I am a member of a playwrights discussion group on Facebook, and earlier in the month I mentioned in a discussion that I had been sued for producing my own play. I answered questions about the case as well as providing a link to the article I wrote for the Dramatists Guild, The Strange Case of Edward Einhorn v. Mergatroyd Productions.
Then on Sunday, August 17, 2014 Edward Einhorn posted a response on the playwrights discussion group.
I sat down this morning to write a lengthy response but realized I had already gone over most of it in the article and on the blog. So I decided to stick to a few points, one of which is Einhorn's attempt to suggest that my response to the case is purely emotional. He began his post:
I see from the recent postings that Nancy McClernan is still deeply and emotionally involved in a dispute we had nearly ten years ago.
First off, the "dispute" was tried in court in April 2006, so it's eight years, not nearly ten. Secondly, the reason I'm still discussing the case is not due to my personal feelings towards Edward Einhorn.
What I found most telling in Einhorn's post was his confession that he did indeed come up with the scheme to register his fraudulent copyright as a tool to drag my former partner and I into federal court. Einhorn wrote:
As I stated at the time, and as I will state again—the main thrust of the lawsuit was that I had directed a show for her and was never paid. As we had merely agreed to a fee by email rather than signing a contract, I wasn’t sure if a pure contract claim was valid. Therefore I included the fact that I felt that she had used my intellectual property—ie, the directing work I had done, without pay. I understand that some people feel that blocking is not intellectual property. It is my opinion that it is just a different sort of choreography, but really that’s an academic question for me at this point.
The "main thrust" of the lawsuit was not about Edward Einhorn's desire to be paid. The amount of the dispute was $1000, and if Edward Einhorn truly cared about being paid he could have taken the matter to small claims court. Or even attempted to negotiate with my former partner.
It does not matter whether Einhorn sincerely believes that I was using his intellectual property, his belief is wrong on two counts: I didn't use his direction - which is what he means by "intellectual property" in the 2005 production of TAM LIN, for which he sued us; and he had no "intellectual property" at stake. There was no precedent for direction as intellectual property when he got his fraudulent copyright.
When F. Scott Fitzgerald said: "Let me tell you about the very rich. They are different from you and me" this is the kind of thing he was talking about. When Edward Einhorn wasn't sure about a legal matter over $1000 he turned it into a federal case by taking a copy of my TAM LIN script, removing my name from it, scribbling in his minimal stage directions, and filing it with the US Copyright Office as his own "blocking and choreography" script. He filed his copyright in late 2004 and then he waited a year, until we began rehearsals on our 2005 production of TAM LIN in October 2005, to sue us for going ahead with the 2005 production - a production which he had no connection with.
This is not the kind of thing someone living on a weekly salary would consider doing.
I just watched an interview with Bill Moyers and Paul Krugman the other night and Krugman had an important point to make about the effects of economic inequality and the dangerous power of the wealthy:
“We’ve had a parade of billionaires whining about the incredible injustice that people are actually criticizing them… this is very strange and it’s kind of scary. It’s one thing if someone without a lot of power seems to be going off into a rage for no good reason, but these are people who have a lot of influence because of the amount of money they control.
People with more money than brains, and more self-regard than either, can do enormous damage to the public interest thanks to their socio-economic advantages. Edward Einhorn, who lives off a trust fund, and who believes that actors don't really need to be paid because they get "the glory" of being on stage, decided to have a hissy fit in federal court.
If my former partner Jonathan Flagg hadn't taken it upon himself to stand up to Einhorn, going to court to get a judge to declare Einhorn's copyright invalid, his fraudulent "blocking and choreography" script would still exist, a convenient toehold for the next legal prospector who dreams of a director's copyright. Jonathan paid for our case out of his own salary, and is the unsung hero of this saga. He no longer has any involvement in theater - and who can blame him - but American playwrights owe him gratitude for fighting this case.
And playwrights need to be aware of stage directors like Edward Einhorn who fully believe in the rights of directors to hold a copyright against a playwright's work. No playwright should willingly work with such a director. And that is why it's so important for me to keep talking about this case - so playwrights realize that there are directors such as Edward Einhorn still out there, still hoping for a director's copyright, fully backed by the stage director's union the SDC, and with enough money to try to make it happen through our court system.
Questions I answered for tourists during my walk in Central Park on Friday evening:
Where is Strawberry Fields?
Where is the west side?
How do I get to 59th and Lexington?
Where is the castle?
