighter pilot? I’m hitting that.

Happy Birthday, sweetheart. I hope your day is wonderful apart from the fact that you’re working all day and that I scheduled you for rehearsal tonight.

Oh, the show? As You Like It.

Tagged
Jan 22 2013
53 Comments
Theatre

A Common Problem I See In Plays By Women Playwrights. It’s Not What You Think.

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Will Hand and Jeanette Penley Marker in Impact Theatre’s Toil and Trouble by Lauren Gunderson, a fantastic play by a brilliant woman with a kickass female character. Check out EVERY WORD LAUREN’S EVER WRITTEN because you will not regret it. Photo by Cheshire Isaacs.

My theatre company is in heavy season planning mode, so I’ve recently read dozens of new plays. I’m always reading new plays, but this time of year, I’m reading a lot of plays, all day long. We’re making an effort to find more plays by women playwrights. We get between 300-400 unsolicited submissions each year, as well as submissions from agents and theatre professionals (playwrights, other ADs or LMs). 75% of those plays are by men, without fail. Unsurprisingly, 75% of the plays we’ve done over our 17 seasons have been by men. So we’re making an extra effort to find women playwrights and ask them to submit.

My company does new plays by “emerging” playwrights (I understand the controversy around that term, but this post isn’t about that, so let’s move on), so I’m reading unpublished plays, many (if not most) by early career, relatively inexperienced playwrights. I noticed a trend in the writing style of these early career women writers, a trend that initially confused me.

I’m seeing a significant amount of plays by women with female characters structurally positioned as the central character. However, that female character isn’t driving the narrative– she is, instead, just reactive to whatever the male characters are doing. It’s a woman sitting around wondering what to do about some man in her life, talking to her friends about some man, interacting with some man about his decisions or actions. It’s still a story with a central male character, just told from the woman’s point of view. If it’s a lesbian play, just change that male character to a female character. The structurally central female character is just as reactive.

Here’s the weird part: I ALMOST NEVER SEE PLAYS LIKE THIS FROM MEN. When I get a play by a man, the central character, male or female, almost always drives the narrative and has an active arc.

Ensemble pieces don’t change anything– they work the same way, just in the plural.

So what the effing eff is going on here? I rarely see this from the more experienced, accomplished women playwrights, but it’s shockingly common from early career women writers.

I thought a lot about this, talked about it with friends, got into a lengthy discussion on facebook (of course) about it. Here’s what I think is going on.

Some playwrights, particularly those who are new to it, are drawing heavily from their own lives and are writing central characters that are reflective of themselves. Sometimes they write plays that are about some perceived injustice they suffered (WHY WON’T HE LOVE ME? WHY WILL NO ONE PRODUCE MY PLAYS?) which can put their central character into a reactive position. But the gender difference, I think, can only be explained one way.

As women, we’re taught to be reactive– to pay careful attention to the needs and opinions of others and react immediately to them. Most women become masters of reading body language and gold medalists at empathy. Not all (of course) but most, because we’re taught that being any other way is unacceptable– at home, in the culture, in plays, films, books, TV shows. Men, however, are taught to be active, and are taught that men who aren’t– who are reactive– are not “real men.” We (unfortunately) re-inscribe this into the culture over and over and over.

Being empathetic and reactive aren’t necessarily bad things, but these received narratives of how to “correctly” perform our genders are having an impact on the way some playwrights are writing, and that impact is working against some women playwrights’ ability to tell their stories.

When you structure a play with a central character, you’re writing someone who occupies the same position in your play that you do in your own life, right? Every person is the central character in his or her personal play/film/video game, because your own life is experienced, of necessity, from your point of view. So when a woman sees herself as inhabiting a reactive position in life, she’s likely going to write a central female character as reactive, because that’s how she perceives what living as a woman IS.

When men write central characters– whether that central character is male or female– those characters are almost always reflective of the active position they’re taught to see as “normal.” Men don’t write reactive female central characters because they see an active self-perception as “normal” in general.

This is, obviously, just a guess, but I don’t know how else to explain what I’m seeing, and I’m seeing it over and over.

Plenty of women writers don’t make their central female characters reactive, but I see enough who do to make me think we should be deliberately and consciously teaching women playwrights to CLAIM THEIR OWN STORIES (the way men are taught to do from the cradle by every corner of the culture). Because a reactive central character isn’t as strong or as interesting as an active one, as women develop their voices as playwrights, I see less and less of this in their work. And of course there are some women writers who never do this. But the ones who do need to be taught to value themselves and their stories. BECAUSE THEY ARE VALUABLE.

So let me tell you now, early career women writers: YOUR STORIES ARE INTERESTING. YOUR STORIES ARE IMPORTANT. YOUR EXPERIENCES ARE IMPORTANT. YOU ARE IMPORTANT. You are important to me, to our work, to the theatre community. YOU ARE MORE THAN YOUR REACTIONS TO SOMEONE ELSE. So write that. And send it to me.

