September 27 – Day 21: “Oh, the Autumn …”
If I thought yesterday’s post was lacking in content, today’s will make that look like War and Peace.
Before I get to that lack of content, though, a word of explanation on our title. Back in 1977, David Mamet wrote A Life in the Theatre, which was a marvelous play about two actors, one older and one younger, working in a regional theatre somewhere. (Remember when Mamet wrote marvelous plays? Remember when he wrote good plays?) I don’t know if it’s aged that well, if only because so much of the repertory system it deals with isn’t around anymore, but I saw the original production with Ellis Rabb and Peter Evans. (It may have been the first off-Broadway show I ever saw.) The scenes with the two actors in their real lives alternate with on-stage scenes parodying various types of shows, including a Chekhovian thing with the older actor, bearded and sitting in a wheelchair, looks out a window before emitting—with a melancholy sigh—“Oh, the autumn …”
In the 40 years since I saw that show (jeebus; forty years?), whenever I get blue or sad, I end up saying “Oh, the autumn.” This morning was one of those days. While it’s literally autumn, when I pulled the shade up this morning, there was something about the quality of the light across the street and the whole general atmosphere that made it feel like Thanksgiving (go with me on this; there was something in me) and just made me unutterably sad and melancholy. Not depressed or anything; just kind of sad.
It’s happened before and will happen again, so I know it’ll pass eventually, but while it’s happening, it’s no fun. (As it turned out, but the time I got to Union Square on my walk to rehearsal, I’d noticed it had dissipated.)
It was odd to have happened today, though, because it was absolutely beautiful this morning. The humidity had finally broken and it was sunny and the temperature was just right. As I’d mentioned, I had some errands to run before rehearsal, so I was glad to get out and do them. (Can’t talk about them until later. Nothing “secret” or career-related; just stuff I don’t want to talk about yet.)
My call wasn’t until 2:00, so I walked up to 29th Street (our last day there) and waited in the hall until the fight rehearsal that started the day was over. Something nice and unexpected when I got in was that our postcards are here. I’d wondered when they were coming (since we open next week), but here they are.
Still love the logo, even if it can look like a bar code.
The plan was to do our first run-through of the whole show for the designers, but neither the costume nor set designer were there, so we did it for solely the lighting designer. Before we began, he came up to Matt and I and asked us in a tone as serious as a funeral director’s whether the costumer had talked to us about our hair or whether we were going to be wearing hats. While I appreciate his thoroughness in making sure we’d be lighted sufficiently, I’d have thought he was breaking some really bad news.
For the first time, we had a space that was more or less the size of the actual stage we’ll be working on. We still had to squeeze some stuff a little, but there was finally some indication of how things are going to feel once we get into the theatre.
There were some adjustments that needed to be made, but things went well for the most part. Lines were a little shaky in Act Two, but it doesn’t feel like we’ve touched a lot of that for a while, so it was understandable (and things will get better, obviously, as we go along). We didn’t quite finish, but we were within about five minutes of the end when we had to break, so even though it wasn’t the beginning, it was a good start.
Walking home, I felt like having a steak, so I was heading for one of a couple of places in the East Village when I found myself walking by Veselka, a Ukrainian restaurant on 9th and 2nd that, from the reaction I got on Facebook, I’m the last person I know to have gone there. I’ve been meaning to go there since last year, but what kind of sold me on the place was that steak frites was up on the menu, and I was going to order it until I sat down and thought, “What am I doing? Shouldn’t I be ordering Ukrainian food?,” so I went for the pierogi combo plate (three “meat” [I didn’t ask; when I was in Moscow, they gave us Russian hot dogs—not sausage—for breakfast. If I don’t want to know what’s in an American hot dog, I really don’t want to know what’s in a Russian one], three potato, and two cheese), a Polish pilsner and, for dessert, cinnamon apple pierogis. It was all quite delicious and I was glad I’d finally gone.
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