Do I wake or sleep?

My soccer team, Dolphman, had a bye this week so the ladies of Dolphman organized a girls' night out.  We met at Tortilla Flats in the West Village (stop smirking, Paula :) and started off with a pitcher of Sangria (them) and margaritas (me).  Our waiter was adorable--at some point we were talking about pop culture and he said he'd just started watching The X Files.  I said Oh, I envy you--one of the best shows ever.  I told him that seasons 3-6 were the best but all the seasons through 8, are terrific.  And I told him especially look out for the beginning-of-season-2 arc Duane Barry/Ascension and culminating with One Breath, which is one of the finest hours ever crafted for TV.  That cinematography!





Amazing episode.  Our waiter was gay, though (I surmise--we didn't actually discuss it but my 'dar was pinged) so sadly I could not score a round of shots for my table by making out with the waiter, as happened at Paula's bachelorette festivities.

However Tortilla Flats does trivia in Sunday evenings--this was awesome!  One of our teammates, AWalks (Ashley), and I SMOKED the competition, blowing everyone away.  We earned four shots each for the table, and Haruko and Alyssa also won one each.  So every person at the entire table (there were five of us) had two free shots!  I was so, so proud--I felt like a hunter-gatherer who had provided for my family!  So much fun.  I told them the story of Paula's bachelorette festivities, which they found hilarious.  After we left there we went to a place on Greenwich Avenue, a kind of dive-y place.  We hung out there for a bit--at one point I was chatting up an English couple who were really, really sweet.  We talked a LOT about English history and culture--they were very touched when I told them that visiting London felt like coming home.  There was a sketchy, grabby older guy, drunk as a lord, who kept squeezing past us (we were seated on stools in a corner--naturally I was the one sticking out) until finally I elbowed him, hard.  Then he kept trying to pull up a stool to chat with us and I kind of ran interference--cockblocking for good.  A guy at the bar noticed what was going on (at one point the bartender was trying to call off Sketchy Older Guy) and bought us a round of drinks, apologizing to us.

In other news, while we were at Tortilla Flats I received a call from our Brad who told me this somewhat convoluted story about how his manager brought down the boom--either the show or your job.  And of course he can't give up his paycheck.  He said that he'd cleared the schedule with him and the guy was fine, or maybe it was another manager--I don't know.  I know managers can be jerks but the whole thing sounds shady.  On the phone I handled it pretty well and was understanding but now the more I think about it, the more annoyed I get.  He auditioned drunk, he's already missed a whole week of rehearsal (he was out of town last week), I worked my ass off Saturday incorporating him into the blocking that he missed, and now we're less than two weeks before we perform at the cemetery and he pulls this?  Say it with me--ASSHOLE.  I called Dave immediately last night but he didn't get the VMs--he emailed me this morning and I was like--uh, did you get my VMs?  THAT was a wakeup call for Monday!

I have no idea why I'm in such a good mood right now!  But I did have fun this weekend.

Rocky Horror rehearsals are going well.  Music sounds good, and my cast really seems to be enjoying themselves--very aware, love the show, know all the callbacks.  After auditions we didn't have any viable Brads (Paul could've played Brad but he's not the strongest singer and Rocky is harder to cast than Brad so he's Rocky again).  Dave found someone who came in and auditioned--lovely voice although he's all over the place pitch-wise!  We figured it might be just nerves. (Dave said he smelled of alcohol--hmmm.  Well, I've been known to take a swig of vodka before an audition--but then I use vodka because it doesn't smell.  So, not sure what to make of that.)  Anyway.  When he came in for his first rehearsal, he tripped over a chair as Sean was introducing him and the entire cast chorused "ASSHOLE."  Brad (whose real name is, coincidentally, Brad) responded "well played, Rocky Horror cast, well played."

