Inspo from Relient K

-They are so dumb and cheesy, but they are what they are.
-Their music is very upbeat and fun!
-Their messaging meant a lot to their fans (still does?).
-A couple of their jams leaked out beyond their doofy community to something "bigger."

The Book of Mormon

Four years late to the party, but I finally saw The Book of Mormon. I didn't want to listen to the music until I saw it, and it has never been in the same city as I have until now.

The production was immensely entertaining and very inspiring for me as a writer.

-Trey Parker and Matt Stone dgaf so hard about what is and isn't appropriate. This is immensely satisfying. Nothing is sacred in their work, and, really, you just have no other choice but to applaud them. I've been in writers' workshops where the use of a pronoun is debated as offensive for half an hour. While I believe we should live in as most loving and truthful world as possible, sometimes it's just nice to see a musical sequence in which Hitler is sodomizing a gay Mormon teen, and the protagonist's father is being felt up by Jeffrey Dahmer. Those things were on the Boradway stage. Those things won Tonys. In an overly PC America, it's refreshing. And it's also totally earned! Nothing is "just 'cause," and nothing else has to be explained.

-The themes of the musical were not as obvious as I thought they might be going into the theatre. Obviously, these guys aren't Morms, so there was really no chance of the production being pro-LDS. But it was remarkably even-keeled about LDS. Most importantly, nothing was made up or exaggerated. This musical literally told the Book of Mormon and mapped out young Mormon life pretty genuinely. Of course seeing any religion shown as a pageant play would be ridiculous, but nothing was blown out of proportion. It was by the literal book with, even, some helpful explanation of why some pieces might seem far-fetched.

-Music is amazingly powerful! Some of the melodies are so fantastic and hopeful, it doesn't matter if the singer is talking about Jesus "growing a pair" or a man raping babies (real topic covered), I just felt good. There are so many people in the world who don't like musical theatre because it is unbelievable or cheesy. Those people can eat rocks because MUSIC IS MAGIC. I don't care if musical theatre isn't "realistic." Why is realistic the measuring tool for making yourself feel an emotion and learn and grown and be happy?

-Stone and Parker tricked a typically white liberal older wealthy-ish audience into going to a show about something they thought they wanted to see (making fun of Mormons) but secretly made it about something else we don't love to think about in this country (Uganda). Spoon full of sugar, y'all!

-Speaking of. I had heard the portrayal of Africans was offensive in the musical. You know, it's really hard to say. What does that even mean? I'm kind of convinced any type of portrayal of an African culture seen via liberal white people can be construed as offensive because we truly don't know enough about Africa to know what's a stereotype and what is real. Like showing a Ugnada with war lords and AIDS and no technology isn't racist. It's just how it is. Maybe it's offensive to show these diseased impoverished people singing so happily, but that's satire. And also, the spoon of sugar thing.

-Speaking of Part II. There are not enough Broadway roles for black actors. Way to go, Book of Mormon for, yes, creating a heavy white male show but balancing it with a huge black ensemble.

-It was funny. That doesn't really need to be said, but, yeah, it was really really funny.

Two gripes:

-The end seemed so rushed. Like, a murderer was conquered in ten seconds of dialogue? Somehow? All loose ends were tied up in less than one musical number.

-Holy pop culture topical jokes. One character was a total nerd...so I get that. And, heck, maybe darth Vader and Hobbits are timeless now. But, little jabs at OJ Simpson and Nicki Minaj...it just tainted the work. TO ME. Maybe that's snobby of me. Whatever, this is my blog. MY RULEZ.

Ultimately:

The musical did have a message about faith, and it was more uplifting than one might think. Ultimately I left feeling the musical said, "Hey, people need something good and hopeful. It can be wacky and made up. It probably is. But, the feeling behind it, the spirit beyond humanity, is not. What a lesson to tackle. Hats hats hats off.

