Crazytown

KEEPING TECHNOLOGY IN PERSPECTIVE

Practical tips for making sure your life doesn't get run over by technology.
by Loren A. Roberts (guru of multi-hyphenate media)

Are the electronics overwhelming you?

My online experience has shifted significantly over the past few months because of family and work necessities, and I thought some of the lessons I have learned might be helpful to you:

STOP HAVING INFORMATION "PUSHED" TO YOU.

This sounds counterintuitive, but you should be the "instigator" of hunting for information -- it will save time. Unfortunately, our iPhones and e-mail boxes have become filled with messages from this company and that company, all trying to get us to click and buy, or click and subscribe, or click and...you get the idea. Ignore the "push" of information. Instead, use the internet like a scalpel -- cutting away until you get to exactly the information you want, on your terms.

"BATCH-READ" YOUR E-MAIL.

Even though I leave my e-mail browser open all the time at the office, I only jump over to Outlook and read a bunch of e-mails about once an hour. Why? Because reading e-mail more often breaks my concentration. I have found that I'm way more productive when I have no distractions, and e-mail is "distraction number one." Delete as many as you can immediately, and then figure out which ones can be addressed quickly. Respond to those, and then, for ones that require a longer response, shoot off a quick message to the sender stating that you will get back to them within 24 hours.

"BATCH-SOCIAL," TOO.

I now have an iPhone. While it hasn't helped as much as I was expecting in cutting down the craziness of life, it has helped in one major way: I "do social" away from the office. On the iPhone. In batches. I'll scroll through screens and screens of your posts all in one (or two) binges, usually after dinner, and away from a computer. That's one less distraction while I am working at the office.

NEWS AGGREGATORS AND SOCIAL AGGREGATORS ARE GOOD FOR YOU.

I will mourn the impending death of Google Reader next month, because I have found the benefit of getting all of my blogs and all of my social in one batch. I still haven't settled on a Google Reader replacement, but for social I am all about Hootsuite. Between that and bit.ly (link shortener) I can move pretty quickly through posts from Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. Too bad I can't get my Snapchat, Tumblr, and Instagram posts fed through Hootsuite as well -- that would be fantastic. But it all has to do with limiting the number of URLs I have to enter, and my ability to scan quickly through lots of information.

WALK...AWAY FROM THE COMPUTER.

I know many of you are New Yorkers, and therefore have the opportunity (even joy, sometimes) of walking through town. Us West Coast people don't do that as much. But we need to walk. So my office is strategically placed right in the heart of downtown Pasadena, so that I'm a 5- to 10-minute walk from the library, a few of my clients, all of the restaurants in Old Town Pasadena, and the Pasadena Playhouse. This has been a good thing -- both for my health, and for my ability to rest my eyes from squinting at the computer. You should do it too. (I have also switched my office's desk to a standing desk -- with a stool for when I get tired -- but that will have to be for another post.)

BALANCE AND LEVITY

Life is about more than our online world, even though much of our time is spent here. Get out. Move quickly through what is needed online, and then make straight for the door and find some sun, and some friends, and plenty of wonder. Take your camera with you if you must, because there will be fun things to see.

LOREN A. ROBERTS produces films, videos and music, designs magazines and logos, plays and sings in a Doobie Brothers tribute band, and is a student of what happens when science and technology and the arts and culture collide. www.hearkencreative.com
EMAIL HIM |  GOOGLE |  FACEBOOK | TWITTER | OTHER POSTS BY THIS AUTHOR

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AN INTERVIEW WITH JILL GOLD, STAGE MANAGER [pt. 3]

Jill discusses careers in musical theatre, Barack Obama, and the future for theatre in general...
by Loren A. Roberts (guru of multi-hyphenate media)

Jill with her daughter backstage during Seven Brides for Seven Brothers at McCoy-Rigby in April.

Part 1 of this series  |  Part 2 of this series

LR: Back to the kids…

JG: Well, I love teaching, but it was great: out of every single class, I get at least one assistant stage manager, and at least one great babysitter! The kids are older now, but…back then, "want an 'A' in my class? What are you doing Saturday night while I'm working?" [laughter] But seriously, on Seven Brides right now, my PA is one of my students from my University of Redlands class.

