This freaks me out on acid.

Ya, Fertile Ground's in full swing, but it's not too soon to plan your post-Fest escapades. Exhibit A, as Rod Serling used to say: this video for Third Rail's upcoming extravaganza. If this doesn't get you into the theater, nothing can.

Fertile Ground 2011 opens….any minute now!

Portland’s scrappy, anything goes, DIY theater fest opens tonight, launching 10 crazy days and night of marathon theatergoing. Since at this point I’m officially the last person in town to handicap the Festival, I’m going to be quick.

TONIGHT I’m attending Nick Zagone’s The Missing Pieces at the Portland Playhouse, a play about a boy's self-initiation into a big, big world. The play is dear to my heart, since it started out in PlayGroup the now-defunct PCS writing group that morphed into the fabulous Playwrights West), and was presented in JAW 2009. And now the full production, which runs through January 30 -- unless, that is, it becomes a huge hit like the Playhouse’s Festival offering of last year, Hunt Holman’s Willow Jade, which went on to win a Drammy Award for Outstanding Playwriting. Break many legs this year, Nick.

Just a few more highlights before I head out. Kim Rosenstock’s aleatory 99 Ways to [interfere with] a Swan continues its wildly popular run at Theatre Vertigo; and the always absorbing and startling Hand2Mouth company presents a new piece by Erin Leddy entitled My Mind Is Like an Open Meadow. And a young audiences piece that adults will enjoy as much as their kids is a wild new Monty Pythonesque version of Robin Hood, penned by James Moore (yes, that James Moore, he formerly of defunkt fame) at Northwest Children’s Theatre. (Okay, so I’m the dramaturg — I can still say it’s hilarious, right??)



Several staged readings of note also grace the Festival, including Andrea Stolowitz’s mindbending new play Antarktikos (on which I served as dramaturg and Gemma Whelan directed) at ART, and Steve Patterson has an eerie new play entitled Immaterial Matters, presented at CoHo Productions. Also Claire Willett has a new play, That Was the River, This is the Sea, co-written with Gilberto del Campo, which has a whole run at a new venue, The Art Department.

AND I can’t wait for Futura, Jordan Harrison’s bracing dystopian view of the future of literature. Though the official opening is February 4, Portland Center Stage is opening its invited dress rehearsal to Festival passholders, and discounted tickets during the regular. Do not miss this one.

There’s a ton more, but now I must shift from gush to rush -- so see you at the Festival.

When Irish guys are stylin’

Across the country but especially here in Portlandia, I’m famous for evaporating like morning mist. Whether it’s a theater event, an art opening or Storm Large’s surprise party, take your eyes off me for a minute and I’m gone for the night. No. I'm not going through that awkward stage. It’s just hate the long goodbyes that are the fallout of social occasions.

My technique, honed by years of disappearing acts, involves scoping out all available exits upon arrival. Ideal targets? Egresses located just past bathrooms; back doors; secret passageways (oh yes — for some reason these abound in Portland). A quick scrutiny of “alarmed” doors, by way of checking whether their wires are attached or not, often yields handy exits where angels fear to tread. And catered affairs are a bonus; the servers will gladly clue you in about any hidden corridors or tunnels.

Imagine my surprise when “Cousin Tabitha” recently informed me that there's a term of art for the disappearing act: the Irish Goodbye. There’s even a Facebook page dedicated to the practice. So apparently I come from a long line of escape artists; it’s actually my genetic heritage.

Recently, though, that changed for me when I donating my aging Jetta to AllClassical. Now I get around by walking (a subversive act for this former Angeleno), busing, cycling, renting the occasional ZipCar. And also the kindness of acquaintances.

Whereas at first the inconvenience of all this seemed colossal — I mean, the ability to take off on impulse is very nearly the definition of American, is it not? — it’s turning to be a kind of blessing. Last week, for ex, Olga Sanchez and I got lost in the fogbound northwest hills and had a fun adventure together. My bus rides around town have resulted in a great increase of reading (and when you do that for a living, you know that can’t be bad). In attending Superior Donuts last week with my Drammy colleague Barbara, I found much about her storied career that I’d never suspected (since I’d never had the time to ask before). From the bicycling, I’ve discovered that oxygenation is entertaining. And last night, instead of being the first guy out the door at Vertigo, I headed over to The Blue Monk — ostensibly to wait for my ride home, then going on to have a rollicking conversation with playwright Kim Rosenstock and director Megan Kate Ward.

As recently as a few weeks ago, none of this would have happened. Had I still my own car, in each of these cases I would have appeared and vanished suddenly. Like Count Dracula, but without the starched shirt, cape and pomade.

So for now, anyway, it’s farewell to the Irish Goodbye and hello to a more earthbound MrMead than perhaps you’ve spotted fleetingly in the past.

Slán go fóill.

