Everything Is Already Something Week 53: Things I Actually Said

Allison Page, daring to look back.

I’ve been writing this blog for two years.

YOWZA.

So I’m saying screw it, and doing my version of a clip show. Here are some of the most and least useful things I’ve ever written here:

On how commercial directors sound to me: “Now do it like your eyelids are on fire and your grandma stole your Chex Mix.”

“It’s okay if you’re tired. You’ll be tired sometimes, but it’s worth it.”

“Do sexy people wear sleeves?”

“I hadn’t been listening. Like, at all. Every one of my lines sounded like I was reading it off of a cue card written in wingdings.”

“When asked, ‘What’s the best role you’ve ever played?’ my impulse is to just respond with whichever was the most grueling.”

“When a show closes, I feel a slump. I always have. Like someone’s carefully lowering an Acme anvil down on top of me, and I’m moving in slow motion to get out of the way.”

“Mensa says you’re a doo-doo head.”

“The grass is always greener on some other asshole’s lawn…take a look at your own damn grass, it’s got things that mine does not and vice versa.”

“Maybe I don’t live on the top of Mt. Crumpit, but I do live on the 11th floor of an apartment building in the tenderloin.”

“Maybe that’s it. Maybe I’m the black sheep because I’ve decided I’m the black sheep.”

“Don’t be an ass.”

“While she was doing the most adult thing ever, making a commitment to a man for the rest of her life — I was doing a drunken interpretive dance to Katy Perry’s Hot ’n Cold.”

“Truthfully, when it comes to acting or writing or a bunch of other shit, the only person you can control is yourself unless you have access to a lot of booby traps.”

“Any writer will tell you, the most important thing is to write, and if it is the suckiest thing in the world, just toss it in the digital trash. At least you wrote something.”

“In a time when the theater is always striving to bring more people in, to get more butts in the seats, the last thing that would ever help that would be to limit the types of stories we think should be told and poo-poo the everywoman.”

“This is my writing beard. Do I look smart yet?”

“If you’re going to not base your worth on someone’s negative opinions, you shouldn’t base them on their positive opinions, either.”

“Swearing is a creative choice.”

“You’re taking a lot into your own hands if you self produce, and hopefully that means you’ve worked really hard on the material, and that you have people behind you who really believe in it…and hopefully those people are smart.”

“I cannot work without an outline.”

“Nobody noticed the characters going to the bathroom too much.”

“The odds that you’ll find me at a desk in an office, or selling shampoo, or baking fucking peach pies for cash are pretty high.”

“It’s fantastic to be a last second replacement. Everybody’s really relieved they got someone on super short notice. They may not be expecting much. I mean, they’ve never heard of me. So that means that if I’m even a little good – I’m a savior!”

“I can’t write it’s cold,
I need a pony to write,
I can’t write it’s hot”

“Oh fuck off, Cathy Rigby. Now you’re just bragging.”

“You can appear to be a great producer, but if you’re stage manager or lighting or sound tech or costume person if a total douchebag — it’s going to reflect poorly on you.”

“I don’t need the rubber chicken. The rubber chicken is within us all.”

“Overall I think it’s a cop-out to say that you can’t write anything unless you’re in the mood or feeling inspired. Maybe I say that so that I can convince myself not to wait for inspiration, knowing that I’m so lazy I might never get around to feeling inspired.”

“When you include a bio about yourself, maybe don’t make it a novella.”

“Everything’s a nightmare.”

“It’s okay to laugh.”

“I’d love to fill a yacht with caramel sauce — who wouldn’t?”

“Be the Lisa Loopner you wish to see in the world.”

Allison Page is a writer/actor/person. You can catch her first produced full length play HILARITY at the EXIT Theatre through March 28th.