+ earring magic ken
+ charlize theron diving board
+ males with bubble butts
+ jake’s unbaked granola
+ sexy male faces
+ tattoo flash of rum bottles
+ clowns with guns tattoos

Um. Okay. Interesting. Especially since these were not one hit wonders, but there are multiple people searching for these things or one individual searching multiple times. I love it.

More later. Now that we’ve eliminated TV from our lives so husband can focus on studying and I can focus on writing, I imagine more regular blog postings will be in the cards.

The 5th season of The L Word - First of all, I just have to say…once again…that I absolutely HATE Jenny Schecter. I know that we are supposed to hate her now, and oh boy, I do more than ever. But I have always hated her. I know she reminds me of someone, I just can’t put my finger on it. Also, I hate the whole prison story line. I mean really, am I supposed to believe THIS? I can suspend my disbelief like a freaking champ, but even I can’t go this far.

Cashmere Mafia/soon-to-be Liptick Jungle. Cashmere Mafia is so bad that I love it. I cuddled up to a few (ok…maybe more than a few) glasses of wine and my laptop this weekend and watched the first 2 episodes. Man. It is bad. And Lucy Liu’s outfits are batshit crazy. Yeah…ok…I get that Patricia Field designed wonderfully fabulous outfits for SJP on SATC. But she was a kooky stay-at-home writer. Not the publisher of a huge magazine group. So unrealistic I can’t even stand it. And I am supposed to think that Miranda Otto’s red dress for the benefit was brave? Um…no. Boring, yes? Did she look good in it? Absolutely, but it was hardly shocking. Ok. Enough about that. I am looking forward to Lipstick Jungle, however, as I liked Lindsay Price on 90210.

Atonement - Loved it. I give it a solid B+.

Sweeney Todd - Liked it. Best comedy Golden Globe? Um…not so much. B-

Charlie Wilson’s War - So fun. Could be that I was sippin’ on red wine during the whole pic. Or the fact that my crush on Philip Seymour Hoffman just grows and grows with every picture - even if he ain’t looking his best in these fun character roles. Another B+

I am Legend - How did I miss that this was a zombie picture? As soon as they showed the huddle of zombies I was pissed. I love me a good end-of-the-world picture (I am a bit of an amateur eschatology buff after all) but this was a bit much for me. I prefer the 28 Days Later chain for my zombies, thank you very much.

National Treasure - Man, do I love me some secret passageways and as you all know, I am a huge fan of conspiracy theorists. Not that I believe all or most of them, but I love wishing that all of those grand conspiracies are true. However, the Goofy cartoon pre-flick? Very bizarre, though I can’t say I didn’t enjoy it. In other news, the Lee Harvey Oswald doc on PBS the other night did get my conspiracy juices flowing. And has me itching to watch JFK for the 3,000th time.

So that’s it for the media-type brainwashing stuff.

In other news, work is plugging along splendidly. Hubby started the second semester. I have been a bit of a hermit these days with the weather and all, but have enjoyed some nice long walks in the rain and cold, have been reading like a fiend (12 books in the new year so far!) and am looking forward to getting back in shape (physically, mentally and in general).

Andy B and I prevailed in the justice system after a 3 year battle for the unreturned security deposit (with great help from jfo and The Lizzy), so that makes me more than a bit happy.

And 2007, all in all a pretty damn good year full of fun times with friends, fam and lovelies, ended as it has for the past few years. With shots, champagne and wooden bowling at the Door after a delightful curry cooked at home for Andy B and the hubby. Christmas was fantastic and chock full of stuff to do and we even managed a 3 day escape at a rural-ish inn with much swimming and hot tubbing and wine.

And now, back to my regularly scheduled workday. Followed, thankfully, by dinner and drinks with Misterelle who I haven’t seen in an unprecedented 24 days.

And since 8 is the lucky number for me and my fam, I have a feeling this is going to be a wonderful year.

And it deserves more than a handful of hours of rehearsal and a few empty chairs and some props. It deserves a park bench. In a park. With 3 or 4 weeks to rehearse and delve as deep as possible into two amazing characters. And I hope that people come to the reading. And I hope they laugh and are moved and just fall in love with the piece. And I hope that someday it gets a full production somewhere. Preferably a free, touring show outside in the parks. Ahhh…olden times.

I must say that it has been a treat to work with Vovosan on another park bench play over 7 years after the first one. To direct Mally after first working with her almost 10 years ago. And to work with Faye, whose work I had never seen and who has literally blown me away with her talent and commitment to the project.

So come see it, ok?

