Looking Back at 2013: My Year of Making Things

I had a broad swath year as far as creating new art. I didn't do any really big projects (unless you maybe count DRIBBLE FUNK 380 for sheer ballsiness or DINOSAUR AND ROBOT STOP A TRAIN for imaginative awesomeness), but looking back, I covered a lot of ground. Here's a look back...

In January I did a PrintBomb Project, hiding my print "Anything Is Possible"
in a bunch of places at the flagship Half Price Books 

In February I directed student actors in a student-written one-act at Tarrant County College

Read my short piece BURDEN OF A LIGHT BLUE SHIRT at Austin's No Shame in March.

In March I also attended the Staple! Expo and sold a few (very few) of my books and postcards

In April, FUN GRIP played the Improvised Play Festival at Austin's Hideout Theatre.

Participated in Rover Dramawerk's One Day Only! XX, a 24 Hour Play event.
An event I founded in 2000. My play was SHARK BITES AND SIDE EFFECTS.

In April, I also saw my commissioned play CARTER STUBBS TAKES FLIGHT put on in a wonderful production by Denton's Sundown Collaborative Theatre, directed by Tashina Richardson.

In May, I taught a solo improv workshop as part of the 2013 Big Sexy Weekend of Improv
for the Alternative Comedy Theatre.

In June I premiered my play DINOSAUR AND ROBOT STOP A TRAIN at the 2013 Festival of Independent Theatres. Next to CHOP, this play is what I'm most proud of from all of my theatre work to date.

A Few More CARTER STUBBS PICS

Some Pics from CARTER STUBBS TAKES FLIGHT

Last April, the excellent folks at the Sundown Collaborative Theatre my plat CARTER STUBBS TAKES FLIGHT. They just sent me some great production pics.

[click on the image to see larger]

My review of my review...

Now that CARTER STUBBS TAKES FLIGHT has ended, I can post one of the reviews of the show. I make it a rule to never post negative press during the run of a show. It is hard enough to get people out to the theatre to make their own minds up without putting up with someone smack-talking your work in the paper or a blog.

To a large degree, I really only see reviews and criticism as marketing tools. If there are a few good pull-quotes, great. If not, oh well. Most reviews are not memorable to anyone but the artists directly involved in the show itself. And though I really like when critics "get" the work and even moreso when they enjoy it, I never really celebrate good press. I also don't really lose sleep over "bad" press. This is because it is really hard to get good, actual criticism. Also, my own awareness of the value and purpose of my work is pretty solid.

That said, I got one of the best, though most unflattering reviews, I have ever received during Sundown's run of CARTER STUBBS TAKES FLIGHT. I do not know the reviewer, Kristy Blackmon, and admittedly, The Column is not a leading source of great criticism, but a few things really struck me about the review...

I do not agree with many of her points, such as the definition of fable, the moral message of the play, bringing up questions with the assumption that these questions also must be answered in the piece, and so on. I won't go point by point through the review and nit-pick. All I'm saying is, she had an opinion and I had another opinion.

What I do appreciate, though, is the intelligence she brings to her criticism. She took the play seriously as a piece of theatre. Though it was presented on a  super-small budget, tucked away at a dance studio in Denton, Texas, she approached her review as if she were going to see a new work at the National Theatre. I really, seriously, appreciate this.

This write-up made me, legitimately, question and think about the play. I went back and scrutinized sections of it.

I also appreciate she calls bullshit on a few things like the badly taped rotating backdrops that  looked awesome, but were honestly kinda shoddy.

I also was pleased she was complimentary to the director, cast and crew. On the whole. Their contributions were apparent and recognized, just as they should have been. 

All that said, beyond matters of sheer opinion, I was also bothered by a few things.

Despite some of the more intelligent analysis, I was surprised at how much she misinterpreted parts of the piece or grafted unintended meaning onto parts. Her confusion over cannibalism in the play, for instance, was over-thought and she missed the main point of "eating one's fear." 

She also labels parts of the play "real life" and "fantasy" even though, there is no such differentiation in the piece. Carter has one brief "dream" sequence. I guess the whole thing works as a memory play as well (like The Glass Menagerie). But her categorizing huge sections of action into "real life" and" fantasy" is a fabrication separate from the play itself. 

