Crazytown

MARIA, WHAT IS IT YOU C#NT FACE?

I once played a nun in "The Sound of Music"
By Kevin Michael Murphy(Actor-Voice Teacher)

I love "The Sound of Music".

As a child, I must've watched the VHS of the 1965 film 100 times.  One reason is because I couldn't get enough of it.  The other, is that it was one of the 3 VHS tapes my Grandma owned, and as an "indoor" kid it was always the best possible option when staying at her condo in New Jersey.

What is not to like about a musical that has both Nazis and a song entitled "The Lonely Goatherd"?
 
Seriously, Maria...what is it you c#nt face?

I'm gonna go ahead and say that this song is perhaps one of the best songs ever written for any musical...ever. 

Aside from the song mentioned above, my favorite scene is when Rolf and Leisel sing "Sixteen Going on Seventeen" in the gazebo. To this day I can't go by a gazebo without out humming the song or doing a full out dance routine.  

  
As a 10 year old, I thought that Leisel was just the prettiest girl I'd ever seen.

So pretty, that a few years later I'd go on to read this book...

 This book made me gay.

Nerd Alert! Check out some clips here of the original screen tests for the film! (I particularly loved the one of Marni Nixon singing all the female songs)

MY DAY AT THE TODAY SHOW

Or How Hoda Kotb Turned Me Into An International Star...For An Hour
By Geoffrey Kidwell (actor)

Most Monday mornings I wake up wishing I hadn’t stayed out til 5 am trolling around the city with a half-consumed bottle of Smirnoff Vodka behaving like a drunk sorority hoopty hoop. I slowly roll out of bed, fix myself a bourbon, and settle in to watch the ladies of The View pretend like they’re talking about stuff that matters.

But other Mondays are different.

Last Sunday night I got a telephone call from a good friend of mine. Turns out, said friend was going to be hosting the 4^th (always drunken) hour of The Today Show. As it turns out, Kathie Lee is off writing a musical in Seattle. God help us.

BTW: my friend is Sara Bareilles. If you’re a gay man or a lonely girl who hasn’t had a date since ever, then you definitely know who she is. If you’re a straight guy – and if you are…sorry – then you can learn more about her here.

(The writer recognizes that he just completely named dropped in the douchiest of ways, but in the interest of providing context to the story, it had to be done.)

Anyway, Sara calls me and asks if I wouldn’t mind heading over to 30 Rock on Monday morning with a couple of our friends and supporting her. DUH!

Of course I’ll come hang out, eat free food, maybe meet Matt Lauer and tell you how pretty you look during commercial breaks.

But, as you are about to find out, things went in a totally different direction.

This Thursday Kimbery gets a kick out of watching the audience...

Leah throws down at an all-female night of stand-up...

And Ryan tries to fight of the continuing surge of "mad" clones in the media.

ATTACK OF THE CLONES

When "mad" clones of creative entertainment properties attack!!!! 

By Ryan Bogner (Producer, Wingnut)

Last week I wrote about how theater producers often look to extant popular material in order to mitigate their risk in the product they produce.

The source material isn’t the only place where the creators and purveyors of entertainment look for inspiration for the next big hit.

Many times they feel that the answer lies in some element of another hit that they perceive to be popular, often the type of story, the setting or the general idea. What results from the line of thinking “since people like x in a they will like something very similar to x in my project, b” is often a pale Xeroxed and cloned demonspawn of the original innovative x.

The current strand of creative DNA that is being mined like crazy for the cloning process in popular culture is the AMC hit drama Mad Men. The artistic trait that most people identify when they analyze its popularity is the deep and layered conclusion that the show is set in the 60s.

So the tastemakers of Broadway and Hollywood have decided to embrace the idea that America currently is having a love affair with the 1960s and has tried to give us what we want!

This season on TV we have Pan Am, which is playing up the glitz and glamour and fashion sense of the era, with too many characters and a thinly strung convoluted Cold War espionage plot…I think.

And we also have the mediocre The Playboy Club, where NBC in a stroke of creativity has hired an actress in a starring role that ALREADY PLAYED A PLAYBOY BUNNY ON AN EPISODE OF MAD MEN WHERE THEY ATTEND THE PLAYBOY CLUB.

