Crazytown

MISCELLANEOUS AWESOME

A few of Shoshana's favorite things. A swan song.
By Shoshana Greenberg (Lyricist/Bookwriter)

It is with a heavy heart that I depart from Crazytown after this week. I have enjoyed blogging here from the beginning, first with Rough and Ready and then with my own words. I'll still be here as a reader, and if you need me I'll occasionally be blogging on my own site: www.shoshanagreenberg.com.

For my final post, here are a few of my favorite things that never made it into posts of their own.


1. So Weird (1999-2002)
I was a bit older than the So Weird target audience--I was in college--but I loved it anyway. It aired on the Disney channel, but it didn't look like a Disney show. Dark in tone, So Weird was the story of pre-teen Fiona (who amazingly doesn't wear make-up) obsessed with tracking down and helping people deal with paranormal activity, all the while trying to connect with her dead father. She travels the country by tour bus with her family. Her mom, played by Mackenzie Phillips, is a rock singer.

I have rarely seen the themes of family, loss, and the supernatural blended with music so smoothly, and never geared toward young people. The third and final season saw major cast changes, and the tone shifted to brighter and more carefree. The Disney Channel was changing to a Lizzie Maguire-type network, and the third season of So Weird suffered because of it.

More than 10 years later, the series has still not been released on DVD. Luckily, many of the episodes are on YouTube, and I recommend checking out this great show, whatever your age.

 

2. Lemony Snicket and The Gothic Archies
I don't obsess over many book series, but I was up bright and early the day the final Lemony Snicket book came out to get a wristband at Barnes and Noble. With this wristband I could return later to get my book signed by the author. Not Lemony Snicket, unfortunately, as he was indisposed, but his replacement, the actual author of Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events, Daniel Handler. I finished the final book the next morning.

What the Unfortunate Events series has that most of the popular series don't is a literary style. These books are for people who love books and words. Another difference is that the story doesn't have one hero randomly chosen to fight dark forces. Instead, three siblings, the Baudelaire children, are handed off from guardian to guardian after they lose their home and parents in a fire. A mystery developes, as often does, and soon the siblings are piecing together fragments of secrets about their parents and past.

Read the first book (which I've read many times) and embark on this series of unfortunate events. There are 13 books in all (plus some supplements), and I recommend at least getting to Book Eight, which is when the story really gets good.

Oh, and Stephin Merritt of The Magnetic Fields wrote the soundtrack to the books with the band The Gothic Archies. Yes, the books have a soundtrack.

 

HOT MESS IN MANHATTAN: THE MUSICAL

An interview with star and writer Cait Doyle.
By Shoshana Greenberg (Lyricist/Bookwriter)

Cait Doyle's new musical, Hot Mess in Manhattan, opens tonight and features songs from a myriad of musical theater writers, including Crazytown's own Ryan Scott Oliver. With a book written by Cait and her sister, Meggie Doyle, Hot Mess... was developed from Cait's cabaret act of the same name. Cait took a break from her busy rehearsal schedule to answer some questions about writing Hot Mess... and working with so many great writers.

 

Where did the idea for Hot Mess in Manhattan come from?  

Hot Mess in Manhattan: The Musical is a more realistic portrayal of the "single gal in the big city" than you're used to on TV or in movies. I meet so many women new to the city in tears, all lamenting that city life is not what Sex and the City, Friends, etc. told them it would be. I realized this was the perfect subject matter for musical theatre--sort of the "musical theater NYC-based Bridget Jones."

How did you decide to use many different song writers?

There is no better musical landscape of a "Mess" than 12 different music styles! Amazingly, each song is very much written in the style of the composer, yet they all do blend together brilliantly. (Thanks to our out-of-this-world Music Director, James Cunningham!)

Did you ask writers to write songs specifically for your show or were they songs the writers had already written?

Every song in the show except one was written specifically for Hot Mess.... The only exception is "Starbucks," written by Michael Mahler. I had performed "Starbucks" in an evening of his music in New York early in my career. When assembling the show, the song kept popping up in my mind. [It's] very much on par with our lead character's viewpoint.

10 THOUGHTS ON WRITING

Dissecting some thoughts about writing.
By Shoshana Greenberg (Lyricist/Bookwriter)


1. Being a Writer
When people ask me what I do, it's easy just to say, "I'm a writer." I don't mean that, though. I try to say instead, "I write." If I want to be more specific, I say that I write musicals, plays, and prose (or, blogs). I don't want to be a writer because I don't want to be defined by what I do. I want to be a person who writes. 

2. Distractions
I often get distracted from writing because I start watching a TV show and can't do anything else until I've watched the next episode of that TV show... and then the next. I've combatted this distraction by channeling what I love about the TV show and characters into what I'm writing. Does the show feature a couple I want to get together? I write a love song. Is a character going through a difficult time? A ballad. I have written some of my best and favorite work this way, and I have these TV shows and characters to thank.

