Back On The Boards

Good morning! I'm fresh off a fun night of Jay and Jill's big play at the Elysian last night! What was the play called? I don't even remember!

Earlier this year I saw a tape of an early version of their play via a link Jay sent me and it really made me laugh. It was sort of this satire of mid 2000s rom coms... very very on the nose and full of tropes, but with Jay's strange and unique detached point of view. Jill O'Connell who I'd see Jay do I few instagram videos with was also hilarious and a nice match to Jay's energy.

Having just seen Kate Berlant's play, I was inspired to see how I could possibly help. I had coffee with Jay and told him I really loved it and promised to write up a bunch of notes that they could consider. They had plans to do the show on the road over the summer, and I offered to direct a version of it back here in LA in the fall. So we booked a night at Elysian, had a few zoom meetings and then this week we met twice at my garage and went through it. They also had a technical director, Chris Fannelli on board who had put together all the graphics, sound cues and stuff and he was really on it organizationally, so all I had to was watch and help them dial it in. Stopping when I had an idea and suggesting refinements on tone, energy, delivery... adding lines and cutting things here and there. I was really fun and everyone was receptive to my takes.

Friday morning I had an early On Cinema writing meeting with the team (oh my goodness do we have good stuff coming your way) and then met everyone at the theater at 3 to squeeze in a blocking rehearsal and a final tech/dress rehearsal. Everything ran smoothly and I continued to refine and give little notes to tighten things up. I asked Wes to come and film it. Doug showed up to play a small but pivotal cameo and our own Alec the intern and his brother Jacob (who stole the show as Big Bird in the Oscar Special) came by to help out as stagehands as one of my big notes was to make everything feel as much as a legitimate play as possible, so in between scenes we had proper stage resets... It all felt like a nice little family production with everyone doing it for the spirit of "puttin' on a show!"

The theater filled up and soon enough it was showtime. Jay asked me to come out and introduce the night, which I did with a tremendous amount of sincerity, treating the evening with perhaps too much dignity and respect.

The show began and flied by without a hitch. Jay and Jill were incredible. Chris hit all his cues beautifully... Alec and Jacob who had only one run at learning the various changes didn't miss a beat. Doug charmed. I watched from the second floor and just smiled and giggled the whole time. It's really such a stupid hour of time wasting...my favorite kind of comedy.

I had the idea to end the night was an in character "discussion" which was really funny and turned into a Q&A... a really pointless affair which led to some hilarious improv and a different, maybe more relaxed kind of humor - Jay and Jill's absurd, ironic, satirical tone is really funny but can be a little subtle and stressful to be in the room for and it felt great to end the night on something looser.

After the show we met up at Zebulon, which of course was too loud and crowded for my taste, but I was happy to see an olive free pizza available and I ordered a few pies for everyone.

I hope we do it again. The plan is to take Wes's film, edit it and submit it to the Edinburgh Fringe Fest and take it from there. It's still quite "out there" but I can't think of a live experience that I've seen lately that makes me laugh harder and that's gotta mean something!

Anyone out there catch it last night?

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My Song of the Blog (new feature of the TimBlog) is Randy's A Few Word In Defense of Our Country "I don't like to THINK about it! (sometimes I like to think about it)"  Nearly a 20 year old song, but it sure fits in nicely right now, don't it? Oh boy.

Have a great Thanksgiving. If you want my advice, get yourself a Kosher bird. It's PRE-BRINED! Hallelujah!

P&L, T