I'm ready for my close-up, Mr DeMille...

It's official: On August 15th, a week from this Saturday, I will be performing in my first show with the Village Idiots Improv company. I've been rehearsing with them for a few months, and the artistic director feels I'm ready to go. I feel good about what I have learned so far, and have been able to use my experience as an actor to move forward at a faster pace than someone without any stage experience at all.

It is a very small space they perform in, holding maybe 35 people at maximum. This translates into being very up close and personal with your audience, but in the world of improv, that's not a bad thing. The rehearsals double as an improv class, where one is taught the mechanics of improv, and if you're already an actor as I am, learning more tools to add to your artistic tool box. If you're interested, this is their website, though I have posted it before: www.improvvip.com


On the flip side, I auditioned last Monday for a play and sadly, was not cast. It was something I wanted very badly, as it was "Speed-the-Plow" by David Mamet, my favorite playwright.
I acted in one of his earlier works once before, 'The Water Engine," and Speed-the-Plow, along with "Glenngarry, Glen Ross," and "American Buffalo," are considered three of his masterworks. His style of dialog, known as "Mamet-speak," is very different from other standard play constructions - and very hard to get down right. Why? Because he writes dialog the way people speak, with a lot of stattico (sp?) delivery, and overlapping conversations. Many of his plays are also known for his liberal use of four-letter words, and for his examination of men's themes. He has been criticized for not developing his female characters very well, tending to stereotype them. His works however, are undeniably powerful.

While not being cast, I have to say that there was a great deal of competition. The play is a three person piece, two men, one woman. There was a large turnout for this, as was expected. I know I did well, as I was kept to the very end, and was not sent home early. I also know I did well by the compliments I got from the artistic director of the theatre, (which is not the one I work with, and do PR for) and the director, and the stage manager, all of whom I know well. The stage manager (who is an actor as well, and with whom I have acted on stage with) sent me a very nice note:

"Always good to see you, and congratulations on a very strong read. We were all impressed by how well you worked with the Mamet-speak."

Directors however have a tough job. They have to go with their gut when they cast a show, and see what they think the best fit is. Having directed in the past, I understand this all too well. I'm just glad I made a good showing of things, and oh well, on the to the next theatrical conquest.

It's not about religion, it's about violence.

"Such evil deeds could religion prompt." Lucretius - Roman Epicurean poet and philosopher.

This past Sunday I had the opportunity to attend a staged reading of a play at a local community theatre (part of the local JCC - Jewish Community Center) that I have acted with in the past. They are not a typical community theatre in that they have professional production standards and is a wonderful place in which to act. They also have a play reading series throughout their regular season that is essentially a forum to test out certain plays that they may wish to develop as full productions at some point. Essentially, the actors are on stage with script-in-hand, minimal props or costumes, (or none at all) and minimal rehearsal time.

The play I witnessed was "The Women's Minyan" by Israeli playwright Naomi Ragen. I say witnessed, because one could not simply "watch" this piece performed without it stirring up such strong emotions. The audience becomes voyeur to the closed society of the ultra-Orthodox Jewish community in Jerusalem, though in all honesty, this could have taken place in any ultra-Orthodox Jewish community, anywhere in the world. We peer into a closed society that brooks very little affinity for those who are not frum. We also see the cloak of religion being used to justify the brutal oppression of women in a society that, is supposed to hold women in high esteem.

Ultra-Orthodox Judaism is no different than any other patriarchal society. Men want to keep control over women, so they devise interpretations of religious texts in order to justify their positions. This play covers these points quite nicely, as it tells the story of Chana, a mother of 12 children caught in a 20-plus year abusive marriage. It is not just physical abuse that she endures, but emotional, psychological, and financial abuse as well.

Chana finally musters up the courage to leave her husband, and with the help of a close friend, is able to flee from her home. The price for this freedom is that she would need to leave her children behind, who range in age from teenagers to toddlers. She makes it her objective to not only secure a get - a religious divorce - but to also see her children again. This is not so easy in her world, as her husband, as well as other family members have effectively turned the children against Chana. The community as a whole has shunned her, abusing her with epithets that suggest she is not only a whore, but a pervert. It seems as though the community has come to the conclusion that she is a lesbian, as she sought refuge in the home of a female friend, and has been lving there ever since leaving her husband and family behind.

A minyan is religious term in Judaism that refers to a gathering of 10 men. This is the minimum that is needed in order to conduct such things as a public prayer service, most notably on Shabbos (Sabbath). There are also other functions that require the presence of a minyan, but they are too numerous to list.

The title of the play refers to the gathering of 10 women at Chana's home on the day she returns with an official order from the rabbinical court; she has been given permission to see her children. Her family however, is deeply divided. What follows is not only the exposure of the abuse that she suffered under her husband's thumb, but a stripping away of the veneer of family life in this very insular society.

I found myself seething by the end of the play, not only for what happened to Chana, but for the hypocrisy inherent in those that proclaim their piousness so loudly, only to use it as a disguise for their own ends. I witnessed this firsthand through the experience of working in Brooklyn all those years, right near the Hasidic community. I would often watch the throngs of men going to shul on Friday nights, or the occasional Saturday morning, dressed in their most somber religious garb. Pious men they were indeed - unless of course their own pleasure needed to be satisfied. This is why one would see these same pious, learned Talmudic scholars underneath the Willamsburg Bridge on a weeknight, haggling with the hookers as though they were purchasing jewelry on 52nd St. Never buy retail when you can get it wholesale.

