| T O P I C R E V I E W |
| TRANSMARINE |
Posted - 03/23/2009 : 14:58:22
Wow...this is my dream. Tennessee Williams classic...I play Tom. Been wanting to do this play for 15 years, and now I have the pleasure and privilidge to do so! We open a week from Friday. Excited and anxious! If anyone is in the OC, come see it! Would be great to meet other FB.netters. Floop came and saw one of my plays. Anyhow, check out the link!
http://www.stagesoc.org/
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His name is Dalton. He's got a degree in philosophy.
-bRIAN |
| 28 L A T E S T R E P L I E S (Newest First) |
| Daisy Girl |
Posted - 05/01/2009 : 14:28:20
TRANS, what a strange thing for the actor just to up and quit like that. Break a leg. Let us know how it goes. |
| TRANSMARINE |
Posted - 05/01/2009 : 11:18:50
Ok, so we (the cast) have spent the last two days in intense rehearsal (on top of our day jobs!) breaking in our replacement cast member. The guy has done an amazing job! In two days he memorized his part (which is a great chunk of all of the second act!), and commited his blocking. We are amazed and thankful for his commitment to helping us out of a situation that could have closed the theatre for good.
However, I am highly anxious and feel more nervous about tonight than opening night.
And, scene.
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His name is Dalton. He's got a degree in philosophy.
-bRIAN |
| TRANSMARINE |
Posted - 04/27/2009 : 12:11:04
no shit! LOL
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His name is Dalton. He's got a degree in philosophy.
-bRIAN |
| danjersey |
Posted - 04/27/2009 : 11:56:03
I see what you mean about leaving theater
too much drama
%)
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| TRANSMARINE |
Posted - 04/27/2009 : 10:50:07
Okay, so I was in a weird mood yesterday...I don't want to give up acting today...
But here's a great story that flips everything on it's head.
Last night we had a tremendous performance...my favorite to date. The audience was sold out (thanks to good notices and word-of-mouth) to the point where an extra row was added, and people sat in the aisles!
There are four of us in the cast, who all share, for the most part, the same stage-time. The other male in the cast, Jim,the gentleman caller was telling me in the dressing room after the show that he felt it was a great show as well. I left feeling very good. A couple hours later, I got a text message from this actor who plays Jim, wishing me luck on our remaining 5 shows, that he feels I'm great in the part. I texted him back and said likewise. At midnight, I got a call from our director who proceeded to tell me that 'Jim' up and left the show. Just called him up, said he's done with the show, and dropped out. Bang.
We have until Friday to solve this. I will keep you informed as events unfold....
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His name is Dalton. He's got a degree in philosophy.
-bRIAN |
| TRANSMARINE |
Posted - 04/26/2009 : 06:40:20
Thanks for asking, Tro. We are now in our 4th week (already?!?!), and after tonights performance, we will have 5 shows left. It's going by TOO fast.
Friday night I was sick with the flu (of course...always happens...last play I was in I was struck with larengitis two days before opening. I didn't talk for 48 hours, horrified what was going to come out of my mouth vocally), but made it through. I was dizzy and nauseous...good times! LOL
Last night was a GREAT night...the audience was totally awesome. We have so many people, especially older audience members who claim this is the best GLASS MENAGERIE they've ever seen, which is a great feeling. Some have even said it's the best production they have ever seen...and that is hard to wrap my head around, but it is a humbling feeling.
As for directing...I am still in the process of deciding. Strangely, I am considering giving up acting and theatre altogether. I know this doesn't make sense, but in the past week I've been considering this...it's becoming extremely draining and encompassing...very hard to balance things with. Ugh...I've officially said it and it's relieving...probably not unlike those who once they stop contemplating suicide and decide to do it become happy.
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His name is Dalton. He's got a degree in philosophy.
-bRIAN |
| trobrianders |
Posted - 04/26/2009 : 01:50:39
What's the latest Brian? And if you're going to direct after, how about Baby Doll as that one act play? I mean, who can resist an expert seduction?
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Ed is the hoo hoo |
| TRANSMARINE |
Posted - 04/17/2009 : 10:13:21
Going into our third weekend now...after Sunday we will be half-way through our run. It's zipping by.
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His name is Dalton. He's got a degree in philosophy.
-bRIAN |
| Carl |
Posted - 04/09/2009 : 14:31:30
Great, Trans (Or should I say Mr. Fichtner?)! You're a star! :) |
| TRANSMARINE |
Posted - 04/09/2009 : 06:35:43
Well, I think we're a hit! I'm posting some links below of reviews from opening night. And thanks Daisy...they loved it! God I wish y'all could come see it...
www.ocregister.com/articles/amanda-laura-ryanen-2358361-parrish-williams
www.examiner.com/x-4129-LAOC-Theatre-Examiner~y2009m4d8-Glass-Menagerie-at-Fullertons-STAGEStheatre
www.backstage.com/bso/news_reviews/nyc/review_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003960706
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His name is Dalton. He's got a degree in philosophy.
