Confessions of a Theater Geek...
May. 30th, 2025 09:42 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shadowkatHalf watching the West End Revival of Kiss Me Kate on Great Performances, and it's not very good. The one on National Theater Streaming is far better. Although the singer performing Lois Lane/Bianca is wonderful. And I like the intergrated casting. The difficulty with Kiss Me Kate is the misogynistic source material, and some of the Cole Porter songs do not date well, while others work quite well. Although the performances are quite good in places. And the guy who did the dance sequence for Too Darn Hot was a showstopper.
Yes, I am theater geek or a theater buff. Ask me about theater, and I can go on and on and on at length, with an almost encyclopedic knowledge. Same is true about television and film.
I fell in love with the theater in the fifth grade - when two tall black boys in a mostly white grade school in the 1970s put together a play as an alternative to playing baseball at recess. It was cold, and we had access to the gym. The play was Snow White and the Seven Dwarves (actually twelve dwarves, we had a lot of folks involved). I was cast as one of the dwarves. I was a tall dwarf, but not that tall - since I was after all only eleven or twelve at the time. My first theater role was a dwarf. To understand how amusing that is? You need to know I was taller than everyone but the two kids directing the play. I think one of their names was DJ or TJ, can't remember. They were wonderful. Kind, smart, and a nice barrier against bullying. No one dared bully or tease me when they were present.
I knew them for such a short period of time, but I still, over forty years later, remember them with fondness. The school year was 1977-78. It was an odd year in my life, a year of lots of changes or what I like to call a watershed year. One of the biggest years. I saw Star Wars, which changed my life (we were among the first in my area to see it), I discovered theater, and we moved half way across the country, from a rural suburb, to an actual one.
I switched schools twice in one year - and in the fifth grade no less. Talk about traumatic. My brother, three years younger, went through a similar trauma, although as a natural athlete, he had an easier time adjusting. Al The first switch in schools was due to "desegregation" or redistricting due to desegregation. (Although I didn't understand that at the time, just that we'd been redistricted.) So, instead of spending twenty minutes on the bus each day, it was about an hour. I didn't care, I loved the new grade school - and the new folks at it. No bullying. Diversity. And THEATER. It was fun.
But alas, it was short lived and we moved from Pennsylvania to Kansas, which was a long long ways away from Pennsylvania. I lost my friends. My school chums. It took us five days to drive there, stopping along the way in the middle of Winter. With a scared Siamese cat making the journey with us, and climbing all over the car. We had to go South, because of blizzards. 1978 had a lot of snow storms. It's about five to six States away. We'd gone from wooded horse country, with lots of trees, the Amish, Philadelphia and a stone's throw from NYC, not to mention closer to the ocean, all the way to the god-forsaken Midwest, with it's trees, houses, streets, shopping malls, and as you drove further west wide open areas with barely a tree in sight (at least we had trees). We were in Eastern Kansas, not Western, which is miles of open prarie. Everything was different.
But?
I still had the theater. I started taking classes at The Theater for Young America in Overland Park, Kansas. They had classes during the school year, all grades, and plays for children. And during the summers? A summer long theater seminar, where we put on a play for about a month or two months. In the sixth grade? I played the Great Goblin in the Hobbit. We also got to write a play during it, and the selected play would be performed. Along with individual monologues. I played various roles, and for a little while I could escape into a story or another character in front of a paying audience or a non-paying one, it varied. I took theater from the sixth grade pretty much all the way through high school, and into college. Then eventually gave up, tired of the stage fright and the criticism.
I preferred writing and drawing to being on the stage, less anxiety. But I did give it the good old college try And I'll say this much for the theater classes - it helped me get rid of my lisp.
I loved the theater, I still love the theater, I just didn't necessarily want to make a career out of it. Also, I'm not an entertainer - I prefer to watch in the dark, unseen. I do however understand actors who live to be on the stage, who love to entertain. And in the theater? You can be anything, including yourself. It's the one place you can be fully yourself. It doesn't care if you are gay, white, black, or trans, or anything else. It's the theater.
