A mystery Solved

A couple of times I have found white Indian paint on my black cassock, both times in the same place. The discovery leads to frenzied cleaning by Jessica, who is the costumer in charge of male Principals.

But where does the paint come from? Father Martin never comes into contact with Indians onstage, and steers well clear of them backstage.

A mystery. A small one, granted, but hey – it’s late June at the pageant. There are eons to go and anything to occupy our minds.

Tonight I figured it out.

Near the start of Big Battle an evil Indian (Troy Folkner) comes up to Father Martin’s cabin. Stalwart defender Tshombe Selby grabs him and throws him against the wall a couple of times before knocking him back into the sand. Troy does a back flip off the deck into the sand.

A little while later poor feeble Father Martin staggers over and leans on the wall right where Troy has been flung. As I staggered over tonight I looked at the wall and saw a big smear of white Indian paint that Troy had left behind.

Solution: adjust my blocking very slightly, lean against the wall eight inches to the left.

One Goal Achieved

One of my goals this summer was to lose ten pounds. As of tonight the bathroom scale says that I have achieved that goal. Of course the three days of the Hurl & Poop Plague might have helped.
Whatever works!

No Sweat

This evening it was 70 degrees with a brisk wind out of the northeast. As Bob Midgette said at fight call: “It’s November!”

Out came long pants and sweatshirts. I found all my sweats wadded up in the back seat of my car. Nipply Indians backstage and we didn’t even break a sweat doing the show.

But y’know, I think it threw us. It was a fairly lackluster show. You would think we would have been energized but…meh.

I survived the delightful stomach bug I had last weekend. Why today I felt almost normal.

Creeping Crud

A quick entry for those who wonder where I’ve gone to. And thanks for asking.

I’ve also been wondering where I’ve gone and I think that the rush of journal entries during rehearsals and opening and the first couple of weeks constitute Chapter 1. Not that I thought about it in those terms while I was writing about them, but that’s what I’m thinking now.

I have all of these notes for things to write about and make new notes every day, but I think I’m in hesitation mode as to how Chapter 2 begins.

Also there is a new kind of Colony Crud making the rounds of the Company. During rehearsals we all shared a bronchial infection which was exacerbated by the heavy smoke from the wildfire that continues to smolder nearby. Now that affliction has cleared up and there is a new treat; a stomach flu kind of thing. There is a day of fever, yesterday for me; a day of feeling like you’ve been run over by a truck, today for me. Next up: a day of throwing up, followed by a day (or two) of diarrhea. I am of course in denial that I will have to go through the next steps. The only part that worries me is the fact that Father Martin spends all of Pot Scene, Small Assembly, Parapet and Large Assembly lying in his bed on stage. I’m already planning discreet exit strategies if I have an attack of the screaming shits during a quiet moment. The Wise Actor thinks about these things.

Anyway – the early stages of this crud have left me without the motivation to write for the past couple of days.

Thanks for continuing to check in here. I’ll be back for the start of Chapter 2.

Rote

We have had the most delightful weather the past couple of days. Temps in the low 80s, a light north wind. The wind direction keeps the smoke from the wildfires away from us (alas, Ocrakoke is getting it now). The temperature at the show after sundown is low 70s. It was actually a bit chilly after the show last night!

I’d like to say that the cool weather has given a new energy to the show, and it has. But offsetting this is the rote ness that is setting in. I’m not sure if “rote ness” is even a word but that’s what spell check came up with. You know what I mean. We’re starting to do this by rote. Press “play” and we do the pageant. We’re phoning it in. I watch the crowd scenes and can tell that some of the people are a million miles away. Don’t get me wrong – all proceeds as it should. It’s just not focused. Hear a cue and say “God save our Queen!” We play the tape in our heads and put in our two cents at the appropriate times. Its only when the tape varies that we get focused. Last night there were a couple of line flubs from Principals. And although I was just playing the tape in the background of my brain I came alert, and I wasn’t even on stage during the flubs, I heard them through the monitor. “That’s not right!” my brain screamed.

And this rote ness is only going to get worse. Last night was number 15 of approximately 70.

