Bruised and Happy

I woke up very stiff and had a little trouble walking to the L this
morning because my leg felt like it was popping out of my hip. Did I
sleep in a funny position? Hmmm... I don't know. I was asleep.

I think it has more to do with the fact that we had an awesome show last
night. I was SO tired and I didn't want to go. But as performers, the
show must go on. So I took a nap and showed up at the last possible
minute without being late. I sipped on a Red Bull (I accept checks
thank you) as I watched the first act of the show. Then at intermission
I slipped into the DJ booth to set my team up with some energy boosting
jams.

"Secrets" went really well. Josh is ALWAYS hilarious as the wacky
foreign exchange student, but this time he added an evil genious twist.
When Jean and Jason ended up on stage together we all knew that Jean
would end up on Jason's lap... but we weren't expecting them to totally
embrace it and start making out! ...and continue to make out as the
rest of the cast came on stage one at a time and commented about it.

And then I got to thinking about it...we do so much better when we play
what we are comfortable with. I mean its great to explore new
characters, but not artifically. You can't just wake up brilliant. You
have to work at it. So you gotta take what you have and "explore and
heighten" it. When we play something we love, we can enjoy it and take
the audience along for the ride.

So after I pulled the lights to an uprorous crowd. I skipped backstage
and cleared my mind of all thoughts. The suggestion was goosebumps. In
the R.E.M. form we do interrupting monologues. Somehow this game of DS
mentioning the wave with Rachel standing next to him lifting her arms
happened twice, so somebody said, why don't we all do it? And we got
the entire audience to do the wave and then we yelled at them for not
doing it right and that was our edit into our montage of scenes.

I don't remember my first few scenes except that I hated them. I got
stuck in a CF with this guy that...well we don't write negative things
on the blog because we never know who is reading. But it wasn't fun.

Then I had a moment of clarity. I like rolling around on the floor! My
IO Summer Intensive friends had made fun of me because I was always on
the floor - that's where I'm most comfortable. I had abandoned that
through my training because I had teachers beat into me the fact that I
needed to enter the scene with a line. I hate talking! So after the
next sweep edit, I got down and started inching across the floor. No
idea. Suddenly Mike entered, slamming the door behind him. So I
flattened myself on the floor in fear. He was looking for his dog.
Apparently he had taught his dog how to play hide and seek, but she got
to be so good at it that he could never find her. I wasn't sure if he
was actually talking about me so I stayed motionless while Mike and Dave
conversed. Eventually I started cautiously scratching myself and
nibbling for fleas. Mid sentence Mike walked over to me and his foot
brushed my hand and I yelped in pain. I heard someone in the audience
say, "oh! She's the dog!" As we got edited my face bumped into Zach's
shoulder. Rachel yelled from offstage "Hey watch it!" I started crying
and there was a sudden cacauphony of watch it! And Sorry! And get off
the stage! And stuff like that... And thus we stepped outside the
fantasy world for a second time.

My dog got brought back a second time when Rachel led me onto the stage
and read an address from something hanging from my neck. I wasn't sure
if I was a dog or a lost child so don't tell the audience but as she
turned me upstage to knock on the door I whispered, "am I a dog?" she
said "yes" just in time for Mike to answer the door and for me to jump
up on him. As he tried to get Rachel to take me off his hands I did all
my tricks. I rolled over a couple times, then I played dead just long
enough for Rachel to worry so I could jump up and bark and scare her.
Then as they continued to argue I played my "hide and seek" trick and
scooted through the upstage curtain.

A few scenes later we got Brechty for the third time when during an
edit, I went to start a scene and Mike went to start a monologue. It
could've been a disaster, but the start of the monologue was, "have you
ever made a huge mistake?" So since I was stuck on stage I visibly
nodded my head, shrugged my shoulders, and started to slink offstage.
The audience felt bad for me ...so he continued, "For example Megan came
onstage thinking she was going to start a scene with something brilliant
and hilarious, and I f'd it up" then somebody yelled and there was
another fight and I started crying again. It was awesome. That mess
was edited into some more solid scenes many involving naming certain
sexual positions by numbers.

I kept looking for an opportunity to bring the dog in for the third
time. And it finally came when Sean was helping Rachel open an ancient
Egyptian sarcophagus. The found a pile of dead bodies in what I think
was the "44" ...and...ME! Woof! <lights!>

I got goosebumps as we took our bow.

That my friends...is comedy. And I didn't have to say a damn word.