Dave's and Robert's schedules are sort of weird so we had to squeeze in blocking rehearsal around their needs.  Our first was yesterday--I blocked "Dammit, Janet" and "There's a Light" as well as the little half-scene when Riff Raff answers the door and the Narrator's first two monologues.  I have a concept for the show and I talked about it with the cast.  While analyzing the text I picked up on a theme of voyeurism and observation (the Narrator, the monitors, the opening number which is all about the movies).  So I expanded this a bit--my concept is that the Phantoms are all Rocky Horror groupies and do this every week.  During pre-show they'll be working the crowd as Rocky horror groupies--some will be hard core, some will be virgins, we'll see them putting on makeup and greeting each other.  Columbia is also a groupie (in fact she is listed in the film as "a groupie").  But she gets sucked into the story--she becomes her character.  As we all know--hell, the title of my journal tells you this!--I am crazy about the Romantics, and this is a very Romantic idea, this kind of transformation and identification with art.  See: basically everything Keats wrote, plus Philomel:

What is this humming?
I am becoming
my own song.

Magenta and Riff Riff are NOT groupies--they are actually their characters, as are Frank, Janet, Brad, etc.  So there are two worlds: the "real' world and the one in-universe.  Gradually everyone gets sucked into the second world--Columbia is of course destroyed, but the Phantoms and Brad and Janet are expelled at the end.  The party is OVER and none of them will ever be the same again (my favorite song in the show is "Super Heroes"--I just love the haunting lyrics.

And Super Heroes come to feast
To taste the flesh not yet deceased
And all I know is still the beast is feeding.

So to come back to the theme of voyeurism, there will be 2-3 "Observer" Phantoms, who sit with the audience and do shoutouts.  This will also help the audience relax and warm up.  The first group includes Paul, who is the best ad libber ever and was riffing with all sorts of great shoutouts.  When Brad and Janet sang "there's one thing left to dooo" he yelled out "FUCK."  We all died.

Susan annoyed the hell out of me on Friday.  I got this chirpy text from her telling me that she would be taking Sunday off for dinner with her family for Rosh Hashana (she had not listed this as a conflict on her audition sheet) and "I apologize for this but I really need to be with my family" and she'd "get the blocking from Sean."  Okay, first of all--do not text me shit like this, you need to email me.  Second, do not TELL me as a friend that suddenly you won't be in rehearsal in two days.  You need to ask me, the director of your show and your boss, if you may have it off.  I absolutely detest when friends who are in my shows act unprofessionally and don't respect the boundaries.  (I must say, in general Susan DOES have a problem with boundaries--she's said some inappropriate things in Pirates rehearsals that just made me cringe.  I'm a little worried that the Rocky Horror environment is only going to encourage it.)  Of course I understand this is an important holiday but if you'd thought you might miss it, PUT IT ON THE AUDITION SHEET.  And don't act as though the blocking is all that easy to get from Sean either.  For one thing, he already has to give the blocking to the others who were already cleared to miss that rehearsal.  And my blocking--as you know, since you "choreographed" Pirates (I put it in quotation marks because really, nearly all of that choreography was mine)--is not that easy to just "get."  It's usually very detailed and precise and demands a lot of spacing and awareness of the others around you so the group pictures look good.  I was thisclose to just cutting her from the scenes altogether but I decided it would make those scenes look lopsided.  However I did make her one of the Observer Phantoms for the "Light" scene and number.  THAT blocking is easy enough--just sit there and yell shit.

Lots of soccer this weekend--two games Saturday and one yesterday.  I had very little downtime between the two on Saturday so I was pretty much exhausted for the second game (I even napped on my way to the field).  But I killed it in the first one--of our team's four goals scored, I scored two of them!  One of the guys on the other team said admiringly "player of the game!"  (This was during a very windy game--and the wind was against us, and we had these ridic tiny popup goals.) And the best sign was that the guys consistently passed it to me.  YAY MY BALL SKILLZ ARE IMPROVING.  SO HAPPY.  The clinics I took have *really* helped my game.  I got to the game yesterday a bit late (fuck the MTA, haaaaaaate, I waited TWELVE MINUTES for a train) so I had to sit out the first part.  When they put me in, it was at halfback--normally I play forward but I can play back if necessary.  It was fun actually, it's nice getting a break from constantly trying to score--sometimes it's nice to cockblock them for a change.  Again, one of the opposing players was very complimentary, telling me "you have got this section SECURED, man!"  Afterward we all went for a beer.

