Cowan Palace: Facebook Is My Favorite Costume

Ashley’s kick starting October’s design theme month with a look into in her favorite costume.

Last week I found myself sobbing in stairwell at work. And my coworker, who happened to be coming out of the bathroom, helped put me back together so I could continue the day. As I cried, she kindly said something about being surprised to find me in such a state because I tend to publicly highlight all the good, positive stuff. I laughed as I tried to manage the snot situation after a pretty ugly cry. “No.” I answered, “That’s just Facebook Ashley.”

Facebook Ashley stars in her own sitcom. It’s a place of laugh tracks and corny music. Even when things seem dark and gray, most of the time there’s a silver lined bow and things wrap up in 22 minute segments. Positivity is pretty makeup she uses. I like Facebook Ashley. She’s the better parts of myself thoughtfully edited and filtered. A better representation of the person I want to be.

Like this. But not at all.

Don’t get me wrong. She’s not a total sham. I do completely adore my husband. My daughter makes my heart feel like a Lisa Frank binder. And I actually like my job! Better yet, I love my coworkers. I also have a tendency to put myself in situations that lend themselves to great stories. Like taking the 38 bus. That place is full of tales that I have been put on this great earth to share. Plus, I’m still involved in the theater scene. Sure, it’s not what it used to be but at least I’ve been invited to the party and that’s pretty cool.

But there’s so much I don’t say. Partially because I don’t want to admit when I’m having a hard time and I have difficulty asking for help. And, to be terribly truthful, I do need help sometimes. Ah, even more honestly, I need it often but I hardly ever say anything. Instead, I make sure my Facebook costume is falling in all the right places to flatter my figure and try to get through each day without getting it too wrinkled. Who needs a colorful scarf when a well-placed emoticon does the trick, right?

However, at some point, I have to launder my costume. The real you has to take the clothes off and wash them. And last week I pushed my own limits in thinking I could do it all. An annual work conference with twelve hour days? No problem. At the same time as my first show in two years? Sure, I guess that will be fine. While your husband goes out of town and your childcare plans for your daughter fall through? Wait, what’s that now? (Cue breakdown in the stairwell!)

As I mentioned earlier this year, I still want it all! It’s been a couple months since I wrote that piece and there have been some very challenging struggles to attempt the routine along the way. And yet, I still find it so interesting that whenever I run into friendly acquaintances I haven’t seen in a few months or talk to long distance relatives, they always, always bring up what I’ve posted on Facebook followed by how happy I am. It’s never a question. It’s always a statement. An exclamation. And then that’s always the end of the conversation.

Sometimes the key to a great costume is that you forget it’s a costume. (Not always of course, sometimes after a rough show your friend made you see, you gotta be able to compliment something and costumes can be your talking point!) The actor wearing a good costume looks so natural in it that it’s simply just a part of them. Costumes help the audience put together an understanding of the character and how they connect to the rest of the cast. It’s absolutely a key element to the success of a production.

Facebook Ashley is a costume devised of my best wardrobe pieces. She doesn’t like to wear some of those poor fitting pants from the past (why were flares such a hot jean style anyway?) or less attractive turtleneck sweaters, unfit to even be donated. But they’re still there, hiding in the back of a messy closet.

We’ve all got a closet. We all get to pick and chose what we wear and what people see us in. We all get to be the costumer of our own play. But the play is more than what the characters are wearing. More than the surrounding set or time period. So while yes, to everyone I talk to about my many Facebook posts, I am happy. But I’m also so many other feelings, too. And I’d love to talk about them, as well! Until then, I guess I’ll continue to like all your status updates and doing what I do. Sharing feelings one post at a time. Wink face emoticon.

Working Title: Oh NO…Don’t Fall Asleep…Again!

In this week’s second installment Will Leschber talks perfect film pairings with Christine Keating, writer of tonight’s Theater Pub, Don’t Fall Asleep.

If yesterday’s blog wasn’t enough for you, we’re back again gazing at the dark themes on the other side of our eyelids. Do we even need sleep? Sleep is for chumps. Speaking as a new parent, if you can’t function on two hours of sleep, man, then you ain’t really living! Get busy living…or get busy zzzzzzzzzzzzz…WHOOPS, sorry there. I nodded off for a second. What was I talking about? Oh yeah, horror cinema and the sweet paralysis of sleep.

