TIME STANDS STILL - blog 3 - Kerry McCue

Matthew Wiener makes me laugh. He is really smart director with a lot going on in his head, and sometimes when he wants us to pick up a scene from a particular line, he paraphrases that line from the script. It is one of his little quirks and it can be hilarious. I have recorded for posterity just a few of his adorable misquotes (with his blessing). Below I have quoted the ACTUAL line from the script followed Matthew’s version. Enjoy!

Script: “Your pictures are beautiful.”
MW: “I love your polaroids.”

Script: “Who could possibly love her more than I do?”
MW: “Who could possibly love me as much as I love me?”

Script: “I wish you had let us help. The magazine could’ve pulled a few strings.”
MW: “You should’ve let the newspaper help you. The newspaper boys could have carried her down the runway.”

Script: “…a good barometer for the political climate of their day?”
MW: “A good barometer for apples.”

Script: “I guess you can say I’m into events, too. Wars, famines, genocide…”
MW: “I’m into events, too. Garbage, gingivitis…”

Script: “Oh, I almost forgot… They wanted me to give you this.”
MW: “Oh, look what I found in my pocket.”

Script: “Sleeping on Richard’s sofa can’t be as comfy as all that…”
MW: “Richard’s couch can’t be tasty.”

Script: “[She has] One kid. A son. Twelve years old.”
MW: “I have a ten year old son.”

Script: “Hey!” “Hey!”
MW: “Hey, Hey, we’re the Monkeys.”

Script: “You talk out of both sides of your mouth, you know that?!”
MW: “You talk out of both sides of your mouth. You’re a mouth talker!”

Script: “Days of Wine and Roses. Blake Edwards. 1962.”
MW: “Guns & Roses.”

Script: “I never thought I’d have to compete with a dead man.”
MW: “I never thought I’d have to fight a dead man.”

Script: “I’m afraid to ask: Is she a grown-up?”
MW: “I’m afraid to ask: Does she have her driver’s license? Is she old enough to buy liquor? Cigarettes? Can she get a tattoo?”

AND MY PERSONAL FAVORITE…
Script: “I just want to be comfortable, does that make me a bad person?”
MW: “I just want to be comfortable, does that make me a diabetic?”

Time Stands Still runs May 12-27. Please join us!

TIME STANDS STILL - Blog 2 - Kerry McCue (Mandy Bloom)

We had our “First Rehearsal Party” for Time Stands Still on Tuesday night. That’s where we invite patrons to come to the theatre for an introduction to the play in progress. When this tradition started, it was actually on the night of the actors' very first rehearsal. Nowadays, we do it after we’ve been rehearsing for a week. Matthew Wiener hosts the event and introduces the actors and designers and they speak about their roles in the production and about the play itself. Then we perform the first 15 minutes of the play with an improvised set, and a few props. Then we have a discussion where the audience can ask the actors and the director any questions they have about what they’ve seen. And then we eat some good food (Thank you, My Big Fat Greek Restaurant!)

My discussion topic was “The Oeuvre” of Donald Margulies. My apologies to the 40 patrons who have heard this already, but I got a really good response so I thought I would do a recap for the rest of you. Here it is:

I am an avid reader. Novels, plays, and some non-fiction. When I read something and like it, I will often go back and read everything that author has ever written in chronological order. I love it when I can see how the author has evolved as a writer. When I was cast in Time Stands Still, I gathered all the Donald Margulies plays I could find and dove in. So, with a very few exceptions, I have read all his plays. Here’s what I discovered: Margulies writes what he knows. This is classic author advice and with good reason. And what the writer knows changes as time passes. Here is his progression:

Margulies started with his childhood. One of his very first plays is called Found a Peanut and it cast is composed entirely of children. It would be REALLY hard to produce this play, hard to find that many professional child actors and then there are all sorts of rehearsal restrictions and special circumstances when working with children. But it is a great play. The children show this microcosm of the adult world in the roles that they adopt in their little gang.

His next phase dealt primarily with Jewish family life. What’s Wrong With This Picture?, The Loman Family Picnic, and The Model Apartment fall into this category. He examines the relationship between parents and children, usually between father and son. Margulies admits that he used his plays to work out issues that he had with his own father growing up.

By this time in his career he had started to achieve some renown in the theater world and his work reflects that. In the plays Sight Unseen, Collected Stories, and Brooklyn Boy, he began to explore what it means to be and artist, a writer, and the affects of fame. But the through-line in ALL of his work is relationships. He writes relationships really well and has a knack for nailing the dialogue. The greatest example being Dinner With Friends, for which he won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama.