My Dolphman season is starting up again--first game is this coming Sunday.  This may be my last season with them--I've had a lot of fun but it really does irritate me that we don't play as a team.  We could do so much better--we could and should support each other so much more, by passing and supporting.  We shall see.

We had auditions for Rocky Horror--it's mostly cast but we're still looking for a Brad (we have a candidate coming in on Wednesday to sing).  Several returnees, including Stephen (tho' not as the narrator--he's ensemble), Paul as Rocky, Jen as Janet and Muslimah in the ensemble (and me of course as Columbia).  And Tawni is NOT Magenta--she had no shot anyway, after her shit during Pirates but luckily she didn't audition that well anyway.  An adorable preppy/goth type named Charlotte is Magenta, and the guy who played Riff Raff in 2005 (so Jason knows him) is coming back.  And our Frank!  He is absolutely amazing--incredible voice and just loves the role.  Mateo wanted to auditon and emailed me, asking me to "keep him notified" or something like that--but he never came to the audition.  I hope he wasn't waiting for me to email him personally!  I'm sure he was emailed by Dave and got the Facebook invite but it's a little weird.  But regardless, as great an actor as Mateo was, he really cannot sing :(  And the new Frank definitely can!

Roland showed up to audition and typically managed to drive Dave and me absolutely insane with irritation in under 5 minutes.  He came shuffling in with a goofy grin and was asking us "what is this about? Are you having auditions?  Should I sign up?  I don't have anything prepared..."  YOU CAME IN HERE.  We did not seek you out, you moron--you came in here, don't take up our time with your unprofessional behavior and your inane drivel!  Oh my God, he is so unbelievably annoying.  I told Dave about his nonsense during A Christmas Carol 2007 (he casually told Gina and me that he couldn't be there for most of tech week--dropped this little bombshell the day before).  He just DOESN'T GET IT.  He is a perfectly nice guy but sometimes that's just Not Enough.  I can't believe that Caley ever dated him!

Maybe it's because fall is approaching but I really have been feeling the knitting/craft urge lately.  Might have to have another session of Drunken Knitting soon, before I get busy with Rocky Horror!  I am also craving some baking--my organized soccer league team (Dolphman) is in the playoffs which start this weekend and I usually bake something for that.  Winter I made my chocolate- and peanut-butter chip blondies and for the spring league I made pumpkin bread.  I was thinking of my espresso brownies this time around...

Tatum Kenney, who was in Pirates and Rocky Horror with me, contracted with me--I proofread her piece of freelance writing, she will bake me some mac & cheese.  Mmmm....I'm looking it over now (just a few tiny nitpicks, mainly comma overkill and incorrect usage of quotation marks) and checked out her website where I noticed a more obvious error--"www.TatumKenney.com has been deemed fit for public consumption by it's neurotic Type A creator!"  Oh, gurrrl...

Just finished a huge proofreading project, BTW--possibly the longest one I've ever done, over 600 pages.  I finally raised my rates this year so this should be a nice chunk of change.  Yay money!