(PS to the men out there writing strong, compelling, active roles for women: Thank you. The women actors of the world also thank you. Don’t let anyone tell you that you don’t have the right to write stories for women because you don’t have “authenticity.” Jesus Timberlake Christ, do they really want there to be FEWER roles for women?)

UPDATE May 2015: For a blog post with only 22K hits, this wins the prize for being the most educational for me as a blogger. One of the most important things I learned from this early post is that the kind of people who will call a stranger an “asshole” or “disgusting” in public for something as small as a relatively unknown blog post are the most likely to be reacting to what they imagine is in the piece rather than what is actually there. I learned that the people who legitimately disagree with the ideas discussed in a post are the least likely to use abusive words. I learned that the people who legitimately disagree with the ideas discussed in a post are awesome, always making me reflect and interrogate my point of view. I learned that engaging with hateful people is always already a lost cause. I learned that I will engage with them anyway. I learned that there are dozens of theatremakers across the country who disagree with some of my ideas and with whom I would dearly love to share a pitcher of beer and an evening of lively discussion.

If you’re here for the first time, I would like to invite you to read some of my newer posts. Click around and see a little more of who I am and what I write. While comments for this one piece are now closed, I approve all comments that are not abusive, so feel free to disagree. Maybe one day we’ll get to share that beer and talk about it in person. Whether you like what you see on Bitter Gertrude or not, I genuinely thank you for being here.

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Jan 22 2013
Theatre

Young Audience Members: NOT UNICORNS

Impact Theatre's production of Romeo and Juliet. Pictured: Joseph Mason, Mike Delaney, Reggie White, Jonah McClellan, and Seth Thygesen. Photo by Cheshire Isaacs.

Impact Theatre’s production of Romeo and Juliet. Pictured: Joseph Mason, Mike Delaney, Reggie White, Jonah McClellan, and Seth Thygesen. Photo by Cheshire Isaacs.

“THEATRE IS DYING. No young people are going to the theatre! There won’t be ANY AUDIENCE LEFT in a few years when they ALL DIE OUT.”

I hear this all the time, and it’s pharmaceutical grade nonsense.  Young people come to the theatre all the damn time. I wrote this article for Theatre Bay Area in 2011. Click here to see it in its original setting.

(I just got back from my theatre company’s annual season planning retreat, so I’m doing the lazy reblogging dance instead of serving you up a fine handcrafted cold-filtered brand new blog post.  One coming soon.)

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“How do you get so many young people into your theatre? How can we do that?”

I’ve been asked these questions over and over and over. And over. The real answer is: I’m not sure. All I can tell you is what we’ve done, how we’ve done it and what I think you can do to better your chances of attracting the 18-35 audience. Will it work for you? I don’t know. Did it work for us? Yes, indeed.

Bear in mind that you need to do all of these things, all at the same time. This isn’t a pick-and-choose situation.

1. Do the kinds of plays young people want to see.
I am astounded by the fact that some larger theatres seem to believe young people should *always* be willing to translate, and blame self-centeredness, lack of interest in culture, lack of education and general boorishness when the 18-40 crowd don’t turn out in droves for a production of Dinner with Friends or Love Letters. Yet these very same theatres won’t slot a new play by an emerging playwright for fear of their subscribers’ reactions. They expect young people to translate, and heap condemnation upon them when they don’t, but they see older audience members’ potential lack of interest as their due. (P.S. Believe me when I tell you that 65 is the new 35. Many older Bay Area theatergoers are more adventurous than you think. TRUST. Moving on.)

While it’s always a good thing to have an active interest in the stories of people not in your age group (or ethnic group, or regional group, or religious group, etc), everyone longs to see their own stories, hopes, dreams, fears, realities and fantasies reflected in honest ways. Young people are no different. The key phrase here is “in honest ways.” A play by an older playwright with roles for young actors may or may not speak honestly to your desired potential younger audience members. Some older writers write very well for younger characters. Many do not. Large numbers of young people are not going to spring for tickets to a show that portrays them as mindless, boorish assholes. Find plays that speak honestly about the lives of young people in some way.

But how do I do that, Melissa?

I’m so glad you asked.

There are over 400 theatre companies in the nine-county Bay Area. We do more world premiere plays than almost any other region in the country—last I checked we ranked third. Yet it’s very common that staff from theatres who purport to want young audiences don’t come to world premiere productions at small theatre companies. How many emerging playwrights have you read this year? If the number is under 10, you’re slacking. Impact Theatre, my company, has produced a world premiere by, and/or entirely introduced to the Bay Area, these playwrights: Sheila Callaghan, Steve Yockey, Prince Gomolvilas, Enrique Urueta, Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa, Liz Meriwether, Lauren Yee, Peter Sinn Nachtrieb, Joshua Conkel, Trevor Allen, Jon Tracy. This is a partial list—I stuck to people you’ve probably heard of. Most importantly, we’re a tiny dog on a very, very big block. There are a wagonload of companies doing precisely what we do. Find them. See their shows. Spy on the playwrights they use. Companies like mine are your R&D department.

Find directors who can make classic plays relevant and interesting—because they are. There are directors all over the country who draw loads of younger audience members into theatres to see Shakespeare, and a bunch of them are directing at these aforementioned smaller theatres.