#DavidBowieIs

Tuesday my aunt took me on a special weekday treat! We went to the Museum of Contemporary Art to explore the David Bowie exhibit. What a morning. We wore headphones that pumped interviews and music through us for the whole two hours we enjoyed the costumes, artifacts, and music videos. No photos were allowed, but I jotted some ideas in my iPhone notes:

"Everything went into my mind as being an influence."-D.B.

Constant theme of Bowie's work is that he was forever devouring art, culture, trash, whatever and grinding it all up into what he made. Truly we all do this--we just don't always know where our influences are. Bowie on the other hand recognized the strings in his brain, and perhaps that made those strings sing.

A major influence of his early in his career was "The Happy Prince," a story I had forgotten about. I used to read it often from an Oscar Wilde treasury from my grandfather.

"The medium is the message."-Marshall McLuhan

"That's the point of contemporary pop music. It spits of the past."-D.B.

Inauthenticity made up the 70s. And here we are in the 20dimes, living in irony.

DB was maestro of his work. He worked with designers, sure, but there were sketches upon sketches for every level of his showmanship. Pages of his boyish handwriting scratching lyrics, little notes for music, clothing concepts, storyboards...He said it was better he do it all himself. I'm honestly glad there's a lot of stuff I don't trust myself to do. I trust others' opinions much more. What a terror that would be--to know you could do everything better. What a terror, and, yet, how important it must have been for DB.

A wall exclaimed, "You are an engineer."

Advice from the man himself: "Define an area as safe and use it as an anchor."

Finally: "No authors give voice, but instead a rich body of work for us to admire, ponder, and make our own."

But the film is a saddening bore

Cause I wrote in ten times or more.

It's about the be writ again.

It's Alive!

Last night I could not get to sleep. Was up for hours getting bonus lesson planning done and suddenly this spec of an idea I had about a play completely took shape and completely consumed my half-dreaming thoughts. I journaled for pages: lines of dialogue, stage directions, climactic images. It spilled out of me like black ink in those old timey pots tipped over.

This morning I began. Here it comes, speeding out of me. I didn't want to stop. I prolonged the workout until I was cutting it close. I thought about these people walking to the train. I have never wanted to cancel class due to creative flow before. A first. They hung with me all day. I have a new pile of essay revisions to grade, but not tonight. Not, at least, right now. I have people to see.

Very early into grad school I recognized I was loathing the hunt of playwriting. I would stay up all night finishing an act, get it ripped up the next day, and keep the document closed until it was my turn for workshop four weeks later. Not a healthy cycle. Not a successful cycle. I wondered if I would ever feel excited again.

Cheeze-It

Yesterday I spent all day at a Prison Education conference. It was extremely inspiring and depressing at the same time. Our country has a major problem with prison reform. I have been interning with a prison this semester reading inmates' creative writing and offering them feedback. I get to visit the participants in a couple weeks, and I couldn't be more enthused. These men are thoughtful, genuine poets. Working one-on-one with them will be a pleasure. Most of them take their work at least fifty times more seriously than the undergraduates I teach.

My beautiful school post-conference.

In addition to tutoring inmates, I have been reading several books on the prison experience from various viewpoints (short term, lifer perspective, cop stories etc.). Something I've noticed is that each inmate story I've read ends up miraculously feeling hopeful, grateful for what they still do have behind bars. This floors me. And even I, who has a good life, sometimes get grossed out by their Pollyanna attitudes. They have every right to believe in nothing and soak in seas of self-pity when most of them find a higher purpose and a sense of peace. It's...cheesy to say the least. But I've recently realized two things.

1. I'm never going to read a book by someone who runs off of bitterness. That person will never do anything. So that perspective, which is probably the majority in prisons, doesn't get scribed.

2. While it seems serving life is the lowest of lows, it is all relative. Once you're incarcerated, I'm sure you see how it actually could be worse. At least you're not insane. (Most prisons are full of mentally unstable people because mental health facilities are too full for them.) Although the only luxuries you have are over-priced Cheetos, at least you can work your 50 cents an hour job to earn them unlike the guy chained in solitary for forty years. Compared to that, even some prison terms suddenly seem livable. Cheesy, but true.