We spoke about the masters of horror genre and touched on the cultural creations that haunt our dreams. But inescapable boogiemen are not the limits of the dangers that we are told lay past our bedtime. Local Bay Area multifaceted theater maker, Christine Keating, in writing Don’t Fall Asleep explores our relationship to sleep and the trappings therein. Keating weaves threads colored in the folklore of yesteryear, cultural touchstones like alien abduction, and modern tales of the alternate life that takes over when we close our eyes.

Keating loved our connection to A Nightmare on Elm Street thematically when discussing Wes Craven but she actually had some unconventional and excellent film recommendations, to seek out if you just can’t get enough stories about the non-fiction, vulnerable nature of sleep. She had this to say:

Devil In The Room

“My recommendations are actually for documentaries that are terrifying. One is a short documentary that you can watch all on YouTube called Devil in the Room, and the other is a full length called The Nightmare. Both are documentaries that take a lot of their stylistic choices from horror movies. They are both about sleep paralysis, and they portray the experience pretty clearly, speaking as someone who frequently experiences the kind of sleep paralysis hallucinations they are talking about. I love how Devil in the Room talks about how culture influences these hallucinations, from the bear like Tokolosh to the modern alien abduction stories. Those are stories and origins I tried to represent in the many monologues and scenes of Don’t Fall Asleep!”

The Nightmare

Man, how am I ever going to go to bed now?! Oh well. It’s only movie, it’s only a movie…it’s only a play, it’s only a play, it’s only a play.

Devil in the Room, again, is available on YouTube. The Nightmare (2015) is available to rent on Amazon, iTunes, Vudu, etc. And Don’t Fall Asleep has it’s final performance tonight at Pianofight. See it before it’s too late!

Working Title: Don’t Fall Asleep

This week Will Leschber remembers Wes Craven, a master passed, and also remembers why you should catch Don’t Fall Asleep before it’s too late!

So I was never much of a horror guy. Sure, I love the classic line from Heart of Darkness/ Apocalypse Now where general Kurtz reaches the end of his exquisite journey into madness and on the very brink of death utters the oh so prescient words…”the horror…the horror.” But that’s not what I mean! I mean the horror genre; Of film or theater for that matter…albeit the latter is much less prevalent. While I loved late night, Elvira showcases of old horror films as a adolescent, or even the endless slasher franchises of sleepless sleepovers growing up, the horror genre seemed to stuffed full of empty, bloody, redundant, cliche, low rent, low quality black holes of cinema more interested in making a sequel and a quick profit rather than anything resembling cinema substance.

Oh course, like most tweenagers, I was wrong. Although horror is still not my preferred genre, I have come around to recognize the pillars of the genre for being quite remarkable with innovation and craft: Hitchcock (Psycho, The Birds, Frenzy) Tod Browning (Freaks), James Whale (Frankenstein, Bride of Frankenstein), Toby Hooper (Texas Chainsaw Massacre), David Cronenberg (The Fly, Scanners), Dario Argento (Suspiria), George Romero (Night of the LIving Dead), John Carpenter (The Thing, Halloween)…and of course the late, great Wes Craven, who passed at age 76 on August 30th.

So many of these directors defined the period and genre they worked in. Many transcended the confines of a singular genre to branch into further cinematic influence. Craven wasn’t the first to set and break the mold for this, yet he continued the legacy like great filmmakers before him. Wes Craven not only made his mark in film; he set the lacerating edges and vicious tone of what a period horror film was decade after decade.