Incidentally, Time Stands Still is the 4th Margulies play that Actors Theatre has done. They previously did Sight Unseen, Dinner With Friends, and Shipwrecked!, which is a total departure from all his other work, so much so that I don’t have time to go into it here. So I won’t.

So is his career he has explored childhood, family, Judaism, art, and fame. And now with our current show he opened up to topics that affect society as a whole. He has kind of reached out and embraced the world with his themes in Time Stands Still, while still maintain his attention to relationship because the play is essentially a love story.

For me, personally, the most interesting insight I received from all this research has to do with my character, Mandy. In three different plays, Margulies has written three completely different young women that all have something in common. The have a tendency to end perfectly good declarative sentences with question mark. It is so poignant. The older woman in Collected Stories has a monologue about it. She describes us as having evolved “a non-regional accent of American youth.” It is disheartening to hear perfectly intelligent girls begging to be listened to. Seeming to say with every sentence “Can you hear me? Am I being heard?”

Donald Margulies has some great plays available at your local libraries. Come see our show and join us for one of our post-show discussions.

photo: John Groseclose

TIME STANDS STILL - Blog 1 - Kerry McCue (Mandy Bloom)

Once again, I find myself pregnant. My character, I mean. In a play. I'm in a play and my character is pregnant. This is not new for me. I've played pregnant at least 5 times before, at three different theater companies and in an indie film. I think my favorite was playing the pregnant goddess Ceres in Mary Zimmerman's Metamorphoses, regally displaying a huge belly, scarfing pickles dipped in ice cream (really) while deciding the fates of puny mortals. My upcoming role in Donald Marguiles' Time Stands Still is my second pregnant role for Actors Theatre. Last time I was "Izzy" in David Lindsay Abaire's Rabbit Hole. When the costumer heard I was cast this time around, she simply pulled my former pregnant belly out of storage. A "belly pad," as it's called, is an interesting costume piece. It looks like a flesh-colored, one-piece swimsuit with a round pillow on the front and extra padding in the bust. My favorite touch is the snap they sew on to simulate an "outy" belly-button. You pull it on over your head and it snaps at the crotch. Too much information?

I've played pregnant women before, but have never actually BEEN pregnant myself so the the physicality is something I have to work hard on. You don't want to be stereo-typical or have your role come off as a caricature. You can only stretch your back and rub your bump so many times. You must re-learn how to carry yourself, how to walk without being able to see your feet, how to sit, and (my favorite) how to lever yourself up from a low couch. And you have to find a way to make "actable" the protective feeling that mothers have about the life they are carrying inside them.

But my character is more than just a pregnant lady. She's a ray of sunshine, funny and open and honest. And she briefly touches on the highly charged working vs. stay at home mom debate that has been in the news so much of late. It adds an up-to-the-minute vibe to this play with is already very topical and highly relevant to what's going on in the world today. Plus is essentially a love story, the most universal of all themes. Don't miss it.

BODY AWARENESS - Blog 1 - Will Hightower (Jared)

As actors, we are already very body conscious, and with a show like Body Awareness, we are even more so. So what do we do? Step up our workout routines? Start a healthy diet? Start a daily push-up and throw-up contest?

Those are all great options, but actors think a little differently. We think in terms of objectives or desires. What's our objective? To look healthy on stage.

Not to be healthy--that is far too difficult! Instead we just want to be perceived as healthy. Because that’s what matters most, right? How other people see us? Well, I have discovered the best way to achieve this objective with one simple mind trick.

Make the other actors fat!

Easy! Genius! If I make all the other actors fat, then I will look healthy by comparison and thus be perceived as healthy.

I started off the battle right by bringing chocolate candies to rehearsal on the second day. Since then, the rest of them have caught on to my scheme and brought in their own weight-weapons.

Here is the current list of the Weapons of Mass Digestion:
Dove Chocolates – Milk and Dark
Cashews
Chocolate-Covered Ginger
Brownies
Sticky Buns
Cinnamon Rolls
Blueberry Muffins
Everything Bagels with Cream Cheese
Cookies
Homemade Mac and Cheese
and something known only as the “Blarney Scone”

The culinary conflict causes delicious destruction as these tasty terrorists cause flakey fatalities. As the good fight continues and the weight wars wage on, stay tuned for the self-conscious caloric-conclusion!

And more importantly, come see the show on March 30th to see who won the epic food fight from the front(waist)lines!

photo: Will Hightower as Jared; credit: John Groseclose

HUNTER GATHERERS - Blogs 1 and 2 - Angelica Howland (Pam)

BLOG 1 Embrace the confusion.