And there's nothing I love more than to listen to actors/directors/folks in the theater/film/television talk about their craft, art, perform their craft, and tell stories visually. It's my happy place. I feel safe watching and listening to that. It takes my blood pressure down, and comforts me. And it has a lot to do with that all too brief experience in the fifth grade.
I went from a desegregated school that was wonderfully diverse to a school that was heavily segregated in a segregated area, where everyone was white. I think we had maybe three POC in the entire area? None went to my new grade school. I noticed. The new school had bullying, teasing, and was mean. The only diversity was religious, gender politics, and class. I retreated into books, theater, and art.
Diversity - I've discovered makes people kinder. When everyone looks alike, they are mean and exclusive, and it brings out the worst in people.
It's why I love New York City - it's so wonderfully diverse in every way imaginable and I've found the people to be kinder than elsewhere. I feel safer here, somehow.
Sorry for the tangent. Long way of explaining why I enjoy listening to actor podcasts.
Speaking of?
Schmactors is back - basically it's two character actors (James Marsters and his buddy, Mark Devine) from theater, television, voice, and film discussing you guessed it, theater, film, television and everything in between.
I have a fondness for character actors, I seldom love the leads. It's a problem, since it's hard to find anything that they are in. I think the reason is - that I was a character actor. I'm always crushing on actors that seem to only get a few roles, and everything else is hard to find.
I started watching Buffy because of Anthony Head, who I followed there from his previous role on VR5. I'd fallen in love with him - in the stage musical Chess, when he briefly took over his brother's role in the London run of the musical way back in 1988. I'd seen him perform it live - three rows from the stage, or maybe four rows. He blew me away when he sang Pity the Child in that run, and I was in love. (I took a course in London for two months - where we read plays, wrote reviews on the stage productions that we saw performed, and discussed them in detail.)
At any rate, it's getting late...so here's a picture that I painted of people I've seen on the subway, from memory, proof that the subway is perfectly safe. They are. Don't believe the idiots who say otherwise, they clearly don't live in New York.
[Note it won't last forever, because FB is quirky about its links.]
Yes, I am theater geek or a theater buff. Ask me about theater, and I can go on and on and on at length, with an almost encyclopedic knowledge. Same is true about television and film.
I fell in love with the theater in the fifth grade - when two tall black boys in a mostly white grade school in the 1970s put together a play as an alternative to playing baseball at recess. It was cold, and we had access to the gym. The play was Snow White and the Seven Dwarves (actually twelve dwarves, we had a lot of folks involved). I was cast as one of the dwarves. I was a tall dwarf, but not that tall - since I was after all only eleven or twelve at the time. My first theater role was a dwarf. To understand how amusing that is? You need to know I was taller than everyone but the two kids directing the play. I think one of their names was DJ or TJ, can't remember. They were wonderful. Kind, smart, and a nice barrier against bullying. No one dared bully or tease me when they were present.
I knew them for such a short period of time, but I still, over forty years later, remember them with fondness. The school year was 1977-78. It was an odd year in my life, a year of lots of changes or what I like to call a watershed year. One of the biggest years. I saw Star Wars, which changed my life (we were among the first in my area to see it), I discovered theater, and we moved half way across the country, from a rural suburb, to an actual one.
I switched schools twice in one year - and in the fifth grade no less. Talk about traumatic. My brother, three years younger, went through a similar trauma, although as a natural athlete, he had an easier time adjusting. Al The first switch in schools was due to "desegregation" or redistricting due to desegregation. (Although I didn't understand that at the time, just that we'd been redistricted.) So, instead of spending twenty minutes on the bus each day, it was about an hour. I didn't care, I loved the new grade school - and the new folks at it. No bullying. Diversity. And THEATER. It was fun.