In the 70’s the brutal, all too realistic, edge of snuff film quality that defined 70’s horror was cemented by Craven’s directorial debut, The Last House on the Left.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8W9KPhmYYtg (1972)

Watching the punishing film felt like looking at something secret and awful that we should not be privy to. The 80’s ushered in an era of slasher personalities the likes of Jason Voohees, Michael Myers and none other than the the dream-demon himself, Freddy Krueger. In A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984), there was no escaping the slumbering boogeyman that lay dormant at the edge of your eye lids. Then again as time flowed forward and the 90’s opened up the meta-horror narrative, Scream (1996) flipped the genre tropes upside down, dissecting them and disemboweling them to the delight and horror of a new generation. We’d moved into a new era of horror and Wes Craven again was at the forefront. Scream proved a intelligent beast able to tear apart what we’d come to expect from a horror film, while finding new ways to terrify. Who better than a master craftsman to reinvent and redefine what it means to be an influential and lasting horror film. Craven knew how to turn the knife.

If all this talk of night terrors and horror sleep-scapes has whet your appetite, you should pair these gruesome film offerings with tonight’s Theater Pub: Explore the Trope: Don’t Fall Asleep.

Wes Craven’s influence spans far and wide and while this theater offering may not be slasher fare, the unsettling nature of life on the other side of slumbering consciousness is cut from the same vein. Freddy Krueger used dream-logic and childhood fears as daggers in his arsenal and Christine Keating, author of Don’t Fall Asleep three part showcase, uses these things with a little extra helping of abduction, witch-ridden folklore, and the paralyzing shadows know only to our sleeping selves.

I’ll check in tomorrow with Christine Keating about her frightful film recommendations to pair with her show, Don’t Fall Asleep. Until then come see tonight’s show and if you get too scared, repeat after me …It’s only movie. It’s only a movie. It’s only a movie…It’s only play. It’s only a play. It’s only a play…don’t fall asleep!

It’s A Suggestion Not A Review: Knowing When to Leave

Dave Sikula, on when to skip out.

My first directing teacher began our first class with his philosophy about the craft: “Directing is nothing more than teaching animals tricks.”

(One of my fellow students took that maxim a bit too literally and would throw M&Ms and other treats at his actors when they performed to his expectations. I have neither sunk – not risen – to that level yet.)

I don’t necessarily subscribe to this theory, though there’s some truth to it in that you’re trying to get people (who are, after all, animals) to do what you want them to.

In actuality, if I see directing as anything other than a collaboration, it’d be raising kids. (And let me hasten to add here that I don’t have kids of my own, so I can only speculate what it’s actually like.) You have a group of humans for whom you have to provide and safe and nurturing environment to ensure they have certain skills before you let them go to prosper or fail on their own.

Part of that process is knowing when to cut the cord and let them go out on their own. In reality, once the show opens, it belongs to the cast and the stage manager. (I used to use my opening night pep talk as an opportunity to verbally turn the show over to the SM. It was a formality, but I liked the ceremony of it.) Everyone has to color inside the lines the director has established, but his or her work is done. At this point, the director is, to quote Chekhov, “an unnecessary luxury … not even a luxury, but more like an unnecessary appendage—a sixth finger.” As an actor, it’s nice to see them, but (to stretch the parenting analogy to the breaking point) it’s like a divorced parent showing up. “Oh, it’s them.” As a director, you’re no longer part of the family, so while you can take part in some of the activities, the company has moved on without you (or in spite of you).

The director after opening night.

For some directors, the process is simple. After opening night, they’re gone. You may see them again occasionally during the run or on closing night, but mom or dad has gone out for a pack of cigarettes and isn’t coming back. Others like to see at least part of every performance. (I have to admit, in all honesty, that I’ve fallen asleep at at least a couple of performances of my own shows, but still felt compelled to go). Backstage at my current show tonight (in which I’m acting), one actor mentioned he’d worked with a director who came to every performance, four or five nights a week for four or five weeks. That’s either dedication or desperation or obsession.

If I do go to one of my shows a lot, it’s either because I really like it (it happens) or I’m trying to learn from it (still trying to figure out why something works or doesn’t – though I can’t recall either re-directing something or giving real extensive notes once a show has opened) or I’m trying to figure out how I want to video it.

It took me a long time to get to that point, though. I guess that, having acted so long, I really wanted to stay part of the company even after I’d kicked the kids out of the nest. It wasn’t until relatively recently that I’d miss a performance. Even now, I still feel, if not guilty, then intensely curious as to how things are going. (Even as I admit that the reception will be pretty consistent night after night.)

