Category: Theatre

  • ODDS and ENDS: Autumn Marketing in Summer, Theatre, and Tottenham Hotspur

    (Just sit right back and you’ll hear a tale…)

    It’s not done yet! I know it’s August still, and it’s hot, and the subway platforms are a swamp, and when I step outside, I just start sweating. I’m an old man and I can’t stop talking about the weather, and around this time of year, I want it to be Fall more than anything. But I’m going to throw the marketeers of America under the bus one this one. These Ad-Wizards starting running back-to-school commercials before the 4th of July. Halloween junk on sale at drug stores and Home Depot in August? Just yesterday, I got a catalog in the mail from L.L. Bean telling me that it’s time for Fall! I’m not crazy; they’re all jumping the gun here, right?

    The kid auditioned for a school play. This made me very excited and proud. Also, it put me on notice not to be a “Stage Dad.” See, the kid needed to have a one minute monologue memorized for her audition, and she came to me for help. You know; me, her dad, the guy who got a theatre degree, and did plays and puppet shows and physical theatre here in New York City. Me! She came to me for help, and I said yes! And then I had to tell myself that I cannot live through her, and her experiences in auditioning and doing this play. No! I am here to support, and give guidance when she asks for it. But, she didn’t know how to score a script, or what a beat was in reference to dialogue, so I had to fill her in a little. But no Stage Dad shit!

    This could be a rough season for Spurs. Just saying…

  • Earworm Wednesday: A 2003 Karaoke Staple

    I graduated college in December 2003 and a bachelor’s degree in Theatre Performance. As such, just about all of my college friends were theatre majors. Though I can’t sing, just about everyone else in could, and this was one of the staple songs that was performed at karaoke night by the women in the department.

    So, besides the fact that this song gets easily stuck in my head, it also reminds me of smoked fill bars over run with theatre majors clogging up the waiting, hoping to get a chance to sing this, and “Come On Eileen.”

  • Thoughts on the Kid’s First Broadway Show

    We had been planning this for a while, taking the kid to see HAMILTON on Broadway. It’s her favorite musical – she has the sound track memorized, and we’ve watched the Disney+ filmed musical performance like a hundred times. We had the opportunity to take her to other shows, but we knew HAMILTON was the only “first” show she could have AND we wanted to wait until she was old enough to appreciate what “seeing a Broadway show” really meant.

    Ans last week, was the right time. (If I might add, the middle of the week HAMILTON cast, with a couple of understudies that went on, was great!) The kid was excited, we made a whole evening out of it with dinner before, and souvenirs when we got to the theatre. The kid was bouncing in her seat when the lights started to dim, mouthed along to the songs that she loves, and, though she said she wouldn’t because she knows the show too well, cried like all of us at the end of the show.

    I would love to flatter myself and say that this was a life changing moment, or one of the core moments of her life, but I can’t say that; only she can – and it might still be years before she would say anything like that to me. No, I just provided a platform, and I hope that it inspires or encourages her in some way.

    For me, it was a very big deal. I don’t do a lot of Broadway. Not that I have an issue with it, but my theatrical heart lies Off-Off-Off Broadway, in the little weird and small houses that play strange and experimental shows. I have taken the kid to see those (mainly quirky puppet shows that friends of mine do) so she knows that world of theatre. Now, after having seen a big, huge, famous show on Broadway, I think the kid has been exposed to both ends of the theatre spectrum.

    And I think that’s my job as a parent – helping the kid experience things, and see as much different art as possible. I’m not expecting her to go into the arts, and if she doesn’t, that’s fine. But art and storytelling are important, and can lead to a better understanding of the world around you. Especially when it comes to understanding that we are all the same. We all love, we all hurt, we all give, and we all take.

  • What It’s Like To Be a Stay-at-Home-Dad? (“Mommy Has Questions” Podcast Interview)

    Here is the episode of the podcast Mommy Has Questions that I was interviewed on. It was a fun conversation about stay at home parenting, male roles in the family, and the couple of other things. I had great time, enjoyed the discussion, and the whole Mommy Has Questions team made me feel comfortable and right at home. So thank you for having me.

    Please, give it a listen – follow, subscribe, leave a comment. You know the drill.

  • That Guy in That Thing

    When I moved to New York City nineteen years ago, with the help of a friend, I got a job working at a theatrical rehearsal studio. It wasn’t a bad job; helped me get a financial foothold in the City. Made some pretty good friends while doing it, as well. But the most interesting aspect of that job was always having this “deja vu” feeling while watching tv, especially when seeing commercials.

    Follow me on this…

    Working at a rehearsal studio meant that I was in contact with hundreds if not thousands of actors. Not only were actors coming in and out for rehearsals, but lots of castings were held in the studios; plays, musicals, tv shows, reality tv shows, movies, and tons upon tons of tv commercials.

    On the whole, actors are a pretty out going and friendly group. Some can be strange, and others can be “chip on the shoulder assholes” but by and large, good people. Chatty people, too. Everyone had a story to tell, or a show that they were in that they wanted you to come and see. Hell, I would try to talk them in to seeing one of my puppet shows, and they would try to get me to go to their staged reading – it’s how the industry works. And it was fun talking to people.

    Then I would go home, turn the tv on to watch something, and there in the Raymore & Flannagan commercial was the guy who was telling be about the reading he was in. Or I would see the woman who was at the second call back for a new musical playing a dead body on Law and Order. Or, I would see a TD Bank ad and wonder to myself, “Don’t I know that guy at the teller widow?” Or “Isn’t that the gal who was warming up in the hallway today in the Jeep commercial?”

    Then a couple of days or weeks would go by, and that actor would walk into the studio for an audition or rehearsal, and my mind would trigger back to that commercial, and I’d say to them, “Saw in that Ben and Jerry’s ad.”

    Other times, I wouldn’t see them again to tell them good job, because they started to work their way up the ladder. Slowly, ad after ad, no lines, then one line. Then featured in an ad, then a background character for some show. Then an under five, leading to a featured role.

    Still to this day, when I’m watching a show or a movie, I’ll still get this feeling when an actors comes on in a small role, that I met them before, a long time ago. I can never prove it, but I do wonder.