LR: And you've been teaching long enough now, that you probably have students everywhere…

JG: I even assisted one of my former students on a show at the Pasadena Playhouse last Fall. I was supposed to be the Production Stage Manager, and he was going to be my assistant, but schedules got complicated and I wasn't going to be in town for the first week of rehearsals, so I recommended to the director that he be the stage manager and I assist. He's 27 now, so he was in my class almost a decade ago. Actually, a lot of my kids from that era have gone out into the industry, and not all as stage managers. One does Vectorworks drafting and works for Mattel, one just moved to Denver and is starting a new theatre company, the list goes on. And I also have to mention that I end up getting some wonderful friends out of teaching, too. If you don't think about the fact that I could be their mom [laughter]…I mean, some of them will call me, and I'll have to ask "who am I on this call: your mom, your friend, your boss, or your professor?" Because the advice that I hand out might be different based on who I am!

AN INTERVIEW WITH JILL GOLD, STAGE MANAGER [pt. 2]

Jill discusses how the economy has affected working in the business, and a musical theatre student who has never seen a live musical...
by Loren A. Roberts (guru of multi-hyphenate media)

Jill has to do a walk-on role in Not The Messiah (He's a Very Naughty Boy) with Eric Idle a few years ago.

(See Part 1 of this interview: http://bit.ly/YUzN6q)

LR: I'm looking at those new big national tours -- Wicked, Book of Mormon -- and wondering if that is having a negative effect on local and regional theatre?

JG: That's both true and false. The only reason I would disagree is that it's nothing new. I was out on a Les Miz tour 20 years ago. And it was the big ticket in town: if you were gonna spend a bunch of money, that was the ticket.

LR: That was in the early 90s?

JG: Yeah, I came right off City of Angels (I met my husband on that show!), and hopped right into Les Miz. And there were a lot of big tours out. It's the same thing: if you had -- back then -- $70 -- today it's $170 dollars -- but if you had that discretionary income to spend, you're probably going to go see Les Miz at the Pantages instead of whatever is playing at the Pasadena Playhouse. Or, you're going to go to the Pantages, thinking the Pasadena Playhouse show is going to be here for six weeks, and maybe you never get to it…postpone, and it never happens. So, I don't think it's a new phenomenon, but I think that they try to make everything into a Wicked now. Also -- and I don't know if this is a direct correlation -- so many theaters have closed, or can't offer big competitive shows. Take, for instance, Pasadena Playhouse. They are doing Sleepless in Seattle this summer. Brand new musical, big show. But a lot of places are sticking with two-person shows, and one-set shows, and…no-deck-crew-needed shows. Trimming the budgets wherever they can.

LR: So you think that's how local theatre is coping…with the consolidation as well as the hard financial times of the past decade?

JG: I think if you look at the seasons for all the main regional theaters in L.A., I think you would see a "slimming" trend over the past ten or fifteen years. … I say that, and then I'm thinking of Tom McCoy's season this coming year, which is Broadway Bound, Rabbit Hole, God of Carnage (Rabbit Hole and God of Carnage are both plays with smallish casts), and Les Miz and Cats. But, Tom's unique in that he's got Jekyll and Hyde on Broadway, Peter Pan has been on the road forever, he's in negotiations to manage three more theatre spaces in Southern California…the point is, he's got other money-making things that help him fund this series, so he can fund the larger shows.

LR: Whereas someplace like Pasadena Playhouse…

JG: …which went bankrupt and then came back, yes, had to look at their model and say "what isn't working?" which would make you significantly more risk-averse. The Geffen has a little more luck, because my impression is that, with their location, and with the late Gil Cates as their producer with his Hollywood connections, and being named after David Geffen, and you look at the names of the donors on the wall and it's a "who's who" list of Hollywood, they have a very strong subscription base. They have wealthier subscribers and donors, so their money comes in maybe a little more easily. It seems that they might have a little firmer footing. But then Reprise, that I used to work for all the time, they did big musicals, and had to shut down, because that model wasn't working. But Jason Alexander, their artistic director, hired the same guy who turned around Pasadena Playhouse after their bankruptcy. He came in, and they are thinking of doing a mix now -- of musicals and plays, and not performing at UCLA anymore (they used to rent the theatre there) because there were stipulations that you had to hire x number of crew, and maybe the rental was higher there than at other venues. You simply have to re-examine your model while trying to maintain the artistic integrity of why you opened the company in the first place.

