Curse of the solo show.

My Little Kelly
6:50 PM

Once the house opens I will need to use the bathroom beneath Fefu's Kitchen (don't make me explain what that means, exactly.) So tonight I stick my head in Fefu's to check out whether or not they had, in fact, put the door on that bathroom. Kelly said I would be sharing it with the cast of FEVER/DREAM, and that is a normal sized cast.

I open the door, and there are ladies in there -- so I shut the door, embarrassed. WTF? Is F/D using that as a women's' dressing room? Carrie had seen me, and came out to say hi, and explain it's just hair and make-up.

A hair and make-up room? Damn. CPT is going all kinds of legit. Good on 'em. I head back in to see everyone, there's three GLTF actor-teachers in the cast, and a lot of other favorite people. They are all putting their hair up, dressed in very nice business office costumes ...

And I felt like I was back at the Fringe. This is always the case with me, surrounded by large casts of giddy, excited, nervous, glamorous, interesting theater people, and then there's me, by myself in street clothes.

We are holding for the second dress ... technical issues. Trying to get the right computer. Good thing, I am exhausted. Really, tonight more than any other rehearsal night for weeks. I'm gonna get down on the floor and stretch.

7:03 PM

Denis walks in with another computer.

9:56 PM

Act One: 1 hour, 2 minutes
Act Two: 1 hour, 8 minutes

Daddy runs fast. Damn. That show makes me hungry.

Everything in its right place.

Backstage
6:50 PM

The year 2000 Radiohead album Kid A included many themes I shared with Dennis to compose to original music for I HATE THIS. And we used it for pre-show at Big Box, in Minnesota, in New York. Since then there has been no call for "pre-show," not in conference halls and hospitals and church basements.

It is playing now. We are five minutes from our first run-through. Takes a person back.

9:59 PM

Act One: Hour Five
Act Two: Hour Eleven

Not so heartbreaking, I have not run these in several days. I know we will rip some out tomorrow night.

During notes Ali got a little sheepish, pointing out the proximity of the lights and how I might need to ... powder my head. I reassured her I was going to do that, anyway. But then Christopher whispered to Kelly, "Oh no! At the beginning of Act Two, that's the only way I can see him!"

Good run. Two more to go. Gotta pick up some milk.

Teching Doughnuts

11:11 AM

Cue-to-cue begins.

Good God. Ali provied a table of food and drink ... bagels, cream cheese, strawberries, Cheetos, orange juice, Coke, doughnuts -- f*cking doughnuts?

That's a line from the show, by the way.

12:22 PM

We just finished doing to cue-to-cue for I HATE THIS.

THESE PEOPLE ARE AWESOME. I BOW DOWN TO THEIR ULTIMATE INCREDIBLENESS.

I have not performed this show with anything approximating light cues for seven years. It looks beautiful. Well, I think it looks beautiful, I can't see it from where I am sitting.

I can't wait to discover what the second act looks like.

1:25 PM

First snag. Everyone laughs. It is taken care of in less than five minutes. That is how this crew rolls.

2:15 PM

And we are done. Hear that? Done. Tech in three.

Now, three nights of run-throughs and we open on Thursday. Or Preview. Whatever Raymond says.

Memo to myself: Ali's medal, extra music.

Josh.

6:39 PM

Yay! Tonight is not about me!

Josh (multimedia) and Joshhawk (light) are present, we are working tech tonight. They are currently trying to get the video projector set, I am getting a few glimpses of Josh's animations ... and OOOH! I am getting excited. Looking good.

7:56 PM

Rolling through the slides of I HATE THIS. The music of Dennis Yurich.

9:03 PM

Finished setting cues for I HATE THIS. We are a happy family. So happy with Josh's work. Christopher is our tech booth guy, taking over for Josh when he runs FEVER DREAM.

9:37 PM

I have been dismissed, we skated through slides from AND THEN YOU DIE in short order so I could see the changes -- this multimedia rom this piece will largely resemble the 2009 production. Well, no that's not true, either, there are some great additions to clear things up ... good gravy we will be going much faster this time.

More flab on me, but much less on the show.

Speed The Play

7:50 PM

We are not tech'ing this evening. Poor Josh. So excited about being to ask to design multimedia for three shows ... only they all are happening at once. My show requires some deceptively not-simple tricks (a speedometer? that's easy ... right ..?)

So ... yesterday I had asked for a speed through for Wednesday ... so Kelly announced today we'd be having one tonight.

Okay. Not prepared for that. I should be, no one's fault but my own. And here we are, during the first break.

I sped through I HATE THIS in 38 minutes.

8:50 PM

AND THEN YOU DIE in 45 minutes. Whew. That means Josh & Josh get 15 minutes to mess around.

(Ha ha ha.)

Ali says I can go home.

Okay. Tomorrow we tech.

I do not want to die.

Sunday Run-Through

2:25 PM

I HATE THIS 1 hour 6 minutes. This will change, we are used to holding for music, this will change. I am delighted to be more animated in this production. We are sharing. We are getting close to the audiences. We need to stop writing in first person plural.

Broke out the sweater for today's run. Ten year-old Land's End sweater. Pale green, iconic. I feel comfortable in it. The sweater acts for me in places. I hold the sleeves every now and then, and connect with my 32 year-old hipster self.

4:01 PM

AND THEN YOU DIE 1 hour 23 minutes???!! How the hell did that work? The show was 1:20 BEFORE I CUT ALL THESE LINES AND ALL THE COSTUME CHANGES ...