There was a talk back session after the play, (which had several actor friends as part of the cast) and there were several women in the audience that bravely told their own stories of abuse and escape. It was also noted, and rightly so, that while Chana's situation is not necessarily endemic to the ultra-Orthodox community, it is certainly not infrequent either. What is endemic is the position of "blaming the victim," something that extends not only out to other fundamentalist religious sects, but even into our own secular society as well, though we have certainly seen a change in that in recent years.

This play however, was not about religion, but about violence perpetrated in the name of religion. Religion served in many ways as a back drop for a larger issue. It also served as a smokescreen for the denial on the part of those that simply had problems facing the reality of a horrific situation. If denial is after all, a God-given survival tool, most of the women in this play use it in spades.

People ask me why I turned away from my faith. This was part of the reason; not the abusive part of it, as it was not something I witnessed in my own home, but rather the hypocritical nature of what I witnessed in many situations. So often, we see those who proclaim their righteousness with such fervor, only to be poor examples of it themselves. I would rather live my life as an atheist, and do what good I can, than wear my religion on my sleeve while I cut off the other sleeve in the process.

I feel guilty.

Is it normal for bloggers to feel guilty for not posting as often as they were in the past? It certainly isn't by choice on my part. I just have been so busy over the past two weeks, that every time I sit down to write something, my brain freezes, and I am not really sure what I want to write about. One thing is for sure; I must be hallucinating. I could swear when I sat down in front of the computer the other day, I heard it say to me (in a Jewish mother kind of way), "Nu? You couldn't pick up the keyboard and blog a little? What am I, chopped liver?"

Either I was dreaming when I thought I heard this, or I need to up the meds.

Well, let's see; on the good news front, that friend of mine, the actor who was let go from the improv troop, has just about secured an interview for a professor position at the local community college for early childhood development. I helped edit her teaching philosophy statement, and I'm crossing my fingers for her. Everyone who knows what happened to her was shocked, and I think it is going to hit the fan at that improv team. They need more oversight from the theatre they work out of, and this might be the straw that has broken the camel's back.

However, she has also invited me to help her teach an acting class for adults and another for high school kids. The one for high school kids came out of a discussion we had one day where we both agreed that doing the school play isn't really learning how to act. Most high school kids aren't taught the tools of acting; how to break down a scene, what is an action, what is an objective, how to stay "in the moment." This will be a first for me, but she feels I am ready to go for it.

It is 3:16 in the very early morning here, so I am off to bed.

To tell the truth.

There are two things in my life that keep my sanity intact: Writing and acting. I got bit by the acting bug while in college in 1984. I had wondered for a long time what it would be like to get up on a stage and perform, but almost as soon as the thought would enter my head, the scary things such as "What if they hate me?," and "I'll collapse into a bubbling mass of crap." would always stop me. "Sensible," I would always think. Why should I put myself out there and let people know I am incapable of this skill.

All that changed when I was passing by the multi-use theatre in my dorm complex. There was a poster up for auditions for a production of "One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest." Having seen the movie some years before and loving it, I was intrigued. I just stopped in front of it and read it over and over for what seemed to be an eternity.

As fate would have it, my friend John happened to be passing by, and he inquired as to what I was doing. "Oh, just fantasizing." I told him

"Why don't you go for it?" came the reply in a snarky tone and evil grin which he was famous for.

"Oh yeah, right." came my less than enthusiastic reply. Who was I trying to kid. I was in no real hurry to be laughed at by a bunch of people I didn't know.

"Tell you what. You get in that play, and there is a good bottle of Scotch on me waiting for you." he dared.

He knew me too well. Never dare me. I just looked at him, asked him if he was serious, which he said he was. "I have seen you teach in EMT's classes." he said. "You're pretty comfortable doing that, why can't you do this."

"Not the same thing." I told him. Besides, he had no idea how much getting up in front of a class and teaching made me sweat, though I did enjoy it.

"Yeah it is. Same thing, bigger classroom." he prodded on.

"I don't know, I gotta think about it."

"Don't think too hard." he challenged me again.

Later that week, I made the decision to go for it. There I was in a room full of other hopefuls, some were theatre majors, others were schmucks like me who had no idea what we were doing. I suspected that we would read from the play, and that would be that. No such luck.

The director paired us off, and one pair at a time, had us improv a situation. The guy that I was partnered with played father and son, (I was the father.) and he had to tell me that he had smashed up the car. Well, that was easy enough, I mean I know how my dad would have reacted to that. We started the scene, and kept going, and going, and going....

Most other people's scenes lasted two-to-three minutes max. Ours, as I would find out, went for seven. They posted the callback list the next day. My name was on it. We read from the script that night, and I got the part of the psychiatrist. Dr. Spivey. A good part for a beginner.

I was excited, elated, and scared shit-less. This was definitely one of those "Be careful what you wish for" moments. Fortunately, our director knew how to work with experienced actors, and people like me that didn't know what the hell we were doing.

Now twenty years later, acting for me is like breathing, a necessary part of life. I graduated from college in 1985, did some theatre in the Bronx for a few years, but then had to give it up as work, grad school, and life got in the way. Of course, when I got sick, everything in my life just stopped, but I did make a promise to myself. If I survived the transplant, I would get back into acting somehow. After moving to Rochester I kept that promise, as Rochester has a large theatrical and artistic community. This is the same town that has produced folks like Philip Seymour Hoffman, Taye Diggs, and Robert Forster, just to name a few. I got lucky in 2000, auditioned for a show at Blackfriars Theatre, got the lead, and have been acting around town ever since.

This Sunday, I'm auditioning for a production of "The Pillowman," also at Blackfriars. John made good on his promise, and as I do every time I leave the house for an audition, I'll pat that bottle of Scotch for luck.

"Find your mark, look the other fellow in the eye, and tell the truth." - James Cagney on acting.

*Update: Didn't make it into the show. Oh well, on to the next one. :-(