The same can be said about her assumption that the piece is about how "modern man struggles to find meaning in a meaningless, capitalistic world that inevitably drives him to drastic action in order to break free of the social structure that is crushing his spirit." I suppose Carter is looking for meaning in much the same way as every character in every story is looking for meaning, but this is a given. Water is wet. So? And what do social structures have to do with anything?

She also comes off overly jaded and cynical when saying the content is "tired" and "this is a story that has been told so often it is nearly impossible to make fresh." Perhaps she has seen the story before. Too bad this prevented her from seeing what was new in this retelling of it. 

I will give her credit, even though the final words in her piece stung the worst. She gives me a back-handed compliment by way of encouragement. If I stick to it,  with a little more "experience and seasoning" my work will eventually have "maturity" and  may "cross from provocative into something truly meaningful."

That's fair. That's how I feel about Ms. Blackmon's review as well.

#   #   #

CARTER STUBBS TAKES FLIGHT

Reviewed Performance 4/13/2013

Reviewed by Kristy Blackmon, Associate Critic for John Garcia's THE COLUMN

Sundown Collaborative Theatre's production of Brad McEntire's Carter Stubbs Takes Flight, currently running at Green Space Arts Collective in Denton, brings me back to the underground experimental theatre scene of the 1990s, where exploration of the Post-Modern existential dilemma placed focus on message and mood instead of a traditionally linear storyline. It is a provocative show meant to inspire conversation about cultural norms, identity, and expectations in a modern world. Playwright Brad McEntire classifies Carter Stubbs as a fable, a short tale with a central moral point. According to this brief and most basic definition, the label is accurate. The play is short, without even an intermission, and the moral message is very clear: modern man has forgotten joy in favor of obligation and routine. Many traditional elements of the fable are either noticeably absent or underplayed however, and the classification does more to cloud the intended message than it does to emphasize it.

Director Tashina Richardson presents a bare-bones production that strips all frills away from the show, preventing any technical distractions from the actors and the script. The technical elements such as set and costumes are deliberately simplistic, and their minimalism itself becomes a central facet of the production. Richardson converted a tiny room into the theatre space, placing about fifty folding chairs at the edges of the room and staging the set backdrops against one wall to create an "upstage" area. She and Lighting Designer Natalie Taylor use a simple but creative light design that makes heavy use of footlights, emphasizing shadows and silhouettes in the more fantastical parts of the play. The similarities between Green Space and a traditional black box theater pretty much end there, but it doesn't matter. This isn't a traditional play, and the lack of a traditional space doesn't hinder it. 

Several plain black wooden boxes of varying size and two black wooden chairs serve for set pieces. The backdrop is innovative: five cardboard rotating stands, each with three sides, portray the interior of the Stubbs' home, the interior of Carter's office, and the otherworldly tropical island on which the more magical scenes of the play take place. The actors turn each piece as part of choreographed scene transitions, which keeps the action moving quickly. 

It is a creative solution to the problem of limited space, but the packing tape holding the cardboard parts together and the rudimentary stenciling and drawing of different scenic elements draw too much attention to themselves. Minimalism for the sake of artistry is one thing, but it should still be done well. While the set pieces are inventive and seem sturdy enough, their slapdash nature is an unnecessary distraction in such a small space. 

The costumes by Joey Harrington, by contrast, achieve both the creativity and simplicity of the set while still being well made. While the characters in the non-fantasy sequences are in nicely stylized street clothes probably pulled from cast members' closets, the primitive inhabitants of Carter's alternate reality wear attractive and artistic cardboard masks and tropical skirts made of strips of paper that supplement the tribal beats of handheld drums nicely when the actors move. The effect is aural as well as visual, and it is quite successful.

The plot centers around Carter Stubbs, a man stuck in a miserable marriage and a dead-end job folding instruction manuals. He and his wife Felicia may once have had some common ground, but it has long since disappeared by the start of the show. He ignores her in favor of work, and she in turn grows vicious. 

Carter's life revolves around routine, and this theme is echoed nicely in the choreographed offices sequences. His work is predictably mind-numbing, his co-workers are predictably annoying, and his boss is predictably overbearing and merciless. Richardson and Choreographer George Ferrie inject some life into these scenes through the use of humorous and thematically relevant movement sequences, but on the whole this is a story that has been told so often it is nearly impossible to make fresh: modern man struggles to find meaning in a meaningless, capitalistic world that inevitably drives him to drastic action in order to break free of the social structure that is crushing his spirit. The overall feeling that I have seen these plot innumerable times drags the show down.