AN INTERVIEW WITH JILL GOLD, STAGE MANAGER [pt. 1]

A career stage manager discusses life, work, family, and bringing up the next generation of theatre tech professionals.
by Loren A. Roberts (guru of multi-hyphenate media)

Jill Gold calling the shots (on a prehistoric computer -- look at that thing!) for Les Miserables in the early 1990s. Fourth National Tour.

LR: I didn't doctor your latte at all.

JG: I didn't want it doctored! Thank you…

LR: I'm glad we got to talk…

JG: I'm glad too! I'm sorry it's taken so long; I'm in the middle of the hardest tech of my life…I'm exhausted! Ohmygosh, this latte is good, is this Europane?

LR: No, it's Coffee Gallery. [both local non-Starbucks coffee shops]

[We get interrupted by a phone call from her husband, who is performing with his quartet in Japan on a cruise ship…]

LR: You know, it's interesting that your husband called right now; you have a unique perspective as a theatre tech professional who also expertly manages a performing family…

JG: Some people might question the word "expertly"…[laughs]

LR: But I mean, that does become a consideration for many of us as we get older, marry, have families, and still participate in the industry. None of us have "9-to-5" jobs…

JG: Boring! But that's also what makes it work for me and my husband, because neither of us have 9-to-5 jobs; many times, if I'm working a 14-hour day on a show, he might not be, so one of us is still home. So it works out.

LR: I find that, because the economy has been so tight, I'm constantly accepting more work, and so the "downside" of not having that 9-to-5 is that I'm working all the time…

JG: …yeah, you can't turn anything down! This is my first Monday off in three and a half months, 'cuz I've been teaching in Redlands...

RIP SMASH (et. al.)

Was I the only CrazyTown writer who never dedicated a post to this show? Oh well. Here's a list of others that we must say goodbye to also...
by Loren A. Roberts (guru of multi-hyphenate media)

It could have been so much more...

Wow. That's all I can say.

A host of cancellations came rolling out at the end of last week.

As many of us expected, Smash didn't make it to next season. The only silver lining for it is that many of the talented actors will be able to find other, higher-profile work. And I can hope that some people got excited for a greater depth and breadth of musical theatre. But when Smash veered off into GLEE! territory, I was hating it with a passion. So RIP, Smash, and let's hope that everyone lands on their feet to do even bigger and better stuff...

Unfortunately there were many other shows that also suffered the same fate this past week, so here is a list of canceled shows, listed by network:

---

ABC

Family Tools, How To Live With Your Parents..., Body Of Proof, Red Widow, Malibu Country, Happy Endings, Don’t Trust The B—- At Apt. 23, 666 Park Avenue, Last Resort, Private Practice, Zero Hour, Bachelor Pad

TRY AND TRY AGAIN

Two things are needed to ensure success: passion and perseverance.
by Loren A. Roberts (guru of multi-hyphenate media)

It might be obvious to composers, but composers are entrepreneurs too.

Let's talk about entrepreneurs. Like many small business owners, I called myself an entrepreneur for a while. Then, after keeping the same business name for a decade, I decided I wasn't really an entrepreneur -- because I thought entrepreneurs start a bunch of companies, and at some point in time become very rich (at least according to American lore).

My thinking has changed, and that changed thinking has to do with etymology. Let's look at the word entrepreneur:

Look back at the oldest usage of the word entrepreneur: The word entrepreneur was first applied to a theater producer/promoter! The producer was the undertaker (French root word entreprende) of the production. Only later did it become the word for someone who launches businesses...