Catching Up

I’ve been a poor correspondent the past couple of days. I had a friend come to town for the weekend and I did the beach thing (note to self: more beach thing). Having a guest (or anyone) in the house inhibits me from writing. For me writing is a very solitary process involving lots of pacing and muttering or just staring into space. Funny – the pacing and muttering part is very similar to memorizing lines. When line learning I pace and mutter trying to get words INTO my brain. When writing I pace and mutter trying to get words OUT of my brain.

When last we joined our heroes the show had been smoked out twice in a row from the nearby wildfires. Friday we were under Code Purple again but we went in. The breeze was stirring and the powers-that-be decided we were going to go ahead. So we coughed and hacked our way through it and lo and behold the wind shifted a little during Plymouth and the smoke went away! It truly is amazing how just a moderate shift in the wind pattern will either blanket us with smoke or clear us out. Along with the wind-shift came the threat of storms moving in from the northwest. From smoke pace (try to breath) to rain pace (must go faster). But we didn’t get any rain. This was the first time we went at rain pace and as usual the note from stage management was “That was perfect pace. Do it that way all the time.”

Saturday night was a little smoky but not too bad. That performance was graced with a lot of alumni who were in town for Bob Knowles Memorial. Comments I got fro the alumni were favorable.

The memorial on Sunday was well attended. Perry Turner officiated. He holds the record for most male Principal roles played (5). Afterwards I introduced myself and said I was closing in on his record, Father Martin being my fourth role. He says if I ever come back for a fifth role he’ll come back for his sixth to maintain his record, although I think both he and I have aged out of most roles we haven’t done yet.

Many remembrances were given about Bob. The Alumni Choir sang “The Lord’s Prayer,” “Jesus, Once an Infant Small (what we call “Lullaby” in the show”) and of course the service ended with “Final March.”

A verse chosen by Bob:

When I come to the end of the road

And the sun has set for me

I want no rites in a gloom filled room

Why cry for a soul set free?

Miss me a little – but not too long

And not with your head bowed low

Remember the love that we once shared

Miss Me – But Let Me Go.

For this journey that we all must take

And each must go alone

It’s all a part of the Master’s plan,

a step on the road to home.

When you are lonely and sick of heart

Go to the friends we know

And bury your sorrows in doing good deeds.

Miss Me – But Let Me Go.

Buffalo and Pete Peterson

Curtain Call

All right, here are my thoughts about the curtain call.

I feel that if the end sequences, Large Assembly through Final March, are done correctly, if the staging is spot on, if the company as a whole is committed enough to the moment, if all the planets line up, if the tension and emotion and final release are all in place, then I think the audience will spontaneously burst into applause and stand up and cheer, or at least sit in stunned silence, perhaps wiping a tear from their eyes. I remember when it would be so back in The Fred Chappell Show. Not every night but often it would happen.

And of course there are the two very obvious reasons not to have a curtain call.

1/ Their disappearance is the mystery of the piece. All the pageantry and pomp, all the struggle, all the passion and desperation, it all just vanishes! I don’t know how many people are in Final March – 60? 70? They gather up every set piece and prop, every hope and dream that brought them to the New World, and take it away with them and leave nothing but an empty stage with the flag fluttering over the chapel. I’m not explaining this well – those of you who’ve been in it know what I’m talking about.  It should leave the audience slack-jawed staring at the empty stage, feeling the mystery. Where did they go? What happened to them?

2/ The author of the play did not want a curtain call.

In rehearsals the director noted the controversy about curtain call and gave as one of the justifications for including it the fact that modern TV-watching passive audiences don’t even know that they’re supposed to clap. And this is true - I agree completely with that point. An average Lost Colony audience isn’t a theater-going audience. The Lost Colony is not so much a theatrical event as it is a tourist attraction. Most of them have never and will never go to a “play.” They don’t know how to respond.

At the first Company meeting (only about a month ago – seems like years) the Designer William Ivey Long gave a brief talk about how live theater seems to be dying. As you know he is at the top of the live theater heap in New York. I personally am a rinky-dink producer in my home town. And he was saying the exact same thing I have been realizing over the past few years. It is dying. We who are committed to it find ourselves working for free or even paying for it ourselves just to keep it going to smaller audiences, older audiences; and we ask ourselves how do we get the younger people back into the theater in the age of YouTube and streaming video and instant gratification for entertainment? Mr. Long and I had a brief exchange after the meeting and a moment of gestalt – from New York all the way down to small town community theater – it is dying.

