Rehearsal last night was a bust. Russ and Lance (one of our runners - we still need one more!) showed and that was it. It looks like half the people who knew they weren't going to make it told Shaun and the other half told me and our lists didn't get meshed properly - a danger of having two producers.
Next time, though, I'm going to get all my rehearsal dates organized ahead of time and then cast people based on whether they can make those times (oh, and talent, I guess. But, really, it doesn't matter how good you are if you can't make it to rehearsal). Trying to find a time (a single time, even, let alone a recurring rehearsal time) when 17 busy people can meet is driving me insane.
We're only doing two shows, and as I said they're trail balloons, so we're not doing the usual FuzzyCo massive media blitz (Shaun's in the middle of a FCMMB for One Man Scene). But I thought it'd be nice if we had a poster, at least. Matt Murphy did a great poster/postcard design of a fork being stuck into a socket for the New York Neutrino, and so we asked his permission to use the same idea for our show. He very graciously gave his permission.
But I wanted to have something that, while the same idea, was also my own creation. So I took a new picture of a hand poking a fork at an outlet (kids, don't try this at home) and doodled around in Photoshop until I had something cool-looking, slapped some text on it and...... realized that I had nearly recreated Matt's original design. Oh well, let's call it homage.
I took Liz Allen's class on "Coaching a Cohesive Ensemble" at the Playground Masters Class today. Her "method" starts with a one-year plan, but I got some good ideas for the 3 rehearsals we have left. We'll see how the cast likes pretending to be zoo animals :-).
At rehearsal last night we got out into the real world for the first time (and found out what happened when 6 improvisors stopped pretending and, ... oh, you know).
Burger King and Lakeview Lounge were both very accomidating to allow us to film (especially since I'm sure BK has a corporate policy against it) (oops -- I hope I don't get those employess in trouble) (oh, yeah, someone would have to read this before they'd get in trouble -- no worries, then).
We discovered a raft of technical problems that we'll have to conquer on the tech side -- the real world, it turns out, is very dark at night, and it's often hard to hear in public places. But we had some inventive work both behind and in front of the cameras, so I think we're in good shape for where we are.
I shouldn't say this out loud (but I'm going to) but these two shows are just the trial balloon, anyway. If these go well, we're looking at doing a longer run early in 2003. And I think by "well" I mean "no one pees their pants in the middle of a scene and the theater doesn't burn down". Low expectations on my part, in other words. Except, I expect great things from this cast and crew. Do I contradict myself. Very well, I contradict myself -- I am large, I contain multitudes.
Runners -- I'm still trying to recruit a few runners, and I got asked a few times what exactly the runners have to do. The show (and I don't think I've spelled this out before) consists of short video segments that are improvised simultaneously by different actor/camera crews outside of the theater and are presented to the audience as though it was a single movie. The runners, simply enough, run the tapes of completed scenes back to the theater and then rejoin their crew to get the next tape. They'll also be on "set" help with timing, etc., when they're there. So, a grunt level, but crucial, job. Oh, and everybody on a FuzzyCo project gets paid -- that's a new policy we implemented. Not always a lot, but always something.
The cast of the Neutrino Project are all excellent improvisors (we wouldn't have asked them to be in the show if they weren't), but most of them don't have much experience or training with acting for film or video. Fortunately, my girlfriend works in the industry and I asked her for suggestions of someone to come in and give us all a crash course in acting for video. She suggested a friend of hers, Tom Groenwald.
So Tom came to NP rehearsal on Wednesday night and yelled at us a bunch (in a good way). "Too big! Too big!" We got a bunch of scenes on tape and watched them and I think it was a really good rehearsal. Next week we're going to get out into the real world, which I think will add a lot of depth to the scenes. The shape of this show is really coming into focus for me, and I can't wait to start seeing it happen.
Clever eyes will notice that a name has disappeared from the cast list. That's a danger of announcing things like this so early.
Also, August 31 is, clever minds will realize, Labor Day weekend. Several cast members said things like "I'm really excited about this show, and I could cancel my travel plans. Too bad my boy/girlfriend will break up with me over this..."
So... Shaun inquired, the next next weekend was also free at WNEP, so we moved the whole thing back a week. Still only two shows, but that's better than one, eh?
First rehearsal tonight. The last improv group I directed fired me. We'll see if this group is more receptive to the Fuzzy magic. (And, of course, it's my production company, so I'm the only one who can fire me. Bwah-ha-ha.) I'm a little nervous. And I think I have a slight fever. And I overslept this morning and was 2 hours late to work. I'll stop rambling now before I end up confessing to childhood crimes.
All the newness here at FuzzyCo is invigorating.
We've got the first FuzzyCo production that's not a vanity project (as in, I'm not in it) - Andy Eninger's new one man show, One Man Seen, I've got a brand-new toy for keeping journals - the Movable Type system, and a brand-new project to keep a journal about.
So, a little background: last month Shaun and I were in New York for the 52-hour Del Close Improv Marathon. One of the many shows we saw there was Neutrino: The Video Projects. They call it (and I'm calling it) "the world's first fully improvised live video show." It was great! We were both really excited about it and when we got back to Chicago, Shaun emailed Neutrino and asked if they'd mind if we produced a version of the show here. They were fine with that and we were off.
So, we're calling "The Neutrino Project" in honor of the creators. And lemme give them a shout-out here that they've been super helpful in sharing all their hard-won knowledge with us.
We've got a cast: Becky Eldridge, Shaun Himmerick, Russ LaChanse, Elizabeth McNaughton, Beth Melewski, Tim Sniffen, Andrea Swanson, and Zach Ward. And a crew: me, Andy Eninger, Cesar Jaime, Cesar's buddy (whose contact info I still don't have, Cesar), Michael Starcevich, and Greg Inda in the booth. Oh yeah, and somehow Shaun tricked me into being the director.
Shaun found two weekends free in the WNEP schedule, so we're going up August 31 and September 7 (both Saturdays at 10:30). One month to:
But, Fuzzy, what's this show about, how does it work? Maybe I'll get around to that next entry. I have to explain it to the cast at our first rehearsal tomorrow night, so hopefully I'll have a concise explaination by then.