But alas, it was short lived and we moved from Pennsylvania to Kansas, which was a long long ways away from Pennsylvania. I lost my friends. My school chums. It took us five days to drive there, stopping along the way in the middle of Winter. With a scared Siamese cat making the journey with us, and climbing all over the car. We had to go South, because of blizzards. 1978 had a lot of snow storms. It's about five to six States away. We'd gone from wooded horse country, with lots of trees, the Amish, Philadelphia and a stone's throw from NYC, not to mention closer to the ocean, all the way to the god-forsaken Midwest, with it's trees, houses, streets, shopping malls, and as you drove further west wide open areas with barely a tree in sight (at least we had trees). We were in Eastern Kansas, not Western, which is miles of open prarie. Everything was different.
But?
I still had the theater. I started taking classes at The Theater for Young America in Overland Park, Kansas. They had classes during the school year, all grades, and plays for children. And during the summers? A summer long theater seminar, where we put on a play for about a month or two months. In the sixth grade? I played the Great Goblin in the Hobbit. We also got to write a play during it, and the selected play would be performed. Along with individual monologues. I played various roles, and for a little while I could escape into a story or another character in front of a paying audience or a non-paying one, it varied. I took theater from the sixth grade pretty much all the way through high school, and into college. Then eventually gave up, tired of the stage fright and the criticism.
I preferred writing and drawing to being on the stage, less anxiety. But I did give it the good old college try And I'll say this much for the theater classes - it helped me get rid of my lisp.
I loved the theater, I still love the theater, I just didn't necessarily want to make a career out of it. Also, I'm not an entertainer - I prefer to watch in the dark, unseen. I do however understand actors who live to be on the stage, who love to entertain. And in the theater? You can be anything, including yourself. It's the one place you can be fully yourself. It doesn't care if you are gay, white, black, or trans, or anything else. It's the theater.
And there's nothing I love more than to listen to actors/directors/folks in the theater/film/television talk about their craft, art, perform their craft, and tell stories visually. It's my happy place. I feel safe watching and listening to that. It takes my blood pressure down, and comforts me. And it has a lot to do with that all too brief experience in the fifth grade.
I went from a desegregated school that was wonderfully diverse to a school that was heavily segregated in a segregated area, where everyone was white. I think we had maybe three POC in the entire area? None went to my new grade school. I noticed. The new school had bullying, teasing, and was mean. The only diversity was religious, gender politics, and class. I retreated into books, theater, and art.
Diversity - I've discovered makes people kinder. When everyone looks alike, they are mean and exclusive, and it brings out the worst in people.
It's why I love New York City - it's so wonderfully diverse in every way imaginable and I've found the people to be kinder than elsewhere. I feel safer here, somehow.
Sorry for the tangent. Long way of explaining why I enjoy listening to actor podcasts.
Speaking of?
Schmactors is back - basically it's two character actors (James Marsters and his buddy, Mark Devine) from theater, television, voice, and film discussing you guessed it, theater, film, television and everything in between.
I have a fondness for character actors, I seldom love the leads. It's a problem, since it's hard to find anything that they are in. I think the reason is - that I was a character actor. I'm always crushing on actors that seem to only get a few roles, and everything else is hard to find.
I started watching Buffy because of Anthony Head, who I followed there from his previous role on VR5. I'd fallen in love with him - in the stage musical Chess, when he briefly took over his brother's role in the London run of the musical way back in 1988. I'd seen him perform it live - three rows from the stage, or maybe four rows. He blew me away when he sang Pity the Child in that run, and I was in love. (I took a course in London for two months - where we read plays, wrote reviews on the stage productions that we saw performed, and discussed them in detail.)
At any rate, it's getting late...so here's a picture that I painted of people I've seen on the subway, from memory, proof that the subway is perfectly safe. They are. Don't believe the idiots who say otherwise, they clearly don't live in New York.