I must remind myself of this several times during the first few days of rehearsal. No matter how prepared I feel, no matter how well read I am on everything about the play... there is still that overwhelming sense of 'EEK!' once the voices of the other actors and the director are added to the equation and we get around the table to start pulling the story apart. But, truth be told, this is my favorite part -- the process of figuring out the whats. What makes these characters tick? What do they want from each other? What makes them do what they do? And, in my mind, it is the initial confusion of what the answers to these questions might be that adds the most interesting human layers to a story. So, for the next few days, I will embrace the confusion. And I will have a fantastic time doing it. Because I seriously dig playing with the big kids.

There is also the confusing juggle of family life, motherhood, cookies and rehearsal -- but I'll get into that more a little later...

BLOG 2 Grown up life can get very overwhelming. Right now, I have a lot going on. I am playing wife, mommy, actress, baker, dog wrangler, volunteer and Santa. And -- I'm beat! But here are a few things that made it all worth it:

1) Having a busy, bad day and then walking up to a dear friend, who gives a hug that somehow, makes it all better. 2) Getting up on your feet in rehearsal for the first time, looking into the eyes of your fellow actor and knowing, without a shadow of a doubt, that the two of you are going to play like gangbusters together. 3) Being released from rehearsal early, going home and being greeted by your sweet family's complete joy at seeing you, which is so palpable, you could wrap it around you like a quilt fresh out of the dryer.

And...

4) Snuggling with a little boy, who, as he is falling asleep, says, 'Mommy, you made my night. I dig you.'

Yup. Totally worth it.

photo: John Groseclose

NEXT FALL blog 7: David Dickinson (Brandon)

As an actor, you always put your heart into creating a performance, but rarely do you get the satisfaction of knowing how an audience perceived the show other than applause and laughter at the appropriate, you hope, moments. You hope no one walks out, but that is feedback too!

After two weeks of performing NEXT FALL, I have received a lot of feedback about the show from our audiences..

NEXT FALL makes no effort to preach or espouse a single viewpoint, but it is rather a social laboratory. The play places people with various viewpoints in real life situations and allows us to listen to the outcome. No one is completely right, but no one is dismissed (at least in the end). As with most plays audience members will identify with the character that expresses the viewpoint with which they are the most comfortable. But because the play is so neutral and non-judgmental, audience members find themselves open to the discussion on stage which takes all of us on a much deeper journey.

What drove this home to me came in an e-mail from someone who connected strongly with the voice of my character Brandon because of his Christian views especially on homosexuality. This is a testament to the play: Brandon's discomfort with homosexuality is a real discomfort shared by some in our community. I'm excited these friends are coming to the theatre. I'm thrilled they are joining the discussion and enjoying the journey as much anyone else.

NEXT FALL makes a case that all of the differences that separate us, our opinions, our religions, our beliefs, our prejudices are all "dinky" when you face the reality that we are only here on Earth for a very short time. It focuses all of us on what is important in life: not winning, not being "right", but loving, respecting and appreciating. Everyone responds to this.

I didn't expect this. While I was personally moved by the play when I first read it, I didn't see its universality. Every time I work at Actors Theatre, it takes me on a ride I'm glad I didn't miss. NEXT FALL is no exception. Thanks to all of you who have shared your thoughts and feelings about the play with me. It makes doing the show that much more joyful.

photo: John Groseclose; (l to r) David Dickinson as Brandon and Andi Watson as Holly

NEXT FALL blog 6: Debra K Stevens (Arlene)

I am a woman who will never wear Press On Nails in real life. I have had quite the journey with Arlene and her nails! How I wish she had had the time to get a real manicure before she had to catch that plane to New York. Here is what I have learned:

Don’t drink too much water during the show as the Press On Nails severely inhibit your ability to remove and restore your panty hose. Forget about it.

Make sure a fellow actor is standing nearby in case you want to eat an Altoid before your scene. It could take a full minute to trap the little sucker.

Forget about redoing your hair or making any adjustments to it after you apply the nails. You will end up with at least 2 dozen of your best strands stuck in the adhesive. It also hurts like a sonofabitch when they get pulled out.

I have new respect for women who keep their nails at a similar length and are still able to use a computer. How do they do that?

If your contact lens is irritating you—suck it up. You will never be able to remove, rinse, and reapply without assistance.

Don’t even try to use your Blackberry. Seriously.

photo: John Groseclose, (l to r) Debra K. Stevens as Arlene and Robert Kolby Harper as Adam