So, if we broaden the concept of entrepreneur from our simple business-world box, we see that anyone who is undertaking some venture -- a project or creative discipline with an end in mind -- is an entrepreneur.

Why does this matter? Well, story, of course. We base our lives on story, and stories of great entrepreneurs can give insight to our daily travails as creative artists/entrepreneurs:

• Walt Disney was fired by a newspaper editor because "he lacked imagination and had no good ideas." His first animation company completely failed. MGM rejected his Mickey Mouse sketches because they thought a gigantic mouse on the movie screen would be too scary for women (ha!). And yet he kept going, eventually finding the creative team and funding to create what is now one of the most powerful brands in the world.
• Steven Spielberg was (now-)famously rejected from the USC film school multiple times. Did that stop him? Well, no (at least until Indiana Jone 4...). He attended Cal State Long Beach, is dyslexic, and is considered one of the most successful and influential directors in the history of cinema...
• When Lady Gaga got a DefJam record contract in 2005/2006, she was unceremoniously dropped within 3 months of signing. But, as an entrepreneur, she kept at it, singing, writing, creating her own burlesque show (which got her noticed by Interscope -- eventually leading to her debut album The Fame in 2008) and now is considered one of the most powerful women in the world by Forbes magazine.

There are hundreds of stories like this (start here and here and here if you want more), but the point is: every single one of you reading this blog is an entrepreneur. Don't sell yourself short, and don't stop. You are an entrepreneur. There will be successes and failures and more successes and more failures, and that's all good.

LOREN A. ROBERTS produces films, videos and music, designs magazines and logos, plays and sings in a Doobie Brothers tribute band, and is a student of what happens when science and technology and the arts and culture collide. www.hearkencreative.com
EMAIL HIM |  GOOGLE |  FACEBOOK | TWITTER | OTHER POSTS BY THIS AUTHOR

FOUR TIPS FOR GRADUATES (AND THE REST OF US, TOO)

A few of the things that I wish I had known when I was graduating.
by Loren A. Roberts (guru of multi-hyphenate media)

I have heard a bunch of conversations recently about what to do after graduation.
I was there too.

You think it’s too early for this kind of list? Think again: graduation season is upon us! And here are my top recommendations for you graduating people:

1. YOU ARE NOT WHO YOU WILL BE IN FIVE YEARS. DON’T SELL YOURSELF SHORT.

I thought that I was ready to go upon graduating. I thought that was the finished product. Oh, how wrong I was. So my goal upon graduation was to work for a nice company, and have a nice salary, and buy a nice house. It took me three more years and three more jobs before I realized that I had grown so much -- creatively and personally -- that I could start my own arts-based company. And I will never stop learning...if I do, I'm dead.

2. FIND FRIENDS (AND COLLEAGUES) THAT KNOW HOW TO TELL THE TRUTH.

In high school, I had a hard time finding friends who were both good friends and good truth-tellers.It didn't get a lot easier in college. Once you are out on your own, it is even more imperative to find people who know how to cut the bullshit. One of the reasons I feel so fortunate to have married Karen is that she doesn't sugar-coat anything, yet she can get just as excited and passionate about things as I do. Professionally, I have a good friend who has become one of my most valuable "peer mentors" -- we can bounce ideas off of each other and make honest critiques. Which brings me to something Michael Dell told some graduates at UT Austin a few years ago:

Try never to be the smartest person in the room. And if you are, I suggest you invite smarter people … or find a different room. In professional circles it’s called networking. In organizations it’s called team building. And in life it’s called family, friends, and community. We are all gifts to each other, and my own growth as a leader has shown me again and again that the most rewarding experiences come from my relationships.

3. FIND THE BALANCE.

Are you a workaholic? Figure out a way to schedule rest and rejuvenation into your life. Are you a slacker? Develop a schedule and a plan, and stick to it. Drink too much in college? Cut back. Fanatic about your workout regimen? Make sure that your body gets rest too.

Do you understand where I am going here? Balance is incredibly difficult in our modern-day life, but absolutely necessary. And for young adults, balance is hard -- to understand, to desire, to work towards. Let me tell you: balance is absolutely necessary.