I don't know if I look knowledgable or just mostly harmless. The castle is of course Belvedere Castle which has a primary function of being a weather station.
And of course I had to take pix of the Shakespeare Garden nearby - very different looking from when I took pix back in January 2011.
Buzzfeed's caption: 18. This centaur KNOWS what the mermaid is like when she’s had a few drinks and doesn’t know why he ever invited her to meet his friends.
Finally got my laptop back. Wow, 50% of my life was basically on hold - playscripts, NYCPlaywrights postings, and of course this blog were neglected while my baby was away with the Apple Genii.
I have so much work to catch up on it will be a little while before I can get to those three rants I promised last week. And they have to get in line after my response to Edward Einhorn.
Einhorn, as readers of this blog may know, sued me for producing my own play in 2005, on the basis of his fraudulent "blocking and choreography" script which was pronounced invalid, although not until 2011, by the US Copyright Office.
I am a member of a Facebook playwrights discussion group and during a conversation about directors and playwrights I mentioned I had been sued and under what circumstances. People were naturally curious and asked for details so of course I gave them, including a link to the article I wrote for the Dramatists Guild about the case.
A week or so later Einhorn actually had the nerve to come around and complain that I would dare discuss this issue of vital importance to playwrights on a playwrights discussion board. My laptop had just died, and I retorted to Einhorn's long complaint as best I could typing with my thumb on my iPhone, but I never did a thorough point-by-point debunking of his claims.
On re-reading Einhorn's comments just now, one thing that strikes me as incredibly appalling is Einhorn's insistence that this is merely some personal dispute between us. As if he and his brother did not conspire to completely alter the creative and legal world of theater to the detriment of playwrights. I didn't raise the issue on the playwrights discussion group because I have issues with Einhorn personally - although I do think he's a clueless trustfunditarian who has lived in a bubble of wealth his entire life and so can shamelessly proclaim, as he did - and entered it into the court record to boot - that actors don't really need to be paid because they perform for "the glory" of being on stage.
And in response to Einhorn's self-pity over having to be reminded occasionally that he tried and failed to stake a claim in my play forever because he had once directed it, I admit I advised him to go and recover on his 14-carat yacht. This is an allusion to the song "Money" from CABARET.
In any case, rich people running NYC theater is hardly a novel or interesting concept, and exploiting actors is so unremarkable the Flea Theater does it on a massive scale. And few people care about my personal contempt for Edward Einhorn - the important issue is his belief that directors deserve a copyright for their stage directions, which would destroy the theatre for playwrights.
Give you everything you need to live inside a twisted cage
Sleep beside an empty rage
I had a dream I was your hero
Damn, I wish I was your lover
I'd rock you 'til the daylight comes
Made sure you are smiling and warm
I am everything, tonight, I'll be your mother
I'll do such things to ease your pain
Free your mind, and you won't feel ashamed
Open up on the inside
Gonna fill you up, gonna make you cry
This monkey can't stand to see you black and blue
I give you something sweet each time you come inside my jungle book
Or is it just too good?
Don't say you'll stay, 'cause then you go away
Damn, I wish I was your lover
I'd rock you 'til the daylight comes
Made sure you are smiling and warm
I am everything, tonight, I'll be your mother
I'll do such things to ease your pain
Free your mind, and you won't feel ashamed
Shucks, for me there is no other
You're the only shoe that fits
I can't imagine I'll grow out of it
Damn, I wish I was your lover (oh, yeah)
If I was your girl, believe me
I'd turn on the Rolling Stones
We could groove along and feel much better (guess what)
Come, let me in, mm
I could do it forever and ever and ever and ever
Give me an hour to kiss you
Walk through Heaven's door I'm sure
We don't need no doctor to feel much better
Let me in, oh
Forever and ever and ever and ever and ever
I sat on a mountainside with peace of mind
And I lay by the ocean making love to her with visions clear
Walked for days with no one near
And I return as chained and bound to you
Damn, I wish I was your lover
I'd rock you 'til the daylight comes
Made sure you are smiling and warm
I am everything, tonight, I'll be your mother
I'll do such things to ease your pain
Free your mind, and you won't feel ashamed
Shucks, for me there is no other
You're the only shoe that fits
I can't imagine I'll grow out of it
Damn, I wish I was your lover
I wanna open up, I'm gonna come inside
I wanna fill you up, I wanna make you cry
Damn, I wish I was your lover
Gettin' on a subway, and I'm comin' uptown
Damn, I wish I was your lover
Standing on the street corner, waiting for my love to change
Damn, I wish I was your lover
And I'm feelin' like a school boy, too shy and too young, oh
Damn, I wish I was your lover
I wanna open up, I'm gonna come inside
I wanna fill you up, I wanna make you cry
Damn, I wish I was your lover
I'm gettin' on my camel, and I'll ride it uptown, oo
Damn, I wish I was your lover
Hanging around this jungle, wishing that this love would change
That old dog has chained you up, alright
Give you everything you need to live inside a twisted cage
Sleep beside an empty rage
I had a dream I was your hero
Damn, I wish I was your lover
I'd rock you 'til the daylight comes
Made sure you are smiling and warm
I am everything, tonight, I'll be your mother
I'll do such things to ease your pain
Free your mind, and you won't feel ashamed
Open up on the inside
Gonna fill you up, gonna make you cry
This monkey can't stand to see you black and blue
I give you something sweet each time you come inside my jungle book
Or is it just too good?