Soccer--since Pirates ended, I have WEEKENDS FREE.  Which means SOCCER.  I've been doing these soccer clinics on Saturday monrings and then playing two hours on Saturday evenings with the full-field guys.  And scoring quite a bit--I pulled off not one, but two hat tricks the past two Saturdays!  What is obviously thrilling and I'm very pleased but it's not like, say, a hat trick at the Olympics.  As I explained to someone on my Dolphman team, when you're playing forward for two hours with no break, if you're reasonably good, you're probably going to score a goal!  Also with the pickup games, we don't have a dedicated goalie, someone who loves that position and is terrific at it--we have whoever's willing to be a goalie for a little while, we're supposed to switch off.  (Never me, though--for one thing I'm always the smallest person on the field because no women ever seem to show up to the full-field games, and for another I told them outright "you don't want me in goal."  It terrifies me.)  However some of these goals were so pretty, I wanted to frame them :)  One was from a cross--I was in front of the goal and the right wing looped it in the air, and I kicked it on the fly into the corner.  The guys were all slapping me and one of the opposing players, who was Irish, said "okay, that was pretty fooking awesome!"

Now the Dolphman (organized league) games are different.  The games are much shorter (21-minute halves) and we have substitutes.  And it must be said that the guys on that team are not very good about passing in general, much less passing to the women.  We are a team made up of a lot of good individual players, but actual teamwork is not as good.  That said, one of our players, Brian, had a couple of cornerkicks at our game this past Sunday, and as I was at left wing, he was kicking them to me and I was trying to head them in.  This happened twice and both times, the kick was just a little bit over my head--I headed the ball but it didn't go in.  Okay, well, it happens.  But I reaaaaallllly wanted to score a goal in a Dolphman game--as I explained they're more rare, and not just for me, for all of us this season--we drew an incredibly tough draw this time, and all of our games are against the top half of the teams (all the best teams).  So our goal differential is very low--we've been winning games by 1 goal in most cases.  Annoying!  Okay, so anyway it's the 2nd half and I've got the ball--I'm close to the goal but there are two defenders, plus the goalie, between me and the goal.  I see Brian further out to the right and no one is on him, so I pass it.  Brian takes it out even further and then crosses it--to me.  I head the ball into the goal, so sweet!  It was TEXTBOOK.  Even the other team was congratulating me, they were saying "you finally got your head goal!"  One of our other players, Adam, said "what made it even better was how unselfish it was, because you'd had the ball at first and you passed it to Brian."  I said "well, I knew I didn't have a clear shot at the goal and he would have more room--can't be selfish!"  Going back to what I said before, another one of our players, later, was driving with the ball and had at LEAST two defenders on him--I was behind him with a clear shot, yelling (several times) "I'm behind you, you have support, pass it back."  I can only assume he did not hear me because he didn't pass it, though he had several opportunities--he just kept trying to push the ball through.  PASS IT BACK.  Good Lord!  Of course they stopped him.  Zach is a cool guy and I don't think he's particularly sexist but come on, guys!

At one point I heard one of the other players asking the referee about...well, a hit I'd delivered--I went after the ball as he was driving and he felt I'd fouled him.  He was very polite and low-key about it, not being a jerk at all (he wasn't a flopper, in other words), and I felt horrible.  I apologized to him at the bar afterwards, saying it's a rough game and I play a rough game but I wasn't trying to hurt or hit him, I really was just going after the ball and I'm sorry.  He was very nice about it and we ended up drunkenly telling each other "you played a great game" "no, YOU played a great game" "your ball skills are off the hook" "that was a great header you did."  One of his teammates corralled me into a picture with him, her and a bunch of the others on their team.

Oh sweet Jesus, Pirates is over HALLELUJAH.

Not that I didn't love the experience but it took up an enormous amount of time, even after it opened.  I can play softball and soccer on the weekends again!  I have free time!  YAAAAAAYYY!  This weekend was especially time-suckalicious--we moved the show to the cemetery.  (The first two weekends were at the amphitheater in Frank Sinatra Park, the last was at Hartsimus Cemetery in Jersey City.  They do shows and events like this as a fundraiser for their cemetery--we're doing a couple of performances of Rocky Horror there as well, in October.)  The move sucked up time because I had to have a rehearsal on Wednesday adapting the blocking to the new space, which only about half the cast could attend.  Which meant that I had to get there very early on Saturday, to show the remaining cast members the space.  Then it rained--we held, then started again.  It immediately started raining again, so we held again.  Poor Taylor had to sing "O Is There Not One Maiden Breast" THREE TIMES (we had a hard time finding the place where he'd stopped on the track).  We finally finished the show and the audience loved it--they were really rooting for us by the end!