3. Deadlines
I like deadlines. The best deadline is having to be somewhere. I start writing roughly 10 minutes before I have to leave my apartment. About 20 minutes later, I'm running out the door but I've gotten a nice chunk of writing done. And that is the story of why I'm often 10 minutes late.

4. Loving Characters
I care deeply about certain characters, and I've often asked myself why. What is it about them that makes me care? Yes, as the rules of playwriting go, these characters WANT something, but I don't love all characters that want things. I think it's the same thing that makes me care about real people: I want them to be happy. There's something very human in a character searching for happiness.

Two characters from Sports Night who want to be happy.

5. Happiness
If a character is searching for happiness, then part of that character is unhappy. For readers/audiences to accept and relate to this unhappiness, they would have had to experience unhappiness, themselves. Therefor, my job as a writer depends on people being, at least at some point in their lives, unhappy. This makes me sad, and I feel a little guilty. I don't want people to be unhappy!

THE PASSION FOR FASHION

The Met's Schiaparelli and Prada exhibit stirs up an old desire.
By Shoshana Greenberg (Lyricist/Bookwriter)

I'm not into fashion. I don't read fashion magazines or shop unless it's for a necessity. I'm familiar with the name Prada only through a certain book and movie title. I wasn't sure, then, what I would think of the Schiaparelli and Prada: Impossible Conversations exhibit at the Met, which closes this weekend. Would I despise it? Be bored? Find it interesting historically?

"The Classical Body" section of Schiaparelli and Prada:
Impossible Conversations

Walking through the galleries, seeing the Prada skirts and the Schiaparelli jackets, I felt something I did not at all expect, something I realized I had been supressing for a long time: the desire to go shopping and buy new clothes.

INTO THE WOODS WE GO AGAIN

Is preserving a production good for theater?
By Shoshana Greenberg (lyricist/bookwriter)

The Public Theater's production of Into the Woods opened last night in Central Park. I'm not going to review it (I enjoyed it) but I do want to address a concern I had as the lights dimmed and the narrator uttered, "Once upon a time": Does growing up watching a video of a musical affect how one experiences other productions of it?

Into the Woods in Central Park. Photo: Joan Marcus

I watched the original production of Into the Woods numerous times as a child, first on the VHS my parents taped from TV and then on DVD. I watched it so often that the rhythms and cadences of that production are ingrained in my head. The costumes, the staging, where the audience laughs, the camera angles. Everything.

Inevitably, I found myself comparing this new production to the original, but the new concept was so different and I hadn't watched the original^[1] in quite a while that I was able to enjoy this one on its own terms... for the most part. Biases creeped into my thoughts: that's not how that line should be said! The emphasis is on the other word!, etc.

THE GIRLS OF BUNHEADS AND WOMEN'S GYMNASTICS

Female friendships thrive on television.
By Shoshana Greenberg (lyricist/bookwriter)

Some critics have praised the HBO series Girls for its focus on "the profundity of female friendship" in ways not seen on TV before. While I love Girls, I don't think this is entirely true. I've seen female friendships among the women on Gossip Girl, Buffy, My So-Called Life, Sex and the City, and Huge, and I'm confused as to why Girls is the show being credited with this development.

In fact, I've seen wonderful female friendships on TV in the past week: the women (young and old) on the ABC Family show Bunheads and the young women of the United States women's gymnastics team. The TV series, created by Gilmore Girls creator Amy Sherman-Palladino, and the Fab Five gymnasts show women navigating this profundity and just being there for each other.

The cast of Bunheads. Image Credit: Andrew Eccles/ABC Family

Bunheads rolls its plot out slowly--the first few episodes function as an extended pilot--but Sherman-Palladino is more concerned with characters than plot, as she says in this great Salon interview. And these characters are all women.

A CHEKHOV CHECK-IN

Revisiting a favorite playwright.
By Shoshana Greenberg (lyricist/bookwriter)

If you have not seen Sydney Theatre Company's Uncle Vanya, go. Now (if you can). Balcony tickets at City Center are $25, and it's worth it. Even if you don't like Chekhov. Maybe even if you don't like theater. Just to see those actors, including the sublime Cate Blanchett, is a master class not just in acting but what art can be.

Cate Blanchett in Uncle Vanya, now at the Lincoln Center Festival

For me, seeing Uncle Vanya was not just about seeing a great production. It was about a return to my first favorite playwright: Anton Chekhov.

I fell in love with Chekhov when I was 15 and had to read The Cherry Orchard for high school summer reading. Like many future theater writers, I couldn't read just one play. I read the entire Chekhov play collection: Ivanov, The Seagull, Uncle Vanya, The Three Sisters, and The Cherry Orchard.