Naturi Naughton in an episode of Mad Men

Naturi Naughton in Mad Men 2: "if we change the color of her outfit no one will notice."

AKA the Playboy Club.

I ALWAYS FEEL LIKE SOMEBODY'S WATCHING ME

Where the line between performers and audience members becomes blurred.
By Kimberly Lew (Playwright/Blogger)

Site-specific, interactive theatre experiences are becoming more prevalent around the city, from Punchdrunk’s Sleep No More to Woodshed Collective’s The Tenant. Recently, I had the privilege of seeing Jonathan Solari’s The Love Letter You’ve Been Meaning to Write New York, a play/performance piece that takes place right in the middle of a block of Greenwich Street. And I mean literally on the street. The audience sits inside of the theatre facing floor-to-ceiling windows, watching as the actors parade outside, while a live band plays at the back of the house.

Something I realized while watching the show is that, in these kind of immersive theatre spaces, you get as much entertainment from watching other audience members as you do from the performances themselves. In the case of The Love Letter, there were so many unwitting audience members just walking along the street, unsure what to do when met with 20+ actors doing a tango-type dance routine in the middle of the sidewalk. Many stared in through the glass, took pictures and videos with their phones, and even mugged it up for us with waves and little motions. On one hand, it felt a little weird to me that we were kind of on display for passerby, but there was also something very sociologically interesting about the idea of people seeming to react to us without realizing they were on display themselves.

It’s interesting how these shows explore aspects of human nature that are not necessarily implicit to the show. At Sleep No More, where all the audience members are masked as they navigate the warehouse-turned-Hitchockian-hotel, I remember that, in spite of the Macbeth witches and murderous plots, some of the most unsettling discoveries would be walking into a dark room where a lone masked audience member would just be silently sitting and staring. I would think to myself, Really, Dude? I know you might be tired, but are you really going to take a break in the eerie room with all the creepy baby dolls hanging from the ceiling?

And as long as these shows are truly inspired and specific in their concept and location, the possibilities seem endless. The beauty in bringing the audience into the performers’ space, or at least challenging what space belongs to who, is that every performance is different and fresh. There are infinite opportunities for things to witness -- and by the same token, there is also the chance that you could become a part of the show for someone else.

KIMBERLY LEW proudly finds herself in the audience as an avid theatre-goer and blogger, as well as behind-the-scenes as a published playwright. www.kimberlylew.com
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ROSIE THE IRREVERENT

Rosie the Irreverent is an all female comedy revue dedicated to showcasing comics whose mother's never told them that if they didn't have anything nice to say then they shouldn't say anything at all. 
-By Leah Bonnema (Stand Up Comic) 

After a year long hiatus Rosie the Irreverent is back! Rosie began as a monthly show in New York City a few years ago after I returned from taking care of my mom in Maine for a year and wanted to produce a regular comedy event that would support and showcase brassy broads. 

The name Rosie the Irreverent came from a vivid memory I have of my mom dressing me up as Rosie the Riveter for Halloween. Fully equipped with a one piece jumper, head handkerchief and mini welding kit she sent me out the door saying "Oh, Leah, you look just like suffrage." What the fuck is suffrage, I'm 7. If my mom knew dressing me up as Rosie the Riveter every Halloween would translate to me expounding on stage about labia I'm sure she'd take it all back. Had she known her commitment to feminist ideals would surface in me via jokes about being burned at the stake by my grandfather and mentally rubbing one out to Eleanor Roosevelt I'm sure she would have let me dress up like a slutty nun or a rock star princess like I had wanted.

                                        The Melody Bonnema in me

My co-producer and partner in crime is Miss Maggie Champagne who you have seen droppin' it like it's hot in the hilarious SunDrop ads. We are very excited that Rosie has a new home and are committed to providing a space for women to be as opinionated, impertinent, saucy and profane as they want to be. You can check us, and a rotating line-up of amazing female comedic talent, at Luca Lounge every third Tuesday of the month at 7pm. 

Leah Bonnema is a Stand Up Comic. www.LeahBonnema.com
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This Wednesday, Matthew gets all control-freaky at a wedding...

Pam goes to therapy with Katie Holmes...

And Gregory calls out the TV. 