4. LIFE IS NOT FAIR.

The hardest thing I have had to learn is that the world owes me absolutely nothing. I could be Mother Teresa or a criminal, and some good -- as well as some bad -- is going to come into my life.This world is not fair, and I have learned that truth the hard way over the years. Does that mean I give up? No, but it means that my life cannot be defined by what I am able to accomplish. I could work my fingernails off, and my dreams might not come to pass. Does that mean I'm a failure? Absolutely not.

The key is to find out who I am rather than defining myself by what I do. What I do has changed so many times since graduation it's a joke, but who I am has been a steady progression that is the sum of my experiences, my friends, my life decisions, and my spiritual journey. This is a hard lesson to learn, but the one that will make the most difference, and the one that will bring about gratefulness. I am grateful for my family and friends, grateful for the opportunity to work and be passionate for some truly awesome causes, and grateful simply for life.

Now those are some things I wish I had known when I was graduating.

LOREN A. ROBERTS produces films, videos and music, designs magazines and logos, plays and sings in a Doobie Brothers tribute band, and is a student of what happens when science and technology and the arts and culture collide. www.hearkencreative.com
EMAIL HIM |  GOOGLE |  FACEBOOK | TWITTER | OTHER POSTS BY THIS AUTHOR

TECHNOLOGY OR SOCIAL? DO I HAVE TO CHOOSE?

This man wants to change the world.
 by Loren A. Roberts (guru of multi-hyphenate media)

He's rich and he wants to change the world. Where have we heard that before?

To be honest, I most often think of these mogul-people as politicians -- and therefore, anything they say is mostly newspeak [go back and read 1984].

But Dustin Curtis brought up this segment from Mark Zuckerberg's Home announcement:

At one level, [Home] is just the next mobile version of Facebook. At a deeper level, I think this can start to be a change in the relationship that we have with how we use computing devices. For more than thirty years, computers have mostly just been about tasks, and they had to be–they were too expensive and clunky and hard to use, so you wouldn't really want to use them for anything else. But the modern computing device has a very different place in our lives. It's not just for productivity and business, although it's great for that too. It's for making us more connected, more social, more aware.

 ...and more beholden to Facebook.

Home, by putting people first, and then apps–by just flipping the order–is one of many small but meaningful changes in our relationship with technology over time.

Essentially, Zuckerberg wants us to trust technology...it can become the savior of our (Facebook-designed) social problem!

When I think about the world today, what amazes me most is the number of people who are getting on the internet every day and how it's improving their lives as they join this modern knowledge economy. I grew up with the internet, and I can't really imagine a world without sharing, and messaging, and searching, but actually only about a third of the world is on the internet today–a little more than two billion people. So we're really very close to the beginning of this. If you look out, maybe five or ten years, when all five billion people who have feature phones are going to have smart phones, we're soon going to be living in a world where the majority of people who have a smart phone–a modern computing device–will have never seen in their lives what you and I call a “computer.”

This is true. Good one, Zuckerberg.

So, just think about that for a moment.

Okay, I'm thinking...

The very definition of what a computer is and what our relationship with it should be hasn't been set for the majority of the world. And when it is, I think a lot of that definition is going to be around people first. We're about to see the most empowered generation of people in history, and it's really an honor to be able to work on these problems.

...and to make more money from them...but again, he's right. Computing will cease to be this thing where we have to sit down in front of a screen and start working; rather, computing will only be needed as it applies to various tasks that we go about during our daily lives.

This is a deeply technical problem and it's also a deeply social problem. This is the kind of problem that Facebook, our culture and our community, are uniquely built to work on.

As an observer of science and culture, what Zuckerberg says resonates strongly with me, and yet fills me with dread: Our relationships cannot be governed by technology. They simply cannot. And yet Zuckerberg sees an opportunity: a way for those of us constantly connected to our devices to remain social beings. And he gets to profit from it. But he also will exercise more and more control over those social relationships; I am wary of Facebook's increasing influence and control over how I communicate with my friends on Facebook. Mind you: I know they have every right to do whatever they want -- they are a publicly-held company that wants to make a massive profit. But we, as human beings, need to be in the driver's seat when it comes to how we interact with each other and technology.

