I’m several minutes in to the reading of my script Shelby’s Vacation (see previous entry) and something’s gnawing at me. Why is this woman on vacation? I’m asking as an audience member. I’m feeling the need to know. Then suddenly my writer brain kicks in (not to be confused with my reptilian brain), and I suddenly remember: a scene is missing.

Fortunately, this didn’t derail the whole reading. What was going on in the present was engaging, I cared about who was onstage and their relationships and wasn’t worried about the past.

The next day, on a sunny porch (with 117 acres of woodland behind me and a pond made for taking a dip in front of me), I calmly chatted with the director and asked about the missing scene. He apologized and said he couldn’t figure out a way to stage it but would try and work something out for that night’s performance. He was a genius at all the other scenes so I was surprised this one scene tripped him up.

That night… the scene was missing again. In the Q & A with the audience afterwards, one fellow mentioned he had trouble following Shelby’s boss in a scene near the end where she’s talking about her upcoming wedding. Mmmhmm. I politely mentioned there was a scene that hadn’t been read that would have set it up. The director spoke up and said this was his fault.

There was so much that was funny and sharp and relatable and touching about the reading, I actually wasn’t angry about the missing scene. It seemed not worth having my reptilian brain go on the attack. And the fact that an audience member missed it, well, that was confirmation it needed to be there. The director asked (not during the Q & A on stage) if that scene is in the script, then wouldn’t it stop Shelby from fantasizing about her boss? The boss is no longer available. Good question.

No, she would still fantasize for awhile – it’s hard to let those things go, even when your fantasy person is off the market. And that happens to be the journey of the play – she learns to live in the present.

The same cannot be said of me. Part of me is still in Vermont.

Sorry for the delay in posting this week – I had a cool excuse: I was in Vermont for a reading of my script Shelby’s Vacation. It’s is a movie script not a play, but it still falls under the heading of Wonderfulness For a Writer, so I thought I’d share a little of Nancy’s Vacation with you.

I’d entered the script in a Chicago contest called Pride Films & Plays (as in, yes, gay pride) and then had the good fortune to end up in the semi-finals of that wingding AND be picked for a new “pride” script reading event at the Chandler Music Hall in Randolph, Vermont. Both of the events were set up and run by the fabulous David Zak. I can say he’s fabulous not just because he picked my script but because I’ve now met him in person. He had the inspiration to create these shindigs, the left-brain skills to organize them and as an added bonus, he had the directorial skills to pull off a movie experience on stage – no small feat considering there were with multiple locations and a fairly large cast.

It’s pretty easy for me to enjoy hiking in lush woodlands (cue up Rogers & Hart: “In our mountain greenery where God paints the scenery…”), sample maple syrup and homemade cheese, and get into the rhythm of small-town life (even Burlington and Montpelier seemed small town),but hallelujah, I took away some insights from the reading.

It had been two years since I heard Shelby’s Vacation, so I’d forgotten some of the scenes, certainly the order of them, and most importantly, the impact of them. I had fresh ears, fresh eyes, and I was like a real audience member – hey, what’s coming next and do I care about what’s happening?

My current writers’ group does not allow us to bring in movie scripts, only plays, hence, I hadn’t brought this script in for the actors to read during the past two years. Who knew this would be to my benefit by giving me distance and perspective??

One scene I’d added to the most recent draft actually showed in flashback the motivation of the main character – why she was taking this much-needed vacation. She’d been fantasizing about her boss too much – and in the crucial flashback we see her boss Marion showing off an engagement ring – she was going to get married, crushing our heroine’s fantasy life (in my movie world, lesbians are actually allowed to marry in California).

Due to some logistics issues, the director chose not to have this flashback staged or read. Without consulting me.

Did this matter? Was the writer upset? Did the director apologize?

Stay tuned for part II!

I took a break from my Fringe watching to peak in on Panel discussion at the Lost Studio last Sunday.

Sponsored by Gunfighter Nation, Padua Playwrights, and The Lost Studio, the panel was titled The Uninvited: Crashing the Party, A Counter-Conference to the 2011 TCG National Conference Convening in Los Angeles.

Chaired by John Steppling and moderated by Wes Walker, the panelists included Murray Mednick, Guy Zimmerman, Denise Devin, Charles A. Duncombe, Zombie Joe, Tina Kronis, Jay McAdams, Matt McDray, Frederique Michel, and Travis Preston.

As someone who is camped outside the TCG castle (I’m the woman tending the fire and brewing the tea), I was excited to see a dialogue and an effort at organizing a theatre community in a place as large and diverse as Los Angeles.

Because this was a meeting of theatre artists and producers (who in this difficult climate are high wire artists), the questions of art and commerce were raised. How do you stay true to a theatrical vision while facing the economic demands? How do you find audiences who are adventurous and want more than television or the Ahmanson? How do you make art in a conscious way that is transcendent?

The panel raised more questions than it answered, but to me, that signaled that there was wisdom in the room.

 For further discussion, I will send you to LA Weekly blog about the panel. Check out the comments:

 http://blogs.laweekly.com/stylecouncil/2011/06/off_the_radar_and_under-funded.php

 By the way, I don’t know how good the food was at the TCG conference, but the food at the Uninvited panel was excellent. I especially liked the oatmeal cookies and the strong spirit of hospitality at the event.