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CPT presents:

LITTLE BOX
Staged readings of new work by 9 local writers

As part of CPT’s commitment to local playwrights and producers, CPT presents Little Box, a series of staged readings. Little Box is modeled after CPT’s successful Big [BOX] Series but on a smaller scale, designed to foster works at an earlier stage of development. 9 plays will presented as staged readings over two weekends.

Premiere Performances

Tickets only $8 General Admission, $5 Students and Seniors

Becomes You by Greg Vovos
Directed by Mindy Childress Herman
Featuring Faye Hargate and Molly McGinnis*
Friday, November 9th
7:30pm

Two strangers at the breaking point of their lives meet at a park bench. Mary, a woman near forty, goes to the park in search of privacy at a time when she is at the absolute breaking point of her life. She considers taking a bottle of pills but stops when she is interrupted by Valerie, a teenager who refuses to leave her alone, no matter how much Mary pleads. What ensues is a territorial battle along the lines of Albee’s Zoo Story that is settled when Veronica pulls out a gun. But how much can a woman with infertility problems and a teenager contemplating abortion share? Lives are at stake as a young woman tries to elicit advice from a woman who refuses to give it.

*Member, Actors’ Equity Association

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http://antiochians.org/forum/viewtopic.php?id=21995

Attention please

It would count as shameless hyperbole to label Cleveland Public Theatre’s opener a blazing theatrical triumph. Yet, ironically, it does italicize the snappy wink implied in its title, AtTENtion Span. For this titular attribute is the one skill not required of its audience.

And that is what makes it such an engagingly breezy evening. The structure of eight mini-playlets manages to let everyone off the proverbial hook. There’s no need for continuing brilliance or that bugaboo of cutting-edge theater: coherence.

Each of the eight playwrights is only responsible for one compelling notion, minus the Sisyphean effort of sustaining it. With each endeavor lasting approximately 10 minutes, the misfires are no more annoying than mosquito bites, and the winners have the refreshing brevity of a well-executed burlesque sketch.

One of the joys of the evening is the opportunity to watch various directors and performers emulate quick-sketch artists, creating idiosyncratic, miniature universes in a flash. The subjects here range from the shoals of zombie courtship, to cerebral lesbian eroticism, to the perils of Internet dating, and effectively culminate on a black comic note in a small gem that toys with suicide as a trendy party game.

An interesting aspect of this type of compilation is that it demonstrates what influences are prevalently affecting today’s writers. Ironically, the most delightful piece derives not from a playwright, but a cartoonist. Steve Strangio’s My Date With a Zombie is a loving nod to the charming ghoulishness of Charles Addams’ celebrated family. In this frothy bauble, we see the tribulations of mixed dating, when an ardent Morticia-like zombie, played with macabre zest by Saidah Mitchell, tries to woo a nice, regular human at an haute cuisine zombie restaurant. Among the playlet’s many superb gags are finger-food made of fingers and Ryan Smith as a talking entree suggesting which of his parts would be tastiest.

On the other side of the theatrical universe, doing a variation on Neil LaBute’s misanthropic view of the battle of the sexes, we have Steven Korbar’s Blind Man’s Bluff, in which a literally blind man lures a girl to a date using the photo of a fashion model. In this well-realized dyspeptic take on human relationships, we find the deceived girl to be ultimately more handicapped than her pursuer. This dramatic obituary of hope and trust is skillfully directed by Mindy Childress Herman to mirror on a small scale the further collapse of Western civilization.

Of the remaining entries, the most successful are those that aim for satire - such as Jayme McGhan’s digest lesbian sex farce. Those that attempt straightforward seriousness tend to trip over their own metaphoric feet. Notwithstanding which, two of the evening’s unalloyed bonuses are its introduction of a plethora of fresh talent and a new remedy to keep audiences awake by having them reposition their chairs after each selection.

Cool Cleveland:

AtTENtion Span @ CPT 10/12
Short, sweet, & hot: This year’s 10-minute play festival, coproduced with TITLEWave, has a crackerjack ensemble and smart direction. Two script standouts, both of them offbeat romances, make it worth taking the trip to CPT. Mike Geither’s hauntingly funny & original Make Yourself Plain has shy Felicita Sanchez and manic Shawn Galligan making a halting connection via photocopying their own body parts in an office duplicator. And the spectacularly funny and sexy Find Mucking has Sarah Kunchik and Margi Herwald Zittelli getting progressively hotter using philosophical tomes as their sex toys.
Caveats: The plays themselves are of varying quality – they range from engaging to one-joke sitcom or pretentious – but the cast is able enough to consistently soar above it, making for an entertaining evening.
Details: Cleveland Public Theatre, http://www.cptonline.org.
From Cool Cleveland contributor Linda Eisenstein

AtTENtion Span: A Festival of 10-Minute Plays

Through October 27 at the Cleveland Public Theatre, 6415 Detroit Avenue, 216-631-2727.

