A Crazy Update

The first week of rehearsals for Crazy, Just Like Me, has been pretty fantastic. The read through was a little disappointing in terms of length of the script (my god, was it really 2 hours just to read?!) but actually sitting down and plugging away with the blocking of the first act was AMAZINGLY successful. In two days of rehearsing, we blocked the entire first act, and even had a musical rehearsal (of which I didn't participate in, but can only assume went well).

This cast is great, and working out the kinks from the last production is as easy as pie, and even evolving the good shit from the last production is great. I started this process in the beginning not wanting to change much - I liked how it was done the last time - but since we're in a bigger space, I wanted to use the entire venue, and try to have as few scene changes as possible. (So far, in the entire first act, we're up to 2, I predict 2 more in the second act (tailor scene and wedding). That reminds me, we need to get a trellis or something so they can walk through.

Anyway, these actors are really cool, and are responding very positively to my direction, even when it's something completely new from what they've tried before, the important thing is to play around with new things, exploring what these characters are going through from different angles. In a show that all of them have done before, the challenge is to find something new... and if it doesn't work, fuck! I quit. Or we can change it. (I'm taking my advice as well, trying to bring something different to the table. Yes, I'm in the show too.)

The next week we really kick it into high gear, and I plan on being off book for at least one of my scenes. Everyone else has the same amount of discipline, if not more so, but I know how awful it is to memorize lines... so good luck to us all.

Also, Stormfield is up! It's FUCKING BRILLIANT! Please check it out!

I was really looking for a name for our Glee Club...

So I found this http://www.buzzfeed.com/peggy/wikipedia-names-your-band/the_emo-band-name-generator and decided to try it out. Resulting in this:



I'm now addicted.

Documenting Stupidity

Hi friends.

Tonight (or rather last night, since it's now almost 3 am) I was pulled over by a cop, and was told I rolled through a stop sign. Not sure it was my fault, but in the end, I was the only person on the road... and well that cop wasn't an asshole.

In any case, I'm going to see how much it is, and if it's completely obscenely priced, THEN I'll try and fight it. I'm angry and said, especially because I'm a good guy. There are tons of horrible drivers out there, and me, the Good Guy, gets pulled over. Fuck. Well. If it's less than 200 bucks, I'll just do it and traffic school.

Fuck.

But I'll document it, because it's interesting in its horrible stupidness.

A day

One hour of pretty hard core exercise down, then a little bit of walking, then a nice healthy lunch. I am totally doing good today. I feel like I can do ANYTHING! Exercise really is the miracle drug. High on life. Sweet action.

Also, Legend of the Seeker is pretty good, if a little corny. But it's on the lines of Xena and Hercules, only a little darker... and I will accept this new direction this trusted fantasy guy is taking me. Even though Zedicus Zuul Zurander is a really stupid name. And wow, lightning on the sword? holy shit. This is getting weird.

Oh wow, in rambling stream of consciousness, google voice just sent me an email saying I have a new voicemail... and it's some dude talking about a laptop. Thought it was spam, but it turns out, it was an actual dude who called about a laptop and apparently this is the last number they had. This shit is pretty awesome.

Nothing much else to say. I hope to have a even more delicious dinner.

Wonderful walk with Monica this morning! She had a late meeting so we were able to walk into our small town and eat breakfast at the mediocre cafe I seem to like way too much. Oh, and hey my unemployment check came in.

Wish I was doing something more with this ton of time off... wish I really had the motivation to get into shape rather than just this halfassedly kinda thing, but when it comes to it, I really need more like a trainer to help me. Or at the very least a friend who is unemployed as well, and could go to the gym for 8 hours of a day. Well, maybe not that much. Don't think I'd be doing that much.

Smoke Detectoring

Should I wear shorts for the rest of the day or should I put on some pants? The temperature has dropped drastically, but I'm not really happy with the pants option. Not sure what I should do with this afternoon. No matter what, the worst I could be is cold, the best I could be is comfortable. I'm sticking with shorts.