All of this isn’t to say there’s no role for the director after opening. In open-end runs (as in Broadway), many directors go back every so often to make sure that, despite the best efforts of their stage managers, the shows are what they intended them to be. Even though when my wife and I go to New York, we generally fly non-stop, for some reason one year, our return flight went through Las Vegas. When we got to the terminal at JFK for the trip home, I noticed an old guy (even older than I) typing away furiously at his Blackberry (that’s how long ago this was). I kept watching him and watching him, and finally turned to my wife (who hadn’t noticed him; she’s not as much of a people-watcher as I am) and said, “That guy looks like Hal Prince.” I paused and suddenly realized it was Hal Prince, whom I was now determined to meet.

Between him checking his phone and asking the ground crew about the flight’s status, he was constantly occupied and I didn’t want to interrupt him. He finally took a break and I rushed up and introduced myself and thanked him for his work and told him how it had influenced me. He told me that was a nice way to start the day (it was, like, 8:00 am), we talked a little shop, and then parted. He, being in first class, was seated on the plane before we were, and as we filed past him, he and I exchanged pleasantries. I kept trying to figure out why he was going to Vegas when it hit me that he was probably going to check up on the production of Phantom of the Opera that was running there then. That’s dedication. (Of course, if I were making Phantom-director money, I’d be dedicated, too …)

My buddy, Hal Prince

I mentioned in a previous post that I think a director’s main job is to get out of the way of the writer, but his or her second job is to get out of the way of the actors and realize that, once those lights come up on opening night, it’s time to realize that the kids have grown up and we need to start a new family. The old one will still be there, but they’re busy raising kids of their own.

In For a Penny: Of Olympic Proportions – Can you Macarena?

Charles Lewis III, lining it up.

All men, mostly White – this is the LEAST likely line-up for Olympians auditions.

“Give [the audience] pleasure – the same pleasure they have when they wake up from a nightmare.”
– Alfred Hitchcock, Asbury Park NJ Press (13 August 1974)

Home stretch, folks. After nearly a year of plotting, outlining, fundraising, and writers burning pages from our own scripts before we tear out our hair and shout to the heavens in futility, we’re now kicking into gear. This past Monday was the final pre-festival meeting of writers and directors (“The White Council”), so from this point on you can consider the gears officially in motion. The SF Olympians Fest draws nigh.

So what does that mean for you good folks? Well, if you’re patron of the arts, fan of Greek mythos, on the lookout for cheap SF theatre, or just someone with strong opinions about dolphins, Miley Cyrus, the name “Jason”, or pumpkin-spiced… anything, then you’re in for a real treat.

But if you’re an actor, then you’re in for the wildest ride of all. This coming Sunday and Monday will see the return of the hilarious chorus line known as the Olympians auditions.

As one of this year’s writers and directors, I originally followed the above statement with a maniacal laugh. Then I took a moment to think about it and remembered the truth about the Olympians auditions: the actors are the ones with the advantage.

First off, you should all read Ashley’s spot-on Olympians auditions advice column from two years ago. Not only is it a great read, it’ll put a lot of the following into context.

Now that you’ve done that, here are a few things I know from having been on both ends of this festival’s audition process. Many folks think being an auditor is easy because all you have to do is plant your ass in a chair for several hours whilst an endless parade of pretty faces beg for your approval by reciting Neil LaBute and 32 bars from Seussical. That’s true, to an extent, but it’s also true that we can be just as terrified watching as you are of auditioning. I’m terrified that you folks will be so goddamned talented that the work on which I’ve spent a full year will seem mediocre when spoken by someone other than the voices in my head. I’m scared that all of the Bay Area actors of color who constantly seek out opportunities won’t even consider coming to this audition. I’m afraid that I’ll find the absolutely pitch-perfect roster – they look the parts, they read with conviction, all of their schedules sync up perfectly – only to be told I can’t use them because they’ve already said “Yes” to another Olympians piece. (As a rule, actors are allowed to be cast in any number of plays throughout the festival, but not on the same weekend.)