The fantasy sequences are more interesting. Carter's opening monologue, directed to the audience, is recited as he flies through the clouds, which are portrayed by the ensemble as they hold Tackett up and carry him around the stage. He winds up crash landing on the beach of a tropical island, where the primitive inhabitants inform him that in order to overcome his soft heart, he must fight a tiger. 

The symbolism nearly overwhelms here, so much so that the meaning is lost. The natives worship a king named after a popular soft drink who indulges in cannibalism, which suggests modern worship of pop culture at the expense of humanity. However, it is by this king's command that Carter fights the tiger, which gives him a strong heart. This seems to symbolize an internal battle that the post-modern Everyman which Carter represents must win in order to regain a sense of identity, but by the end of the show, the metaphors have become too mixed to really work. Are the primal islanders something to aspire to or a source of revulsion? Perhaps this is the question we are meant to ask: what is "civilization" and what does "primitive" mean? The problem is not that McEntire doesn't answer these questions for us, but that he doesn't seem to know himself.

If we have forgotten the joys of our childhoods in the mundane stresses of adult responsibility, it remains unclear what McEntire's solution is, or really even what the point of the fantasy sequences is.

All of the actors perform well. Kasey Tackett gives a good performance in the title role, playing the straight man to the supporting characters' comedic foils with a deadpan delivery and spot on sense of timing that keeps the pace moving. 

Lauren Belmore's performance is a high point. She displays a talent for dark comedy, playing Felicia with confidence and committing herself fully to her choices. Her comedic timing provides a much needed balance to her cruel treatment of Carter, keeping the domestic scenes from becoming emotionally stifling. 

David Helms, both as Carter's boss and his fantasy land king, does a good job of conveying all the symptoms of Napoleonic syndrome, and Robert Linder as Carter's soon-to-be-retired coworker Henry provides moments of much needed levity in the office scenes while helping to ground the show with bits of wise advice. As the lawyer, Linder delivers one of the funniest performances in the short play.

With Richardson's creative approach, her and Ferrie's nicely done choreography, and the imaginative and largely successful technical elements, Sundown gives us as commanding a performance of Carter Stubbs Takes Flight as I think possible.

Ultimately, it all isn't enough to overcome the problems with the script, though. The "real life" scenes at times are pat, and the fantasy scenes at times are confusing. For a show just over an hour long, the messages and themes are too convoluted and unclear. McEntire's wit and intelligence are obvious, but the themes he explores are tired, and he brings nothing new to the table with this play. His skill with dialogue is undeniable, and one gets the sense that he just needs some more experience and seasoning to give his work the maturity it needs to cross from provocative into something truly meaningful.

Original post HERE.

cast and crew of Sundown's CARTER STUBBS TAKES FLIGHT

cast and crew of Sundown's CARTER STUBBS TAKES FLIGHT, a photo by dribblefunk on Flickr.

CARTER STUBBS on TheaterJones.com

Carter (Kasey Tackett) and Felicia (Lauren Belmore) in CARTER STUBBS TAKES FLIGHT

Review: Carter Stubbs Takes Flight | Sundown Collaborative Theatre | Greenspace Arts Collective - Denton

To the Moon, Carter!

Sundown Collaborative Theatre's Carter Stubbs Takes Flight is playful and poignant.

by Kris Noteboom - published Thursday, April 18, 2013

Denton — Destiny is an oft-overused word. Like so many hyperbolic words—awesome, genius—people tend to use the word “destiny” rather loosely as well. And that can cloud a very important meditation on the meaning of the word. What exactly is destiny?

Carter Stubbs Takes Flight, a new play by local theater and visual artist extraordinaire Brad McEntire, produced by Sundown Collaborative Theatre, both examines and exemplifies the concept of destiny.

The play itself follows a familiar Everyman type, Carter (Kasey Tackett). Carter is feeling rather disaffected with life. His marriage with Felicia (Lauren Belmore) is crumbling, his Boss (David Helms) is riding him, and he’s miserable. But things start to change for Carter when he strikes up an unlikely friendship at work with the soon-to-retire Henry (Robert Linder). Henry instills in Carter the concept of taking flight, or following your dreams. After decades of the daily grind, Henry, aided by hindsight, has found a new clarity in life and eagerly anticipates his impending freedom.

However, things don’t go as planned for Henry, and Carter finds himself with a gift from the sage old man: a rocket pack, both actual and metaphorical as it turns out. And with that,Carter Stubbs takes flight.

McEntire’s writing style is, to put it simply, playful. But the playfulness belies an underpinning of complex themes that weave through the out-of-sequence story and tie it all together with stirring deftness. It’s fun and poignant, never too preachy or schmaltzy. The play grabs hold of the audience’s attention without relinquishing it until the story’s completion.

The group at Sundown Collaborative make the perfect partner for McEntire’s work. It’s one of those great times when one plus one equals more than just two: McEntire with his inventive text and Sundown with their patented, unique process and staging.

Under the masterful direction of Tashina Richardson, the cast of Carter Stubbs Takes Flight absorbs the delightful absurdity of the script and makes it their own.This is especially hammered home in Linder’s performance. Playing three roles, Linder completely lets loose of all pretension and inhibition, imbuing his characters with an engrossing physicality. More than anyone else, he connects with the material on an almost psychic level. He’s the most delightful part of the show.

Of course, that’s not to say the rest of the class isn’t excellent. They are. Helms, who plays two roles, brings a fiery intensity to both while fully distinguishing them from one another. He’s a perfect foil to Carter. But so is Belmore. Her manic portrayal of Felicia has the possibility of drifting into annoying melodrama, but she maintains a sharp comic edge.

In fact, the only complaint would be that Tackett, playing the straight man to this crazy cast of characters, sometimes struggles to match the level of those opposite him. Belmore and Helms especially get right up in his face and read him the riot act on several occasions. And though his character is meant to be a little understated, the sometimes mundane reaction is jarring in its contradictions.

This show required a high level of technical accomplishment by the Sundown team, and they were up to the challenge. Richardson’s and George Ferrie’s set design is creative, employing rotating backdrops to signify setting changes. And Irvin Moreno’s prop design, especially of the rocket pack, is also impressive.

Carter is a man in search of his destiny. And while it would be a spoiler to say whether he finds it or not, one thing’s for certain: Brad McEntire and Sundown Collaborative Theatre working together does feel a bit like destiny, and certainly makes the audience feel they’ve found the paradise that Carter himself is seeking. The euphoric result will negate the audience’s need for any rocket pack—they can take flight with Carter Stubbs just by sitting in their seats.

◊ Carter Stubbs Takes Flight continues through April 21 in Denton; and then April 25-27 at the Magnolia Lounge in Fair Park (home of Nouveau 47 Theatre).

Original article HERE.

CARTER STUBBS in the Denton Record-Chronicle

Kasey Tackett (Carter) and Lauren Moore (Tahalla) in Brad McEntire's CARTER STUBBS TAKES FLIGHT
[photo credit: sundown collaborative theatre]

TALES OF AN UNHAPPY MAN

Sundown premieres fresh play,‘Stubbs,’ by TWU alum

Denton Record-Chronicle

Published: 04 April 2013 10:34 AM — by Lucinda Breeding

Sundown Collaborative Theatre, Denton’s busiest indie theater company, will open its upcoming show April 11.

 

Sundown Collaborative commissioned Carter Stubbs Takes Flight from Dallas writer Brad McEntire. The play finds Carter Stubbs in the quicksand of good old American ennui. He’s unhappy. His wife is unhappy. And Stubbs’ job isn’t the height of excitement either. When a handful of misfortunes hit at once, Stubbs opens the escape hatch. He lands on a strange Pacific island, where he can examine his true nature without being molested by the obligations of gainful employment or the happily-ever-afters promised by tradition. The play comes to the crucial question: Can Carter Stubbs make a new life?

 

Tashina Richardson directs.

 

McEntire gathered his theater education from the College of Santa Fe in New Mexico before venturing to Denton, where he earned a Master's degree at Texas Woman’s University, with a concentration in playwriting. He’s a familiar face in the North Texas theatre scene, as the founding artistic director of Audacity Productions from 1999 to 2006. He’s now the artistic director of Audacity Theatre Lab, a post he’s held since 2008.

 

CARTER STUBBS TAKES FLIGHT

Who: Sundown Collaborative Theatre

What: a fable by Brad McEntire

When: 8 p.m. Thursday through Saturday, April 11-13, 8 p.m. Thursday through Sunday, April 18-21, and 8 p.m. Thursday through Saturday, April 25-27

Where: April 11-13 and April 18-21 performances are at Green Space Arts Collective, 529 Malone. April 25-27 performances are at Nouveau 47, 1121 1st Ave. in Dallas.

How much: $10 for adults, $8 for students and senior citizens. For reservations, call 940-220-9302. Rated R for mature themes and strong language.

 

Original post HERE.

At the bar after CARTER STUBBS



Ruth during pre-show about to watch CARTER STUBBS

At the bar after CARTER STUBBS, a photo by dribblefunk on Flickr.

CARTER is open!

Info HERE.

CARTER STUBBS trailer

CARTER STUBBS TAKES FLIGHT... World-Premiere April 11, 2013. Tickets and info at www.SundownTheatre.org

CARTER is on the way...

CARTER STUBBS TAKES FLIGHT in rehearsal

Just a week until the world gets to experience CARTER STUBBS TAKES FLIGHT. Info HERE.

CARTER STUBBS poster

The good folks at Sundown Collaborative Theatre just released their poster design as well as a few promo pics for my play CARTER STUBBS TAKES FLIGHT. I saw a rehearsal last week and it is totally coming along. Should be an awesomely fun evening of theatre! Ticket info available on their website ( HERE ). Opens April 11th!

[...as always, click on image to see it larger ]

CARTER STUBBS is on the way...

I have a new play premiering in a few months. It is called CARTER STUBBS TAKES FLIGHT. A small, but scrappy theatre group in Denton, Texas commissioned it and I had a good time collaborating with them. They just announced the project on their website. It will play April 18-28, 2013. Here's a blurb:

Carter Stubbs is unhappy. His wife is unhappy. If his job could feel, it would also be unhappy. Suddenly besieged by a series of unfortunate occurrences he is driven to escape. On a strange Pacific island Carter is offered a chance to face his true nature and maybe, just maybe, chart a new direction for his future.

In addition, they asked me to put together a poster for the production. I sketched out a mock-up and then came out with a final product.

[click on images to see 'em bigger]



Sketchbook mock-up of CARTER STUBBS poster

 

 

And in full color...

 

 

Hello, 2013...

So, today I went to the Webb Gallery in Waxahachie to see sideshow banners and Esther Pearl Watson paintings. Ruth and I listened to Macklemore, Otis Redding and the Lumineers as we drove down. We then ate an early dinner at Olive Garden via a Christmas gift certificate. Haircut then nap. Played Adam Sandler's WATERBOY in the background while I worked over tweaks on the third draft of my new play CARTER STUBBS TAKES FLIGHT. 

That's a full day. 2013 is out of the chute...

P.S. You can see pics of my visit to the Webb Gallery HERE on the Flickr.

CARTER STUBBS makes progress

I met with the Sundown last night to go over the first draft of the play I've been commissioned to write for them. We had our "creative meeting" at a bar, which I think bodes well for our whimsical, absurd project about a man given a rocket pack who fights a tiger on a Micronesian island. Look for the finished beast next spring.

Looking for Structure

“A story should have a beginning, a middle, and an end... but not necessarily in that order.”

~ Jean-Luc Godard

I have what might be called a passionate, perhaps even militant, belief in the art of narration. The narrative is everything. I'm reminded of this as I work on my new play CARTER STUBBS TAKES FLIGHT. It has a straight ahead narrative structure to present an eccentric little fable, but as I laid the thing out, it seemed both kinda boring and predictable in chronological order. So, I started playing with the order of events.

As my progress continues on the play, I stumbled across this video the other day. Writer Rebecca Skloot was attempting to find a working structure for her multi-narrative book, so she wrote the different plots out on color-coded index cards. She then spread them all out where she could look at them, and then went searching for stories with multi-threaded narratives that she could borrow from. She ended up storyboarding the story lines from the film The Hurricane (great movie, BTW) on the same color-coded index cards, and then laying out her book material over the movie’s structure. Totally interesting stuff!

  
Rebecca Skloot: How Fried Green Tomatoes and Hurricane Carter Shaped The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks

Doubts from Steinbeck

John Steinbeck

I'm working on a play. This involves a lot of carrying it around in my brain followed by infrequent bouts of getting those thoughts down on paper. Sometimes it sucks. Sometimes I feel I have something worthwhile in the works. Sometimes it is a joy, sometimes a drudgery.

Today I made very little progress and the whole exercise seemed ridiculous to me. And then I stumbled upon a neat entry on Austin Kleon's Tumblr... excerpts from John Steinbeck's working diary while he was writing GRAPES OF WRATH.

June 18: …I am assailed with my own ignorance and inability. Honesty. If I can keep an honesty to it… If I can do that it will be all my lack of genius can produce. For no one else knows my lack of ability the way I do. I am pushing against it all the time. Sometimes, I seem to do a good little piece of work, but when it is done it slides into mediocrity…

This totally lifted my spirits. I mean, if Steinbeck had bad days, then...

The diary is collected in Working Days: The Journal of The Grapes of Wrath, 1938-1941.

A new play forms

A new play in progress... one of the pages of notes for CARTER STUBBS TAKES FLIGHT

To my Book Tossers

image credit: abbarber.blogspot.com

Recently, on artist Austin Kleon’s Tumblr he cited a New Yorker profile by D.T. Max. The profile is about David Foster Wallace:

[Novelist Mark] Costello remembers, “Junior year, David and I were sitting around talking about magical realists—I think it was ‘One Hundred Years of Solitude’—and someone said, ‘Pynchon’s much cooler.’ We said ‘Who?’ He threw a copy of ‘Lot 49’ at us. For Dave, that was like Bob Dylan finding Woody Guthrie.”

He goes on to think about that simple transaction… a book is casually tossed, taken home and read, and it changes everything. Kleon says, “…usually when we recall these transactions, the Somebody isn’t important, it’s the book, or our hero who catches it, who’s important… but the Somebody, or the Book Tosser, is the unsung hero here: if it weren’t for the toss, there wouldn’t be a catch.”
 

I have been working on a play on commission for the Sundown Collaborative Theatre. I found out about SCT from my friend and colleague Chris Taylor. Even though I submitted work to the organization on my own, Taylor would be the person I cite with brokering the opportunity for me. My acquaintance with him allowed my later connection with Sundown. My career is filled with these connections. 

 

One of my favorite collaborators (and people, for that matter), Chris Humphrey down in Austin, was introduced to me by my friend Jeff Swearingen. In a way, he was the book tosser for all the creative work Humphrey and I have done together since then. These little interpersonal connections and transactions are important. I’m sensitive to them. The busier one becomes the harder it is to keep straight who lead who to what, but I try to stay aware of it.

 

Actually, I used to be overly sensitive about the whole thing. I have been the book tosser myself many times. I was good at it. And honestly, it used to chaff a bit when no recognition was thrown my way. I kind of carried around this secret knowledge that because of me -  because I’d introduced a person to something or someone -  they prospered, be it professionally, creatively or practically. The person would never remember, of course. Or if they did, they never said anything. If asked, it was that person’s own personal victory. He or she had been in the right place at the right time. It was all “them,” with no outside help whatsoever.

 

Anyway, that is how I used to be. And like I said, I realize it has become more and more difficult to remember all these book tossers in my life. In fact, I have built up a weird defense, in a way, against gathering too many more.  
 

I “discover” stuff on my own. It is a joke that one of my friends will say “hey, check out this cool website…” I’ll either ignore it or half-heartedly peruse it. Then six months later I’ll stumble on it and spread the same news back to my friend about the awesome website I “discovered.” It is a bit of an amusing running gag in my small, close circle, but I believe this habit did not develop out of a vacuum. 
 

In light of having both been burned in the past as an excellent book tosser (kind of like what Malcolm Gladwell called a “maven” in his book THE TIPPING POINT) as well as the fact that it is difficult to keep who has done what for me straight on the other end, of course I’d be defensive. And aware.

 

If any of my book tossers are reading this post… Thank You. I couldn’t have done what I’ve done without each and every one of you.