Trickle down – Why are New York theater professionals dominating The Lost Colony (or other places – I see the same thing happening in smaller venues like Raleigh)? Because the theater scene in New York is dying, there is less opportunity to practice their craft, and earn a living doing it, so they are going to where the work, the art, is.

But I digress … I think my point in including that brief lament is that we have to train the modern audience how to respond to live theater. Hey folks! Now you’re supposed to clap! And I think that was the director’s point as well. Maybe some young people who’ve been dragged to see The Lost Colony will like it so much that they’ll take a chance and go see another play sometime.

Anyway, my base feelings about the curtain call haven’t changed. I don’t like it. It blows the mystery, it shatters the mood that we’ve worked so hard to create. Where did they go? Oh, there they are. They didn’t wander off into the wilderness – they were lining up backstage for the curtain call.

But I’m just an actor here. They pay me. I have a great deal of respect for the director Robert Richmond. I think he has done an excellent job with The Big Show and I would happily do the curtain call standing on my head if he told me to do so.

And y’know – it is growing on me. As noted – I’m an actor. I sort of like taking my bows. There is something magnificent in seeing the entire acting company lined up on stage, receiving their kudos.

And they are your kudos as well. (uh oh – here he goes again) If you’ve ever been in the company, if you’ve ever dragged yourself through the heat and the sand, ever acted like you’re freezing when the sweat is pouring off you, if you’ve ever given your whole soul to create the moment of mystery, if the sight of the flag over the chapel touches your soul – I’m taking a bow for you.

Ouch

After the show was cancelled last night there was a small impromptu gathering at a local drinking establishment.
Ouch.

Today the heat wave that has been baking the rest of the state for a couple of weeks has finally rolled in to the outer banks. It will be the first time doing the show in the real heat. Hopefully the smoke will stay away.

Mordor at TLC

The Lost Colony was cancelled tonight due to the heavy blanket of smoke from the wildfires near Stumpy Point, about 30 miles away from Roanoke Island. Oral history says that this is the first time The Big Show has ever been cancelled for this particular reason.
We had been "advised" that a cancellation was probable. We didn't say a word - we just went about our pre-show business in the smoke, coughing.
At 8 o'clock we cancelled.

Is not a sunset backstage at The Lost Colony the most beautiful place you've ever been? Does not your heart live there?
Of course it does, unless you've never been there.
Here's a picture taken from the back dock this evening at 7:45.

Pass the Tissues

I’m a weeper.

I admit it. The older I get the easier it is for me to burst into tears. My father was the same way, and he once told me that his father was also. I think one of the reasons that I’m semi-reclusive is because the less I interact with other people the less chance there is that I’ll inappropriately start crying. On the other hand I like nothing more than indulging my sentimentality by holing up and watching a movie that pushes my “Cry” button.

I think we all build up so many barriers; we wear so many masks, to insulate ourselves from genuine emotion. Kids these days (and by kids I mean 20-somethings) effect a snide, sarcastic, jaded demeanor. I think it is the right of passage from child to adult in the 21^st century. One ceases to be a child when one becomes a sneering asshole incapable of recognizing or giving in to emotive feelings. The other kids will laugh at me!

For the past couple of years I’ve been actively trying to shed my masks and barriers and present myself to the world exactly as I’ve always really been. And you know the old saying: “Every year I become more like myself.” OK – that isn’t an old saying except in that I’ve been saying it for years.

So these days I’m a lot friendlier than I used to be. I’m a lot more open with my feelings when something touches me. I’ve let old grudges and resentments slip away. I rarely get angry anymore. When anger or resentment or other negatives bubble up from my soul I just let those emotions roll off me. I give in to people and things that spark good feelings in me. Sometimes I feel like I’m coming out of a decades-long bout of depression. Whoa – nice world out there! Good people, too. I watch people more and more (and I’ve always been a people-watcher). Sometimes I’ll watch little private moments that people, singly or together, are experiencing and I will become them – I’ll inhabit them and feel what they are feeling. I just let the emotions wash over me and take me away. And beauty in any form takes my breath away and I get a lump in my throat and the water works in my eyes cut loose.

