Theatre East Blog is Go!

Working hard with Theatre East to keep bringing Art to Life, On Stage and Off! Check out the blog, the website, and join us at O'Lunney's Times Square for Theatre East Third Monday Mixers!

Red Letter Day

Went out with the wife to the Lower East Side last night. Originally we were headed to Gallery 151 for an Art & Aromatherapy lecture, since those two topics hit Jody's areas of interest and expertise.Unfortunately the lecture was canceled due to illness, but we were happy to check out the current installation (and the current space -- Gallery 151 is a moving gallery, so check out this show at 311 E. 11th before the end of the month).
After chatting with the artist and the owner and the gallerist, we decided to grab a bite to eat in the neighborhood. Since our friends Guy & Sara used to live there, we asked them.
Motorino was the first recommendation and we lucked out: the 30 minute wait ended up being only 7, and we got the prime table by the windoor (or whatever you call a floor-to-ceiling window open to the street). We had the warm & spicy octopus & potato starter, a salad and Jody had the spicy soppressata pizza and I had the special with ramps. The look big, but the thin Neapolitan crust makes it very easy to finish a whole pie by yourself. This is perhaps the best in the city (Jody had heard of it but somehow I had not). Do yourself a favor and check it out.
This all followed Jody winning a cool new lamp for our apartment on Apartment Therapy and being featured in yet another Etsy showcase.

Bold New Steps for Theatre East

Had a great company meeting last week for Theatre East. Very exciting, ambitious plans for our Education Outreach and Community Outreach committees, not to mention some cool artistic programs forthcoming, like our Mi Casa Es Su Teatro program.

Eye of God listed in the New Yorker

Check out the Goings On About Town - we're in pretty good company!

Eye of God - Director's Vision

As Director of Communications for Theatre East, I shot and edited this short clip.
Director Lisa Devine talks about what the play means for her and what she hopes to give to the audience.

Had a great rehearsal last night. Tim Blake Nelson attended and seems energized about this production. He is even going to be giving us some cuts/rewrites!

Mingering Mike

I was catching up on m'News of the Weird and saw this classic:

"...a Washington, D.C., man whose love of music led him, in the 1960s, to meticulously hand-make and hand-paint facsimile record album covers of his fantasized music, complete with imagined lyric sheets and liner notes (with some "albums" even shrink-wrapped in plastic), and, even more incredibly, to hand-make cardboard facsimiles of actual grooved discs to put inside them. "Mingering Mike," ...His 38 imagined "albums" were discovered at a flea market after Mike defaulted on storage-locker fees."

I had to Goodsearch that and found Mingering Mike's web site. Please. Check it out.

Pulp Fiction

Found Thomas Allen's online gallery thanks to Very Short List. I think this one is my favorite:Also check out today's Recession This!

Quid Pro Quo

This image is from Lost In Transit collective's photostream on flickr. I found it when I was looking for a quid pro quo image for yesterday's post, but didn't use it, lest people thought it was by the Medium Large guy.

Scavengerjo Art on Exhibit at the Central Park Zoo

My wife, Jody, has been asked to exhibit her found-object art at the Central Park Zoo as part of their observation of Earth Week. Jody will be there all this week from 12:00-3:00; it's $10 to get in, but well worth it in my opinion. Plus, you can see monkeys.

Phonoharps + Koto

Saw this article about Walter Kitundu in the January/February issue of the Utne Reader.
This guy takes turntables and incorporates them into stringed instruments of all stripes.
Check it out on San Francisco Public Television via YouTube:


At about 5:24 he plays something that looks like a koto. I first heard the koto in my student days at Augustana College. Jeff Wichmann was a senior my freshman year, and he still plays it and the trumpet combined with loads of other instruments; check out his MySpace page.

Also check out today's Recession This!

One Hit Wonders of Sundance

Being an actor, I thought it might be a good idea to keep an eye on the new prodigies coming out of this year's Sundance Film Festival.

Then I got an e-mail from Sundance listing the 25 Top Directors Who Haven't Done Anything Since They Were All That in Park City (or something like that).

On the one hand, this justifies any laziness on my part; on the other, it's a little saddening.

Also: don't forget to check out Recession This!

Photo by Pedrojperez via Morguefile.com

Puppets for Grown-ups

I don't know anything about this guy, but I just learned Dan Hurlin will be doing a puppet show at St. Ann's Warehouse about "portrait photographer Mike Disfarmer, who for decades shunned his family and neighbors while operating the only portrait studio for miles around Heber Springs, Arkansas."
It looks intriguing, and reminds me of a show I did in Minneapolis years ago with Broken Mind Theater, a company formed by Sesame Street on Ice puppet builders. We did a production of Tennessee Williams's Suddenly Last Summer and I played Mrs. Venable via a bunraku puppet. It was a great experience.

It's not funny or anything, but to get a feeling for Hurlin's work, check out the video: