Yes, I was totally scared.

You'd think by now I'd be anesthetized against more images of girls in nightgowns with black hair hanging in their faces, but apparently I can't get enough:



This was beautifully shot, really well acted (in some cases by kids!), scary, frustrating for a time, and ultimately sad and weirdly satisfying. Hang in there: it does make sense in the end. More or less.

Aww, Scott!

Home alone on another Saturday night.

It's deliberate, though. I had a comp to see a friend's new one man show, and I have been very excited about it, but I'm getting very nervous about Reckless lines and a few cast members basically demanded that I stay home and work them, so I cancelled my reservation and I don't know if I'll get a chance to see it now.

Happily, it was the right choice: I mean, I've been sick, and I still have this icky, hurty cough, and I've had a pretty productive evening. But the adage is true: you can't work on lines for more than 90 minutes before you melt down. So...

I played "shoot the rubber band" with Poky.

I watched some of the Heath Care debate live from the House Floor. The Republicans are just ridiculous.

I listened to my downstairs neighbors having sex and remarked to myself that it's a slightly less annoying sound now that I'm sexually active again (only slightly less annoying though, and I was annoyed afresh when they started up a second time). Seriously, who the fuck has headboards anymore? This is a cool LOFT building, not a Super 8 or your Grandma's guest room.

I took like a 20 minute shower, which I never do. I pay for my hot water!

I searched between the floorboards for another Clonazpam, since I only have one left and the pharmacy will be closed tomorrow when I'm done with work so I'll be OUT of my klon-klon for a night (terrifying). I took a couple Valerian root capsules. Do those even WORK?

I went back to the lines. Craig Lucas must have had enormous faith in whomever he wrote this role for (actually I think it's semi-autobiographical, at least in a dream-logic kind of way). And I thought Blackbird was hard. At least in Blackbird if I went up I could just pause and glare at Bates. Here we gotta keep thing rolling.

I did NOT watch a movie, or even one single Arrested Development episode. I'm being good.

Cautiously optimistic...

photo: Mark L. Saperstein

So Reckless is coming together nicely. I don't think I've ever enjoyed rehearsing a show so much, in spite of my lingering, ever-evolving cold. It's just the most delightful bunch of people. And the play is so rich and the character I'm playing is one of my favorites ever. Come see it! Nov-13 thru Dec. 12 at Speakeasy!

Halloween Swoon: KBO

Most likely the most effective costume at The Donkey Show last Saturday.

Karl, I'm seeing visions of you as Prior Walter in the Signature revival of Angels in America. Threshold of Revelation...

Mainstream? yes, fine. Hilarious? ABSOFUCKINGLUTELY.

I am home alone on Halloween because:

a.) I'm sick.

b.) I have rehearsal at 9 AM and we have our first run-thru, and I have to learn at least a few new lines tonight.

c.) I don't give a fuck about Halloween anyway.

But rather than learning lines, I've been dicking around on the web, and I found this fantastic video. Enjoy:

Parking Lot Moron @ Yahoo! Video

Better than last time!

Last time looking like this....

And by "build," I think you mean "detonate."

Broadway has a learning disorder. Run away, Liev!

UNFAIR

I woke up this morning with my THIRD COLD in as many months. I am so upset. I ran to the store just now and bought Aconite (as per Anastasia Lyman's instructions) and Gaia Herbs' "Quick Defense." Fuck this. I'm NOT going down again.

Good Enough!

From BPT's comment drop box:

(Click photo to enlarge)

Experiment II

I was delighted to learn that my insurance actually covers unlimited acupuncture, and I found someone in Boston who takes my insurance! I had my first appointment today and it went well, I guess. I liked her. I told her, "I had a full blood work up recently where they tested everything: vitamins, thyroid, minerals, diseases, you name it, and the only thing that stood out was--" and she said, "You're vitamin D deficient." Which was TRUE! Maybe it's just 'cuz I'm pale...

The best was the needle she stuck right between my eyes, or in the place they call the "third eye." It created the most strange, calming, focusing sensation. Some say it doesn't work, some swear by it, but I'll try anything. The idea is to reduce my back pain and my allergies/asthma.

Here goes nothing!

Experiment.

Last night, the fella I've been on 3 dates with took it upon himself to make me an avocado pit plant, a la 1st grade, telling me where to put it, how to help it grow, and that it would sprout in several weeks and turn into a beautiful "free!" plant in a few months.

Here's hoping he lasts longer than the plant. Cuz I like him.

