iLove:'s review from The Conveyor

Who's the Chalk Dust Man?

The Fringing has commenced!

Well, WOW.

The fourth Fringe Festival is now underway, and it definitely seems bigger and better than evah.

Last night was the first night of performances on the Fringe, and there seemed to be a really good turnout - which is totally awesome for a Wednesday and the start of the Festival. If I can remember anything except the evening's at the bar series, last year's didn't seem to kick into high gear until the first weekend, so that's a terrific sign.

I wasn't able to experience any fringe shows last night, cause of rehearsal for this little show called Radiant Baby that we're cooking up, but my crew of babies did hit up all of the venues last night with the launch of our ChalkDustMan.com campaign, which was a ton of fun. (Especially when one particularly radiant homeless man started chasing a group of us down the street).

After rehearsal, I had to book it to the final runthru of iLove:. Wow, I'm so proud of this amazing ensemble of artists. This project has been their life for the past year, and it's really come a long way. The work has crystallized into something pretty extraordinary. I can't wait to take it in again tonight, and what I'm sure will be a glorious opening. What stunning work, Satori.

I have to say though, the highlight of my night was the Fringe-i-oke or Yemaoke or whatever they called it at the bar series. I definitely enjoyed taking the last chorus of Santana's "Smooth" up the octave - why? because I could. ;)

Although Hannah Dowdy's spot on rendition of "My Heart Will Go On", featuring Jeff Syroney and Jen Spillane with their amazing impromptu interpretive dance/acting, did put me to shame, methinks.

I will not talk about Luke and him FORCING me to back him up on "You Oughta Know." I'm sooooo sorry, Alanis. I love you. I really do. We'll just act like it never happened.

‘But, of course the culture writes us first, and then we write our stories.”
-Charles Mee
the (re)making project

iLove: has been over ten months in the making and it is about to make its world premiere at the 2007 Cincinnati Fringe Festival. Featuring Adrienne Clark, Charlie Clark, Anthony Darnell, Adam Standley, and Lindsey Valitchka, iLove: has been heralded by Jackie Demaline as one of the three not to miss.

Made as part of Charles Mee’s (re)making project the Satori Group has been work-shopping since August of 2006. Originally, the Satori Group had worked on Fetes de la Nuit, one of Mee’s scripts, but decided to make the leap to a completely original work. Or as Mee would put it, an “un-original, original work.”

Little of the text from Fetes de la Nuit exists in our play as it is presented today. Instead, we have drawn upon the voices in the culture around us – Barack Obama, Bjork, Richard Linklater, Jacques Derrida, The Books, etc. – and yes, we have written our own stories.

To read the script visit http://satorigroup.googlepages.com

We hope to see you at our show!

The Satori Group

Well, Sylvia finally died for the last time.

I spent the last two weekends of The Goat sitting in our makeshift light/sound "booth," waiting. With such a technically minimalist show, there were only a handful of cues spaced out over nearly two hours. leaving me plenty of time in between to stare off into space or, more frequently, watch the audience.

Much as I love this show, it's a little too intense to witness closely every night. I first read The Goat the year it came out and immediately fell in love with it with a kind of sad resignation as I assumed no group would ever produce it, or at least not in Cincinnati. When I finally got to see it first-hand here at New Stage a few weeks ago, it was definitely worth the wait. The raw emotions that appear on stage and the troubling subject matter force you to think about a topic that I at least had never considered. Not just think about it as a passing whim, but in a jarring, intensely personal way. It shakes you.

Which is why I loved watching other people respond. At the start of the show, there is always audible laughing, sometimes an isolated giggle, sometimes washing over the room as the whole audience resounds with one deep guffaw. A man having an affair with a goat? Ridiculous. Hee hee. But slowly, it stops being funny. This is not just an interesting notion to contemplate, but a reality, a terrible reality for the characters on stage. As the audience starts to believe it, the laughter changes. It becomes nervous, grateful for relief from the yelling, the desperate silences, the crash of pottery.

I always considered the ultimate test of an audience to be when Stevie carries on the dead Sylvia (who, by the way, left fake blood and hairs everywhere, including on my arms when I had to take her backstage every night. Ew. Anyway-). Sometimes this was met with dead silence, as if the whole audience was holding their breath. Often there were gasps. I liked those. It's always a nice reminder that the audience is getting emotionally invested in the work, enough that they would forget the people around them, forget the theatrical construct, and allow themselves to react as they would normally. And every once in a while, someone would laugh. I always wondered about those. Was it nervous laughter? Were they trying to cover another reaction? I still don't know. But even then, the effect of the work on the individual was palpable. It got to them, somehow. And that's the kind of shows I like working on.

First Post

Howdy, everyone!

Today marks the launch of the new NSC Blog! Check back here for behind the scenes info, rehearsal diaries, info about special events, exciting things our friends are doing, and much more!

BTW, this week is your last chance to get your goat at NSC! Our newly-acclaimed Season's Best Play has been extended thru this Sunday, the 27th! Get your tickets online or at the door, but whatever you do, get your goat!