The last scene in The Lost Colony is called Final March. The Colonists, starving and forsaken and under a threat from the Spanish, abandon their settlement. Carrying everything that they own they march out in to the wilderness.

It gets me every time. I haven’t been part of Final March since 1997 when I played Old Tom. Other characters I’ve played are out before the end. Most years I’ve watched it as an audience member. It gets me every time; even in years when it is indifferently staged or performed it gets me. The ragged band staggering up the hill, the touching moment of redemption as the treasonous Runner helps the incapacitated Father Martin up the hill, pulling the audience’s focus to stalwart John Borden with Eleanor Dare and her child – he pointing with his rifle at the ragged flag fluttering over the Chapel. It gets me every time – jeez, I was weeping on my keyboard just writing this paragraph.

And now I’m in Final March again. I am the incapacitated Father Martin desperately trying to keep up with his fellows in the march; failing, falling, carried up the ramp. You know I have a tendency to become unstuck in time at the Colony and this is a major time traveling event for me. I become Jimmy Darmo and Eric Green and others – no, WE become Father Martin and we are all there and eternal. Lisa, Max and Alice are there every night. If you’ve ever been in it you are there every night and I see you. I see you.

I start to lose my shit when the flag bearer (T.J. Pass) starts the song in his lonely quavering pure-toned voice. I’m leaning on my crutch in front of the Chapel and slowly hobble to join the end of the line as we shuffle through the sand. I pass behind the Runner who is sullenly sitting alone by the fire, pause, gesture to him, “My son?” Negative. He is the lost lamb, the Father’s failure. That’s when the water works really start. Turn, stagger, go face first into the sand, try to drag myself, fail. And there is the Runner to help me up, to be my crutch. We become each other’s redemption as we stagger sobbing together up the ramp. The Runner this year is Travis Clark. He and I haven’t ever talked about the moment. The moment just is. He is a soul mate for those few seconds every night.

And I’m not acting – whatever the hell that means. I’m just there, in the moment, letting the pure emotion of the sequence carry me along as firmly as Travis’s arm carries me.

There are other weepers in Final March. When we go into the dark by the light tower we hear each other sniffling. We make our way quickly down the back path to line up for curtain call, trying to get our shit together.

Early on one of the kids asked me: “Why are you crying?”

Why aren’t you?

View From The Crapper

As you are aware I have a thing for wandering around the theater looking for the scribbles that Colonists have left on the walls over the years. I’ve discovered a new source.

A year or so ago they expanded the men’s dressing room by extending the end of the building out toward the costume shop. This added several feet to the male Principal room and the AT room. Also in that renovation they upgraded and expanded the bathroom, adding a stall. There are now poopers for Indians only and for Colonists only.

(Note to non-Colony readers: the segregated toilets and also the benches backstage exist because the full-body make-up that Indians wear must not be allowed to come in contact with other costumes. It is very hard to get out. Colonists are not even allowed to touch Indians unless specifically directed to do so and then the Costume Department is standing by to clean the paint off the soiled costume.)

The expanded bathroom facilities extend into what used to be part of the AT dressing room. When they built it they carefully left intact the wall (with scribbles) that borders the hallway.

What this means is that when one is seated in the Colonist’s Only stall one is facing the wall filled with the scribbles left by Actor Techs of yesteryear.

Benjamin Stone, Eddie Garcia, Townsend Pass and many others – you are now in the crapper. I’m happy to have found the scribbles you left

Is My Mic On?

Here's one that will live down the centuries that come.
As the Master of the Queen's Ceremonies was leading the party-goers off to the feast everyone was ad libbing on their way out. The MC touted "singing birds, sparrows and barrels of sack in my mouth!"
His mic was on.

This Just In

To top off our long day of matinée and evening shows it was also Company Meeting night.
Important information conveyed:
"Don't abuse your bundles."

18

There are 18 stair steps going down from the SR parapet. I count them every night exiting onto the "boat" at the end of Plymouth.
Pick up your capes.