So, don't be too cool for the cheesy. You get places by being optimistic--no matter how stupid it might seem to someone on the outside.

Why So Serious?

Neighbors are trying to kill me.
I run before the sun is up. I pass their orange brick home
Oh! That guy scared me--Wait. What's--?

 OH GOD.

WHY would anyone do this? My heart exploded.
I stopped. Okay, it's a cut-out. It's a cut-out.
Wait...IS it a cut-out? This could totally be like the time that guy stood still in Madame Tusseau's Wax Museum and when I inspected him, he offered a mild, "Boo" so I obviously jumped nineteen feet into the air and darn near knocked wax Will Smith over. If I were a serial killer and was going to dress up as The Joker, I would definitely take the possibility of being mistaken for a piece of cardboard into consideration. The advantages! So I stared at this promotional material/genius murderer for a long time. A. Long. Time. And then I felt stupid, so I ran away.

Maybe it seems stupid to you too, but when when I'm running empty streets at 6 AM, bumping into a tubby child holding cotton candy wearing a Rainbow Bright t-shirt would terrify me. Let alone ol' Heath.

So an interesting thing is happening. I see this creepy image like every other morning. This thing that completely wrecked me last week is now typical scenery. I've grown accustom, maybe even fond, of the lil menace. It means I have a quarter mile left. I imagine his overly-lip sticked face cheering me on. Maybe stabbing future marathon competitors with a pencil.

Is there inspiration here? Like, what really scares us can become routine? I'm still kinda of working on the metaphor. Not that we should learn to be comfortable with our fears, but rather, we should see them as just two-dimensional benign onlookers. Maybe.

Morning Inspiration

Bathed myself in inspiration to prepare for today's demands. Some essays by Brecht and an article by Paul Stark Seeley.

"It is significantly hard to find out anything about what other European writers think. But I take it that where literature, for instance, is concerned they all share more or less the same view, namely that writing is a melancholy business. As usual Shaw, whose views about anything under the sun are far from unknown, differs from his colleagues here...he likes writing. There is no room for a martyr's halo even outside his head. His literary activities have in no sense cut him off from life. On the contrary. I am not sure if it is the right way to measure his gifts, but I can only say that the effect of this inimitable cheerfulness and infectious good mood is quite exceptional."--Brecht, "Three Cheers for Shaw"

"The accomplishment of this demand may be a long-continuing one, but let us remember we cannot find any objective to compare with this one, and the rewards are immediate and continuous."--PSS

Encroachin'

I'm not one to get too Christian woo woo here, but I read this verse today, and I was pretty inspired:

"Where I am, there ye may be also" (John 14: 3)

I think we hear a lot--regardless of what faith we are or aren't--this concept that God/Good is where WE are, but rarely do I consider that flipped. But, actually, that makes more sense. It's as significant of a difference as saying, "I ate at the same pizza parlor as Cher" vs. "Cher ate at the the same pizza restaurant I did." Do you get what I mean? I might not be clear. This is a break from studying all my theory notes and grading a billion script outlines while listening to the Titanic soundtrack on repeat.

It's not that we go to horrible places, but, you know what? Good stuff can be there! It's more like...we are inherently where Good stuff is. We encroached on God's domain--not vice versa. And that's nice. It's nice to encroach on God's domain. S/he doesn't mind. Rather, we're all quite welcome.


In two months I'mm be at camp with this one. Kath & Me. 2011.

Been Singing This While I Ride My Bicycle

We need some light.
First of all, we need some light.
You can't sit here in the dark.
And all alone, it's a sorry sight.
It's just you and me.
We'll live, you'll see.

Night after night,
We'd sit and wait for the morning light.
But we've waited far too long,
For all that's wrong to be made right.