And make no mistake, folks: we will fight over you. Every year there are those actors who bring it so hard in auditions, that you can feel it in the room. As soon as one of them leaves, every writer and director underlines their name and puts stars and hearts around it like a middle school love note. And it’s not as if it’s just a handful, oh no. Olympians auditions are an embarrassment of riches: actors you haven’t seen in years; youngsters fresh out of (or still in) school; adult newbies who always loved performing and are trying this for the first time. All those people whom critics claim don’t exist in the Bay Area theatre scene – they all come out of the shadow.

And we auditors sit dumfounded, asking ourselves “Where have you been all my life?”

So if I had any advice for actors auditioning next week, it would be “You have all the power. Use it.” You don’t need to prepare anything, you don’t need to worry, you don’t need any preconceived notions – just be you. And if you’re curious as to whether we still had spots available, you read the info here and send a query to the e-mail provided. In fact, you can even try getting a walk-up slot, if one’s available. Just bring a headshot, a resume, and a love of performance.

Other than that, there’s a room full indie theatre’s best waiting to hear you totally own your randomly-selected monologue.

Now do it with a Scottish accent.

Charles Lewis III is writing and directing this year’s Poseidon play, which requires a cast of various ethnicities and genders. He can’t wait to see who shows up.

Everything Is Already Something Week 63: Helpful Steps To Be More Professional And Less Awful

Allison Page, America’s Less Awful Version Of Most Things.

Step 1: Get a fucking calendar. That’s how you keep track of your stuff.

Step 2: Use that fucking calendar. Ya see, then you’ll maybe show up to the stuff.

Step 3: Did you fuck up your calendar? Take care of that shit. Communicate with people when you need to change timing of a meeting or audition or ice cream. Don’t wait for them to ask you where the fuck you are.

Step 4: Apologize for fucking up. That was on you, say you’re sorry and suggest solutions.

Step 5: Learn from your fucking mistakes. Don’t keep making the same ones, especially with the same people. Nobody’s perfect, but don’t be awful.

Step 6: See Step 1.

Step 7: You did fucking get that calendar, right? Because…I was totally not kidding about that.

Step 8: Laptops generally come with calendars on them. If I see you with a MacBook pro and you can’t figure out your schedule, I’m going to flip a table. There’s also this thing called a smartphone.

Just one of the many fantastic calendar options of 2010

Step 9: Communicate your conflicts in a timely manner. No, no, you didn’t suddenly end up in Spain. That’s not something that happens. You had to buy tickets to Spain, so maybe that would have been a good time to tell the director you’re going off to find yourself and eat paella.

Step 10: Don’t over-promise. Listen, I have fucking done this before, and it’s terrible. Your volunteering isn’t going to make you look charitable if you cancel it 6 minutes before it’s supposed to happen. I say this from experience on both sides of that shitstick.

Step 11: Don’t underestimate someone’s ability to remember that you fucked up. Oh, they remember. BOY HOWDY. If you’ve fucked up and been a no-show more than once with the same person/company, you should probably call that out and say that you know about it and don’t plan to do it again because YOU HAVE ESTABLISHED A PATTERN, MY FRIEND. People notice patterns. Like fucking houndstooth.

Step 12: Your resume doesn’t matter as much as you do. If your resume is nice and you act like a shithead, it’s the shithead I’m going to remember, not the resume.

Step 13: Don’t be a shithead.

Step 14: If you don’t like the rules, don’t do the fucking thing. It saves you from doing something you don’t really agree with, and it saves every other person involved from listening to your bullshit. Know the expectations of the project/show/whatever and if they aren’t to your liking, walk away. It’s probably just better suited to someone else and you’re probably better suited to a different project that you actually like.

Step 15: See Step 1.

Allison Page is a writer/actor/creative director of Killing My Lobster.

The Five: Everything I Need to Know about Storytelling I Learned From Professional Wrestling

Anthony R. Miller checks in to ruin any credibility he had as a writer.