Sunday I played in my organized soccer league--we had been undefeated but we played one of the best teams in the league and lost.  Not by much (2-0) but still.  Kind of frustrating because we played pretty well, we just didn't convert our chances.  HOWEVER I played probably my best game so far--I was trapping very well, handling the ball, getting around defenders and wow!  I was thrilled, especially when not just once but several times the goalie warned the defenders about me.  Ooooh, I'm dangerous!  Very flattering.

After the game I went into Jersey City to the cemetery for our closing performance.  The show started off very hot and sunny (my hair is crazy-blonde today from all the sun) and then AGAIN during "Oh Is There Not One Maiden Breast" it started pouring.  We huddled under the tents for quite awhile--at least a half-hour, possibly closer to 45 minutes.  Finally it started to clear up and Paul (one of the ensemble pirates) and I were sweeping the bigger puddles off the "stage" and laying down carpet.  But now we had a new problem--Duncan and Michael (our Pirate King) both had to be gone by around 6, and we were well past 5:00 already.  I ended up having to cut two songs from the second act on the fly--thankfully the actors were all good sports about it, and Lauren (our sound designer) could figure out where to pick up.  We still went past 6:00 but Duncan had a ride to the PATH station and I told him to take a cab once he got into the city. It really was a perfect storm of inconvenience--when we started again it was still raining just a bit and Dave told me if it rains any harder than this, I should call the show (he had to leave so I was the House Manager).  But no, it stopped raining completely--which is a good thing, but I was also super-stressed about getting Michael and Duncan out of there in time.  Anyway it all worked out.

After we packed up everything, we all walked over to Dave's apartment for a cast party and I screened The Pirate Movie for the cast.  Melissa and Kristy LOVED it--they were glued to the screen the whole way through.  Dave's friend Christian loves the movie as well and he and I were singing the blow job song ("Pumping and Blowing").  If you're treadin' water and romance is on the slide/Don'tcha ya know you have to swallow/Something more than water/....It's your pride...  Ah, good times.  Such a guilty pleasure that movie is.  Afterward Dave and I were talking about Rocky Horror--we need to set the dates for auditions, they will probably be sometime in late August.  And I ended up being schmoozed by Tawni (who played one of the daughters in Pirates)--she REALLY wants to audition for Magenta.  Um--I'm actually not that crazy about Tawni.  She gave off major attitude during the Pirates rehearsal process (at one point she tried to correct me on my own choreography)--lots of attitude with nothing really to back it up.  (She's going for her MM, really?  From which school?  Because she really does not sound well-trained.)  She has her moments onstage but she's a very sloppy, fidget-y performer and DOES NOT take notes.  And frankly she's kind of lazy onstage--she's more interested in having fun than actually playing a character and being invested in what's going on.  She's complacent, which I detest in performers.  Several weeks ago I put her on my mental "will not cast again" list.  But she was all sweetness and light last night and we actually had a fun conversation about 19th century art music, specifically lieder.  She would be a good fit for Magenta, but I'd have to talk with her first and say "dude.  You'd better clean up your performances and DON'T cop an attitude.  Do not ever try to school me on my own staging."  Also if Kelly Anne comes back (last year's Magenta), she will have the first shot.  Dave and I are going back and forth about whether or not to flat-out offer everyone in the last cast their roles again.  I would be fine with doing so, but for one exception--Stephen who played the Criminologist.  He really misfired, IMO--I love Stephen but did NOT like what he did with that role.  Susan wants to audition and I can't come right out and say "you're in" but of course I'm probably going to cast her.  She's a fierce dancer and looks great in skimpy clothes, and I love working with her, it's a no brainer.  She was interested in choreographing but I really want Robert to do it again, I loved those dances!  So much fun.