Something has got to give.

4:41 PM

After notes. I am feeling a little sore. I need to hammer down these lines and have a speed through. One day. Not yet. We do have time, a lot of time. In fact, we are teching tomorrow. I will have sound and video and light by Wednesday, I will be running with full technical elements a full week before we open, how awesome is that?

So. If it is all too much, we have time, to cut, to shape. To make it work.

Cut it now.

I would bemoan the fact that my current schedule still makes it very challenging to get a run in ... except we worked AND THEN YOU DIE tonight, from 6:30 to almost ten. Bouncing up and down on my toes for three and a half hours, leaping onto and off of cubes and platforms, running circles around you sooner than you know. ... and dancing. Don't forget the dancing.

Exhausted and hungry, my throat very tired -- my neck even hurts, why does my neck hurt? And then there are my knees. They are both very sore. This is going to be a joy.

At a little after eight, Ali asked if I wanted to "run" it again. And I said ... yes.

That's how I said it. "...yes."

I have been working, in my so-called spare time, on running lines. New lines, to be sure, and old lines. It's just not all in there for me, yet. I keep changing things -- cutting things, mostly. There was a lot of stop-and-start but hearing the first run took an hour twenty was disheartening. I mean, yes, I stopped and started a lot but I have to know, to believe it will be an hour. I cut more. Do I hate saying that? It's out. Have I made my point? It's out.

I had more ideas for revisions before I had even left the parking lot.

"Run" Through (Get it?)

Oh my God what was I thinking.

We had a "run-through" tonight for the benefit of our video sound guy, Josh, and the lighting designer, Josh. They are two different guys named Josh. The LD has a mohawk so Ali calls him Joshhawk, but that is confusing to Josh because it makes him think there's an actual bird in the room.

Act One (I HATE THIS) went not so piss-poorly. There was a performance of DARWINII going on nearby in the storefront, so I have not been speaking full-out ... which means I cannot "bring" much to the performance (as the kids say) but at least it makes sense. It has been sketched out in blocking, I have an idea of where to be. And the lines are, well ... okay, let's not talk about the lines. They exist. They are simply not accurate.

As for Act Two (AND THEN YOU DIE) well, crap. The running, all the running ... the truth is, my ass is bouncing in the most unpleasant way. This is not where I wanted to be right now. Oh well. Let's see what I can pull together in the next few weeks.

Then there's the text, thing. I mean, even that is not so horrid. We only attempted it so the designers, especially Joshhawk could get the gist of everything and have something to work with. Tomorrow afternoon, Monday, we will get this sucker into some blocking order.

Plans are coming together for Sunday's festivities. Need to go grocery shopping tomorrow, make arrangements with Mom and Dad, we may see them on Sunday, too. Weather suggest 50 degrees and partly sunny. I'd like it to be warmer, but as long as there is no snow or rain, I should be satisfied. I'd like to run around the zoo with the children.

Celebration

I am supposed to be off-book my next Tuesday. This was an arbitrary date arrived at Monday night when it was decided that rehearsal would proceed even though my director needs to be absent. Kelly and I will read lines, I must be off-book. This worried me ... until the past two nights when I discovered exactly how valuable to human mind is and how much can be retained through sheer repetition. So much, locked up there, waiting to re-emerge.

Ali has cut my tethers. So much of the original I HATE THIS was static. Sitting. Telling stories. Until I suddenly leap into action, bolting around the hospital bed in order to hit the intercom, movement is pretty slow and measured. These things will change. Working in Fefu's Kitchen, a tiny room but pretty much the dimensions of the stage in the Storefront, I am encouraged to address everyone, on all four sides, in close. This is new. Turning around, putting my back to the corners, using the entire space. We have been playing, I have been speaking low -- so as not to interrupt performances of DARWINII, but also because I am reserving strength, I am very tired from work, and am aware of how much energy the ATYD rehearsals will take out of me.

Bounce on your toes for three hours. It's a little trying.

We play with gestures, those I was aping for ATYD, get folded back into IHT. Reflection. Memory.

My family is making plans for Sunday. Calvin would be ten. Calvin is ten. How do you fill a decade? With words, to be sure. The girl is looking forward to visiting the zoo. The boy ... has been invited to someone else's birthday party. How do you tell a five year-old he can't go to a birthday party for his schoolmate so you can commemorate a dead sibling? That's easy -- you don't. You take him there. You make it work. It's all a celebration.

First Read-Through ... Again.

CPT Poster!
No, I have not read these plays out loud, back to back, at one time. Ever. Until tonight. The rehearsals begin, Ali, Kelly and I huddled in Fefu's Kitchen, listening to me read the complete script of I HATE THIS/AND THEN YOU DIE.

First act (IHT): 50 minutes
Second Act (ATYD): 53 minutes

Hey, what? Really? Well, that's good news already. I mean, that's not run time, no way, we'll tack ten minutes onto each, I am sure. But IHT used to be 1:07 and ATYD was at least 1:20. Cutting is good. Cutting is very good.

Ali set some of my fears to rest tonight. She says they have the same voice, even if they have different energy. Her concern, if I understand it correctly, was whether these pieces are realistically about the same "character." Can we believe David in the first act is Pengo is the second.

She wanted Pengo to be called "David" once during the second act. I think I put it in the right place. Doesn't matter to me, neither of them are my proper name, anyway.

My voice is tired. I need water near to me at all times. I must be careful.