Day after day,
Wishing all our cares away.
Trying to fight the things we feel,
But some hurts never heal.
Some ghost are never gone,
But we go on,
We still go on.

And you find some way to survive
And you find out you don't have to be happy at all,
To be happy that you're alive.

Day after day,
Give me clouds, and rain and gray.
Give me pain, if that's what's real.
It's the price we pay to feel.

The price of love is loss,
But still we pay.
We love anyway.

And when the night has finally gone.
And when we see the new day dawn.
We'll wonder how we wandered for so long, so blind.
The wasted world we thought we knew,
The light will make it look brand new.
So

Let it
Let it
Let it
Let it
Let it
Shine, shine, shine.

Day after day (day after day),
We'll find the will to find our way.
Knowing that the darkest skies will someday see the sun.

When our long night is done,
There will be light.
(There will be light.
There will be light.)
There will be light.
When we open up our light.
Sons and daughters, husbands, wives.
Can fight that fight.
There will be light.
There will be light.
There will be light.
There will be light.


Crossing the border into AZ. July 30th, 2011.

Inspiration Comes in Funny Places

P-San, Nara, Japan, 2008

In the temple housing the biggest wooden Buddha in the world, there is a pole with a hole at the bottom the size of Buddha's nostril. If you can fit through, you are supposed to find enlightenment. So basically, if you're a certain body shape, you will be enlightened, and if not, forget it. Lame. But, I really liked it. It's kinda scary--shoving yourself through this little tuna can and coming out the other end supposedly closer to happiness, but really just on the ground.

"Honey, your odds go up when you file an application."
-Angelica, the bartender in Win a Date with Tad Hamilton

Freedom!

Great inspiration for today--
We're all familiar enough with "Truth makes man free." I believe it fully. But, I always think "free" as in the noun. Being truthful, experiencing Truth, makes me to be free! But, try this on for size my friend! "Truth makes man free" as in a VERB! Blew your mind open?! Yes, it's true either way you slice it. Being truthful lights a passion within you to let others share perfection and freedom. So, really, by being free, and then encouraging others to see truth does not only help those others but inherently demands that they take up their part in freeing as well. Woo! An end to slavery of all kinds!


Fourth of July, 2009: KWall, Cocoa, Me

I won't let you down. I will not give you up.

I'm an Alum

Started to get nervous leading up to graduation. I have a job and plan for next year, so not about that. Rather, I was afraid to cry at graduation. It's such a happy day with so many freaking people around and so many cameras...I had this horrid image of me bawling my little eyes out while shuffling across the stage, getting my diploma all wet.

I'm so so dang grateful for my entire four years. The good and the bad, the happiness and the sadness. My college experience has been super dope. I almost considered listing all the things that made it so, but it would be the longest list of all time. So, I'm okay as we line up and start the procession, but as I entered the auditorium with "Pomp and Circumstance" blasting out the organ, and a thousand beaming faces around me, and my family all cheering silently and snapping pictures, and my classmates surrounding me, and then, all my professors on stage looking down at us...I did start to tear up. Then, we sang one of my favorite hymns. NO! I willed the tears to suck back up into my eyes. And! They did! I had this epiphany that I usually apply to theatre. I know if I got all riled about about a final performance I am cheating myself from knowing that my experience is a continual line--not segments of experience. It's all additive. That's the key. Graduation and college--no different. I was all smiles and it was fine. I walked, pointed and bowed to a few notable profs, and shook and took, and was sunny for all pictures.


Capstone Ladies Minus Kiwi

Yesterday Kay and I had lunch at Baker's Square on our way to Chicago. It was delicious. We were happy--sharing gratitude for the whole shindig, and then I said how nice it was to see all the people on stage who helped get us there. And it all came out--right onto my strawberry cream cheese pie. A million tears bottled for about 24 hours. I am so grateful for so much. He came around, we laughed, we enjoyed pie, I checked on Blanche, we drove away.

Here the future is always so clear.