I have to say, as much as I loved working with Susan this time, I wish she had been a little bit more on the ball.  I told her "I need you to choreograph this and this and this"--about 4-5 things (not even full numbers) all in all.  And we would get to rehearsal and she would sort of figure it out during rehearsal--girl, I need it AHEAD of time, you need to come with it already blocked for the most part.  In fact you need to show it to me beforehand so I can decide if it'll work.  And she kept saying "my" choreography--uh, no, *I* choreographed nearly all of the show!  This is why I added "musical staging by Clara Barton Green" to the program.  I'm very proud of my dances, I worked my ass off on them!

Anyway it was fun to look forward to Rocky--I NEED some time off (I am exhausted today) but am definitely antici....pating the fall!  And I must say, the extremely positive response we have gotten for Pirates makes me very happy.  It wasn't an ideal show (Michael never really worked as the PK--not sure what his deal is but he was a sinkhole of charisma, really bland.  I tried so hard but he flickered to life only a few times.  Also, Mara is a sweetie but has some major liabilities as a performer--for one thing she needs to look people in the eye!)  but it was a pretty good one, a very light, sweet, delightful show, if I may say so myself.  The cast did a great job and I loved the costumes (Roe did exactly what I wanted with the daughters) and the laughter from the audience was extremely gratifying.  And I know Dave was thrilled.

So, I am a huge gymnastics fan and The Olympics is my happy time. (Although World's is fun too.) Most Olympics fans are what we call four-year fans--nothing wrong with that, BTW!  But I thought I might give you a little bit of background on the American team and the likely contenders.

The team format:

This Olympics, we have a different team format. There are only five members per time (plus 2-3 alternates), in contrast to past Games where we had 6 (Sydney in '00, Beijing) or even 7 (Atlanta in '96). Also 3 team members compete on any one apparatus--and most importantly all 3 scores count. It used to be that you could drop the lowest score on an apparatus, so if one member flopped, it wasn't such a big deal. Not any more. This format is known as 5-3-3. Bruno Grandi, the head of FIG (Fédération Internationale de Gymnastique, the worldwide governing body of the sport) in an effort to curry favor with less-represented countries that traditionally have not been featured much in gymnastics, devised this system to that countries like the US, Russia, Romania et al. have less of an advantage--you need fewer good gymnasts to win. I personally hate the system, as do many fans, because I think it's crappy to make the teams smaller and allow fewer gymnasts to become Olympians. Small countries have plenty of opportunities to qualify for event finals or the AA--team finals are supposed to decide the best TEAM, as in plural.

Individual All-Around format:

Only 2 gymnasts per country can qualify, as opposed to the past where 3 could qualify. And I believe the top 24 (not 36) overall qualify.

The Players:

The US team are the current World champions. This is no guarantee of gold, though--in both '04 AND '08, we also came in as world champions. But we are definitely the favorites--I believe our strongest competition is probably the Russian team. However, interestingly, the Romanians beat the Russians in Europeans. China is likely not a threat in team competition. But anything can happen, as Beijing proved!

American Jordyn Wieber is the current World AA champion (and two-time US champion). Jordyn beat out Russian Viktoria Kimova in a controversial finish--Jordyn had had a bad bars routine which seemed to take her out of contention but then came back with flawless beam and floor routines, which were also difficult. Vika made no major errors throughout the meet but her sets weren't as difficult and she gave away a lot of tenths here and there...and they added up. When she saw that she'd ("only") gotten silver she burst into tears, and was...shall we say, not exactly sporting on the medals podium.




BUT. She is a lovely gymnast, and I hope both she and Jordyn hit in London. Vika is definitely out for blood and motivated, but she is a bit of a headcase. We shall see.

