PEBKAC

I've worked for many different organizations over the years, and change has been a constant.

My current day job is in the midst of a massive operational change. An international-nonprofit organization, it has had double-digit annual growth for over a decade. More money equals more mission, but also more staff and more systems and procedures. As an organization grows it stretches it's systems. After a while you need to change and adapt, or everything will come to a screeching halt--a sort of organizational implosion. Our various software systems were approaching that point and needed to change to reflect not only where we are now, but where we are heading. So we're undergoing a massive change. Some are not happy with it, even though once complete it will make their jobs much, much easier.

In all the jobs I've held, at organizations ranging in size from my grandpa's farm and roadside vegetable stand when I was a kid, to the oil change shop I ran in high school--on and on 'till you get to the current day job--there has been one constant impediment to any new ideas or changes. PEBKAC (Problem Exists Between Keyboard and Chair) is the term most IT guys I've known like to use.

Many are resistant to change for the sake of being resistant to change. In no field I've worked in has there been more resistance to change than in the performing arts. I've never wondered why some many of the very intelligent, creative people I've worked with have been so set in their ways. We fear new ideas, we fear change, we fear not changing and being left out in the cold. Something will have to budge.

When we see new ideas, new ways of looking at our field, are we unwilling to try because we've tried them all before and they don't work, or because no one else has tried them? What types of "leaders" only try something by following when someone else has first succeeded?

Chicago Promoter's Ordinance is Tabled for the Time Being

The proposed promoter’s ordinance will not come to a vote tomorrow.

Chairman Schulter (47th Ward) has decided not to report the event promoter ordinance out his City Council Licensing and Consumer Protection Committee. In other words, it will not be on the City Council agenda tomorrow and there will not be a vote on the bill as previously scheduled.

via Time Out Chicago

In response to an nearly unprecedented outpouring of concern from the Chicago music community, Ald. Eugene Schulter, chairman of the City Council License Committee, has decided that he will not present the so-called "event promoter's ordinance" to the full council on Wednesday for a vote as scheduled -- and that the committee will go back to work on fine-tuning the law.

via Jim DeRogatis

Roundups and Tidbits

Weekend was good. Birthday Saturday, Mothers Day Sunday. Relaxing and fun. Had fun at the birthday party, hope everyone who attended did as well. We were going to go to the zoo for mothers day, but it was pouring, so we had brunch at our favorite place, which is right by our house and then chilled (and even got a nap in) instead.

Had to cancel the show on Thursday. We always have had a hard time on the second weekend.

Friday's show was pretty rocky. Low energy and there were a lot of additional dramatic pauses. 10 minutes of additional run-time worth. Had a critic in the house, so we'll see what she has to say. It was not the best performance to have caught.

Talking to her afterwards she told me she had shows to review Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and Monday for last weekend. That is a herculean feat for anyone to see that many shows in a row, let alone review 'em. The spring season is definitely in bloom.

Saturday's show was the best it has been so far. The actors are settling in their roles and making new discoveries--especially finding more of the comedy. I think that one of the many huge advantages that larger theatres (and ones with their own space) have over the small/tiny is the luxury of two-weeks of previews. It's tough (to say the least) to load in a show on Monday that opens that weekend. But we have to play the hands we're dealt, and overcome those obstacles as best we can.

No Love from the Reader. They didn't like the play, and had only a sentence to say about the production.

HENRY IV After a fall from his horse, an Italian nobleman claims he's King Henry IV--the German one--and his friends and servants humor him by adopting medieval names and costumes when in his presence. Eventually we learn that this Don Quixote is actually a Hamlet: at least some of his madness is feigned. This being a Luigi Pirandello play, the central conflict is between illusion and reality; but where Pirandello makes that conflict unsettling and illuminating in Six Characters in Search of an Author and Tonight We Improvise, his writing here is tedious and clumsy. Tony Adams's production for Halcyon Theatre maintains an admirable energy throughout--most impressively in the notoriously dull first act--but its breakneck pacing comes at the expense of clarity. --Zac Thompson

We (myself included) often talk about how actor and audience are all that is needed for theatre. But, I think there are two more parts that need to be in that equation. The story being told and how it is told. If you don't like the story, it doesn't matter how it is told, you'll rarely love the production. Or, if it's a great story told poorly, the same thing happens. One side can be good enough to override the other and one can really like a production, but I don't know if it is possible to love a show without liking both.

So far three of the five expected reviews are out. Two very good, one not so much. (I really enjoy the Review Roundup page on TheatreinChicago.com.)

Digital camera is dead. Hopefully soon we'll be able to get a new one, but for now, we go on sans pics. The grandparents are missing out on hundreds of baby pictures. It's amazing how many more we take when we don't have to pay to get them developed.

Happy Friday-- Sam Cooke's Advice Edition

I think the secret is really observation. If you observe what's going on and try to figure out how people are thinking and determine the times of your day, I think you can always write something that people can understand. --Sam Cooke

In-between the lone artist speaking for him/herself and pandering to the bottom line there is a middle ground that few today seem willing to explore. I wonder if in the busyness of expression too many artists forget to observe the world around them. In theatre this runs rampant. "Political Theatre" is too often so unbalanced to be anything more than a rant preaching to the choir. "Serious" shows about the artists' relationships and their apartments abound, alongside fluffy sequins stuffed with jazz hands and cover bands hiding lack of depth in spectacle and nostalgia.