WHEN COMMERCIALS ATTACK

Calling Out TV Ads On Their Shenanigans
By Gregory Jacobs-Roseman (composer-lyricist)

I watch way too much television. Whew – it really does feel better when you say it out loud.

If you’re like me, the invention of DVR a few years ago was a gift from the heavens – the ability to record shows and fast forward through the commercials (all without a VHS cassette) meant hours more fun on the sofa while allowing your brain to melt into warm liquid goo. To counteract this brain melting effect I prefer to balance my television time between the utterly inane (I’m talking to you, every show on Bravo) and the educational/informative.

It’s no secret that I love MSNBC, and one effing amazing host in particular. When I watch a news program that broadcasts live, I prefer to watch it live – which, of course has the drawback of not being able to use the magic of DVR and skip the commercials. I was enjoying a broadcast of Hardball the other evening when we came to a commercial break, and by the time it was over I felt as if I had been scarred for life.

First, this Prius ad came on:

What-the-fuck-is-that-person-people-thing?!?!?! This commercial is so creepy. It's a creepy sneak-attack! Nightmares. Seriosuly, nightmares. I feel like Bart Simpson curled up, chanting: “Can’t sleep, clown will eat me.”

It only got worse from there. Apparently Geico decided that they have enough spokesmen (I tried to find the 30 Rock clip where Liz and Carol discuss the multitude of Geico spokesmen to link to here, but to no avail) and were just gonna go for the gross-out factor:

BEHIND MURPHY MADE: THE WEDDING DANCE

By Matthew Murphy (Photographer)
A wedding is a day defined by pressure and anxiety for all involved: the photographer included.  I've done my fair share of dealing with brides and grooms, but I knew when it came to my sister Carson's big day--which arrived in a blur of energy and emotions this past Sunday--I wouldn't be able to photograph the whole celebration on my own.  I was, after all, part of the bridal party, so unless I wanted to keep my camera on a tripod and set the timer to take pictures that I was in, I was going to have to enlist some troops. 

Being a protective younger brother, I knew I couldn't pass off the responsibilities to  just anyone who can hold a camera; I knew I had to get the best, so I called upon two of my friends, the fantastic photographers Curtis Scott Brown and Kevin Thomas Garcia. (Boy, do I feel out of place with just two names.) 

These boys were running all over the place for me on Sunday, and with five cameras between us I knew we had have every angle covered.   They dealt with my frantic energy as I tried to both help my sister get ready and get them set up, and they even made me feel comfortable BEING in a few pictures, which, as most photographers know, is extremely difficult.  Once I got a taste of being behind the lens I found I absolutely can't handle being in front of it anymore. 

Even though I was lucky enough to have their brilliant eyes on the events, the control freak in me couldn't resist picking up my own camera a few times throughout the night.  Here are a few of the shots I snapped between booty pops on the dance floor (and some photographer-y advice good measure). 

(One of the most difficult things about wedding photography is the wrangling.  You know there are certain photos you want to get, and you're basically attempting to harness people who have the energy equivilant of drinking ten Red Bulls.  Yet the wrangling must be done.  I knew once I got the Groom's Party (made up entirely of members of the show STOMP) lined up I would have less than a minute to get the shot and move on.  So I said simply, give me your best STOMP SWAGGER.  And this is what I got.  One of my favorite group pictures I've ever taken.)

(For this photo of Carson and Nicholas, I knew I wanted to mirror an engagement shot of them that I took a few months ago.  Focusing the energy of the bride and groom is perhaps the most difficult of all, as everyone wants a piece of them.  So it's usually best to give them plenty of direction.  Of course, it's nearly impossible to take a bad picture of my sister, so my job wasn't too tough.)

(Tyra Banks may be a crazy person, but a few years ago she spouted some nonesense on America's Next Top Model that I find to always be a fun guiding rule: look for the juxtaposition in the concept and the posing. (Of course, Tyra's not the first to come up with that idea.) If this had been a picture of Carson and Nicholas standing on a gorgeous marble staircase, sure it would have been gorgeous, but it wouldn't have the character of sitting this exquisitely dressed couple in front of a completely run down building. Thanks, Tyra.)

KATIE HOLMES IN THERAPY

Have you ever wondered what a Therapy Session for someone like Katie Holmes must be like? Maybe it’s like this...
By Pam Quinn (Writer)

   

 

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