Hey you guys, In keeping with Septembers theme of “Breaking the Rules”, and following up on my “Tips for Doing Reasonably Well” I have one more installment of rules I actually follow. Which I suppose is my clever way of breaking the rules. Now I make no secret of my passion for the Art of Professional Wrestling, I have long considered it theatre at its base, undistilled if you will. One thing that most fans can agree on is that feats of athleticism are great and all, but when Pro Wrestling is truly great, it is because of its adherence to strong storytelling. So along with Lajos Egri’s The Art of Dramatic Writing or Stephen King’s On Writing, being a lifelong fan of pro wrestling has taught me some important rules in compelling story telling, and wouldn’t you know it, there are five.

DISCLAIMER: I am still not famous, so these shouldn’t be seen as rules that will make wildly successful, but they do work for me.

Black Hat/ White Hat

Even in a world of grey area and anti-heroes, it comes down to one basic principle; there is a good guy and a bad guy. Call it Protagonist / Antagonist or Babyface / Heel, but there’s the character you feel compelled to root for and there’s the jerk who keeps messing it up. The good guy is not seen as such just because he smiles or says things that make us cheer, he is supported by just how awful the bad guy is. Sometimes we want the good guy to win simply because the bad guy does such awful things; we are invested in him getting what he deserves. The good guy is simply a representation of what we want to see most in the world: justice.

Why Did You Do That?

Sure, we know Johnny Skullcrusher is going to bust out his steel chair at some point. But what makes that moment exciting is when and why he does it. While it is in the nature of the bad guy to cheat at some point, it comes at a time when he is afraid he will lose. It should be seen as an act of desperation. Because of that act the bad guy is seen as a cheat, or a coward. So, like in any story, there is a reason for the character’s actions. A series of moves with no real motivation is the same as a series of events that are not connected to each other. It is the difference between “This happened AND THEN this happened AND THEN this happened” and “This happened, BECAUSE OF THAT, this happened.”

Pacing, Pacing, Pacing

Like any good story, you can’t just have action, action, action. The same goes for an exciting match. There can’t be just spectacular moment after spectacular moment. There has to be peaks and valleys. Sometimes you slow things down to build tension, sometimes you speed them up to create excitement. Great matches, like great stories place major events at just the right time, and they take the time to build up to those major events.

Winning is Better When You Think They’re Going to Lose

I’m a sucker for a good underdog story, and if your story is told well, I am emotionally invested in the good guy getting what he wanted. In the case of pro wrestling, it is a victory for a championship or it is to settle a grudge. This make the moments leading to his victory pivotal. This might be the moment when our villain has seemingly overpowered our hero. And then, our hero digs deep and pushes himself harder than he ever has and fights back at the last moment to get his victory. But the weight and emotion of his moment of victory are dictated by two questions; did we want him to win and was there a moment when we truly thought he wouldn’t win? Everyone likes a happy ending, but it still needs to be earned. Victory is so much sweeter when we truly believe if just for a moment, it’s not going to happen. Equally, a loss is more upsetting when you truly believe everything is going to work out.

The Only Thing They Remember is the Last Thing They See

Also known as “Stick Your Landing”. End strong, the final moment of your story and the emotion it carries is what your audience takes with them as they walk into the lobby. Were there a few botched moves? Sure. But these moments can be forgiven with a strong impactful ending. Maybe it’s our battered hero, almost unable to stand, hoisting the belt above his head. Maybe our hero only wins because he has turned to villainy. Whether your ending is happy or sad, it should have emotional intention. Does it make me feel happy? Do I feel excited? Do I feel emotionally exhausted? Whatever the feels may be, the ending has to make me feel them. A great ending in pro wrestling is like any story, we’ve gone somewhere with the character, we have experienced things along with them. Everything is just a buildup to the end, where we feel the triumph or the tragedy. Now there are bad feelings too, like bored, or relieved it’s over, or dissatisfied. No matter the medium, those feelings are the result of weak storytelling. A great ending should be something we feel along with our hero.

Anthony R. Miller is a writer, producer and wrestling nerd. His play “Sexy Vampire Academy” will get its first reading in October, learn more at www.awesometheatre.org. His other play “Christian Teen Dolphin-Sex Beach Party will be read as part of the San Francisco Olympians festival in November.

Theater Around The Bay: Don’t Fall Asleep Opens TONIGHT!

