I had no intention of daylogging again anytime soon, but the last two days have played like the prologue to a bad movie, low-key good things with moments of weirdness stumbling through.
Or, to be more precise, moments of weirdos.
First, though: I guess the big news for me, if not the universe, is that we will be reviving ...Shadows.... Sure, other plays we've workshopped over the years have been bigger, friendlier, bring-the-kiddies crowd-pleasers, but none have had the lasting effect of that one, nor garnered the kind of responses. Also, every time we create one of these shows we seem to stagger further from the original premise, which was to create theater based on the experiences of teens. Maybe this will bring us back to basics.
Paula, a young English teacher and soccer coach has gone gung-ho for the project, and has been actively recruiting the kind of guys who often don't turn out for things dramatic. She has no experience of the original, and I think her perspective will really help me with the rewrite. We also have three other adults on board for various duties, so we should be okay. I talked to the kid brother of the original Kevin; he saw the show when he was in elementary school, loved it and, now a high school senior with several local and high school plays under his belt, would really like to do this one. He still has to decide about auditioning, because there's a Community Players production starting up about the same time.
So, here's hoping.
I managed to get away from work early Thursday, and drove to Hyde Park. This is not the park of that other London, but a small town nearby. The huge antique warehouse there is like a literal E2, where you wander through a maze and every corner brings you childhood toys, odd comics, decades-old furniture, 1950s novelties, history.
Anyway, I was buried deep in the back section, with only one other guy nearby, and I'm looking at some underpriced original line Star Wars figures to see if I could find any my nephew would want in his collection. I'm not even thinking about the other patron; the last human beings I've seen there were two old ladies looking through cross-stitching books. Then I smell something, not antique dust mites but something more foul, and turn and this guy is standing two feet away from me, slack-jawed. I move aside in case he's wanting to look through this collection of miniature Lucas and DC heroes, but no, he just stands there, staring vacantly, and makes a noise like, hrrrrr.
I decide I need to move on, and practically have to walk through this mummy-like moron. What the hell? I've never seen street people in the wee town of Hyde Park before; it just isn't big enough. Surely its dispossessed move to London.
Maybe it's the big-box Wal-Mart and Price Club they've just put up in former farmers' fields across the road.
Last night, Friday, Nancy and I head to our local place to meet Singularity Girl and have dinner. It's changed, of course. They've redone the bar section, reduced the pool tables from 42 to a handful, and installed bowling lanes in the back-- though they've done a wonderful job of keeping the sound out of the front portion. A younger Singularity Girl had been a writer on the original ...Shadows..., and is enthused about the revival/re-workshopping. She talks about her new job, and about Michael. She's not sure about this guy and still has very mixed feelings regarding, uh, her mixed feelings. She misses her ex-girlfriend. Her personal drama gets a cheesy joke parallel in the fact that she couldn't decide between meat or seafood on her pizza.
Well, it was funny at the time.
Later that evening, we're heading home and we see a bunch of guys wandering out of the parking lot. They look a little drunk, a little slow.
They head to Adelaide Street-- a major, four-lane north/south conduit and busy on a Friday night. Several of the houses on the other side have been decorated for Halloween. It's a mood-evoking, starless night.
And they walk right into the freaking traffic.
Cars screech. Fortunately, the light at Oxford has just turned yellow and the cars were slowing down. Tires screech, but no one, apparently, gets hurt. We stand and stare.
Asshole! someone yells.
In the streetlight, we can see these are not university students, bold with alcohol, but a weird mix of people. They stagger across the street like the Family Reunion of the Pithed.
We recover. I mention that her favourite movie has never been written up at E2, and this might be a place to start, if she wants to actually node. She's been doing a lot of her own writing, and she has signed up at E2.
Her ex still has her copy of it, she notes, and she frowns, mistily.
The semi-comatose pack makes it across the street, and staggers on.
Very quiet this morning.