Don't say you'll stay, 'cause then you go away
Damn, I wish I was your lover
I'd rock you 'til the daylight comes
Made sure you are smiling and warm
I am everything, tonight, I'll be your mother
I'll do such things to ease your pain
Free your mind, and you won't feel ashamed
Shucks, for me there is no other
You're the only shoe that fits
I can't imagine I'll grow out of it
Damn, I wish I was your lover (oh, yeah)
If I was your girl, believe me
I'd turn on the Rolling Stones
We could groove along and feel much better (guess what)
Come, let me in, mm
I could do it forever and ever and ever and ever
Give me an hour to kiss you
Walk through Heaven's door I'm sure
We don't need no doctor to feel much better
Let me in, oh
Forever and ever and ever and ever and ever
I sat on a mountainside with peace of mind
And I lay by the ocean making love to her with visions clear
Walked for days with no one near
And I return as chained and bound to you
Damn, I wish I was your lover
I'd rock you 'til the daylight comes
Made sure you are smiling and warm
I am everything, tonight, I'll be your mother
I'll do such things to ease your pain
Free your mind, and you won't feel ashamed
Shucks, for me there is no other
You're the only shoe that fits
I can't imagine I'll grow out of it
Damn, I wish I was your lover
I wanna open up, I'm gonna come inside
I wanna fill you up, I wanna make you cry
Damn, I wish I was your lover
Gettin' on a subway, and I'm comin' uptown
Damn, I wish I was your lover
Standing on the street corner, waiting for my love to change
Damn, I wish I was your lover
And I'm feelin' like a school boy, too shy and too young, oh
Damn, I wish I was your lover
I wanna open up, I'm gonna come inside
I wanna fill you up, I wanna make you cry
Damn, I wish I was your lover
I'm gettin' on my camel, and I'll ride it uptown, oo
Damn, I wish I was your lover
Hanging around this jungle, wishing that this love would change
Here I am at the Queens Library now because my laptop has still not been fixed by those so-called Genii at Apple. I keep looking to my right to see if the guy next to me fell asleep at his computer station - his breathing is so loud. No, he's awake. He just naturally sounds like Darth Vader.
So many inconveniences thanks to one malfunctioning graphics card. Not to mention my journey to the Brooklyn Pit of Filth on Saturday.
I will say though, that my brief friendship with the guy who lives in the BPofF was not without some benefits. For one thing he took me to the Tea Lounge in Park Slope and I quite liked it. I will try to go back again, although hopefully I won't see that guy.
And thanks to him I also discovered Archer. I didn't want to like Archer - it was playing on the guy's huge flat-screen TV in the only relatively clear area in the Pit of Filth, and I really wasn't watching it - I was too busy trying to work on the NYCPlaywrights weekly email blast while my mind was screaming "you need to get out of here!" Yet in spite of all that, I picked up that the dialog on Archer was very clever. So yesterday I couldn't resist any longer - I Googled "cartoon spy show" and found out exactly what it was I had been watching in the BPofF.
And I liked Archer even more when I found out that the main character has tinnitus, just like me. And the people at Audio Notch are pretty excited about it.
It's a definite advantage of dating younger guys - I never heard of Archer before and here it's been on since 2009.