This is my exciting news in my life lately. Also, the smoke detector is running low on batteries so it's being particularly annoying. Stupid safety and me having to go get some batteries. Sheesh.

AND I GOT MY NEW GLASSES! I'm super excited.

That's it.

Super Slow Internet

I'm convinced that no matter what internet is happening in this place, it will always be slow... at least this is consistently online... but no matter what, it's always dragging and awful. Even the surrounding wifi that I sometimes borrow around here is super incredibly sluggish.

Also, for some reason I really want to go to the Hollywood sign in LA. Like in all those movies where they're sitting around the sign. Can you do that? Is that possible? Or is that just a movie thing?

Also I want to go to Hawaii.

Also, I gained 2 pounds. Fuck.

Coupla Days

Has it been a while? Yeah, it happens, and a lack of events in my life have been keeping me from really writing anything else. Wildcat's been going well, and aside from some line flubs tonight, (and most every other nights) things have been smooth. Well, I'm always great, but those OTHER actors, well.. we can't all be a Ben.

Rocked out an audition tonight; trotted out a new song "Change in Me" - it turned out to be pretty amazing, and it impressed the audition people enough to have them read me for the three shows they're doing later this year.

wow, had to rewrite a bunch of these sentences - syntax is off in my tired state.

Saw Star Trek, Wolverine. Both were entertaining movies, Star Trek amazed my face off with it's awesomeness. Seriously, it's a wonderful new twist on the series that comes from people who really want the franchise to succeed. Thought nothing could pull back after Enterprise. Man, I might go see it again, and I don't really see movies twice in theatres anymore.

Okay, a pee and a tooth brush (hopefully not at the same time) and a bedtime for me.

Pokemon Saved My Life

Okay so I still haven't finished writing about my trip? Well, that'll just wait a few more days. Or just a day, because all my pictures are on my lovely laptop. So yeah.

The runs have been going well (not the diarrhea) and despite the fact I've been called 2 hours before the show actually starts, it's a good time. I guess we ARE still in rehearsal, so the 2 hours are useful for some people... but for those of us that are only in some scenes and NO dance numbers, it's a little bit of a long haul. Thank god for Pokemon, that's all I have to say. Also I'm bringing a book tonight. So much for that reading a play a week thing I meant to do this year. Oh yeah, remember that I was trying to do that? Didn't happen.

Mom's coming tonight, so that should be even more fun. Plus maybe some drinks afterwords. I love my mom. She's cool.

A Barfy Day

Threw up this morning. It must have been the super fatty fast food I had last night, but it could have been anything else; I've been feeling bad since yesterday afternoon. I hate throwing up (who really likes throwing up? Honestly.) although afterwords it certainly made me feel better in my tummy.

The big problem with this is that I was supposed to do something really cool today, a really cool internship that I have to keep quiet as it's still going on... but I'd rather not get other, more importanter people sick. And to be honest, Monica is right, I have to worry about myself (and my own career) before other things; I need to be well for the run through tonight.

Also, I'm sick of this voice actor that does the Clone Wars newsreel narrations; he's not a bad voice actor, he just has a very noticeable voice, and I'm tired of hearing it in all of my shows that I watch. Especially when I'm sitting here all barfy and trying to sleep. I much prefer Will Arnett's voice on Cartoon Network.

So. Cartoons and water with the occasional saltine today. Not a bad sick day, if I do say so myself.

5/3

I sit here with my lurve after an extremely long rehearsal, and I'm satisfied I'll sleep this evening, and that's a good thing, considering how stupidly unsleepy I've been for so long. All I've been doing this weekend is rehearsing, no movies, no video games, no nuthin. Especially none of the stuff that I've been planning to do, like watch Wolverine and Battle for Terra. (Both Reviewed Medocrely, but I want to see them still.)

In addition to rehearsal and my upcoming movies this week, I want to try and get back on the horse when it comes to exercise, and do my aerobics in addition to my normal shit of just getting out and walking; my weight loss is still happening, but it's happening at a slower pace than I'd want. Not that I'm getting weird about it! It's just that I need to get back on the ball. Shooting for 2 pounds a week, folks, lets keep that up.