2. Be realistic about your pricing.
It’s always annoying to hear people say, “But they’ll spend $60 on a concert ticket! Why won’t they spend $60 on theatre?” It’s like wondering why someone would drive all the way across country to be with her beloved but not drive just as long in the hope that she will meet a hot stranger in a bar. People drop bucks on concert tickets because they already know and love the artist and have every expectation of seeing a great show and having a great experience. Condemning those people for refusing to drop a similar amount of money on a show they may know little about that will, let’s be honest, likely bore them because it’s aimed entirely at someone else, is a bit much, yes? If you’re going to condemn the under-40 crowd for not dropping $60 on your play about middle-class, middle-aged white people and their midlife crises, you should also condemn Grandma because she’s not stocking her DVD collection with $60 of Robot Chicken.

So keep your ticket prices accessible. Some companies do an under-30 rate, which, quite frankly, I’m not wild about. That 30-40 crowd is young enough to need enticing into your theatre but old enough to be on the brink of having enough money to become donors and subscribers. You want them. They’re routinely ignored and that’s not going to pay off in the long run for your audience building. Make an under-40 rate if you must. Make some performances pay-what-you-will. Make your less attractive seating areas $20 for the first few weekends. Whatever you need to do, do it.

3. Market to young people.
If you’re not active on Facebook and Twitter, you need to be right now. Learn how to use these powerful tools properly. This isn’t a social media marketing post, so I’ll assume you can figure out where to get this info and move on. The blog on your website is going nowhere unless you’re pushing it with Facebook and Twitter, by the way.

Find ways to make your outreach to young people honest and, most importantly, unpretentious. One of the main things keeping young people out of the theatre is that they’re afraid they won’t fit in—they’ll feel awkward and out of place. As my friend’s dad was fond of saying, they’re afraid they’ll “stand out like a sheep turd in a bowl of cream.” You want to make them as comfortable as possible. A big step towards that is to use your marketing to make them feel welcome. Not pretend welcome, as in, “We want to sell you tickets,” but truly welcome, like “Come over and play with us! We just got a new toy!”

Theatre is not medicine. We don’t go because it’s good for us. We go because we think it’ll be awesome. Make sure you’re approaching your marketing properly. “It’ll be awesome” + “You’re totally welcome and will be comfortable” + “We’re not stuffy and pretentious” will go a long way. Make sure you’re delivering those goods onsite as well. Nothing drives someone away from your company forever as efficiently as an undelivered promise.

And that’s pretty much it. This is what I believe has worked for us over the past 15 years. I hope it’s successful for you as well. We all need to work together to build audiences for our future as an artistic community. There’s not a single one of us that exists on an island. We’re all in this together.

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Jan 16 2013
3 Comments
Culture

All right, drama queens, here are the ACTUAL 23 executive orders

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I’ve been making the mistake of reading comments on news articles about this. People are going BATSHIT FUCKING LOCO.

Hey, gun-toting crazies: You might want to take a look at these before announcing to the world that the scary Black man is taking away your guns and you’re going to start an armed rebellion, mkay?

Here are the executive orders along with my commentary.

1. “Issue a presidential memorandum to require federal agencies to make relevant data available to the federal background check system.” (BACKGROUND CHECKS. Like we already have, but making sure states actually send in the damn data so we can track their convicted rapists.)

2. “Address unnecessary legal barriers, particularly relating to the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, that may prevent states from making information available to the background check system.” (More about making the background checks work better)

3. “Improve incentives for states to share information with the background check system.” (Even MORE about making the background checks better– this time with 33% MOAR BRIBERY for recalcitrant red states)

4. “Direct the attorney general to review categories of individuals prohibited from having a gun to make sure dangerous people are not slipping through the cracks.” (Hey, maybe we should make sure convicted rapists can’t buy guns in all 50 states.)

5. “Propose rulemaking to give law enforcement the ability to run a full background check on an individual before returning a seized gun.” (When the cops take your gun away from you because you were starting shit at Applebee’s on a Friday night, now they get to run a background check on you to make sure you’re legally allowed to possess it. Sorry, Rapey McFelony! Everyone else– as you were.)

6. “Publish a letter from ATF to federally licensed gun dealers providing guidance on how to run background checks for private sellers.” (A letter?!?! About BACKGROUND CHECKS?!?! FASCISM AT WORK.)

7. “Launch a national safe and responsible gun ownership campaign.” (Hi. I’m Adrienne Barbeau, and I’m here to talk to you about guns)

8. “Review safety standards for gun locks and gun safes (Consumer Product Safety Commission).” (How do we make gun locks and gun safes better? ASKING THIS IS AN OUTRAGE!!11!)

9. “Issue a presidential Memorandum to require federal law enforcement to trace guns recovered in criminal investigations.” (Wait, they don’t already do this? The hell?)

10. “Release a DOJ report analyzing information on lost and stolen guns and make it widely available to law enforcement.” (Writing and releasing a report. Yeah, I agree with conservatives: sounds like CIVIL WAR TIME TO ME! NO REPORTS. And no glossy report covers, either! Those are for the gays and the libruls, right, boys?)