I feel the earth move under my feet
I feel the sky tumblin' down
I feel my heart start to tremblin'
Whenever you're around
Ooh, baby, when I see your face
Mellow as the month of May
Oh, darlin', I can't stand it
When you look at me that way
I feel the earth move under my feet
I feel the sky tumblin' down
I feel my heart start to tremblin'
Whenever you're around
Ooh darlin', when you're near me
And you tenderly call my name
I know that my emotions
Are something I just can't tame
I've just got to have you, baby
I feel the earth move under my feet
I feel the sky tumblin' down, a tumblin' down
I feel the earth move under my feet
I feel the sky tumblin' down, a tumblin' down
I just a lose control
Down to my very soul
I get a hot and cold
All over, all over, all over, all over
I feel the earth move under my feet
I feel the sky tumblin' down, a tumblin' down
I feel the earth move under my feet
I feel the sky tumblin' down, a tumblin' down
A tumblin' down, a tumblin' down, a tumblin' down
As my daughter will be happy to tell you, I am not a neat freak by any stretch of the imagination. Although I should note that I am not happy about it - mess just seems to happen and there's never enough time to properly clean everything. And I always clean before I have guests. But when I don't have guests almost anything goes.
Well it turns out even I have limits.
So this guy was on the youngish side, but he was cute and smart and sweet and really seemed to like me. Although it was a little freakish how much he had in common with the character Buddy in my play JULIA & BUDDY - he went to bording school, and his last girlfriend dumped him due to a physical trauma and he quoted Nietzche at me (that would normally be a bad thing - a joke in the play is that whenever you meet a guy on a dating site and you ask if he likes philosophy he will invariably mention Nietzche. However in this case he mentioned Nietzche outside of a general discussion of philosophers.)
We had a couple of nice dates this week - I even took him to my favorite place, the Black Mountain Winehouse in Brooklyn. And when I told him about my laptop meltdown he offered to let me come to his place on Saturday and use his laptop so I could get out the weekly NYCPlaywrights email blast. That was so sweet and I was inclined to feel romantic towards him.
Until I got to his apartment.
To say that it looked like a bomb went off really understates the war zone aesthetic. I was astounded - just crap everywhere. The only area that was not covered in crap was the two lounge chairs set in front of a huge flat screen TV, on which was blaring some cartoon show. I stuck it out for 30 minutes before I got the hell out of there. I felt so disrespected that he clearly made no effort to clean on my account.
And then I had to pay Staples to let me use their computer station to finish the NYCPlaywrights newsletter. And that's where I'm typing this.
As soon as I get home I am cleaning my apartment - and I will never let it get messy again.
Day after day spring’s glory vies with the glorious sun. Sloping roads to the hill city smell of flowering almond. How long before the heart’s threads, all cares gone, Float free for a hundred feet with the gossamer?
I love myself
I want you to love me
When I'm feelin' down
I want you above me
I search myself
I want you to find me
I forget myself
I want you to remind me
I don't want anybody else
When I think about you
I touch myself
I don't want anybody else
Oh no, oh no, oh no
You're the one who makes me happy honey
You're the sun who makes me shine
When you're around I'm always laughing
I want to make you mine
I close my eyes
And see you before me
Think I would die
If you were to ignore me
A fool could see
Just how much I adore you
I get down on my knees
I'd do anything for you
I don't want anybody else
When I think about you
I touch myself
I don't want anybody else
Oh no, oh no, oh no
I love myself
I want you to love me
When I'm feelin' down
I want you above me
I search myself
I want you to find me
I forget myself
I want you to remind me
I don't want anybody else
When I think about you
I touch myself
I don't want anybody else
Oh no, oh no, oh no
I want you
I don't want anybody else
And when I think about you
I touch myself
Ooh, oooh, oooooh, aaaaaah
I don't want anybody else
When I think about you
I touch myself
I don't want anybody else
Oh no, oh no, oh no
Well OK the chorus is pretty much a single entendre..
Luckily my hard drive did not fry. The Apple Genius said I needed to have the graphics card replaced. Hopefully that will be done by the weekend at least - I know some of you blog readers are looking forward to my anti-zombie rant.
And I am about to get carpal tunnel syndrome from typing so much on this iPhone.
In the meantime continue to enjoy the fine selection of music I am posting here.
In trutina mentis dubia
Fluctuant contraria
Lascivus amor et pudicita.
Sed eligo quod video
Collum iugo prebeo;
Ad iugum tamen suave transeo.
(In the wavering balance of my feelings
Set against each other
Lascivious love and modesty
But I choose what I see
And submit my neck to the yoke;
I yield to the sweet yoke.)