-bRIAN |
| Daisy Girl |
Posted - 04/08/2009 : 15:33:36
So what did all your friends and family think that nite Tranny? |
| trobrianders |
Posted - 04/07/2009 : 23:20:20
Keep us posted tranny. It's interesting to hear developments.
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Ed is the hoo hoo |
| TRANSMARINE |
Posted - 04/05/2009 : 09:44:34
Interesting review, trobrianders. Thanks for posting that!
Last night went extremely well, as well! We had an audience comprised predominantly of seniors, which was interesting. But what was wonderful about that was that they could remember this time...and they relished it with "ooohs" and "mmmm's", as if reliving memories themselves. It was wonderful...one of my monologues talks about the local dancehall adjacent to our apartment, and how the young dancers would come outside in the spring dusk to kiss secretly "behind ashpits and telephone poles" unaware that "change and adventure" in the form of WWII would soon be along to forever alter their worlds...the audience vocally recollected with sighs of nostalgia...MADE MY NIGHT!
Today, I am again nervous, for tonight I have seven people coming (family and coworkers) to see it. Very excited...very nervous...
"I didn't go to the moon...I went much further. For time is the longest distance between to places. I left St. Louis. I descended these steps of this fire escape for a last time, and followed from then on in my father's footsteps...attempting to find in motion what was lost in space..."
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His name is Dalton. He's got a degree in philosophy.
-bRIAN |
| trobrianders |
Posted - 04/05/2009 : 02:13:51
Looked up the 1995 review for The Glass Menagerie from the time I went. Do you read them? Ben Chaplin and Clare Skinner as Tom and Laura were mesmerising. Sam Mendes went on to Oscars for his first movie.
http://www.variety.com/review/VE1117910179.html?categoryid=33&cs=1
Yeah I love Elia Kazan too. His presence must be felt anytime a Tennessee Williams play gets staged. Cool Iguana story. The title NIGHT OF THE IGUANA always makes me laugh, like some awful Puerto Vallarta poolside chat-up line, "Hey baby come back to my room. I wanna show you my iguana".
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Ed is the hoo hoo |
| Carl |
Posted - 04/04/2009 : 16:03:34
Congratulations, Trans!
"You have the brain of a four year old, and I'll bet he was glad to get rid of it!!" |
| TRANSMARINE |
Posted - 04/04/2009 : 10:59:06
YES! BABY DOLL was an original screenplay from his one-act play 27 WAGONS FULL OF COTTON. Great GREAT movie! I also really love NIGHT OF THE IGUANA. I got a chance to visit Las Caletas beach in Puerto Vallarta where John Huston lived and filmed IGUANA. It is a beautiful tropical jungle, and the actual sets are the living areas where they worked! Totally cool.
I'm thinking about directing soon...would love to do a Tennessee Williams play. Maybe CAMINO REAL, or one of his more obscure and disliked 1960's experiments such as THE SEVEN DESCENTS OF MYRTLE.
I also love Anton Chekhov...perhaps one of his...I dunno...
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His name is Dalton. He's got a degree in philosophy.
-bRIAN |
| trobrianders |
Posted - 04/04/2009 : 09:25:34
I've seen a couple of TW plays here in London including TGM. No one ever laughs, always so damn serious, so good for you. Baby Doll's my favorite of his, really wicked humor in that one. Good luck tonight.
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Ed is the hoo hoo |
| TRANSMARINE |
Posted - 04/04/2009 : 06:47:24
It was fantastic. I have never been involved in something with an opening night as successful as it was. We had a full house...people were applauding after every scene...which struck me as odd...flattering, but different. The audience ate it up! I was horrifyingly nervous just before curtain, of course...feeling I'd rather slit my throat then go on stage. But, once out there, we channeled the voices of these characters, and the neatest feeling is holding an attention span of a mass of people...feeling them hang on your words. At the same time, I feel as if I am in another space...and everything is ethereal and tunneled into a magical and small universe where those watching are like voices you hear as you are falling asleep...somewhere way out there...
We had three reviewers who seemed very supportive of it...we'll find out this week. I was engaged by one, not knowing at first he was a reviewer until he told me normally he leaves almost every show he sees. This one, he said, was beautiful. He gave one note: some vocal projections were hard to hear in the back. He apologized then for giving me the note, and I assured him it was not only valid, but imparative! It was very strange to actually hear people crying in the audience...and there were many people, friends and strangers, who came to us afterwards actually with tears in their eyes, but bouyant with excitement!
This was the thing I was most proud of. That people laughed...and they laughed thruought the show. The general misunderstanding of this play is that, because it is Tennessee Williams, it is dramatic and depressing...which it is. But, I believe, if we play it properly it will be funny and charming because it is so easily relatable, and there's something for everyone to identify with. It's almost a pressure valve for the audience...to see dysfunction played to a slightly higher degree releases them of normal burdon, and allows them to enjoy it through the characters. It was such a wonderful evening.
All that said, I am now nervous again for tonight. Goddamn, it's senseless!!
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His name is Dalton. He's got a degree in philosophy.
-bRIAN |
| trobrianders |
Posted - 04/04/2009 : 00:10:41
How'd it go T-Marine?
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Ed is the hoo hoo |
| TarTar |
Posted - 04/03/2009 : 19:35:25
I go to opium dens!
