Before We Begin: Flat History

The Before We Beginroom is coming up like these things do: one wall at a time. As theatre-folk, when we say "walls," what we mean are "flats," ie, fake walls that create space. These are common base-objects in lots of plays -- particularly when you're using black boxes that need help defining the performance space and creating architecture. We're pretty lucky that we have some storage at our house so that when we finish a show we can actually store the flats and use them again. Each show, however, wants a different scenic feel, which means that unearthing flats is like a trip through your past shows. By the time audiences see Before We Begin, of course all of this will be covered up, but right now in the Black Box I can personally see the ghosts of three past shows on these flats.

This flat still has the painted scene from last summer's Idle:

You can see it in action here with actor Clara Weishahn in the show:

These flats still hold the colors from 2012's A Terrific Fire. The colors had fantastic names like "creme brûlée" and "hot watermelon. We were obsessed with them while making the show, but I can't remember them now. Anyway, here they are the flats today:

And here's some in their original incarnation.

This is the green (like, "majestic forest" or something?):

And here's that "hot raspberry" or whatever:

This wallpaper looked super familiar and I couldn't place it. . . .

Then I remembered we loaned the flats to our pals at Elemental Theatre Collective in 2012 for their show Vacancy, and they had wallpapered it to look like a cheap motel room. I wish I could find a picture of that online, but sadly. . . we'll all just have to use our imaginations. Unless someone from Elemental can hook me up with a picture. . .

(UPDATE) D'Arcy Dersham read this post and then sent me the perfect picture. Check out the then-in-tact plaid wallpaper with actor Jeff Hodge:

And soon all these concrete reminders of these past shows will be covered up by Before We Begin. Good thing we take pictures.

Before We Begin: In the Space!

Today is the big day. We've officially started moving into the AS220 Black Box and building our room within the room for Before We Begin. Jed found a rock on the beach last week that is our guiding force for the visual aspects of the room:

There are a lot of reasons why this rock is a powerful symbol for what we're building. It's simple and grey. It's round and ovally. But it also is deceptive. There is a strange tork to it -- a kind of divet if you look close. It has these vague lines and circles. It has a great weight. It kind of makes you feel calm and also in love with how nature makes such perfect objects.

We had a mid-day trip to an unnamed hardware store where we bought all the wood that could possibly be available to two people not building a home, and then brought it back to the space. Here's Jed in shopping mode:

While there we got to ask ourselves, "What kind of wood paneling should we get?" Thank goodness for that rock. It might sound nuts but it guided us toward the exact right wood siding.

And more and more more!

Before We Begin: Songs and Movies

We are making a new play that isn't really a play. As a part of the work we're doing on this non-play is collaborating with Xander Marro on a video that goes in the piece and Kirsten Volness and Jacob Richman on writing a song that we will teach the audience to sing. Both avenues of creation are new to us and all are artists we've admired for a long time, but never worked with. In other words, we're having a good time. We can't show you the video or sing you the song (yet!), but we thought it might be fun to share a couple little teasers.

So! Here is a still from a video test shoot Xander did with us to get the green screen down:

And here are the lyrics of the amazing song we wrote with Kirsten and Jacob:

We live in a dead man's house. We live in someone else's dream. I live in a time of creation. My bones grow while I sleep.

Show up when you're ready. Tell me how you feel. Dirty snow is dirty Because we get behind the wheel.

Past hopes. Future wishes. Time washes the grooves of our struggle From the shores of our remembering.

Who will sing your song when I am dead?

Then there's also this little chant:

If it's useful, celebrate it! If it's crashing, elevate it!

See you June 1-12 at AS220 in Providence.