Well, I was feelin' so bad Asked my family doctor 'bout what I had I said, "Doctor, doctor,
Mr. M.D. Can you tell me, what's ailing me?"
He said, "Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah All you need, all you really need, good lovin'"
Because you got to have lovin' (Good lovin') Everybody got to have lovin' So come on baby, well squeeze me tight Don't you want your daddy to feel alright Well I said now baby (baby) Well it's for sure (baby) I got the fever (baby) And you got the cure (baby)
I know a guy who's tough but sweet He's so fine, he can't be beat He's got everything that I desire Sets the summer sun on fire
I want candy, I want candy
Go to see him when the sun goes down Ain't no finer boy in town You're my guy, just what the doctor ordered So sweet, you make my mouth water
I want candy, I want candy
Candy on the beach, there's nothing better But I like candy when it's wrapped in a sweater Some day soon I'll make you mine, Then I'll have candy all the time
I want candy, I want candy I want candy, I want candy
Live if you want to live
(Rastaman vibration, yeah! Positive!)
That's what we got to give!
(I'n'I vibration yeah! Positive)
Got to have a good vibe!
(Iyaman Iration, yeah! Irie ites!)
Wo-wo-ooh!
(Positive vibration, yeah! Positive!)
If you get down and you quarrel everyday,
You're saying prayers to the devils, I say. Wo-oh-ooh!
Why not help one another on the way?
Make it much easier. (Just a little bit easier)
Say you just can't live that negative way,
If you know what I mean;
Make way for the positive day,
'Cause it's news (new day) - news and days -
New time (new time), and if it's a new feelin' (new feelin'), yeah! -
Said it's a new sign (new sign):
Oh, what a new day!
Pickin' up?
Are you pickin' up now?
Pickin' up?
Are you pickin' up now?
Pickin' up? (Jah love, Jah love -)
Are you pickin' (protect us!) up now?
Pickin' up? (Jah love, Jah love -)
Are you pickin' (protect us!) up now?
Pickin' up? (Jah love, Jah love -)
Are you pickin' (protect us!) up now?
Pickin' up?
Are you pickin' up now?
UPDATE: damn NC your friends are blowing up my web analytics.
And you know I'm right about the zombies.
As soon as I have a little down time I will be writing and posting three righteous rants on this here blog:
Rant #1 - what is wrong with the "romantic comedy"
I made a good start on this one by including in the NYCPlaywrights weekly email blast a few weeks ago a whole slew of links to articles on what is wrong with the romantic comedy. If you want to see them you can sign up for the NYCPlaywrights weekly email blast and look through the archives. I have issues with Bitter Gertrude's opinion on the subject - she wants to fire all romantic comedies into the moon, as if the existence of some bad rom-coms makes the entire genre worthless crap.
Rant #2 - the theater audience is older women. Get over it.
It isn't fashionable to be a blatant misogynist, so theater hipsters will not admit to it, but a major reason why theater producers keep trying to lure straight men into the theater is because they are mortified by the fact that the theater audience skews female. I really believe the attitude is this: women, especially over 40 = stupid cows. This is why it's vitally important to try to fill your theater with men under 40, preferably hipsters in porkpie hats and tattoos. It isn't just Broadway either. Off Broadway and "Independent Theater" is all about pushing plays about zombies and sci-fi and noir clowns these days. Because that's what straight guys care about. For as the article about theater producers above states:
“It’s always been a holy grail on Broadway — to have a show that universally appeals to men and women,” said Michele Groner, the lead marketing executive for “Rocky.” “Women are the low-hanging fruit. Trying to appeal to men is an increasingly scary challenge.” (The attendance problem is mostly with straight men; gay men are widely considered by producers and group sales agents to be a reliable Broadway demographic.)
I believe that one of the reasons why there is still such resistance to producing plays by women is because the fear is that plays by women will likely bring in even more women, thus compounding the problem of too many women in the audience. And if you think that's far-fetched consider this: one of the excuses given for why there aren't more plays produced about people of color (and written by people of color) is because the audience is so overwhelmingly white. But that excuse breaks down when it comes to women - women are a clear majority of the audience in theaters - and yet that does not translate into more plays by and about women - something that a majority female audience would prefer. Giving the audience what it wants is a pretty basic component of making money. So that shows you just how really deep the misogyny goes - theater decision-makers from Broadway on down would sacrifice profits to prevent girl germs from ruining the coolness quotient of the theater. Bring on the zombies!