Recently I finished reading The Secret Life of Puppets that had the best description of the difference between high and low art that I have come across to date. In one chapter, Victoria Nelson is comparing Kafka and Lovecraft, using the example that when reading Kafka, one has completed a journey, though they may go back are reread the same work. When one finishes a horror or detective novel, mired in formula, they never fully complete the journey--they pick up another volume to devour.The formulaic nature of horror, noir, the fantastic and other "low art" genres have one flaw that separates them from the "high art" of Kafka and others. They never get too close to the source of the terror or wound; never close enough to complete the journey. The wound is not from our inner selves, it is from the other. This doesn't discount their place, or purpose. Both are necessary.

High art--low art is a symbiotic, mutually reinforcing continuum, not a dichotomy-a continuum on which it is possible to go too far in either direction. Too much celebration without the spine of Story means a basic emotional bonding with the work never takes place, but a reader will also drown in too much formulaic tale telling.

It's easy to swing too far to one end of the pendulum, to fail to observe ourselves and the other outsider. Both are necessary, both reinforce each other. Legally Blonde and Mother Courage both have validity and purpose.

We get ourselves into trouble in denying or ignoring one or the other. Our politicians lost this concept long ago, but if artists--those charging themselves with illuminating the greater truths of our world--are unable to hear other sides and other voices, we cannot truly observe the world in which we live. How can we examine and mine the truth of that which we cannot observe?


Happy Friday Y'all

Got a Sitter for the Birthday Party

This week two of the folks that worked on Henry had Birthdays, Denise who's in the show and Barber who did sound design for it. Oh and this Saturday is my birthday too. (31st)

So, we thought it would be fun to throw a big ole shin-dig at the Peter Jones Gallery after the show on Saturday!

If you're in town and wanna stop by, come at 10:15 p.m. for the party… $10 will cover the cost of drinks and snacks for everyone, and the extra will go towards Halcyon Theatre and our upcoming Alcyone Festival……

OR come at 8 p.m., and see the show ($15 general admin, $10 with headshot/resume.) It'll be at the Peter Jones Gallery; 1806 W. Cuyler, 2^nd Floor (Map)

RSVP, to my lovely and talented wife (jenn AT halcyontheatre DOT org) if you're thinking of stopping by, cuz if we don't know yer comin', we can't buy enough supplies! Nothing ruins a birthday party faster than running out of booze.

It's my party and I'll have a benefit if I want to. Plus it'll be a great place for in-person civil discourse.

Brought to you by the committee for My Birthday--bringing people together since '77.

GIMP?

Does anyone out there have any experience with GIMP? I'm looking at it and would love some feedback on how well it works. My version of photoshop is old and as much as I love the creative suite, I can't really afford to fork over that much money to adobe right now.

Any one out there tried it?

Chicago Free Press review for Henry IV

It is rare that a show with dense verbosity and classic, tangled plotlines is able to accurately reflect contemporary existence, but such is the case with Halcyon Theatre’s vibrant production of Luigi Pirandello’s “Henry IV.” As adapted by Tony Adams, this production allows us to examine the often absurd power of the wealthy, the church and medical officials. Most importantly, in its title character, we are able to remind ourselves of the multiple ways in which we all try to avoid bleak day-to-day realities.

Twenty years after a nobleman’s fall resulted in his living a delusional life as medieval German emperor King Henry IV, the primary participants of the event return and attempt to shock him back into reality. Under the guise of a dead mother’s final wish, a passionate (if misguided) doctor leads the group through a series of scenarios that are quickly undermined by the passionate nobleman-king. Buffeted by a group of live-in actors who comprise his imagined court, we soon begin to wonder if the intended target is truly insane or just merely seeking his own kind of revenge on the former acquaintances who have wronged him.

At times confusing and a bit too ponderous, this mounting of “Henry IV” ultimately reveals itself to be a passionate, well-articulated production. As director, Adams’ love for the material is evident from the beginning moments. He imbues the opening scenario with a contemporary musicality, giving modern audiences a leeway into the difficult material at hand. Adams also, with the artful aid of Patricia J. Murphy, structures costumes that signify both the sweepingly medieval and the constrained contemporary eras of clothing utilized in the production. Adams’ set design also reveals itself to have multiple levels and shadings that illuminate the tale with generosity. Antonio Bruno’s pulsing techno-friendly score adds the appropriate level of tension and mirrors the misguided heroics and confused heart of the primary characters.

In retrospect, it is hard to signify whether the opening fight chorography is awkwardly staged on purpose or if it is just a minor slip in an otherwise smoothly rounded imagining. Additionally, there are some awkward patches of acting and overemphasized emoting, but these flaws may evaporate over multiple showings.

Overall, Adams has comprised a cast of passion and skill. Even Nick Staten, playing a mostly silent valet, makes a favorable impression. Every thought and reaction of his supporting character registers with ease and true emotion, proving that Staten is a performer to watch out for. As Henry IV, James Allen resonates with passionate shrewdness and hammer-hard comic edge. He is ably supported by energetic Scott Allen Luke as Landolph, his primary conspirator. Luke beguiles with magnificent playfulness and earns audience sympathy with his ultimately supportive confusedness. Denise Santomauro provides some refreshing feminine petulance as a sassy, multi-leveled descendant of the original reveling transgressors. She is well matched by Greg Polijacik as her supportive, loving counterpart, Charles DiNolli. It is Petrucia Finkler as Matilda and Eric Lee as the doctor who imbue this production with the freshest take on Adams’ vision, though. Their unique artistry is equal to Adams’ productiveness and then some. They practically carry the show away on their very industrious shoulders. --Brian Kirst

From the Chicago Free Press website