You spend a third of your life unconscious and paralyzed. If that doesn’t concern you, you should join us in September for Explore the Trope: Don’t Fall Asleep! a new show by Christine Keating, directed by Sydney Painter.

Act One, Hag-Ridden, uses folklore-inspired monologues to tell the tales of hags who condemn writers to die if they fall asleep, succubi who control men and impregnate women while they slumber, and witches who take sleeping peasants for joy-rides.

Act Two, Alien Abduction, adapts a classic pulp novel short story into a flashy, old-timey radio play about alien abductions.

Act Three, Sleeping Around, incorporates multi-media elements to tell the story of a person who believes they are sleeping soundly…until their phone records tell a different story.

Why do we sleep?
What happens when we sleep?
What CAN happen?

Featuring Andrew Chung, Danielle Ishihara, Freddy Merlos, and Jeunée Simon.

The show plays four times, only at PianoFight and is FREE (with a five dollar suggested donation).

Monday, September 21, at 8 PM
Tuesday, September 22, at 8 PM
Monday, September 28, at 8 PM
Tuesday, September 29, at 8 PM

Don’t miss it!

Hi-Ho, the Glamorous Life: Rah-Rah for Dada

Marissa Skudlarek mingles with some Fringe elements.

Last Saturday, spending an evening at the San Francisco Fringe Festival, I saw two pieces in a row that mentioned the French surrealist André Breton, which has to be some kind of bizarre record. In Sebastian Boswell III’s mentalist act “The Ineffable Experience of Impossible Achievements,” he plays a game of Exquisite Corpse with the audience, claiming to have learned the game from Breton himself, in the 1920s. Following that, I saw Breton (portrayed by Ignacio Zulueta) as a featured character in Zurich Plays, “a Dada history of Dada.”

I like to think Breton would be pleased by this coincidence. After all, at its best, Exquisite Corpse is a game that allows you to find deeper meaning in the products of chance. And the SF Fringe Festival itself is a product of chance: as a member of the Canadian Association of Fringe Festivals, it is required to choose its lineup via lottery, rather than curating it based on ideas of what is “good” or “worthy.” This accords with Breton’s Surrealist Manifesto, in which he wrote of wishing to make art “in the absence of any control exercised by reason.”

The production of Zurich Plays at the Fringe Festival is spearheaded by Steven Westdahl, who directed the show and plays Tristan Tzara. (Steven and his partner Megan Cohen – who also appears in Zurich Plays, portraying Man Ray – were the forces behind Theater Pub’s April 2015 show, Steven & Megan in “Megan and Steven Present a World Premiere by Steven & Megan.”)

There’s something strange but wonderful about seeing 21st-century artists in a Fringe Festival in California paying homage to a revolutionary avant-garde arts movement that took place 100 years ago in Switzerland. After I saw Zurich Plays, Steven kindly agreed to have a brief conversation with me about the show and about the Dada movement (with Megan adding some pithy comments).

Hugo Ball performing at Cabaret Voltaire in 1916. (This costume gets re-created in ZURICH PLAYS!)

Marissa: From my research, it looks like you were involved in a previous production of Zurich Plays in Atlanta. Can you talk a little about your decision to bring this show to the SF Fringe?

Steven: One of the ways I was “paid” for my work on the 2001 production in Atlanta was with no-fee rights to the script for future production. With less than an hour left before the deadline to submit for the SF Fringe, I hastily threw together a proposal for Zurich Plays. I knew the 100th anniversary of Dada was around the corner, it is a script that I knew had never been seen outside of Atlanta, and it was so much fun to see and then work on. Once it was chosen out of the lottery for a slot in the festival, it finally dawned on me that I had to cast, design, rehearse, and produce a full-length play in a few months. With the help of my partner, Megan Cohen, I got some of the best Dada-minded actors in the Bay Area to agree to work with me for two months for next to nothing.

Marissa: It’s been nearly 100 years since the Dadaists presented their revolutionary performances at Cabaret Voltaire in Zurich. Are there any lessons you think contemporary artists can learn from them?