Belarus and Hungary and what you can do

Yeah, it's about time I came out of retirement, right? Well, here's a good reason. Never mind what you think of the Ho-Hum Theater's latest Arthur Miller revival, there are places in the world where theater really matters because it provides a hard-to-govern forum for social ferment. Which has attracted some serious attempts to repress it.



Probably you've heard about what's going on in Hungary these days, but matters in Belarus are no less dire. To bring attention to the plight of the Belarus Free Theater, cities nationally and internationally are co-presenting the event described in the press release below.

Portland's edition is this coming Monday, January 3. Please come if you can to show your support for freedom of expression everywhere and to hear this amazing Pinter piece read. The reading lasts about an hour, and if you like, you'll have the opportunity to sign an online petition. See you there.

..............................

CONTACT:
Tim DuRoche: (503) 720-6171
Tracy Cameron Francis: (503) 318-4330
e-mail: timd@worldoregon.org

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

“FREE BELARUS – PORTLAND”: LOCAL THEATER ARTISTS COME TOGETHER IN SHOW OF SOLIDARITY
FOR INTERNATIONAL HUMAN RIGHTS AND ARTISTIC FREEDOM

December 29, 2010- Portland, OR. In an act of support and solidarity for artistic freedom and international human rights, Portland theater artists will present Free Belarus–Portland, featuring a reading of Being Harold Pinter, a work by The Belarus Free Theater — a group that has been in hiding, following massive government crackdowns on democratic dissent and free expression in the republic of Belarus.

The reading will take place at on the Mezzanine of Portland Center Stage, 128 NW Eleventh Avenue, on Monday, January 3, from 6-7:30 p.m. The event is free and open to the public. Being Harold Pinter is a piece that mixes transcribed statements by Belarusian political prisoners with writings by the award-winning playwright Pinter, who also was a friend and supporter of the troupe. The play blurs the boundaries between art and reality, delivering a poignant contemporary commentary on violence, oppression, freedom and human dignity.
The Portland installment of Free Belarus will feature local acting talents of Bobby Bermea, Chris Harder, Hannah Treuhaft, Dustin Rush, Haley Talbot and Noah Dunham.

The event is part of Global Artistic Campaign in Solidarity "Free Belarus," a coordinated effort by theaters and human rights activists around the country (in Portland, Washington DC, Minneapolis, and New York) and in the UK (including the passionate support of theater luminaries like Ian McKellen, Tom Stoppard, and Jude Law) to bring attention to the plight of artists and citizens in the former Soviet republic. Global Artistic Campaign in Solidarity "Free Belarus" is the U.S. extension of a campaign begun in the UK five years ago by Tom Stoppard and others.

Also that evening at Portland Center Stage, attendees will have the opportunity to hear a statement from co-artistic director Natalya Kolyada and to sign an online petition in support of BFT: http://humanrights.change.org/petitions/view/free_political_prisoners_in_belarus.

Aaron Landsman, a New York-based theater artist and one of the event’s national organizers, said: “Just keeping their cause visible can make a difference. Because while the Belarusian government is brutal they aren’t dumb. The more attention that is focused on specific individuals there, the less likely they are, frankly, to kill those individuals, and the more likely the country itself will advance . . . I was lucky enough to work with Free Theater in Minsk. I cannot quite describe to you what it feels like to see theater in a safe house in which are crammed 60 of the most eager, desperate people, who are all there to have their sanity restored, their country’s lies undone, their friends remembered.”

BACKGROUND ON BELARUS FREE THEATER
The Belarus Free Theater was scheduled to perform at New York’s Public Theater for the Under the Radar Festival, which begins early in January. But that appearance is now threatened, as both founders of the troupe are in hiding, and another member is in jail, as the result of a government crackdown on protests against a presidential election that human rights groups have described as rigged.

The arrests of the theater company members are part of a larger campaign of repression directed by the government of Aleksandr G. Lukashenko, who claims to have won 79 percent of the vote in the recent election. Since 1994 Mr. Lukashenko has run this former republic of the Soviet Union, leading what former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice once called “the last true remaining dictatorship in the heart of Europe.” Last week, Mr. Lukashenko announced that hundreds of “bandits and saboteurs,” including several of his opponents, had been arrested. Among those arrested and detained were members of the Belarus Free Theater including artistic directors Natalya Kolyada and Nikolai Khalezin. Both Kolyada and Khalezin have been released and have gone underground. Their manager Artsiom Zheleznyak is still detained. Over 600 people are still behind bars.

Organized and coordinated by Tracy Cameron Francis (Theatre Without Borders, Hybrid Theatre Works) and Aaron Landsman (Elevator Repair Service), in conjunction with Mark Russell, Artistic Director of Under the Radar Festival, and with the support of Michael Rohd, Sojourn Theater, Mead Hunter, and Tim DuRoche of the World Affairs Council of Oregon—with generous in-kind support from Portland Center Stage.