Yes? Or are we destined, as Ray Kurweil posits, for a moment when we transcend the biological, human/social constructs that we have relied on for centuries?

LOREN A. ROBERTS produces films, videos and music, designs magazines and logos, plays and sings in a Doobie Brothers tribute band, and is a student of what happens when science and technology and the arts and culture collide. www.hearkencreative.com
EMAIL HIM |  GOOGLE |  FACEBOOK | TWITTER | OTHER POSTS BY THIS AUTHOR

HOW TO IMPROVE YOUR MEMORY

Musicians: You need more sleep. Seriously. You will memorize your music better, according to a new study.
by Loren A. Roberts (guru of multi-hyphenate media)

Your memory is a fragile thing, but studies show we can help it along...

I have spoken about this before [here], but there is a new study that I want to discuss.

Are you feeling like you are having a hard time memorizing new music? It happens to us all. This new study suggests that the reason might be twofold: lack of sleep and/or too much other input. Directly from Science Daily:

Performance of a musical task improved among pianists whose practice of a new melody was followed by a night of sleep, says researcher Sarah E. Allen, Southern Methodist University, Dallas.

...

The study found, however, that when two similar melodies were practiced one after the other, followed by sleep, any gains in speed and accuracy achieved during practice diminished overnight, said Allen, an assistant professor of music education in SMU's Meadows School of the Arts.

...

Surprisingly, in a third result the study found that when two similar musical pieces were practiced one after the other, followed by practice of the first melody again, a night's sleep enhanced pianists' skills on the first melody, she said.

The researchers are reticent to make blanket statements about how this might affect our pedagogy for music training, but I will simply say “let’s try sleeping!” And secondly: “let’s simplify and only learn one thing at a time!”

So, next time I need to learn a new piece of music, I’m going to a) learn a single short piece only, b) sleep on it, and c) repeat until I have learned the whole piece.

LOREN A. ROBERTS produces films, videos and music, designs magazines and logos, plays and sings in a Doobie Brothers tribute band, and is a student of what happens when science and technology and the arts and culture collide. www.hearkencreative.com
EMAIL HIM |  GOOGLE |  FACEBOOK | TWITTER | OTHER POSTS BY THIS AUTHOR

HOW TO GET TO 80 AND STILL HAVE "IT"

Our fascination with youth culture has made us forget something people have known since the beginning of history: our elders might actually know something.

And I want to get there.
by Loren A. Roberts (guru of multi-hyphenate media)

Two of my favorite actors: Tim Curry (Clue!) and Gabrielle Anwar (Burn Notice). Can it get any better?

It was supposed to be a routine chaperone trip: both of my kids were performing at a Music Center gala for the Los Angeles Children's Chorus last Wednesday night. I would be wrangling kids for six hours offstage while people with way more money than I dined on excellent food and listened to the choirs perform.

Instead, I got schooled (again) in how far I have to go, and how age can make something even better.

Who schooled me? First, let's look at some industry numbers out this week.

Source: http://bit.ly/10OG8OY

I was at NAB this past week, and wow, is the industry changing. Everything is getting cheaper. I remember hearing Michael Cioni predict to a room of us filmmakers that movie cameras would become obsolete, because you could replace all of those monstrous $$$$$ movie cameras with something the size and price of your iPhone. The size is now almost there, and so is the price.

And what to we do with all of that video content? At NAB, Verizon doubled down on streaming mobile video, which is kindof a holy grail for broadcasters (we all want to see our sports and Netflix on our phones, right?). This completes the round trip: we can now shoot a movie on an iPhone, and we can stream it from YouTube or Hulu on that same phone. Cool.

Remember my post from last week where I mentioned that music streaming is the future? Well this week’s corollary is the video is the future. If you don't have your work available on streaming video, you’re invisible. Fix this now. Thank you.

AGE IS GOOD

Now back to getting schooled...