Where is my haiku?

I almost forgot to write,

but, at last, it’s done.

Someone moved my cheese.
How am I supposed to fart?
I will cut the bread.

Recently, every WNEP Company Member was given the following two tasks:

1) To list ten things a person would have to do to understand them as an artist.

and

2) To list ten things a person would have to do to understand them as a person.

Here’s what Amanda Rountree had to say:

______________________________

1) List ten things a person would have to do to understand you as an artist.

Read my teaching notes.
Find the connections in everything.
Play with the audience.
See both the show I did in the aged turret in Switzerland and in the beer tent at the Kentucky State Fair and observe the similarities.
Paint with calm impatience.
Turn an agonizingly long primal yell into a funny story.
Taste words.
Be affected by what you think the world is trying to tell you.
Journal about it, sleep on it, and then make it into a show.
Make up a song about fruit and perform it for your plants.

2) List ten things a person would have to do to understand you as a person.

Accidentally move to a new city. Then live there for several years.
Become vegan–or at least vegetarian.
Be tormented and bullied by a cruel caste system in grade school and then blessed and honored with amazing friends thereafter.
Journey alone to Ruby Beach.
Recycle. Even if you live in a city that doesn’t make it easy. Sigh.
Walk. A lot.
Allow yourself an uncontrollable laughing fit (30 minutes or more) now and again.
Work no less than twelve ridiculous jobs while you follow your dream.
Feel guilty that you’re not doing more.
Feel bad that you made yourself feel guilty. Take a nap. Then start the cycle over again.

______________________________

Be sure to catch Amanda at next month’s Frequency (Saturday, November 20th at Transistor in Andersonville). She’s hosting AND performing. How can you go wrong?

WNEP Theater Presents: Frequency at Transistor, an open-ended invitation to the WNEP wavelength. On the third Saturday of every month, starting at 8pm, the WNEPeeps host a free live theater event showcasing performers of every kind. Anyone is welcome, be they actor, storyteller, musician, comedian, improviser, magician, puppeteer, juggler, filmmaker, dancer, or. . . well, you get the idea.

Transistor is located in the heart of Andersonville, at 5045 North Clark. Equal parts art gallery, CD & record shop, specialty audio electronics boutique, performance space, and more, it is without a doubt one of the hippest, most unique new establishments in the city of Chicago, and is easily accessible by bus, train, and car.

The next Frequency will be on Saturday, November 20th, and will feature the talents of Don Hall, Amanda Rountree, Mary Jo Bolduc, Rebecca Langguth, Rani Woolpert, Fred Mowery, Snorky Bloomfeld, Kevin Gladish, Thea Sherman, and more. As always, feel free to bring your own booze.

If you’re interested in performing, in November or any other month, email Dave Goss, WNEP’s Managing Director, at dave at wneptheater dot org.

If you’re not interested in performing, come on out and let us show you a good time.

Hope to see you there.

Until then, check out these clips from October:

. . . That in order to even begin to understand the art of improv, one must first understand the following things:

1. That it is, in fact, an art.
2. That it is not a form of comedy – that the funny will come, but only if the real comes first. Good improv is funny, but it’s also sad, tender, sweet, angry, frustrating, tense, and sometimes very uncomfortable. Good improv is a reflection of real life.
3. That we do it everyday. Every one of us. All the time.

. . . That in order to understand the art of DADA, at least the performance aspect of it, one must first take everything they know about acting and throw it away – or, rather, set it aside.

. . . That George W. Bush was a bad president, but he was never a bad man – at least not intentionally. He just wasn’t very smart, and because of that, he was easily influenced by the forces around him — like Dick Cheney, the darkest of them all, who was (and still is) a bad man. One might even go so far as to call him evil.

. . . That, despite the fact that Barack Obama hasn’t exactly delivered on his promise to clean up Washington, he is a good president – and could be great. . . if he would just stop trying to please everybody.

. . . That being a parent is hard, but as long as your kids know you love them, they’re going to be just fine.

. . . That I’m going to go sit in the recliner and have a snooze.

I love you.
Dave Goss, Managing Director