Also on Tuesday I'm doing a very special internship that I hope will be as awesome as I think it is. Granted, I'm just going to be the sandwich guy thing, but this may be something I never forget. All thanks to monica.

And so to bed.

Just some stuff.

First run through tonight! And we open in less than a week; how did this happen? And I all of a sudden have an audition tomorrow! I need to actually prepare! How do these things happen?

Plan for tonight: work on monologues on the car ride into the city! I'm a genius. Also, when I'm not on stage, I'm totally going to work on them then! Or possibly play Pokemon. Actually, Pokemon will most definitely be played. Or monologues.

Anyway, I'm always nervous about auditions, but something that just came out of nowhere makes me even more nervous.

And blog out!

Rehearsal and Such

An email this morning: All called, Stumble-thru/work Act 2.

I've been critical of the scheduling and directorial process of wildcat in the past, and I know it's a hard thing to keep so many plates spinning at once when you're a director, but there are some scenes we just haven't touched throughout this process... and I'm still a little annoyed.

Perhaps it's just because I haven't been called that often that I haven't been in the habit of thinking I'm really in a show, it's more that I go to a rehearsal for an hour or two in the evening, and then head home to play prince of persia or whatever. It's been very odd, actually. Well, at least for the actual show I won't have a whole lot to do, and it's equity points. So there you have it.

I'm just tired of the incompetence of the various theatre companies around here. Sigh. It happens, and I feel I'm writing this more and more... but honestly the frustration doesn't go away, so what else should I write?

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I really want a flying carpet lately. Is that weird? I think it is. But it'd be fun!

Saturday in St Louis

This was the day to try and get everything else done; and honestly, we put way too much on our plate for the trip... especially the time after getting back from Memphis. Did you know that practically everything was closed that Sunday? Yeah, it was Easter, but still... what about all the secular people? Huh? What about us? Nevertheless, it was pretty fun anyway.

After our harrowing trip back to get the car, and coming back home before collapsing in a heap on the bed the night before, we slept pretty well, and pretty late into the morning. This day was the day of more museums, and looking back on it now really makes me wonder why we had such a hard time figuring out our schedule that day... we went to the Scott Joplin house, as well as the art and history museum... and for some reason we had to leave early.... for something. Oh well, I'm sure Monica will tell me and I'll edit this later.

Scott Joplin house was first.



This was the place where Joplin lived from 1903 to 1906 or something like that; some very small period of time. It would have been fun, but the tour guide was an idiot, and the museum itself was talking about how houses were back then, rather than who Joplin was and his accomplishments. Several times, I looked over to Monica to see a look of sadness and the words I am sooo sorry on her lips. It was pretty hilarious.

As said, we went to the art museum, saw some cool old stuff. "I have exhibit envy." said Monica several times throughout the presentations. It's a cool place, (favorite: mummies) with a neat outside garden that I had a really arty picture of me taken.. but I can't find it, so here's a pic of me in front of the history museum.



History museum was fun as always, and we skipped the world's fair exhibit this time, to see other ones, like the one from the start of St. Louis as a city, through the fire, before we had to go for some reason... it was cut short. I have no idea why now that I'm writing this. Isn't that weird? I remember having to leave early, but for what... no idea.

We also tried to go to Crown Candy that day... but the line was literally stretching around the block, so we didn't do that.

Later that evening we headed out to O'Fallon (OH THAT'S RIGHT, WE WERE LEAVING TO GO HERE!) to visit Nick and Melissa, and to go to Dave and Buster's for delicious dinner and fun playing of games. We were going to go to the City Museum that evening, to keep our Day of Museums going, but I think that our friends didn't know what it was, so were hesitant to come to the city and see what it was. (Their loss... it's one of the best places to go ever.)

Always good to see Nick and Miss, and playing and winning at Dave and Busters was incredible as well!



It's a grown up arcade. Also, we had a huge dessert that was delicious. We also had an annoying waiter. As before, we drove home and collapsed in bed.

Did I mention we were sleeping on an air mattress? yeah, that got annoying after a while.