 I heard about the panel through the Lost Studio Facebook page. Now, I’m blogging about the panel here. Maybe we’re more connected than we thought in the LA Theatreland.

 And on that happy note, it was an absolute delight (as always) blogging this week. I’m off to Arizona in August for the Dirty Laundry New Play Festival conceived by fellow lafpi blogger, Tiffany Antone. For more info, you can go to the website: www.littleblackdressink.org/

The West Coast Premiere of Kate Fodor’s play, 100 Saints You Should Know, is being produced at the Elephant Theatre and is part of the Hollywood Fringe Festival.

Even though West Coast Premiere is one of my least favorite phrases, I was intrigued by the Saints in the title. Plays about saints are my second favorite kind of play (right after plays about sinners). Will there be a parade of 100 saints with brass instruments? Would St. Anthony get a monologue?

I continued to be optimistic about this play because I like seeing plays at the Elephant Theatre. They have comfortable seats. I also was able to slide into an awesome parking spot one block away.

The set of 100 Saints You Should Know is beautiful. Tree branches weave through wooden squares holding stacks of books. There are large white  screens, and the furniture is efficiently shifted on and off by guys in black. There is a tranquility to the set as if the play is more a meditation than a character driven story.

100 Saints You Should Know is about Catholicism, the relationship between celibacy and the body, and a study of prayer. Matty is a young priest who has been suspended after nude photos of men were found in his study. He goes home to his mother, but one night, the cleaner at the rectory shows up with a book he left behind. The cleaner, Theresa, is a single mom with a sixteen year old daughter, Abby. While Theresa is asking the big God and prayer questions of the priest, Abby, left outside in the car, gets drunk with a neighborhood boy, and horrible Act One ending events occur.

On one hand 100 Saints is a typical Playwrights Horizons (it was produced by Playwrights Horizons in New York) linear well-made play in which the characters are not super extreme and the settings have a realistic feel to them.

However, I found parts of 100 Saints quite moving because Fodor is smart enough to not let her play get in the way of her quest for ideas. She gives her characters time to just exist reading Victoria’s Secret catalogs and playing Scrabble. These little moments take on a prayer-like quality and give the lives of the characters a simple sacredness. After all, this is America. We can all be saints here—even the sinners.

 100 Saints You Should Know runs with Fringe Festival with performances on Fri, June 24^th at 8pm, Saturday June 25^th at 8pm, and Sunday June 26^th at 7pm. Then the play’s run continues until July 16th with Fri and Sat performances at 8pm and Sunday performances at 7pm. All performances are at the Elephant Space at 6322 Santa Monica Blvd (at Lillian Way). You can get tickets from the Fringe website or the Elephant Theatre Company website (www.elephantthearecompany.com) or by calling 213-644-0556

Voices from Chornobyl Jr. is a children’s version of Cindy Marie Jenkins’s Voices from Chornobyl. Since Cindy is a fellow blogger here on lafpi, I was very excited to see her work off the computer screen.

Voices from Chornobyl Jr. is about the Chornobyl Nuclear Meltdown as seen by a nine year old girl named Katya. The disaster happened twenty-five years ago, but recent events at Fukushima have brought nuclear power and its dangers back into public consciousness.

As Katya (beautifully played by Kappa Victoria Wood, an adult actress) both experiences and tells her story, we come to understand that radiation, though invisible, retains a power to hurt even decades after the meltdown.

The short play ends with a question and answer session with the audience as information about nuclear energy is passed between actors and spectators. Yes, a children’s play about nuclear radiation might seem odd, but that’s what makes its presence in the Fringe Festival so darn cool .

Another play with history told from a female point of view is Hog Riot! set during the hog riots of 1826 in lower Manhattan. I didn’t know about this historical happening, so I was intrigued. Hogs? Really?

 Nearly two hundred years ago, hogs were allowed to roam the streets of Manhattan freely until the Common Council issued an ordinance requiring pigs be penned or rounded up by a hog catcher. But! Does government have the right to issue such an ordinance? What of the poor pig girls who can’t afford to build pens for their hogs?

Hog Riot! focuses on the young pig girls. It is not about men and their power plays. Instead we see history unfold from the point of view of the girls on the street. The five leads (Olivia Kamalski, Milan Learned, Sullivan Long, Melissa Lozano, Mizuki Sako) are between the ages of 13 and 15 with two adult actors (Olivia Briggs and Maarten Cornelis) and a butcher violinist (Max Bogrov) rounding out the cast. The young actresses bring a lot of energy and fun to the proceedings.

Hog Riot! was written and directed by Laurel Long for her company, Dollface Ensemble. Laurel started Dollface Ensemble to create artistic opportunities for young female theatre artists and to empower them to eventually create their own opportunities. The Dollface Ensemble plays focus on a historical event told from a young female point of view.

Voices from Chornobyl Jr. will be playing at the Annex Space at the Fringe Central on Saturday, June 25^th at 1pm and Sunday, June 26^th at 1pm at at 6569 Santa Monica Blvd. Tickets are $10. You can get tickets from the Fringe website, www.hollywoodfringe.org.  You can also visit the show’s website at: www.voicesfromchornobyl.com

The last performance of Hog Riot! will be on Saturday, June 25th at 2pm at the Arena Stage Theatre at 1625 N. Las Palmas (just south of Hollywood Blvd in Hollywood). Tickets are $10, and you can get tickets from the Fringe website (www.hollywoodfringe.org).