[Note it won't last forever, because FB is quirky about its links.]
no subject
Date: 2025-05-31 05:55 am (UTC)Many years ago, one of the characters in my stories asked me to write a tale about this novel — in English, of course.
I accepted that request without hesitation and wrote it. I can share it here, if you’d like — just under a spoiler, in case you ever find the time.
📝 Spoiler
She was about to step into the world of reality
from the world of make-believe.
William Somerset Maugham is one of the best – known English writers of the 20th century.
Maugham’s plays, though successful at the time have not lasted terribly well, whereas his novels particularly “Theatre” still hold their appeal.
I think Maugham called his book “Theatre” very exactly and my favorite character is Julia Lambert.
I want to comment on Julia’s dualism in the quotation:
“It often seemed to her that she was two persons, the best – dressed woman in London, and that was a shadow; and the woman she was playing at night, and that was the substance!”
In my opinion Julia did not lose in her “amusing experience” with Tom.
Julia Lambert is the best actress in England, her skills are admired by everyone: from high officials to the ordinary office clerks. In her 46 years she looks beautiful, never minding her age she continues living with the stage, and pleasing the audience with new characters, because art does not get old. Julia succeeded as a woman, has a perfect family, according to the public and friends, of course. Her husband, Michael Gosselyn - according to her is the most handsome man in England, an actor, a caring father and the owner of their family theater as well. Michael hired a young accountant Thomas Fennel to look through their theatre’s account books. Thomas perfectly coped with his task, besides he taught Michael how to reduce income tax, not breaking the law.
As an expression of his gratitude, the respectable gentleman, (Mr. Gosselin could not be called another way) invited a young economist for a dinner, having introduced him to his wife first. Tom was incredibly embarrassed, blushing and tying himself up in knots at the sight of a famous actress. To make him completely happy she gives him one of her photographs. With her old photos Julia revives her memories: she was born on the island of Jersey in the family of veterinarian. Her aunt, a former actress, gave her first acting lessons. At the age of sixteen she entered the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, but she was formed as a real actress by director of Middlepool Jimmie Langton. Acting in the Jimmie’s troupe, she met Michael. He was divinely handsome. Julia fell in love at first sight, but she could not get him answer her feeligs - perhaps, because of Michael’s complete absence of temperament both on stage and in life. Anyway, he admired her acting. Michael was the son of a colonel, graduated from Cambridge, and his family did not approve of his choice of a theater career. Julia sensitively caught it all and managed to act a girl who could please his parents. Julie and Michael’s relationship was very soft and fragile. Michael, as a true gentleman was somewhat shy and did not presume any liberties with the girl. Julie was madly in love, but it seemed that Michael had no strong feelings for her, perhaps he just did not show them. After getting acquaintance with her parents, Michael proposed to her, but it did not change anything in their relationship. Michael was still very reserved and modest, he was more interested in love as a spiritual enjoyment, not letting out an animal instinct. Michael was offered a favourable contract in America, where he could reveal his talent and earn money to open his own theater with Julia, but on condition that he would go there for a long time without Julia.
Of course she was freaking out, and could not accept the fact that he would leave her alone. However, Michael had left and returned with money as he had intended, but his acting skills did not find its audience in the States, that’s why he came back, they got married and moved to London after that. The first year of their matrimony could have been insane, rich with pleasures of married life of two young men, but Michael’s character did not allow this. He showed his feelings reticently, which infuriated Julia, who missed passion. That’s why she invented a lot of reasons for being jealous, making endless scenes... There was a time of war and World War was reaching England, Michael felt that his country needed him, and went to the front, leaving Julia alone again. His military uniform suited him, Julia did not want to let him go there alone, but the public should not forget they were actors, that’s why she played in the theater, and was soon considered to be the best actress of the younger generation.