11. “Nominate an ATF director.” (This doesn’t count! You were supposed to do this ALREADY. What, is your laundry #19?)

12. “Provide law enforcement, first responders, and school officials with proper training for active shooter situations.” (I can see how properly trained cops, firefighters, and teachers would piss off conservatives. UNION THUGS.)

13. “Maximize enforcement efforts to prevent gun violence and prosecute gun crime.” (OK, enforce the laws we already have, got it)

14. “Issue a presidential memorandum directing the Centers for Disease Control to research the causes and prevention of gun violence.” (MEMORANDUM!?!? About RESEARCH? That’s almost as bad as a REPORT! GET MAH RAHFLE.)

15. “Direct the attorney general to issue a report on the availability and most effective use of new gun safety technologies and challenge the private sector to develop innovative technologies.” (HOLY SHIT A THIRD REPORT. Seriously, this is getting SCARY. Someone block off the Office Depot paper section, STAT.)

16. “Clarify that the Affordable Care Act does not prohibit doctors asking their patients about guns in their homes.” (Um, just writing that sentence does that, so, check.)

17. “Release a letter to health care providers clarifying that no federal law prohibits them from reporting threats of violence to law enforcement authorities.” (THE FUCK. Now we’re up to three reports, two memos, and a letter? TYRANNY. Don’t clarify existing law for doctors! YOU MIGHT AS WELL JUST SHRED THE CONSTITUTION AND WIPE YOUR ASS WITH IT, LIBTARDS.)

18. “Provide incentives for schools to hire school resource officers.” (Wait, isn’t this what conservatives wanted? They’ve been screaming about it nonstop since Sandy Hook.)

19. “Develop model emergency response plans for schools, houses of worship and institutions of higher education.” (Emergency response training? AGAIN WITH THE TYRANNY.)

20. “Release a letter to state health officials clarifying the scope of mental health services that Medicaid plans must cover.” (ANOTHER letter? MORE clarification of existing law? THE AMERICAN EAGLE SHEDS A SINGLE TEAR FOR THE DEATH OF LIBERTY.)

21. “Finalize regulations clarifying essential health benefits and parity requirements within ACA exchanges.” (Weren’t you supposed to do this already? I don’t see how this counts. This one, along with the one about appointing the head of the ATF, are just filler, aren’t they? Was there a word count minimum for this?)

22. “Commit to finalizing mental health parity regulations.” (Ahem. See 21.)

23. “Launch a national dialogue led by Secretaries Sebelius and Duncan on mental health.” (Not a dialogue! Talking is TYRANNY and SOCIALISM and requires THINKING.)

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Jan 16 2013
Culture

Hey, Guess What? If You Think Women Are People, You’re a Feminist

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So facebook, amirite? Facebook. It’s a roiling sea of poorly-thought-out opinions, my own included. In the middle of a discussion about women playwrights (blog post coming soon), someone said that she’s not a feminist because women are “different,” and that we are “not equal” to men.

After I found my eyeballs and put them back into their sockets like a Tex Avery cartoon, I wondered if maybe she and I are just defining the term “equal” differently. What is “equal”? And can difference preclude that? Sure, there are ways in which difference can create inequality. Almost every human on the planet is a better athlete than I am. They are better; I am inferior; there is undeniable inequality there.

When we’re talking about gender equality, though, we’re talking about cultural equality and civil rights, where “equal” means “equal under the law” and “of equal worth.” Of course we’re not fully there yet; I know that. In a world where women still make 81 cents when a man in the same position makes a dollar, where 81% of all male faculty in the US are tenure-track or tenured as opposed to a measly 68% of female faculty (fully 32% of female faculty are lecturers– academic temps), where a woman CEO of a major corporation is as rare as the possibility of successfully navigating an asteroid field (NEVER TELL ME THE ODDS), we clearly have yet to achieve cultural equality. And when everyone down at the courthouse barely had a single fuck to give when my husband and I picked up our marriage license, but would have rung the HOMO ALARM had my betrothed been female, we have some progress to make regarding gender under the law. And pause for a moment to remember just how privileged cisgendered women are, despite our struggles.
But we ARE making progress.

I suppose it’s no surprise that a woman whose mother subscribed to Ms Magazine in the 70s and taught her who Gloria Steinem and Angela Davis were before she could walk has no problem proclaiming herself a feminist. The surprise to me is why YOU DON’T, people.

If it's good enough for Captain Picard . . .

If it’s good enough for Captain Picard . . .

Sure, women are different, I guess, in the aggregate. And there are plenty of things about me that conform to the stereotypical woman’s role. I loved being pregnant. I love to bake. I take pride in making seder. I also love to be in charge of shit and, honestly, I’m damn good at it. I don’t usually wear make up, I spend way too much of my free time on the xbox, I swear like 100 sailors, and I would rather listen to five hours of jackhammering than watch fourteen seconds of Sex and the City.