My first introduction to the kind of thing BG is talking about was Jeff Sweet talking about the work of Neil Simon. Who, you might be interested to know, is male, and a very commercially successful playwright.
But more than that, BG almost never bothers to back up any of her claims on her blog ever with empirical evidence, and this is no exception. She makes reference to the new plays she's read, but she doesn't offer any examples. And I for one am not willing to take her word for it because:
A. I have read lots of new plays and this has not been my experience and
B. I think BG has plenty of internalized misogyny to get over - although internalized misogyny is probably helpful if you want to attempt to be a bigshot in an artform that is still completely dominated by men, the way theater is.
I invited Donna Moore, the creator of COUGAR THE MUSICAL to see JULIA & BUDDY and she came, daughter in tow. I saw her after the show and she said that my play really gave her something to think about, which I consider the highest of compliments.
Although I wrote about the experience of seeing her show, I really didn't know that much about Donna, although she knows my friends Valerie David and Kitty Hendrix. So I was amazed and impressed when I found out, just recently that Donna had been one of the kids on Zoom! I guarantee I saw the episodes that Donna was on when they were first aired - I'm just about Donna's age. It is a small world after all.
I asked Danny Bernardy, who played all the guy roles in COUGAR to play Buddy in my show, but he wasn't available for the full run. Which is perhaps just as well - someone who knows Danny's work and saw Matt DeCapua play the role said in her opinion Matt was actually the better choice for the role.
I certainly can't imagine that Danny could have played the Schopenhauer part as well as Matt. One of my ambitions for J&B was that people would look at their programs to see who was playing Schopenhauer because they weren't sure it was the same guy playing Buddy. The actors and stage manager scoffed at the idea when I mentioned it during rehearsals but sure enough, for the last performance a coworker friend of mine who came to see the show admitted he wasn't sure, at least at the beginning of the Schopenhauer scene, that it was the same actor. VICTORY!
As I blogged before, I did like COUGAR much more than I expected I would. And I'm also extremely impressed that Donna was able to create a successful show as she did. She's promised to let me take her out for drinks and ask her for tips on how to be a success in this business we call show.
Bruce Barton (downstage right) as Leontes in Hudson Warehouse's A WINTER'S TALE
Not every play by Shakespeare is a gem. This past weekend I saw performances of two of the Bard's lesser works - my friend Bruce Barton was Leontes in WINTER'S TALE and Amanda Thickpenny was Sebastian in TWO GENTLEMEN FROM VERONA.
I have much more tolerance for liberties taken for his lesser work than I do for messing with HAMLET for instance, and both these productions did some inspired work.
Amanda Thickpenny (on the grass) as Sebastian in Hip to Hipt Theater Company's TWO GENTLEMEN OF VERONA
WINTER'S TALE went to town with the bit about the bear. The stage direction "exit, pursued by a bear" in the middle of the play is famous because stage directions are so rarely included in Shakespeare's plays. So they had a member of the Hudson Warehouse dress in a bear suit, entering stage left - she stopped center stage, lifted up the bear head so we could see her face and said: "exit pursued by a bear" and then exit, stage right. I thought that was brilliant.
More gruesomely, during the following scene various body parts flew across the stage to represent the poor character being eaten by the bear.
And Bruce was very good, of course.
TWO GENTLEMEN by Hip to Hip Theater Company was done in a commedia dell arte mode, very stylized, but it did very well for the play. My favorite moment was when Julia, who had been running around disguised as a boy (the first of many in Shakespeare's plays) with her long hair under her cap, suddenly whips off her hat and lets her hair down, and all the characters on stage go "ooh!" as if utterly amazed that this boy should suddenly turn into a woman. It was really funny and the audience got a huge kick out of it. Amanda played several roles, all with great style and panache.
Krugman says no. And reliably got off a good one at Paul Ryan:
Paul Ryan thinks that we’re living in an Ayn Rand novel.
He provides a link to the New Yorker article Ayn Rand Joins the Ticket which contains this awesome fact:
...as a Congressman, Ryan not only tried to get all of the interns in his congressional office to read Rand’s writing, he also gave copies of her novel “Atlas Shrugged” to his staff as Christmas presents, as he told the Weekly Standard in 2003.
I'm sure that Ryan doesn't appreciate the irony of celebrating a Christian holiday of free-handed gift-giving through the anti-altruism Bible written by a devout atheist.