Her success was spectacular, and she was able to leave the scene quietly for a few months to give birth of child and then return to work. Shortly before the end of the war Julie fell out of love with Michael, then felt free, as if she were on an equal footing with her husband. After the war, having got a small inheritance from Michael's parents, they opened their own theater - with financial support from the rich old woman, Dolly de Vries, who admired Julia since the days of Jimmie Lengton. Michael took in all the administrative work, it fitted him better than acting on stage. Julia's incredibly sad, thinking about her life deception, love has died leaving her only the art ...One evening, Julia receives flowers with a postcard signed by Thomas Fennel. Having written a thank-you note in response, she sent it, because an actor can not offend the audience, though, after a moment she forgot the name. Next night Tom called her and invited to his modest apartment for a cup of tea. Julia decided to please blushing financier for the second time and to accept the proposal. Coming into his modest apartment, she recollects her youth of inexperienced actress, all the images of how she started her career, but suddenly the young man begins to kiss her passionately! And Julia is being lured. Realizing that she is making an incredible stupidity Julia feels herself 20 years younger! She just glows with happiness, but does not understand that she fell in love. Yes, yes, absolutely fell in love with a young guy, who is the same age as her son. Without showing her feelings to him, she tries to tie him to her in any possible way. Tom is a snob - and she introduces him to a higher company. Tom is poor - she showers him with expensive gifts and pays his debts.
Tom prefers a company of her son Roger to her company. They spend time together wonderfully, and soon became good friends, Tom felt completely free about relationship with his mother ... As well as it happened with her husband she faced the fact that she lacks focus and Tom spends his free time with her son , she decides to prick his pride, and leaves him a note, in which was enclosed money with the request to leave a tip to the maid. The next day he returns all of her gifts she managed to offend him. But the impact force was not calculated - the idea of a final break with Tom throws Julia in horror, but as a real actress, she acts an incredible scene just on the phone , masterfully playing on the feelings of a young boy forced to remain with her, his heart could not stand woman's tears.
After that, Julia and Tom's relationship became even stronger, she got younger and younger every day, several times a week she appeared in the Tom’s company in expensive restaurants, she spent nights and nights in the clubs, and was not even aware that her impeccable reputation might be in danger . Rumors about her young companion crawled very quickly in London, but before they reached Julia from her own husband, who was informed by their co-owner of the theater Dolly. Mike was a true gentleman and would not even hear about it, he would not discuss his wife, even with a friend, or his parents, and he told Dolly that he was happy for Julie, she had someone to spend time with and have fun, but, as a matter of the fact, it sounded as a reproach.
However, Dolly did not stop and soon talked to Julia, trying to show her that her life needed changes because she lost her talent and it depended on how she behaved in reality , and, anyway, young Tom had a great popularity among girls, and soon he brought to Julia’s theater Avis Crichton for an addition. According to Tom she was very talented. Julie saw he was in love with a young actress and she was in pain, but could not compete with her, because she had no equals on stage in England, that it why she gave a role for young Avis in her theater.
Julia can not accept the fact that her love is unrequited, and tries to forget everything associated with it. For some time she leaves England, hoping to take a break from her fame and feelings to Tom, she goes to her mother, but her fame finds her in the train, where there was no sleeping places, and most likely, that she would have to sit up all night. But fortunately there was a benefactor, mustached man, who gave her his place in a compartment, and in consequence became a new adventure of Julia, just for one night.
Julia's mother was cold to the glory of her daughter, and enjoyed a moderate life in old age without the worries and noise. Back in London, Julia wants to please her longtime admirer Lord Charles, but he rejects her heat out of unexplained reasons. Though he was in love with Julia for many years, perhaps, he was one of the few real gentlemen.
After Julia's lost heart, her faith in herself was shaken and the only man who drew attention to her was another admirer who asked an autograph for his wife.
Her Son Roger also gives her reasons to think about the point that for all his years he could not find his mother, she played in theater all the time, and he expressed a doubt that it was all the same, that the theater and real life were mixed for her. Julia was very scared of the fact her son could have been right...