The difference between a full-length play and a sketch is roughly comparable to that between having sex and masturbating. Each can be satisfying in its own way, but real plays and shared sex have much deeper resonances, last longer (with any luck), and don’t contribute to carpal tunnel syndrome.

So when the Cleveland Public Theatre billboards its current production as AtTENtion Span: A Festival of 10-Minute Plays, you can certainly quibble with the terminology. There’s no such thing as a 10-minute play. But the best comedy sketches can be small works of art in their own right, as proven by Elaine May and Mike Nichols, Monty Python, and the rest. In this series of eight comedic skits, a couple of efforts aspire to those heights. Overall, while they vary in accessibility and wit, the bits are performed with infectious energy by the CPT cast — even when the writing doesn’t deserve it.

In the opening “My Date With a Zombie,” Saidah Mitchell is a sexy undead chick who puts the rigor in rigor mortis. She visits a zombie café with a normal fellow played by Tom Kondilas, and they seem to hit it off until a barely breathing human entrée is flopped onto their table. Written by Steve Strangio, the jokes are predictable (actual finger food for appetizers, etc.), and there’s no punchy ending, but the actors and director Christopher Johnston sweep us up in their spot-on portrayals.

“Blind Man’s Bluff,” directed with simple clarity by Mindy Childress Herman, features a svelte young woman (Sarah Kunchik) who is waiting for her blind date. The man (Derek Koger) eventually arrives, white cane in hand. Author Steven Korbar comes up with some cute lines (the woman ruefully observes she should have been tipped off by her date’s e-mail address, “eternaldarkness@hotmail.com"). But she resists his advances, even when he notes that blind men have a reputed talent for cunnilingus.

In the most successful effort of the evening, “Find Mucking” by Jamie McGhan, Kunchik and Margi Herwald Zitelli play college women who are lustily attracted to all manner of intellectual arcana, not to mention each other. Ping-ponging obscure concepts, from the intricacies of oxidation to remote literary references, the gals engage in kinky sexual horseplay as their temporal lobes flush and swell. Director Greg Vovos keeps the pacing so taut, none of the sexual or comedic tension goes limp for even a second.

Less entertaining are sketches with promising premises that just don’t develop. Mike Geither’s “Make Yourself Plain” posits an office environment where two workers (Felicita Sanchez and Shawn Galligan) are busy xeroxing their faces and body parts while intoning a sacred chant. The idea of a copy machine as God is interesting, but the script veers off course as the young man begins fantasizing that he’s a warrior/hero/lover of olden days. Perhaps these different threads could have been pulled together in a longer piece, but director Jaime Bouvier can’t quite manage it here.

“Henry and Louise and Henri” falls short in a different way, by taking a clichéd situation — the ugly American tourist in a French restaurant — and bringing little that’s new to the table. Most of the audience could write funnier lines than author Kathleen Cahill comes up with here, which in the end hangs director Vovos out to dry.

At the bottom of the barrel are “Antarctica (purity)” and “In the Cool, Cool, Cool,” each abstract and irritating. The former, a humorless exercise by Anton Dudley, features a postman who, while delivering a package to a couple, shares a homoerotic fantasy connected to nothing. The package contains only a piece of ice from Antarctica (it’s a symbol, apparently; if you don’t get it, don’t feel bad). In “Cool,” writer Peter Papadopoulos leads us through a surgical procedure in which the patient dies — and almost kills the evening in the process.

The entire show, as produced by Greg Vovos, is staged in different areas of the theater, with audience members instructed where to point their plastic chairs for each scene. This seat shuffling is gratuitous, since virtually all the “plays” could have been performed in one place. But this periodic rearrangement keeps everyone awake, if not necessarily enlivened.

The final sketch, “Scream,” happens high in the balcony of the theater, and it actually makes use of that location. Here, author/director Vovos has imagined a literally drop-dead party for happy fatalists, but the running gag gets tired, and the takeaway (the media, like roaches, always survive) is pretty ho-hum.

All in all, AtTENtion Span is as momentarily diverting as a brisk round of Whack the Weasel. But it can’t hold a candle to the real thing.

My job, you know…CPT…won Best Theatre Company of the Year in Scene Magazine and Best Theatre Company of the Year in The Free Times.

Not too shabby.

My show opened in preview tonight with a small, appreciative audience of about 50. I am excited for the official opening night tomorrow, and interested in hearing The Husband’s opinion. Then, I am VERY excited about not seeing the show for the first time in weeks and possibly hanging out with the chitlins on Saturday.

WTF? If that happened to me, I think I would hide away and wear the same damn pair of pajamas all day.

Oh well….

Those are my deep thoughts for the day.