The folks at the MITF posted another review of JULIA & BUDDY on their Facebook page on Saturday night. It was a nice surprise. This one is not as glowing as the first one... but that would scarcely be possible.
I found this part to be especially interesting - I didn't think about it in quite this way...
Julia, a philosopher, tries to understand Buddy and “put together the pieces of the puzzle” as she puts it, while at the same exact time Buddy seems to realize that Julia knows very little about herself: Just as Buddy figures out that Julia is calling for a maintenance man to unlock her door, when she is actually afraid of leaving the house, Julia simultaneously realizes that even though the maintenance man is supposed to fix the ills of an apartment, Buddy quite literally can’t do any of the things in his job description. The two prove to be completely self deluded as to their actual standing in the real world, not fully comprehending their own ridiculousness. However, as I watched the two figure out the other’s flaws in front of me, I found myself completely transfixed by the actors playing caricatures of people, yet truly finding the realness of both of them. Though Julia’s various phobias and stigmas and Buddy’s multiple problems and shortcomings pose a certain threat to their respective sanity, the two find solace in their understanding of one another.
Very interesting perspective. Although I regret to say that Schopenhauer is not mentioned once. The second half of the play would make more sense if the critic had a better appreciation of the role of Schopenhauer in the proceedings. I have to say, I thought the review by the college guy (also appearing in Drama-Queens.net, strange that the same media outlet reviewed it twice), while excessively hostile, at least mentioned Schopenhauer - even if he did fail to completely understand the importance of Schopenhauer to the play.
So I'm walking home from work and I'm struck by a graffito that I had never seen before on the boarding around a construction site..
It was an unusually literary graffito so I felt compelled to take a photo. I was unfamiliar with the tag SEK and I wondered what that symbol was above the letters on the tag. I don't know if a life like Gatsby was meant as aspirational or what - although if you've read "The Great Gatsby" you probably don't want to aspire to Gatsby's life.
So I'm walking along and several blocks later I see this. Apparently somebody is not a prince - or is no longer a prince.
And they are also not a king.
Hey wait a minute... there's something familiar about this graphic style...
AHAH! So that's what that symbol means - SEK has a halo.
Naturally I assumed that SEK was some local kid who decided to decorate the neighborhood.
Apparently SEK is/was recently in NYC doing some work for Nylon Magazine according to SEK's Facebook profile.
So the artist currently known as SEK has made an apparition in Queens. And you know what that means - while most of SEK's street art is untransportable, that grafitto on the construction board is. And is probably worth more - and potentially worth much more - than your standard construction site board.
If I had a car I would maybe try to get it. This could be similar to the Banksy situation.
I wonder if my friend the Penis Artist knows about the career potential in street art.
Matt DeCapua as the Space Cowboy from JULIA & BUDDY photo by Linda Jaquez
You never know what the audience is going to laugh at when you write a play. If you write a romantic comedy, you have to hope you can predict when at least some lines get a laugh.
In my JULIA & BUDDY this never failed to get a laugh:
BUDDY Hey, do you want to play dress-up? I could be the cowboy and you could be the Indian girl.
JULIA And then what, you give me smallpox and steal my land?
No matter how quiet the audience was, this exchange, at least, would make them laugh.
And the best part is, it is 100% politically correct.
However, another politically correct line that I thought would get a laugh: "If you ruled out every Great Man in history on the basis of misogyny, you wouldn't have any left" only got one really solid laugh during our 5-show run.
Sometimes the actors will make a line funny. In the second half of the play, Julia has a panic attack, by herself, while she's on a boat. A little later Buddy joins her and observes that the weather and water are so beautiful nobody could have a panic attack in such an environment. To which Julia replies: "almost nobody." For several performances that got a good laugh, and I had never expected it, and mostly actor Claire Warden gets the credit for it.
And Matt DeCapua's Schopenhauer got sterner with each performance and so naturally became funnier, until by the last performance, one of the biggest laughs we got was this:
JULIA And he has a good sense of humor and sometimes he is so sweet and kind. But then again... he has brain damage. Mild brain damage. But still...
SCHOPENHAUER A brain-damaged actor. If you are serious about philosophy you will dispense with him immediately.
JULIA But I was so lonely before he came into my life.
SCHOPENHAUER I recommend you get a poodle.
JULIA Is that all there is to life? Poodles?