But “different” doesn’t mean “unequal.” When you say “I am a feminist,” what you’re saying is “I believe women should be treated equally, both under the law and culturally: That women should earn as much as men; that women’s stories are as important as men’s; that women should be considered equally for jobs and promotions.”

The tenure thing expressly pisses me off, yes, partly because I’ve been a dramatically underemployed lecturer for eleventy scrotillion years while watching men with less education and experience get tenure, but mostly because the gender breakdown of underpaid, overworked academic temps known as lecturers (who make less than the people working at the campus Starbucks) weighs heavily to WOMEN, while the gender breakdown of the people with tenured positions making twice what we make (to start) weighs heavily to MEN. Bear in mind that women earn 52% of the PhDs awarded each year, corresponding neatly to our percentage of the population. And yet we’re still largely held down into temp positions while the men around us land tenure-track positions in numbers that far outweigh their representation in the population.

But I digress.

YES, women are different than men, sometimes. Maybe most of the time. I’m interested in the neurology about gender. I still find babies miraculous and pregnant women enthralling and special. But women are not BETTER than men, nor are men BETTER than women, and if you think so, it’s a matter of opinion. Also, you are awful.

So what is a “feminist”? I gave it away in the headline, so if you made it this far, I SALUTE YOU. I hope you don’t feel cheated.

“Feminism” is the belief that women are people, and, as people, are as important as men, regardless of any differences, and deserve equal protection under the law. (Recommended reading: The equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution.)

YOU ARE A FEMINIST. Boom. What? BOOM.

worthyvoice

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Jan 14 2013
9 Comments
Theatre

What Playwrights Should Know, Part 1

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Ah, the theatre.
(Stacz Sadowski in Impact Theatre’s Of Dice and Men by Cameron McNary. Photo by Cheshire Isaacs)

So I read a lot of plays. A LOT. And I have a ton of work to do today; I have to read about 20 more plays in the next, oh, 30 or so hours, plus teach a class, shower, and engage my husband in some light badinage to let him know that, Yes, although I am SCREAMINGLY busy, I still remember he exists and appreciate that existence.

So.

I don’t have the time to do a full post about the submission process. IOU a real post about it. Pinkie swear. But today, after reading +/-10 plays so far, I have a short series of pet peeves to unload, and a short series of high fives to give out.

PET PEEVES:

1. SMOKING. For starters, it’s illegal to smoke indoors in California, and faked smoking always looks asstacular. Additionally, it’s almost always a boring, lazy choice. Yeah, I’ve seen it used well in new plays on occasion, but for the most part, it’s just a lazy way of tagging a character with a certain characteristic– nervousness being the most popular. Come on, you wrote a whole play! Surely you can come up with a better way to express a characteristic, right?

2. NO CHARACTER LIST. If you managed to include a page with quotes from Lao Tzu, Pliny the Elder, and Chaka Khan, surely you can include a page with a character list. We need it.

3. ONSTAGE SEX WITHOUT COVERS. I produce in a two-sided thrust that seats 59. I read fully 5 plays today that included this. How in the chocolate-covered fuck am I going to stage that believably? My front row is close enough to make the scene a sneeze away from an eleven-way. Also, the narrative stops when the sex begins. The amount of time it takes for the action of start-to-finish onstage sex is far too long for the information “they had sex.” It’s not porn; we can’t show anything good. So it’s just actors awkwardly groping each other while the audience sits there awkwardly waiting for the action to recommence. If you must, AT LEAST GIVE ME A BLANKET TO WORK WITH. Help a sister out.

HIGH FIVES:

1. STRONG, INTERESTING FEMALE CHARACTERS WHO DO NOT DIE AND WHO HAVE A NARRATIVE ARC THAT IS NOT ALL ABOUT A HUSBAND AND/OR A BABY. Thank you. You know who you are.

2. PLAYS SENT TO ME AS PDFs. I really do appreciate that little courtesy.

3. PLAYS THAT KNOW THEY ARE PLAYS AND NOT FILMS. When I see work by playwrights who understand what is unique about theatre and explore that in some way, I am DELIGHTED.

OK, back to work for me.

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Jan 13 2013
7 Comments
Theatre

Things Not To Do At TBA Generals Or Really Any Audition Ever

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Well, the first day of the annual Theatre Bay Area General Auditions is under our belts, and I’m seeing too many actors sabotage what would otherwise be an excellent audition with easily avoided mistakes. Here’s what NOT to do at TBAs (or at any audition). Strap in.

1. RUSHING. I would *much* rather you get cut off than have you rush through your pieces trying to play Beat the Clock. When you rush your pieces, your shaping, diction, and choices go straight to hell, and all I’m left with is the knowledge that you can say a lot of words very quickly. Your punchlines do not land. Your beautifully crafted emotional moments speed by and make as much impression as a poem written on the side of a runaway freight train. Cut your pieces down to manageable sizes and rehearse them TIMED.

2. BLAND CHOICES. I get that you don’t want to be pigeonholed into one particular “type” and miss opportunities to be called in for other types of roles, but speaking emphatically is not acting. I’ve seen dozens of monologues where the actors made choices I thought were misguided or downright awful, but at least I could see that they were able to make bold choices. That skill is worth a callback. I’d rather have you swing the bat and miss than never pick up the bat at all.