My life is dirt but you seem to make it cleaner... reduce my felony to a misdemeanor |
| TRANSMARINE |
Posted - 04/03/2009 : 08:47:13
So tonight is opening night...we are sold out...I am very nervous! AAAAARRRGGHHH!!! I can't figure out why I do this!!!
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His name is Dalton. He's got a degree in philosophy.
-bRIAN |
| Daisy Girl |
Posted - 03/27/2009 : 17:44:42
Wow TRANS, that is so cool. It's very powerful listening to how you pepare. You really put every inch of your soul into it. I really wish I didn't live in the cold north and I could check out one of your plays. So are you open to film or are you set on plays? Anyway, 7 days left to go! I can't wait to hear all your great reviews. Hopefully someone from the forum can make it too. |
| TRANSMARINE |
Posted - 03/26/2009 : 11:01:21
How do I get in character? Hmm...I always think of it reversely (is that a word?) In any play, a character is structurally defined immediately and precisely by the words he/she speaks, AND by how the other characters speak about him/her. I will stare and stare and mull over the script (without memorization at first) until I get an impression. Then I will do the same thing again...and again...until I have enough impressions to then analyze. If the written character has motives or passions or ideas not inherent or familiar or even acceptable to ME as a person, then I have to justify, and place myself in their place WITHIN this controlled story to properly accept this written person as a real human being. Once I can justify and at the very least empathize, I will continue to re-read. Once I get into the rehearsal space with other actors, I have myself so open spiritually, mentally and emotionally that all I can do is hope this character trusts ME enough to come off the page and into ME. As I purposely do not memorize before actual rehearsal, I know the intentions and the course that I literally can commit the lines very quickly after that point. Unless outer stimulus of other people is affecting me, it's pointless. SO, until I am comfortable and have a clue how the other actors work, I will not commit to anything other than accepting my character. Now it is time to hone the lines to reflect absolutely in recite how it is written on the page. Deviation from the written word, even to add an "oh" or "um" is criminal I believe...someone has taken the time to write something from their heart...who am I to suit it to entertain my comfort? We are 8 days away from opening...I am anxious, nervous, and ready...strangely I've never really talked about my process of preparation. I hope it doesn't sound phony or cerebrally-silly. It's very simple...it just takes a LOT of power in mind and body. But I think I love it. My advice to beginning actors is this: any 'acting' book given, prescribed, or forced upon you...READ IT. Then, without batting an eye, THROW IT AWAY, and never look back at it. Intertwined during these book 'episodes' will be actual performances! The script is the only acting book you will need outside of yourself, because it is all in there, provided by the author! Anyhow...now I'm rambling...but yeah...hope that gives an insight.
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His name is Dalton. He's got a degree in philosophy.
-bRIAN |
| Daisy Girl |
Posted - 03/24/2009 : 16:10:22
Wow TRANSMARINE. That sounds like an amazing play. So what do you do to get in character? |
| TRANSMARINE |
Posted - 03/24/2009 : 14:55:51
"The play is memory..." begins the work. A drifter haunted by his past confesses to the audience through flashback his guilt and justification of abandoning his immediate family 10 years prior. His name is Tom. In the mid-1930's, St. Louis, at the onset of the second World War, stifled by his home-life and dead-end job in a shoe factory, Tom sets out to find "change and adventure". He is a daydreamer and poet who, because of an absent father, supports his mother Amanda (a faded Southern belle still going through life as such, ignoring the firey trap of poverty and sameness that traps them)and his crippled and socially inept sister, Laura. Laura lives in a world of her own, a world of glass animal figurines and old phonograph records...too shy, unobtrusive, and inferior in her mind to connect with anyone other than her mother and brother. Amanda, blaming Tom for their nowhere road, while simultaneously dependent on his income, concocts plans, schemes, and provisions...the introduction to Laura of a "gentleman caller". When Tom brings home a friend from work as a possibility of courting his sister, the world of love and emotion turns from a dull, dimly lit haze to an earth scortched and lit by lightening...a heartbreaking and devastating ending to a story beginning with only a glimmer of hope. Tom, having followed in his father's footsteps, flees his family to come to terms with his own life...but is left with repeatedly suffering the need to collect the shards of glass-fragil abandonment.
Loosely, loosely based on Tennessee Williams own early family life and his first commercial success, it is commonly called an autobiographical piece.
I play Tom. (Tennesee Williams real name is 'Tom'. Thomas Lanier Williams).
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His name is Dalton. He's got a degree in philosophy.
-bRIAN |
| Daisy Girl |
Posted - 03/24/2009 : 14:31:28
Hey TRANSMARINE... congrats on the play. So for people like me who are not familiar with the work, what's the play about and what's your role about??? |
| danjersey |
Posted - 03/24/2009 : 12:21:06
Break a leg! Do the pros really say that? Seriously though, Congratulations! |
| Carl |
Posted - 03/23/2009 : 16:56:09
Good luck TRANS! My Dad-who's an amateur actor-played Brick in Cat On A Hot Tin Roof a few years ago (he also appeared in Irish soap Fair City!). |
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