i get on my soapbox about theatre just before i go write some porn.

I have to write a script today… I have to write it, because I promised the troupe I was going to write it. Unfortunately, there was much drama going on last night, and I haven’t had the chance to write it yet… so now I have to write it at work. This wouldn’t be a problem necessarily, as I often write my web page here at work, but the subject matter of this sketch is a little different, and it’s not like I’m just joking around on the web like I do on this page.

To be blunt, the sketch is a satire of Penthouse Forum letters, and if someone came by and saw me typing this stuff on my (quite visible) screen, I’m sure I could get a good talkin’ to. I could try and cover it up quickly with some e-mail, of course, but everyone knows that when you look guilty, you usually are.

So now I’m trying to figure out how I’m going to write the sketch about busty nymphs that want to drink your jizz without getting caught, and I’m starting to feel as dirty as if I’m actually writing for Penthouse magazine. Although if I worked at Penthouse magazine, then my filthy mind would be encouraged…

But I do need to write this sketch today, because last night The Talk happened in the troupe where we discussed our upcoming show, how close we were to the upcoming show, and how much we didn’t want to blow the opportunity to go to Aspen. We tried to light a fire under the asses of some members of the troupe and get a group think going. It’s crunch time, and some people weren’t acting like it. So after I play cheerleader for an hour saying, “Do the work. Put yourself into this. Don’t just piss it away,” if I show up for rehearsal tonight (at my house) without the script that I’ve been promising for a week, I look like the biggest slacker of them all.

But I’m so concerned that my house will be messy, and I won’t have any food to feed them, that I know that I won’t be able to work on the script at home before the rehearsal. I would have done it last night, but the drama and the conversation went into the wee hours of the morning. It was a good talk between me and a couple of my troupemates. Lots of ground covered. Lots of worries and concerns (both professionally and personally) brought to the table. Many drunken rambles about,

“This is the BUSINESS. If you don’t like it, get the fuck out.”

“Don’t listen to them.”

“I never said I didn’t like you, I just said… well, never mind what I said, the point is I like you now.”

And my personal favorite, “Don’t trust ANYONE. Don’t trust her. Don’t trust him. And, hey, don’t you dare ever trust me.”

And a “You’re wrong”/”No, you’re wrong” argument that got so heated that other people were looking over at us in the bar and it looked like these two friends were fighting over me.

Every show goes through problems. In the theatre your closest friends are always the people you are working on a show with. It has to be that way for the show to work, for the chemistry to be there. I’m not talking soulmates, or anything, but for those few weeks, you accept their flaws, you embrace their quirks, and you become a clumsy dysfunctional family that puts on a show. Kind of like the Partridge Family. But usually, in theatre, after the six week run of the show, the family disbands, and you don’t have to put up with these people every day anymore. Then you miss those friends, and sometimes you get to step back and say, “What the hell was I doing hanging out with that guy? What an asshole!” And sometimes you realize how much you actually liked someone’s company. But mostly you realize how much you neglected your other friends and family outside of this show-world when you were in it. And before the next show, you spend some repair time at home… mending loves and relationships and not being an actor.

But in a troupe, that doesn’t stop. You have shows every weekend. You spend every night with these people. You know them better than you ever wanted to. You understand how they think, you know what kind of jokes they make, you know how they work on stage, how they operate at home, how they like their cheeseburgers… it’s a non-stop second family, and sometimes we need some work. Sometimes the family has to have a big gathering and take inventory and decide what’s best for the family. And that’s what happened last night. We had to decide what was best for the family… and we don’t know what’s going to happen, quite frankly… we may not have a show, after we’ve been working on it for two months. Our director may quit. We may have to do an improv show instead of a sketch show… we may have to do it on our own.

We know that whatever we do will be good… but we want it to be excellent, and without the full support of the entire cast, that’s awful hard to do. Everyone has to believe in it. Everyone has to want the same thing. We have to want to go to Aspen. We have to want to have an amazing show.

It’s just stupid. So many egos get in the way of a great show. So much work goes into something, and it’s wrong to get bent out of shape because you aren’t in as many sketches as you’d like. Group mentality. There has to be a group mentality. I’m just being too optimistic, I know.

So last night I didn’t get to write the sketch. So I have to do it today… I could go home early, but I know I’d just spend the time making my apartment more presentable.

Even if I write the sketch here I still have another problem: copies. If I want to make copies of the sketch for everyone, that means going into the copy room with potentially pornographic material.

Why can’t I be writing a bunny sketch?

Which means that today, sometime, I have to write the dirty sketch… I will have to wait until I don’t think anyone’s coming in my office, turn off my phone for fifteen minutes, and write the dirty sketch. And then, just before it’s time to go home, when almost everyone has cleared out of here, I must make it look like I’m popping some popcorn in the microwave, but I’m really making ten copies of the dirty sketch.

I’m a comedic spy. A rebel. Infiltrating corporate America with pages of dick jokes.

Some people go on hunger strikes. Others set themselves on fire. I use the Corporate Network to promote comedy, breaking probably fifteen indecency codes a day.

A girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do.