Working in the Office

As I type this, I'm over at the DRF office with Rob and Rufus. After we looked at the timetable to finish up the horror film we're working on, we started going through the different composers that we want to consider for the upcoming movie. I posted an ad on Craig's List about the opportunity, and I sorted through 40 composers to find the best dozen to pass onto Rob. He is going through some of the websites and sample tracks now, since it is ultimately his decision and his deal that he has to make with the composer. I'm the Internet middle man who pulled the people out of the web and put them in front of the director so he could make a choice. I guess that's sometimes what real producers do. We're doing all the work cooped up in the office, all three of us working away at our laptops. It's just a question of finding the way to make money doing this.

Up and running

I am now full-swing into my rehearsals for D&S, the Philly Fringe show in which I am performing. It's sometimes a strange process for me since my character is only in isolated scenes throughout the show, but all of them are with the same actress playing my wife. Everyone else is in large group scenes, they play multiple characters, and they have all different kinds of energy bouncing through the room. It's bizarre to only have five scenes to play with, but there is also an excitement to that as well. My character has a very clear story-arc that moves well from scene to scene making clear and distinct points. The lead character, my wife, goes through a lot of other scenes as she moves her way through the play, but it's very fun to get to play my entire show scene-to-scene.

These rehearsals, of course, are just one of the things that I'm working on at the moment. I'm about to start directing CDD for the NYC Fringe Festival again, and I've just completed the second draft of my audio drama of Jekyll and Hyde. And like all good little actors, I've been keeping up the audition rounds, and I've had a few exciting things happen lately, which I will post about in the next few days. I promise.

Local on the 8s

This is a really quick entry. I just wanted to point out how wonderful the weather has been. And us MNDreamers were just lucky enough to have a summer of very calm and clear weather, before the heat of the summer descended on us. We had some really nice weather for our shows, which all got performed before the weather really broke 90 degrees. And that's a very lucky thing for us.

I told you this was quick.

Shakespearing out of doors

Over the last two evenings, I've been to see two different companies perform two different Shakespeare productions out-of-doors for summer crowds. Well, one of the actual performances was moved to an indoor space because of weather-related situations. But the other was outside in a little gazebo in a nice park. Adding in the outdoor Shakespeare that I did this summer, that's at least three different companies running concurrent productions. It used to be that the summer season in Philly was a little slow, but now outdoor productions seem to be kicking it up a notch. It's nice to see the scene developing around in local communities, local organizations that bring these companies out to perform.

The company that I just worked for has spent the last five summers building their relationships with the communities around the parks where they perform, and we were like small rock stars in those places where the company has been going for years. It's a great feeling to know that you're a part of such a great cultural event for a community that is looking forward to your visit. It's a great thing to be a part of.