Another AA contender is American Gabby Douglas, who actually beat Jordyn Wieber in the Olympic Trials. ("Oooooh, All About Eve drama!")  That dynamic is actually reminiscent of '92--Kim Zmeskal was the current US and World champion, but Shannon Miller won the Trials, and then Kim fell off the beam in the team prelims. Gabby's biiiiig strength is bars--she absolutely flies over them, as high as Dominique Dawes used to, she gets incredible air. Her weakness is that she's a little unreliable--in last year's Nationals she fell off the beam 3 (3? maybe 4) times. In one set. She's also relatively inexperienced, just a few big meets so far. But I think if she hits she has an excellent chance of medaling.

A Romanian AA contender is little Larisa Iordache, who is absolutely darling, a real old-school pixie. I am hoping she will sneak onto the podium, I enjoyed watching her at Europeans. Another Romanian is Catalina Ponor, whom you may remember from the '04 Olympics! That's right, she's making her comeback and doing very well. Catalina's events are the beam and the floor--she and Larisa traded golds and silver on those two events at Europeans.

McKayla Maroney is the current World vault champion, and you will see why when she competes. She has the biggest vault you've ever seen--she gets mad air. Goes up higher, stays up longer, lands further than anyone else. She makes vault exciting.

The vault final at Worlds was interesting--they had gymnasts from EVERYWHERE. Two particular favorites of mine were Yamilet Peña from the Dominican Republic, who tried to throw a very difficult vault and ended up sitting it down. She got up and with a big smile saluted the judges. What a trouper! She gave it her all--gotta love that. Peña has in fact qualified for London at the Olympic test Event, so I can't wait to see her. The other vaulter was a tiny slip of a thing, Phan Thi Ha Thanh from Vietnam who ended up winning the bronze! The joy on her face was incandescent--she was thrilled just to BE there, but to actually medal...!



Since she medaled at Worlds she automatically qualified for the Games but funding for her sport is very low and she's had much difficulty training.  The other gymnast on McKayla's right is Oksana Chusovitina, a fierce HBIC who has been competing FOREVER.  Remember Barcelona in '92?  She was THERE.  She competed as a Soviet, for the Unified team, for Uzbekistan and now for Germany.  Chuso is Da Woman.

He Kexin, one of the age-controversial gymnasts in '08, will be back although just barely.  She actually hasn't done so well since Beijing--a shame as I like her gymnastics.  (Yes, I think she was underage--bitch, please.  No, I don't blame her and would never blame the gymnast--she's part of a totalitarian system, she has no say in this.)  But China needs her bars, so she's back.

Britain might actually medal this year, which I believe would be an Olympic first.  Their big gun is Beth Tweddle, who is a past World champion in both bars and floor.  REALLY pushing for her, I love her work *and* the fact that she's an older gymnast.  I also get a kick out of how very ENGLISH Beth looks.  Case in point:




Those are some CHOPPERS!  But I kid because I love--best of luck, Beth, hope you perform well for the hometown crowd!

Senate passes resolution, Obama supports it, to have moment of silence for murdered Israeli athletes.

Yes! It's an absolute disgrace it's taken this long. Just unbelievable. The IOC failed miserably back in '72 and Avery Brundage was a wretched example of Olympic ideals. (God, he sucked. From refusing to support a boycott against the Nazi Olympics to being a complete dick about the travesty of Jim Thorpe's stripped gold medals to ignoring the massacre of the Israeli athletes--a massacre that was enabled by HIS shoddy security practices--in every way he was just a terrible, terrible human being. He also had a female athlete, a gold medal favorite, kicked out of the Olympics for drinking champagne refusing him after he hit on her.)