On the day of the premiere of a new play in which Avis got the role, Julia faces Tom and realizes that he does not cause any feelings any more, that was her victory. The public rejoiced, at the end of the play, Julie showed all her talent, and her red handkerchief stayed in the memory of people who had been sitting in the hall that day. She was summoned for an encore for more than 10 times, kept getting hundreds of bouquets and Tom, who was fascinated by her acting more than acting of Avis was trying to get to her through the crowd, but it was all in vain, Julia did not want to waste a single minute of her precious time. Michael praises her, making no secret of fact that he has already forgot the last time he saw such an acting
Dolly arranges lavish banquet in her honor, but Julia escapes from flashbulbs and sweet speeches in the cozy restaurant, where she requests steak with onions and fried potatoes, these small pleasures, from which she has refused for years and only dreamed of enjoying them. Beer and a juicy steak bring Julie into raptures. She thinks, : “What nonsense that was that Roger talked the other day…..?”
“All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players”( Shakespeare).
But there’s illusion , through that archway ;it’s we, the actors , who are the reality. That’s the answer to Roger. They are our raw material. We are the meaning of their lives. We take their silly little emotions and turn them into art, out of them we create beauty, and their significance is that they form the audience we must have to fulfit ourselves. They are the instrumenents on which we play, and what is an instrument without somebody to play on it?”
“Roger says we don’t exist. Why, it’s only we who do exist. They are the shadows and we give them substance. We are the symbols of all this confused, aimless struggling that they call LIFE, and it’s only the symbol which is real. They say acting is only make – belive. That make – belive is the only reality.”
She had a wonderful sense of freedom from all earthly ties, and it was such an ecstasy, that nothing in comparison with it nad any value.
I was really touched by what you said: in the theatre, you can be anyone…
Yes, and perhaps the best part is that you can still be yourself — through different characters.
no subject
Date: 2025-05-31 02:05 pm (UTC)Yes, and perhaps the best part is that you can still be yourself — through different characters."
There's a lot of philosophical and psychological disagreement on whether there is truly a self or an authentic self. Some philosophers and psychologists do not believe the self exists and it is primarily a construct of the ego, who feels it has to have a self - this is largely the Buddhist view and the view of Fred Newman. Then there's the other group that believes the journey is to find your authentic self and to be true to your self, and it's important to be your authentic self - this is the Friedrich Nietzsche and Søren Kierkegaard view. The Buddhist believe that we are who we are in the moment, and to let go of the construct of the self. There is no fixed self.
So, it depends on which philosophy you wish to adhere to or works for you? I personally prefer the Buddhist - it's more freeing. But mileage varies on this point.
***
It's been a long time since I've read anything by Somerset Maugham, who was ...not a fan of women and not a happy man. Part of it was the time period. I read The Razor's Edge in high school. I found it in my parents library, an old paperback copy, stained with coffee, and worn, with a publication date of 1965 or thereabouts. And I'm thinking maybe a few short stories. I was an English Lit Major in undergrad or college, with a cultural anthropology minor. But this was over thirty years ago. It was in the 1970s and early 80s?
At any rate, interesting story. Thank you for sharing it with me.
no subject
Date: 2025-05-31 03:30 pm (UTC)For the phylosophy - quite difficult to say now. But a good point for thoughts for future.
Current situation, and goverment system here (an Military as well) is tryint to delet this "self". And its not only here...
When i was in Asia, understood, that have to come beck and try to find my way in this places with phylosophy and serching itself in silance.
Your knowledge in the letter immediately said that the matter is honed by time, going back to school years. As well as knowledge of literature. I did not have such a concept as English, all together - world literature. But school programs were and are outdated, here. Therefore, only personally can you discover this whole world of books. You prompted me to remember, perhaps I will write about it today.
no subject
Date: 2025-05-31 06:33 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-06-01 07:46 am (UTC)