Xtra, Xtra

“If you can type, you can make movies” -- so goes the tagline for one of the hottest websites in the stratosphere these days, Xtranormal. This outfit provides free software that allows you to put your own dialogue into the mouths of prepared animated characters and then watch their conversation play out.

As such, it’s launched a veritable gold rush of snarky cartoons, sometimes giving voice to wish fulfillment conversations we’d like to have, others time reporting outrageous (and often recurrent) dialogue verbatim.

The first one I saw came to me from the my Cousin Tabitha (nhrn), who I have no doubt has had countless conversations very close to this one. (Warning: this piece contains some “language,” so don’t play it full blast whilst at work o whereva.)




Here’s another fave, created by one of Portland’s best actors, Tim True. If you’re a performer, I’ll bet you’ve had much the same conversation with somebody at some time.





And finally, one I especially love because it has been my lot in life, as a writer, editor and dramaturg, to perform the sort of work that many people believe they could do very well at any time if only they were ever in a mood someday to feel like it. If you’ve encountered analogous attitudes in your profession, whatever it may be, you’ll appreciate “So You Want To Write a Novel”:

I got your new music right here.

Blame it on the holydays, or blame it on my favorite scapegoat — le media social. I do, and frequently -- not merely for convenience, but because it’s demonstrable (accent on demon) that the siphoning off of communicative impulses into Facebook and Twitter makes blogging seem downright long-form (aka antique).

Culpabilities aside, I firmly resolve, with the help of thy grace, to return to ye olde confessional mode soon. Meanwhile, here’s a fun bagatelle for you. One of my favorite composers in the aggressively moderne style is György Ligeti. Like many, my first exposure to this artist was via Stanley Kubrick, who used Mr. Ligeti’s often disturbing music to great effect in The Shining in particular.

Ligeti doesn’t make for pleasant background music; it’s full of quirks, such as flatulent squeaks and whispered words. Many’s the time I’ve been asked to eject his CDs or, more passive-aggressively, just asked “How can you listen to that?” And my response is that I don’t invariably hear scary movie music. Instead I hear whimsical, playful, even mischievous music.

Q.E.D.: this performance of Ligeti’s Mysteries of the Macabre, as performed by the fabulous Oregon-based new music ensemble Beta Collide, in a video produced by Yachats company BlueDot Productions. Consider this proof positive that new music doesn’t have to be a solemn affair.

Mysteries of the Macabre from BlueDot Productions on Vimeo.

Theater High

A highlight of my recent trip to see my sainted mother in St Louis was a visit to the Rep to see a new play by Matthew Lombardo, High. As rolling premieres go, this production is something of a stampede; it had runs at Hartford Theater Works and Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park before moving on to St Louis Rep, and the plan all along was to wind up Nueva York — Broadway.

When my mother picked up the tickets, the box office took one look at her and decided to do some pre-emptive deprogramming. “You do realize it’s……gritty?”

This spurred me to go online and find out just how nitty this gritty could get. Apparently the fuss is about the main character — a potty-mouthed nun sans wimple (but avec rosary) who works in a Church rehab service. Enter the challenge of her life in the form of an equally battle-scarred addict, and a shady priest with a mysterious agenda, and the games begin.

How does a lurid three-hander get Broadway legs? By dint of its star, Kathleen Turner. The very idea of sexy Ms. Turner married to Christ yet speaking fluent gutter punk is too delicious to resist. The gambit worked for the Rep; we were there on closing night, and the place was packed.

We got to sit within spitting distance of Ms. Turner, whose legendary smoky voice has deepened to a near-baritone. The woman has gravity; she commands a stage presence you don’t always get from movie stars in live performances. Fortunately for the production, her costars (Evan Jonigkeit and Michael Berresse) are both excellent — as they had better be, to stand up to Ms. Turner’s incandescence. In fact all the production elements are superb; there seems to be nothing else for this show to do but open on Broadway.

It’s interesting to me that St Louis was part of this gradual slouch toward New York. Leafing through the Rep’s program, I was impressed to see ads for about a dozen more theaters than I knew existed in that town. Seth Gordon is now at the Rep, as its Associate AD, where he’ll be kick-starting a new play development wing; he was out of town while I was there, but I was privileged to have lunch with two other noted theater artists, dramaturg Megan Monaghan and director Tlaloc Rivas, both teaching now at U of Missouri. And Carter Lewis has been catalyzing Wash U’s playwriting program for several years now. Looks like I have to revise my assumptions about St Louis being a theater backwater.

Oh, about the box office’s warnings? The putative grittiness came down to occasional blue language, a brief but convincing display of violence, and a smidge of nudity. My sainted mother’s assessment? “I’ve seen worse than that on TV.”