I was hooked on the philosophical monologues and loved the characters who dreamed of going places but never seemed to get anywhere--I could totally relate as someone stuck in suburbia dreaming of living in the city.

"S" IS FOR SUGAR

A sugar fiend's favorite desserts.
By Shoshana Greenberg (lyricist/bookwriter)

If you have spent any time with me, you know that I'm a sugar fiend. If there is a baked good somwhere in the vicinity, I must find a way to eat it. I consider Cookie Monster my soulmate.

Can you blame me? I grew up in a family bakery where I was given free rein. I could walk into the store and eat whatever I wanted. That does stuff to a kid.

Since I'm ALWAYS thinking about baked goods, I thought I'd share some of my favorite desserts from New York City area bakeries with a few additions from the family bakery, Mindy's Desserts, outside Philadelphia. I'm no connoisseur, but I think it's safe to take advice from someone who always has sugar on the brain.

Pie
Fun fact: my first word was "pie." My sugar addiction started early. My favorite pie is a toss-up between two pies from the family: Key Lime and Peach with Hamantaschen Crust. Word to the wise: If you ever see a pie made with Hamantaschen Crust, sample it immediately.

Key Lime Pie from Mindy's Desserts

Cake
Another fact: All cake is good. But I want to highlight a unique cake that appeared one day in my office: the Pizza Crumb Cake from Hummel-Hummel Bakery on Long Island. It's served in an actual pizza box and tastes like a buttery funnel cake with the texture of a flakey pastry. Hopefully one will appear in your office, too.

Pizza Crumb Cake from Hummel-Hummel Bakery

Cupcake
The cupcake wars are over and the victor is Baked By Melissa. I know, I know, they're small. But they're dense. Plus, you don't have to choose! Since they're so small, a bunch of flavors add up to one regular cupcake (at least that's what I tell myself). It's hard to pick a favorite, but if pressed I'll say the Tie-Dye. Or the Chocolate Chip Pancake...

Baked by Melissa Cupcakes

DEFENDING TAYLOR COTTER

Why such a negative reaction to one blog post?
By Shoshana Greenberg (lyricist/bookwriter)

Taylor Cotter, a 22-year-old recent college grad, has a blog on Huffington Post about life in her early 20s. It's part of a series Huffington Post is doing on the "quarter-life crisis." Normally I wouldn't think much of these pieces, but this one got my attention because the comments and Internet chatter became unnecessarily mean.

Courtesy hellomerch.com

It's not a bad post. It's a comment on her life at this moment, as the Quarter-Life series requires, but a Village Voice story says she sounds "obnoxious." A post on Gawker has called her "entitled," as do many commenters.

Why the attack? I didn't see the post as a sob story or even indulging in self-pity. Her argument seems to be that college graduates today are given many different messages, both from adults and pop culture, and she's questioning the pressure she's felt from adults to play it safe and get a steady job no matter what it is.

The pop culture messages, on the other hand, romanticize the NYC Bohemian lifestyle, and I would have loved to see Cotter critique them. Instead, she gives in to them, but the influence of television characters (those of Sex and the City and Girls) and of her friends can be strong. It's natural for her to wonder if she's missing out on NYC adventures and the struggle to pursue her dreams.

Remember how awesome the characters in Rent were for doing just what she's describing?

The original cast of Rent.

SUMMER IN THE CITY: THE BEST FREE THINGS TO DO

Five fun ways to spend summer days/nights without spending money.
By Shoshana Greenberg (lyricist/bookwriter)

I've never understood why people flee NYC in the summer. The city is like a playland. This is my 10th summer living in NYC, and over the years I've accumulated a list of must-do free activities that aren't crazy crowded:

1. River Flicks: Movies on the Pier
Many parks have movie nights in the summer, but the pier has always been my favorite summer movie destination. The movies on the pier at Hudson River Park fill up, but get there just an hour or two before showtime and you can have a prime seat. The line-ups include a Wednesday night series for grown ups and a Friday night series for families. Oh, and there's free popcorn for those that enjoy that sort of thing. I'd call settling in to watch a movie as the sun sets over the Hudson a perfect NYC evening.

2. Summer Streets
There's nothing like the feeling of owning Park Avenue as I speed down the MetLife building ramps on my bike. Only a few years old, Summer Streets has quickly become a summer tradition. On the first three Saturdays in August, Park Avenue and connecting streets close from 72nd to the Brooklyn Bridge, so runners, walkers, and bikers can take to the streets.  Along the way are free bike helmets, exercise stations, and a Whole Foods snack area where all the snacks are free. One year they even had dumpster pools.

Summer Streets 2011 Photo: Shoshana Greenberg