Hindsight Hour

Yesterday I had my first recording session for my new podcast project theoretically titled "Hindsight Hour". Tim and I are collaborating again, which is fun and easy, it feels good to get back into his studio. Our working relationship is very fluid because of all the time we spent on Bubble Boys.

Tim and I are still working on the format of the show but basically each week will have a theme like "The Work Place" and will contain scenes improvised from written premises. The goal is to have more realistic grounded type scenes in an effort to get at some commonalities within these generalities and to see how different performers find inspiration with the same prompts. What the end result will sound like I have no idea.

We had Annie, Brunlieb, and Scott in the studio yesterday and it was such a joy. I am very grateful to work with Annie one last time before she leaves and always stunned and delighted by Brunlieb and Scott. They really sunk their teeth into the stuff I threw at them. I'm taking more of a directing role with this project which has its own challenges and excitements.

Today Malarkey and Chimko came in to record, I did some scenes with them, one where I was their dad busting them for curfew which felt real good. Their first team at iO was the first one I coached so we have a bit of a paternal dynamic which added to it. With Malarkey also leaving at the end of the month it was important and gratifying to have them in, felt like closure.

Everyone was responsive, game, and creative and made this new project, which isn't totally defined, really fun to start work on. They gave me some great material and triggered some ideas on how to put it together.

It's incredibly satisfying to start work on a project. I realize it's the thing I've been missing the past couple months which has caused a bit of angst. At the end of the month lots of folks are taking off and it feels like things here are starting to roll.

Holy Fuck Comedy Hour

Crocodile Doctor

The Holy Fuck Comedy Hour is a weekly free midnight show at The Annoyance. Each week the cast puts up new sketch material, from solo to full cast, with the goal of experimentation, irreverence, and occasional perversity.

Its been my favorite show for the last couple years. At first I started going just to see Tisher, I kept going because no matter what each Friday I'd see something fresh, something challenging, something inspiring. Not all the bits certainly. There is a lot of trash. But even in the grossest, stupidest, most ill-conceived bits there is a pervading sense of courage. And on those rare nights when nothing hit it was rewarding enough to spend an hour or so with friends.

About half the cast is leaving at the end of the month, from its inception it has been a show in constant flux. I'm excited and hopeful for all the folks leaving the Chicago nest and interested to see how the show morphs into its next incarnation.

Fridays at Midnight. Free. Annoyance Theatre. Holy Fuck Comedy Hour.

Graffiti 136

Photo credit to my sis who is on her honeymoon in the Pacific Northwest. She said the farting ghost made her think of me.

"I remember as a kid having a balloon and accidentally letting the string go and watching it just float off and into the sky until it disappeared. And there's something about that, even, that feels very much like what life is, you know, that it's fleeting, and it's temporal." -Pete Docter

"An idea, like a ghost, must be spoken to a little before it will explain itself." -Charles Dickens

"Don't think, just fart." -John Cage

Street Talk 20

Downtown, outside a Northwestern building. A group of young college kids approaches.

College Dude: (nerdy, cocky, looking at my motorcycle helmet) Hey. Hey. What kind you got?
Me: I'm sorry?
College Dude: What kind you got?
Me: Honda VTX.
College Dude: What?
Me: Honda VTX.
College Dude: (scornfully) Oh. That's nothing.
Me: (mystified, slightly irritated, dismissively) All right man.

The college kids move on, one turns back.

College Dude#2: I got a 1984 Ninja GPZ900R.
Me: Cool.
College Dude #2: And I just got a Susuki GSX 600. What kind you got again?
Me: Honda VTX. (points) That one.
College Dude #2: Very cool. Don't mind Dave. He doesn't even have a bike.
Me: Have a good night man.

It Is Almost The Year Two Thousand

To start the world of old 
We had one age of gold 
Not labored out of mines, 
And some say there are signs, 
The second such has come, 
The true Millennium, 
The final golden glow 
To end it. And if so 
(and science ought to know) 
We may well raise our heads 
From weeding garden beds 
And annotating books 
To watch this end de luxe.

-Robert Frost

'The Trip To Italy' A Review

The Trip To Italy is a buddy road comedy, the sequel to 2010's The Trip. Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon play fictionalized versions of themselves on a restaurant/vacation tour of Italy, the follow up to their original tour of northern England. They see the sights, eat great food, crack jokes, do impressions, discuss their careers and families.

The film has the same casual fluid feeling of the original: light, fun, and surprisingly soulful. It does have the perfunctory sequel call out at the beginning, dropping Godfather II, but that dove tails into the films first series of delightful impressions. It is not better than the original but it is not worse either. The dynamic has switched with Coogan being the more laid back and Brydon as a new father suffering some doubts. The scenery and culinary beauty of Italy enhances an already pleasing return to two interesting, humorous, authentic characters.

Two great comic actors in a low-key sequel find moments of improvisational brilliance and relaxed emotional truth.

See It.

The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress

Ambition can be poison,
jealousy: a shit-smeared
dead-end.

I wish I was moving
or had this job
or had that audition
or was thinner
or it was summer
or knew this person
or wrote more
or got more respect
or was in a prestigious Masters program destined for unavoidable success
or didn't have to commute
or was revered
or had a couch with corresponding flat screen TV
or got more love on Instagram
or was published on HuffPost or McSweeney's or Paris Review
or just somewhere that would get more hits

Garbage thoughts.

Moments can be ripe for plucking
-savory and succulent-
if the past can stay behind
and the future, a loving distance.