short-form adventures

this one day
i was invited to play a 'short form show' with t futch and his company laughing matters. he tells me that, i think , so it's clear there's no need for d e e p talk about the 'prov. it's for a multi-national corporation, after all, and they get what every multi-national corporation deserves. a few grown men tapping on audience members, filling in ____s and generally having a wingding of a time.
laughing matters is atlanta's longest running improv. we used to kid around how dad's garage would become atlanta's longest running joke. so far, so good, dad's garage.
the company we did the short-form for was siemens. from their website:
Do you know how, where and when Siemens crosses your path? You may be surprised!
they crossed my path outside the walnut room. i was surprised. so surprised only a scotch on the rocks from their open bar could still my astonishment.
they were a funny group, from all over the world. what they shared was a love of sex. almost all their suggestions were typical innuendo. we made a few. but neither of us made a semen joke. it's no laughing matter.
yet another short-form improv show i was invited to occured in the north georgia mountains for a jewish kids camp. s coulter, cruchic and i drove up, coulter uttering benign phrases in a german accent. it was funny. even funnier? the first person we met at the camp was german. like, uber deutsch. the thickest german accent i ever heard. it was dripping with tomatensaft. coulter was außer sich vor ironie.
we workshopped through the day and into a crisp evening. we performed in their synagogue (temple for you reform types). no open bar.
on the one hundred-mile drive home through the foothills of the appalachians, cruchic pulled off the highway to a hidden dairy queen. she claims these small town DQ's are a cut above. we all got ice cream. i got a butterscotch sundae, for which the mentally handicapped man at the register charged me eight dollars US. the manager, a sixteen-year-old, remedied this with a roll of the eyes. "it's been a loo-o-ng day," he said. as an after thought, cruchic added a hot dog to her order. it came wrapped in foil. it came teeming with flies. and not just regular houseflies. but big green-eyed, freshly maggot-hatched horseflies.
she returned it for another one. i know. i'm as surprised as you are right now. scotch on the rocks...
the manager yelled through the window "hey, man! this has flies in it." the cook quickly served up a basket of french fries. "not fries, man. flies!"
at this point, cruchic wisely got her money back. none of us questioned the integrity of the desserts. we didn't wanna know.

je sui l'petit cochon

Guys, I got a heads up on an audition for a commercial job where they need a character with a French accent. If you can do a believable accent let me know ASAP do (sic) that I can submit you. Thanks!
well, that's all i need to hear! i spent over a year dating a french girl. she can tell you, in that time, we spoke to each other a lot. almost daily. by the hairs on my barbichette, i'm your spokesthing!
my droite side is my good side. and i love manger, so in between shots, you'll find me at craft services. partaking of the brioche and fromage, and of course any super bonbons.
mind if i take off my shirt? cool. i've worked hard to look like this, and it's a waste to stay clothed.
like i said, french is a wonderful accent. when applied to english words, it softens any angular tones. might be perfect if this commercial is a soft sell. i can't tell you how many truck ads for the new model year could use a french accented announcer. somehow we americans have managed to make chevrolet an ugly word.
can you hear it:
no muh-nay down
lo-lo ay-pe-argh
pro-wd to be ani-merican.
wiss ze highess jz-ivetrain powuh in ziss way-class
in conclusion, my accent is believable. my french girlfriend sure believed a lot of the lies i told her. which were in english. so imagine how wickedly effective your campaign and i will be with je and le thrown in there!

so i say to pasi nurminen:

tomorrow, my lord: time goes on crutches 'til love have all his rites.

and she looks back at me like i make no sense (see right). this bill snakespeare stuff is hard.
last night i did my first performance as claudio. he is right and noble. it's a stretch.
i also came up with some very creative cuts to the script. chopping about a full minute off the running time. then adding it back on by missing an entrance.
the middle ground i want is affording the language to do a lot of the work, yet avoiding the lifeless talking heads stuff that loses people. theatricality mixed with intelligent banter. could we do it the way they do 'curb your enthusiasm'? is't possible? it'd be great? i'd like it?

was did does do

this blog is usually told in the past tense. looking ahead, though, can be exciting.
fortunes can be told by observing light from the stars. light that is older than we are. stars from the past tell our future.
i will be taking the place of justin w in much ado about nothing at pp. that means i have less than one week left to get my act together.
zombie sitcom will be in it. as the lead, they call bene-dick.
perhaps i should know something about shakespeare. i will do some research. and i will learn.
about billy snakespeare. and his wife anne hathaway with words. their kid homelet. i will learn about bill and stratford-up-on-it. thin, delicate boys playing girls. fat, unsightly girls stage managing. how little will have changed from now until next week!
one of my favorite moments will be when the awe-dience (that's what they'll be full of) dreams in their seats that they are the stars. telling us what we already knew.