So I've been taking these adult soccer clinics on Saturday mornings, to help improve my ball skills--and it is working out very well, I am thrilled. My game has gotten better slowly but surely--I can really feel it during the pickup games. In addition to the clinic, I also played two hours of soccer Saturday evening with the full-field guys, and another hour Sunday morning. You definitely feel the heat but as I've been telling my fellow players, I grew up in Virginia. We had practice in heat and humidity worse than this every day in August. And what you always did was you froze a quart or so of water, brought it to practice and left it in your car, and when you had a water break you pulled it out. Voila! Lovely cool just-melted water. Anyway so although I'm sweating quite a bit, I am perfectly able to continue playing throughout the entire two hours or whatever.

Which is great because now that Pirates is winding down, I WILL HAVE FREE TIME IN MY LIFE AGAIN O YEA. Very, very happy about that, July 4 was the one day off I've had in weeks. And the show! Oh, the show is going so well--we had a runthrough yesterday, our first runthrough, and not just once but *several* times I was literally laughing so hard I was crying. They are AWESOME! There's still a ton of cleaning up to do but they're all so funny and they've worked so hard. The dances look great--my favorite is "When the Foeman Bares His Steel" which is SO MUCH FUN. But my new favorite is "Stay Frederic Stay" which Jen and Taylor are KILLING. We've restored the middle section and Mabel's disingenuous attempted seduction of Frederic is effing hilarious. And it's not just me laughing--the cast was in the wings dying as well, and several cast members were cracking up ON stage. Taylor is our Frederic--what a find! He has a gorgeous voice and takes direction so well--and he comes up with funny stuff as well! We all just love him. And I love his silly run offstage when he exits after "Stay Frederic Stay"--I have a couple of Silly Walks in the blocking and he came up with that one. He just looks so goofy.

I have several actors from The Vagina Monologues and they're all 3 killing it as well. Jessica is The Bookworm/Ethel (I gave all the daughters personalities)--the climax of "Climbing Over Rocky Mountain" is just such glorious, exuberant music (the run on the piano right after the Edith & Kate soli and before the final "Let us gaily tread the measure...") that I wanted them all to dance around in different joyous dances. So Kate is doing ballet, Edith and the Baby/Molly are dancing in a ring, etc. I decided The Bookworm would be dancing dorkily--so Jessica is just out there dancing dorkily full-out and selling it for all she's worth. So, so funny! She is just hilarious--so committed, so focused. I keep telling the cast--you MUST commit in comedy. If you pull your punches or if it's too naturalistic, it's not funny. I sometimes feel with the less experienced cast members, I'm serving as much of a coach and teacher as a director, but so many people don't understand how to do comedy. It IS hard; it DOES require certain elements for the alchemy, and discipline and timing. And different kinds of comedy are handled differently--slapstick vs. character-based comedy vs. conceptual comedy. So I will set up a bit or gag, and then when I'm giving them notes I'll say things like "you have to commit--that's what makes it funny." Or "you can't run it all together here, have to break it down a little more here--that's what makes it funny." Some people think you're either funny or you're not--mmm, I disagree, but maybe that's just my work ethic kicking in there (i.e., I want to believe that anyone, if they work hard enough, can be funny). But upbringing and culture have something to do with it. I was lucky enough to be born into a family that LOVES humor, and then I've worked with some really talented actors.

Another thing I love about comedy is how contextual it is in every way. It is structurally--on a single joke basis, you establish and expectation and then violate it. But then within the show itself, it's contextual---once you get the audience on your side, they'll start laughing more quickly as the show goes on. And then finally it's culturally contextual, in a couple of different ways. First, because tastes in comedy can change--this is why we find Jerry Lewis painfully unfunny now, but back in the '50s he really was a genius. But in another way, I LOVE that comedy is all about stealing gags--in Pirates I have cheerfully lifted from Monty Python, Star Trek, The Princess Bride, Airplane! and yes, I had an idea yesterday for a gag I'm stealing from The Empress of Sex! (Hope you don't mind, Duncan! :) I love the idea that I'm connecting with all of those clowns from generations past by recycling their bits, and if I'm lucky someone will use ME as an inspiration!