Steven: Depends on which Dadaists you turn to for your lessons… Hugo Ball would teach you that it is OK to walk away from a group that you founded if you no longer agree with the direction that it is heading. Marcel Duchamp would teach you have no fear in recontextualizing your surroundings and the products that you are being sold. Man Ray would teach you to brand your work with a unique and identifiable name. André Breton would teach you to see and name what other artists are doing, if even just for yourself.

Megan: I think they teach you Y.O.L.O.

Marissa: Do you think there are any artistic movements in our own time that, similar to Dada, are upsetting the status quo and rewriting the rules of what art can be?

Steven: The territorial pissings of graffiti, stencil, and wheatpaste street art; the 4chan-esque corners of the internet; self-taught artists who break the rules without knowing them. Bansky might consider ‘themselves’ to be Dada. But also Banksy isn’t Dada.

Marissa: If the Dadaists were transported 100 years into the future and saw your production of Zurich Plays, what do you think their reaction would be?

Steven: Zurich Plays might be too safe. We cut the real onstage urination in favor of stage magic and a piss-rig. We bought a few things from prop stores and use them as what they were intended to be used for. We test the patience, focus, and stamina of the audience but never really offend them. I think the Dadaists would want more people stirred towards riot or, at least, a few walk-outs. No one is going to protest Zurich Plays. It’s an experience but not a revolution. It is art about anti-art without being anti-art itself.

Megan: I hope they would say it made them hungry.

Zurich Plays has 3 more performances at the San Francisco Fringe Festival: Saturday Sept. 19 at 2:30 PM, Wednesday Sept. 23 at 7 PM, and Friday Sept. 25 at 7 PM. Advance tickets available here.

Marissa Skudlarek is a San Francisco-based playwright and arts writer. She realizes that the Dadaists would probably denounce her as hopelessly bourgeois. Find her at marissabidilla.blogspot.com or on Twitter @MarissaSkud.

Cowan Palace: Crappy Holidays From Our Dysfunctional Family To Yours!

Ashley’s enjoying the crap out of Crappy Holidays.

Hi gang! Well, it’s been quite the month in the new working mom/actress/writer sitcom that is my life in San Francisco. So this week I’m keeping with our themes “breaking the rules” and exploring the Fringe Festival with a blog comprised of some images of my experience being back on stage… instead of you know, writing about them. Such a rebel, I know.

Will Leschber, Warden Lawlor, and Ashley Cowan in Crappy Holidays

But first, let me plug the show!

Crappy Holidays was written by the eternally funny and wonderfully wicked, Nick Gentile and Lisa Gentile. Warden Lawlor is our fearless director and completing the bad ass team is the cast; featuring, Eden Davis, Kat Bushnell, Dan Kurtz, Tavis Kammett, and Will Leschber. Oh, and Cowan Palace Queen herself, me.

Tavis Kammet, Ashley Cowan, and Will Leschber in the first scene of Crappy Holidays.

As our Facebook invite explains, “Crappy Holidays is a trio of dark comedies showcasing the cynical side of Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas. “Death is My Bitch” features the Grim Reaper making friends in the wrong places. “Ma’s Thanksgiving Pie” depicts a quasi-sane mother locked in a battle of wits with her offspring. “Bobby’s Letter to Santa” delivers a drunken, disgruntled holiday icon facing a career change. Don’t need to see “A Christmas Carol” again? Then this show is for you!” (Guys, this show is seriously for you.)

Eden Davis puts the elf back into Christmas.

The production has been endlessly fun to work on for so many reasons. Everyone is hilarious and brings so much to the table (sometimes in the form of pie!). You have three more chances to see us:

September 19 (1 PM),
September 20 (9 PM), and
September 22 (9 PM).

Katrina Bushnell and Tavis Kammet backstage at the Fringe.

Also, The San Francisco Fringe Festival is in its 24th year! That means it can almost rent a car! It’s full of all the fun, adventurous stuff that defines the scene. So if you can, come see our show! Or go see one of the many other offerings of this year’s lineup. And if it helps to convince you, here are some pictures from our dressing room and from our show last night!

Dan Kurtz, approving of the editor’s decision to scatter the pictures throughout the article.

Find out more about Crappy Holidays and all the other shows the Fringe has to offer at http://www.sffringe.org.