SCHOPENHAUER Life is misery…
That's where the laugh was - after Schopenhauer says "life is misery." There's actually quite a bit of monologue after that, but Matt began to take longer pauses after "misery" for each performance, until by the last one it got a good hearty sustained laugh, which was immensely gratifying and still quite surprising, considering what he's actually saying.
I was disappointed that the Space Cowboy scene didn't get more laughs - the dialog is just so absurd I thought, surely... but after talking to my brother-in-law, who came with my sister to see the show, I think the reason it doesn't get a laugh is because the audience is perplexed as to what is going on. It is explained in the next scene why we see Buddy playing a Space Cowboy, but there is no exposition prior to the scene. So the audience was probably too confused to laugh.
Well I laughed every time he said "operational lady parts." Although it might be because I know the provenance of the phrase.
I received this message from someone on an online dating site.
Why is it that so many men on these sites think that the women there are a bunch of really inexpensive prostitutes?
And why hasn't Science ever looked into the issue of why such a high percentage of men are rotten horrible people? Could it be because until recently virtually all scientists were men?
This guy was a construction worker, youngish, and attractive, although not as attractive as his dating site photos. But he really impressed me by asking me specific questions from my profile, especially about my art background and portrait work. And charmingly, he had grown up in New Orleans.
It took about a single hour for him to morph from that into a good old cigarette-smoking Southern boy who:
Informed me that the Illuminati were behind 9-11
Revealed that the Rothschilds and the Rockefellers were secretly controlling the government
Claimed the government is controlling all our lives
And is planning to take our guns so we can't fight back
When I gave change to a homeless man, he chided me that I might have been contributing to the guy's scam.
By the last item on my list I was completely done. I jumped into the subway and never looked back.
And now they've decided to stop charging a submission fee.
Now I can't say for sure that we were the cause of the change of policy - but we did our best.
When enough people give theater organizations shit about submission fees, they will change the policy. I've had other groups do the same thing after I told them that NYCPlaywrights will not run their call for submissions.
If there was no down-side to charging submission fees, what would prevent all theater organizations from doing so? I don't enjoy guilt-tripping and shaming theater organizations, but there doesn't seem to be any alternative.
Actually I hardly ever watch porn - I find my own fantasies are much more satisfying than the standard ugly-men-screwing-Barbie-dolls-without-human-conversation which is what most porn appears to be about. But it does seem like it's becoming a problem with a segment of young men who come to see the tropes of Internet pornography as the essence of sex. I just watched the movie Don Jon which addresses that.
This TED Talk below addresses the reason for the distancing effect - because cameras need to be able to see penile penetration, so hands must be kept out of the way.
This man seems so sweet when he talks, especially about the insidious effects of porn - the complete depersonalization of human sexual response.
I don't know though if I agree with him when he makes the leap from porn to slut-shaming: he talks about young women making videos with their boyfriends and then those boyfriends sharing the videos and then the young women being humiliated and hounded and socially isolated - in some cases to the point of suicide.
The self-made videos may be depictions of sex, but they are not in fact "porn" - porn is made by actors being paid to have sex. The videoing of a sincere sexual event, even if there is betrayal later, is not in itself "porn." And slut-shaming is not an essential part of porn. It's true that the same people who consume porn may look down on the people, especially women who make porn (as was so well represented in Boogie Nights) but that is not the fault of porn.
And although there is no doubt that too much porn is violent misogyny, I did a survey of porn a couple of years ago, and I did not find that most of it was misogynistic - although it was certainly aimed at men and the porn actors generally seemed very stupid - although that might have been the result of their terrible acting.
What is wrong with people? There has been a dog barking incessantly in apartment 3R in my building since yesterday. I was too busy yesterday to deal with the situation since I had to get ready for the last performance of JULIA & BUDDY, and hoped it would stop. But it continued today.
I knocked on the door of 3R but no answer - it appears they've just abandoned this poor dog for days. And the thing is, we aren't even supposed to have dogs in this building. And when I called the superintendent to report the situation, I could barely understand what he was saying, between his accent, broken English and the bad cell phone connection, but he said something like the people in that apartment don't really live there, and the superintendent doesn't have a key, and maybe they'll get around to breaking the door down. And meanwhile the little dog just barks and barks and barks.
I also knocked on the door of 3R's next door neighbors. Not only did they not know anything about their neighbors in 3R, they didn't seem to be bothered at all by the fact that a poor little dog was in distress and barking constantly right near them.
Why am I the only person in this whole apartment building who is disturbed by a poor dog's constant barking???