3. SINGING WHEN YOU CAN’T SING. It’s not helpful. Sing if you’re a singer. Sing if you are hoping to be cast in musicals. Do not sing because you’re doing a monologue about a guy who sings all the time. Two minutes of listening to singing done by a guy who can’t sing is not putting me in a callback frame of mind. What’s worse is that the singing in such a case is all too often taking the place of solid acting choices. Do not sing because you can kind of sing and think you might be cast in a “play with music.” Most people can’t sing and that’s FINE. If that’s you, just act. It’s enough, I promise.

4. POOR CHOICE OF MONOLOGUE. Non-linear, experimental, poetic monologues are the very worst choices you can make for audition monologues in a general audition. Almost all of us are casting for linear narrative projects. If there’s no narrative in your monologue, I can’t see how you shape narrative. If there’ s no discrete character, I can’t see how you make character choices. In the end, all I have is you speaking emphatically (again). Monologues that are sexist, racist, or insane are also poor choices. I covered that point in my earlier audition tips post.

5. UNDERREHEARSED. My heart bled for a kid who went up during his Macbeth monologue today. This is not something you want happening to you at TBAs. Only do pieces you know as well as I know the layout of Solitude in Skyrim. Which is to say: PERFECTLY.

6. SONGS WITHOUT RANGE. BLUES SONGS. ROCK SONGS. If you’re singing a song with a four-note range, I have no idea how well you can sing. If you’re taking the trouble to sing at an audition, show me what you can do! Blues songs and rock songs are just beside the point of most musical theatre. While you may be rocking the cast-iron fuck out of that song, we still have no idea how you handle musical theatre songs, which are, let’s face it, the vast majority of musical theatre out there. Even “rock musicals” are (mostly) using musical theatre-style voices, and most musical theatre songs are technically more difficult and demanding, with wider ranges, than most blues and rock songs. They just don’t give me the information I need.

7. WEARING A SHORT SKIRT AND SITTING IN A CHAIR ON A RAISED STAGE. This one needs no explanation. Hello, nurse!

8. TRYING TO CRAM 4+ PIECES INTO YOUR TWO-MINUTE SLOT. This is never a good idea. You’re not showing virtuosity. You’re not giving us enough time to understand why you’ve made the choices you’ve made. It’s unfocused and always ends up being a parade of caricatures. Two pieces are plenty. We don’t need to see everything you’ve ever done.

9. DOING A MONOLOGUE WRITTEN FOR A PERSON OF COLOR WHEN YOU ARE NOT A PERSON OF COLOR. Remember, most of us have no idea who you are and have no way to ascertain if you’re making this choice on purpose (although to what end, I would have to wonder). This will only result in every auditor assuming you haven’t read the play. And if you *are* making this a deliberate choice, bear in mind that this is an incredibly controversial action that would be perceived as naive at best and racist at worst by most of the people in the room capable of giving you a job.

10. YELLING, SHOUTING, OR SCREAMING. Yes, I understand that on occasion volume can be a powerful choice. On the rare occasion. Like, very rare. Easily 99 times out of 100, yelling, shouting, or screaming is the easiest, cheapest, and most boring choice you can make. Pick something more interesting. Any fool can say words loudly. McKayla is not impressed. When you feel the urge to use volume in a monologue, put your thinking cap on and come up with a few different choices to try in that moment. You’ll be glad you did because WE’LL be glad you did.

Auditions are bizarre. WE KNOW THAT. It’s extremely difficult to truly showcase your talent and skill in two minutes. So do yourself a favor and craft that audition to show yourself to your best advantage. We’re all out there rooting for you, honestly.

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Jan 11 2013
2 Comments
Culture

WalMart and Anthropologie Go Batshit Insane

What WalMart thinks I'm wearing

What WalMart thinks I’m wearing

I didn’t think there could be any more WTFery coming out of major retail corporations than WalMart’s recent listing of “Jewish costumes” for children. Dress your child like a Jewish Grand Rabbi! What we imagine to be a not-so-grand Jewish Rabbi! A Jewish High Priest! Jewish Mothers! (I dress NOTHING LIKE THAT, but I imagine you can’t sell a costume that’s just a Star Wars T-shirt, yoga pants, and a pair of Chucks.)

Just in case you need evidence (and I TOTALLY UNDERSTAND if you do, because WHAT) here: WalMart’s Insanity

Do I need to explain the racism here? No? Are we good? OK, moving on.

Now the geniuses at Anthropologie are under the impression that someone will pay $398 for a two-foot-tall candlestick with a Mammy and JFK on it.

Seriously.

Seriously.

I’m not offended, I’M PERPLEXED.

The hell is going on? I’ve already resigned myself to the fact that America is much more racist than my Bay Area-born, liberal-raised ass wants to believe, but I question the judgment of execs who think they can sell “Jewish” costumes (WHO WOULD BUY THESE?) and I am doing even more questioneering about the judgment of retail execs who think thousands of people would be willing to spend $398 on a stack of racist, hotglued crap.