My GRRRRL!

My beloved Miranda July has done it again. Cindy Sherman-esque, sure, but still very Miranda, and I'll take anything I can get. I also just found out she's married to (or about to get married to) a director named Mike Mills, and I'm... jealous.

NOT a bummer.

Last night I couldn't sleep, so I got up and watched The Exorcism of Emily Rose, which I had rented because Halloween is coming and because I wanted to see Jennifer Carpenter. First of all I should tell you that I was SCARED BAD by this movie, and I slept fitfully all night, and though I'd gone to bed with the light OUT, I woke up with it on, which means I had one of my classic night terrors because of it. It's not the best movie ever, of course, but Jennifer was SO sympathetic in the role, and religious stuff in general scares me (except when it's in Paranormal Activity).

But the point of my post is to say that Jennifer Carpenter is doing AMAZING physical and vocal work in this movie. To take the edge off, I watched the bonus features, where I learned that Laura Linney (also in the movie) recommended Jennifer for the role of Emily based on Jennifer's work as Mary Warren in the 2002 Broadway production of The Crucible they did together. I can TOTALLY see Jennifer tearing that shit up. Her physical commitment to this poor possessed/sick girl is really humbling and I just have enormous respect for her now. The director and special effects guys all talked about how they ended up toning down the computer effects they had planned because Jennifer's work and face and voice and physicality were scary enough as is. She really knows how to use those long limbs.

I have mystery bruises from Little Black Dress and tummy aches most nights from accidentally swallowing a bit of fake blood, and I'm screaming and scrambling and falling down and getting knocked around, but it's nothing like what Jennifer did.

I bet she bruises like a banana too.

Here's to European acting right here in America!

Bummer. (Spoilers AFTER the photo)

I was so prepared to be terrified by Paranormal Activity (2009) that I a.) almost canceled my plans to see it and b.) put the lights on in my bedroom before I left for the day so that when I came home I wouldn't be scared of my room.

Turns out I'm still more scared that that scraggly-haired little girl from The Ring is going to show up in my bathroom than I am today of anything that happened to anyone in Paranormal Activity, and this shit didn't hold a CANDLE to The Blair Witch Project.

Most critics agree that what makes the movie fun is the audience response, and if there was ever a movie I wish I'd seen at Lowe's-E Walk, this was it. Yes, there were many young people in the Lowe's Boston Common and it was a pretty full house, but it wasn't the all-out, insane laugh/shout/scream-fest it could have been on 42nd St.

Here's an important general conclusion that others have made and I remembered last night after the movie: Horror movies are most interesting and enduring when they provide some kind of comment on societal ills of the moment. Like The Night of the Living Dead was about a zombied out sixties culture and Invasion of the Body Snatchers was about communism, and vampire movies are usually about STDs and sexual fear. Even The Ring included a kind of coda that set up the dreaded video tape as a metaphor for the power, indifference and perhaps EVIL of the press. Paranormal Activity had the chance to illuminate a couple different contemporary problems: male obsession with media over human interaction, and male (or maybe female too) impotence and loss of purpose resulting from unemployment and the weak economy. Not to mention another fun topic that was tediously depicted but never really explored: the pitfalls of contemporary cohabitation.

At any rate, you should be warned that most of the intersting/scary bits of the film, I'd say all but three, are IN THE TRAILER.



But the dude has a good job as a day-trader and while the girl is annoyed about the camera in her face all the time, she never REALLY puts her foot down about it (or there would be no movie, I guess). The guy stubbornly decides to try to "fix" the problem himself with no help from "the demonologist," which might have had resonance about the search for purpose and power in the face of unemployment and male shame.

There were two KINDA creepy, very smart moments in the movie. In one: the girl gets out of bed and then the time-laspe digital clock on the camera shows that she just stands by the side of the bed staring at her boyfriend for over an hour. That digital counter became one of the best used effects in the film, and where a lot of the exciting information came from. THe other scary moment involves the girl being dragged slowly out of the bed and down the hall by an invisible demon, and it looks, like, TOTALLY real, dude.

My sister made a funny point they they probably spent $10,000 of their $11,000 budget on the final 10 seconds of the movie, but I was a little pissed that they broke with their own vocabulary of the movie to use some (crappy) CGI in the last shot of the film.

And to sum up, I'm afraid of GHOSTS, not personal, specific-to-you and not the place DEMONS. So I slept fine last night. I am fully aware of my demons, thank you.