Scribbles

Alice's wall scribble in the center.

Valerie Chappel Medlin, Dancer then fervent Colony Mom now, to the left of Alice's.

Valerie's daughter Kate's on the far left.

Kate gives the line "I thought we wouldn't have school today!" 

That was Alice's line in her day.

Squinting Off to the New World

Breaking news!

This just in!

Matinees suck!

Last Friday and today we had matinee performances of just Act I at 9:30 am for school kids bussed in from Dare County Schools.

They’ve tried this before, and you would think they would remember what happens.

It sounds good – bus in school kids to see The Lost Colony! Share our local treasure with the schools! Show how involved we are with the community! Expose the children to some live theater!

Take a few hundred kids and sit them in the hot summer sun…

Last year they fried the kid’s brains so bad that at intermission they were handing out free water from concessions and kids were throwing up and suffering from heat stroke and ambulances were called.

That’s why this year they decided to just do Act I. Friday morning was not-so-hot with a nice breeze. Today was a scorcher. By Plymouth you could see the kids were bright red-faced and sweating. We finished just in time.

As for the company – the ATs came in and set up starting at 7:30, the rest of us wandered in at about 8:30. We waited till the last minute to get into costume. Capes, helmets, heavy cloaks, extra petticoats etc. were cut.

We have a new pace – Matinee Pace. Go really fast because the kids aren’t very interested and not even the teachers know what a “diadem” is.

Louis (Old Tom) had a pre-existing conflict so his understudy Joe Mallon went on and did great!
By the end of Plymouth the sun was high and we all went squinting off to the New World.

Indians warm up before the matinee.

Impassioned Gibberish

Yesterday at fight call I had an extended conversation with Mrs. Manteo (Allison Arvay) in authentic Algonquin.

Just kidding – no one here has the faintest idea what authentic Algonquin sounds like. I think a number of years ago Robert Midgette and Pete Peterson did some research and Indians were provided with a phonetic list of phrases (or my brain just made that up), but all trace of that is gone. What Allison and I conversed in was, of course, gibberish. A bunch of made up syllables randomly strung together. But we knew what we were talking about.

There is a lot of such gibberish in the show, and always has been. During rehearsals the director made some references to the Indians sounding like they were speaking Mandarin.

During Amadas and Barlowe there is a whole lot of gibberish bandied about by the alarmed Indians as the white men invade their village. Likewise in the Ralph Lane massacre scene. In the Indian Dance there are a number of different words being sung/chanted. “Any-Way-Ki-Yah-Nee” seems pretty simple but there are variations.

During the battle sequences lots of gibberish is being yelled. We are directed to fill the scenes with noise. I yell lots of “No!” and “God save us!” and “Save him!” but mostly I’m yelling “Ga-blah!” Just random noise.

I recall one summer when I was Old Tom and Mike Campbell was the Runner. During Large Assembly, after I said “I’ll kill the first man that tries to pass me!” Mike and I would hurl impassioned gibberish at each other during the crowd reaction.

Last night was the first Dare Night, when local people can get in to see the show for free (a donation of food for the food bank is requested). It used to be that there was only one night for Dare County citizens and that performance would be closed to the public at large, but now there are three chances for locals to get in and tickets are also sold to the general public.

We gave them a good show but the enjoyment was diluted when, in the middle of Act I, the wind shifted and we were blanketed with heavy smoke from the wildfire that continues to burn south of Roanoke Island near Stumpy Point and the bombing range. We’ve had the smoke before but never this bad. From the stage one could barely see the light shack at the top of the hill. Actors and audience alike coughed their heads off.

Allison Arvay as Bad Ass Mrs. Manteo

Not My Niece

It seems that early in rehearsals there was some confusion that this was my niece-

That's NOT my niece. That's Juliet Eden who is from the theater world in my other life in Southern Pines. I sent her to the Colony to be a Dancer two years ago and she returned this year.
Perhaps there was confusion because I do have a history of sending nieces to the Colony-

Now THAT'S my niece, Jocelyn Turner, who was a Dancer in 2004-05.

Photos

For some excellent photos of the current production of The Lost Colony Click Here. There is even one of me (with my mouth open of course) christening the baby.