But hold the phone. The “Trinket and Treasure Candlestick” is unique! Each piece is different! EVEN MORE WTFERY. This means that Anthropologie had to specifically select a candlestick with racist nonsense on it out of a box of less-racist candlesticks. Someone with a degree in Marketing had to purposely select, photograph, and cause to be posted online the candlestick with the Mammy on it. WHAT COULD POSSIBLY GO WRONG? Sounds like a legit marketing tactic, right?

And you just KNOW they’re going to get complaints when people open their boxes and discover their candlesticks were LESS RACIST THAN ADVERTISED.

If the world is going to insist on confusing the fuel-injected fuck outta me within an hour of waking up, I’m going back to bed.

See Anthropologie’s nonsense for yourself.

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Jan 10 2013
Culture

Yet Another “Law-Abiding” Gun Owner Wants to Kill You Over Gun Control Laws

This guy says he's going to kill you if someone else passes stricter gun control legislation.

This guy says he’s going to kill you if someone else passes stricter gun control legislation.

See, OK, this is exactly what we’re talking about, you guys. Gun advocates all say over and over how most gun owners are law-abiding, wonderful people, but we’re seeing this kind of thing repeatedly now– ignorant, panicking armed idiots THREATENING OUR LIVES and the lives of our CHILDREN over something the president can’t even do. Despite what you heard some halfwit on the radio say, NOBAMA can’t take yer guns away by executive order. No, he can’t. You need Congress for that, and since this Congress is about as useful as the condom Scalia’s had in his wallet since 8th grade, I’m going to label that occurrence “UNLIKELY.”

I’m sure there are gun owners who are law-abiding, gentle, kumbaya-singing hippies who would only shoot in self defense and keep their weapons in a bunker 100 feet underground accessible only by a keypad and a retina scan, like you all claim. Sure, why not. But you know what? WE DON’T BELIEVE YOU that *MOST* gun owners are law-abiding and awesome, because THIS. Over and over, THIS.

‘I’m Going To Start Killing People’ Says CEO Of Weapons Training Company Over Gun Control.

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Jan 09 2013
4 Comments
Theatre

General Auditions Dos and Don’ts

My Lisa Keating headshot. She's amazing!

My Lisa Keating “I’m a fancy grown-up Artistic Director” headshot. She’s amazing!

This is an article I originally wrote for Theatre Bay Area Magazine about the TBA General Auditions. While it was written specifically for these annual Bay Area-wide general auditions, 99.997% (shut up, I did the math) of the article is applicable to any audition. 

Theatre Bay Area General Auditions are right around the corner, and many of you are preparing for what will be the most important audition you’ll have all year. As someone who’s watched thousands of actors audition over the years, I’ve seen a lot of great auditions and a lot of truly awful ones, and despite the number of audition workshops going on in the world, lots and lots and lots of actors make the same, easily avoided mistakes. Here are my top 10 audition tips to help make your Generals audition—and all your auditions throughout the year—look professional and polished.

Before we begin, let me start by saying that, for the auditor, every audition is a set of problems that needs to be solved. If you’re casting, say, “Measure for Measure,” you have a minimum of 13 problems that need to be solved—13 parts that need filling. Each and every person who walks through that door is a potential solution to one of your problems, and trust me, all casting directors are rooting for you because of that. There’s no adversarial relationship—quite the opposite! We want you to do well.

1. Be polite to every single human you see. This seems like a no-brainer, and yet I saw an actress flip off Berkeley Rep casting director Amy Potozkin in an ill-advised bit of road rage on my way into the Generals last year. This is the sort of thing my businessman brother likes to call “career-limiting behavior.”

2. Dress appropriately. By this I mean that you should wear something clean, comfortable and reasonably professional. You don’t have to wear something uber-dressy, but you should look presentable. You should not look like you just tumbled out of some strange bed in the SFSU dorms and barely managed to get on BART in time. You should wear something that makes you feel confident and that you don’t have to fuss with. You don’t want to be futzing with your sleeves or pulling the Picard maneuver every few seconds, because then we’ll start to watch that instead of watching you. For this same reason, you shouldn’t dress provocatively. When you dress like Jenna Jameson on the red carpet at the AVN Awards, pretty much all anyone will notice is your outfit. That finely tuned Rosalind goes right out the window. Also, please do not wear something “costumey.” I know many of you have used this kind of thing successfully for commercial auditions, but I do not recommend it for the Generals. While an audition is indeed a type of performance, it is first and foremost a job interview. A special note for the TBA Generals: Please avoid anything shiny or reflective, such as sequins. The last few times I’ve seen this at the Generals, the light bounce made the audition almost unwatchable.

3. Do a well-rehearsed monologue. Under-rehearsed monologues always look terrible, as they are without fail filled with bland choices, blank spots where you’re hunting for lines, and unmotivated pauses. I know you think you can totally pull it off, and maybe you can, but you’d be in the tiny minority. Be mindful of the difference between doing it in front of the bathroom mirror and the pressure of doing it in front of all of the Generals auditors.

4. Face forward so everyone in the room can see you. No, you can’t do your audition to an empty chair stage left or in complete profile stage right. Whoever told you that’s okay is wrong. Also, please never “use” us. Don’t look directly at the auditors. It makes us uncomfortable, and that’s the last thing you want. We stop thinking about you and your monologue and become fully absorbed in the fact that you’re staring at us. We do not wish to be part of your scene; we want to watch you and take notes. Place your mark over the auditors’ heads.

5. Make bold, interesting, motivated choices. Some early-career actors make bland, boring choices in audition monologues, fearing that bold choices will lock them into one “type” or another. However, all they’ve shown me is that they’re bland and boring. Make bold and interesting choices! Show me your chops! On the flip side, don’t make wild, unmotivated choices in the mistaken attempt to show virtuosity. Unmotivated screaming, weeping, maniacal laughter, or randomly chosen physicalizations, for example, are not showing you to the best of your ability. Also, please don’t bring props. Again, I know some of you have had success with this for TV auditions, but it’s not done in the theatre. I actually saw someone whip out a prop gun during the Generals one year. Not a good idea.

6. Choose your audition pieces wisely. Choose pieces that focus on your desired area of specialization, whether that’s period-specific, type-specific or what have you. In addition, when you choose your audition pieces, bear this in mind: many of the Generals auditors will have never met you before, and our only real taste of you will be your audition. Try to avoid choosing pieces that, while potentially awesome in a performance situation, could be unsettling in a monologue situation. I understand that this sounds unfair, but life is unfair, bubbeleh.

Avoid monologues that are creepy or insane unless you have a sharply contrasting companion piece. Exceptions are very well-known monologues, particularly Shakespeare.

Beware of monologues with lots of overt sexual talk and/or swearing. Many auditors, including myself, don’t mind that at all, but many do, and who they are would surprise you.

Avoid monologues that are insulting, racist or otherwise controversial. Yes, I understand that the character doesn’t necessarily reflect your personal opinions, but again, you want to avoid making a roomful of auditors who have never met you before uncomfortable. A great example of this is Carter’s monologue about his mother from Neil LaBute’s “Fat Pig.” While some people love this piece, enough people are put off by its hateful content to make it an extremely poor choice for Generals, or any audition where you’re not absolutely sure it will be well received.

7. Beware the classic pitfalls everyone warns you about:

Avoid accents unless you’re truly expert. Nothing pulls an auditor out of a monologue faster than a poorly done accent. Additionally, many auditors talk about how they sigh wearily to themselves whenever someone busts out a Southern accent (unless the play calls for it), because they are astonishingly overused in audition situations.

Avoid the monologues that are ludicrously overdone. I realize that this is subjective to the individual auditor, but by and large, all your standard lists are generally applicable: No Durang tuna fish monologue, Laundry and Bourbon, Spike Heels, Cowboy Mouth, Shadow Box, Popo Martin. I exempt classic pieces from this, because there are only so many from which to choose. If you want to do Julia or Launce, be my guest. Just be the best damn Julia or Launce you can be.

Never do a self-written monologue. Even if you’re the next Marga Gomez, a self-written monologue tells me exactly nothing about how you would handle standard material. It’s simply beside the point of most auditions.

8. Know what you’re talking about. Please don’t come in pronouncing words—or even the name of the playwright—incorrectly. Read the entire play if at all possible. If the play is unpublished, you can bet there is something about it somewhere online, and Google is your friend. Even a brief review from six years ago can tell you valuable information about the play’s tone, about the characters, etc. Once I judged a high school Shakespeare competition where two girls did the willow scene from “Othello” as slapstick comedy. Painful.

9. Make sure your headshot and résumé are professional. A great headshot is worth the money. While you may look gorgeous in the DIY headshot your boyfriend took of you in the backyard in front of a bush (why is it always in front of a bush?) it simply doesn’t look professional. And that shot from ten years ago is no longer usable, no matter how much you spent on Botox. There are many fantastic headshot photographers in the Bay Area. In my opinion, Lisa Keating is one of the finest in the country. Check out her work at http://lisakeatingphotography.com.

Poorly formatted résumés are a rampant (and distressing) problem. Many actors have excellently formatted résumés posted online that you can use as examples. Check out http://cindyim.com, http://valerieweak.com, and http://reggiedwhite.com for properly formatted résumés. Too many actors leave off their most recent email address, the names of directors, or the names of the theatre companies. Please also make sure that you have the name of the producing company, not the venue. La Val’s Subterranean Theatre and Exit Theatre are venues, not theatre companies. Finally, make sure that everything on your résumé is spelled correctly. An actor once auditioned for me with my name misspelled on his résumé. If you’re not good at spelling and grammar, find someone who is.

10. Exude confidence. Don’t apologize for being there, either verbally or by the way you present yourself. We know it’s nerve-wracking, but do your best to feel confident and enjoy performing for us. We’re all rooting for you, truly.

All right, kids: Now go kick some ass. I’ll be in the audience at TBAs this weekend sending you ass-kicking vibes.

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