(…and yes I said yes I will Yes)

A few seconds ago, it was last Saturday and we were stumbling off the plane, and in the blink of an eye, I was (not) stumbling in at 3am Sunday. In between we opened the show, played to enthusiastic houses, ran lines, did makeup, bought props, stuck together, explored solo, sang songs, drank pints, climbed cliffs, ate fish, walked, swam, rode trains, and started packing again. Sigh.

There are wives, boyfriends and kids, cats, guinea pigs and a dragon named Steve at home, but for a week we were Outlook, a new play. This is Outlook:

The Director

Mark Finley’s been on board since the beginning. Though we’ve known and worked with each other many years on many plays, it’s only the second play of mine he’s directed (people are always surprised to hear that). It’s just that when we work on a play, we work on it for a LONG time. (The evolution of “Off-Season” to “Some Are People,” to “End of Land” took about 4 years).

One of the secrets of our successful collaboration is that we both work in the same building, for the same company (for now). We chat from the 2^nd to the 9^th floor. We spot each other across the cafeteria and I interrupt his Sudoku time. We meet for a blast of caffeine just before the coffee bar closes. And we run our concurrent theatrical lives over my latest editing deadline and his planning of the huge international event he runs.

We are not getting too old for this shit. We are getting better at it: The Secretaries, And Sophie Comes Too, readings of Careful, Slipping, I Know My Own Heart (all found in Dublin), Street Theater at the Center. Doric’s Celebration of Life.

What he’s taught me is about letting go and trusting… when you KNOW you can let go and trust. This script, this version, came in at 83 pages. We had a 70-minute window. We’d sit in nooks and crannies at work and before rehearsal, slimming it down, line by line, exchange by exchange, and 9 times out of 10, when he said: can we cut this? I said: you’re right. (Though we ARE putting some of it back next time, right Mark?)

It wasn’t so much a negotiation as a passing back and forth, holding up and examining, taking it into the rehearsal room and: yes you’re right…no that does belong there. And we ended up with a play.

Mark is my half-Gemini brother from another mother. And he’s very handsome.

Jen

My play is about what happens when a magic wand comes into the picture and changes everyone’s lives. Jen Russo makes the magic happen. Our paths first crossed at the APAC reading of my play “End of Land,” in which she ran a wonderful, efficient gig, and soon after, I noticed that she & Mark Finley were joined at the hip (theatrically speaking) Good call, Mark! After coveting her for many shows, and watching her kick it without breaking a sweat, I finally got to work with her on one of my plays, and I have to say if she weren’t “married” to Mark, (and I weren’t happily married myself) I might have to fight him for her.

We knew the production would be low-tech, and when Mark and I were discussing how to indicate the magic wand was working, I suggested using a xylophone. Jen went down to Toys ‘R’ Us and picked up one of those Fisher-Price models on wheels, with a plastic hammer attached by a string, and each rehearsal, she’d produce a TZINGGGGGG when Susan waved the wand.

Each night as we set up, Jen said: “Sound check!” We’d pause and she’d run the hammer up the notes. Then: “Sound check finished.” The xylophone goes home with her.

The Actors

Back at the turn of the century in a hotel in Seattle where the participants in the ROCKRGRL conference were congregating, I spotted two tall women I’d seen play in and went over to introduce myself (again). They were Chapter in Verse, and they were hanging with a much shorter woman, who introduced herself as Meghan Cary from Hershey, PA. “Oh…do you know Shakeys?” I asked. “I went to see Joan Jett and the Blackhearts play there.” Long story. Meghan said that she did know where it was…and asked me to her show.

When she strode onto the stage at a Starbucks a night or two later, she planted her feet and took charge of the audience in such a way I said: ACTOR. Then she started playing and singing and that was it for me. A keeper. And someone I must work with. And later I asked where she’d trained. She seemed surprised, and told me she had both undergrad and grad degrees in acting. When we started En Avant playwrights, she was in “A Bushel of Crabs.” And I’ve summarized elsewhere our long history of short plays, readings, her stepping in to save the day in “Grieving for Genevieve,” and getting married having 2 kids in there (and 3 albums). And now after 12 years, I got to see Meghan originate a part in one of my full-length plays. Because when I see something, I try to make it happen. Sometimes it just takes a REALLY REALLY long time.

Donnetta has been keeping me honest as a playwright this whole time. Each of the characters has a throughline, and we see what she wants. But Brown, the character Donnetta plays, is more mysterious; some have suggested she’s an entity of some kind. (And generally I leave that sort of thing up to the actor). But as a writer, I know we aren’t quite…THERE…yet with Brown’s sweet spot. And having someone both as smart and grounded as Donnetta helps me as the playwright figure out what’s missing (and until then, she fills in the gaps, beautifully). We talk about the character, and Donnetta tells me what she feels is going on; and what isn’t there for her to find as an actor. And as I said sometime last night, after not one, but two conversations with people who’d seen the show and said: what does Brown REALLY want, I said I can’t decide that in my top brain. I have to put it down in my reptile brain and let it rise to the surface, probably between sleep and waking, or in a dream (which is what I have in common with Brown: she dreams things and tries to capture them and make them happen. It’s what she does). And what Donnetta does. My fleet-footed Palmetto state messenger of the gods, our Thespis.

Ironically, Irene is our junior member, but she’s the one who plans, organizes, and cajoles the rest of the gang into getting from here to there, knows about train tickets and has a list of “must dos” that she checks off with alarming efficiency. She’s our ingénue who could run a small country. Or a slightly larger one. Don’t be deceived by her slight appearance, her blonde hair and bubbly laugh. I didn’t know it when we first cast her, but she is so like Ella, her character, that in many ways, all she had to do was bring her essence as she is onto the stage, and we GOT it. But there is a serious craft at work here; and Mark pushed her hard: and she took it all in, and claimed her own space on the stage with a powerful group of fellow players. This is the best work I’ve seen her do. And we have nicknamed her boyfriend Serious Ron (the name of her boyfriend in the play).

The thing about Danielle is that she seems to transform every time you look at her. At any angle, you say: I didn’t see that before about her eyes, the tilt of her head, the way she’s holding her hands. We’d passed through each others’ orbits at EAT, and the first time we got her in the rehearsal room…then saw her at the Chesley/Chambers reading of “Outlook” (many drafts ago), Mark and I looked at each other and just said: oh yeah. She’s a dancer and you can tell. And as an actor she is just as rigorous on herself as you know she is on her students…though there’s a clear leavening of kindness and wisdom as well. Someone told her last night: you know if the Abbey had seen you do this play, you'd be hired on the spot. Everyone pulls me aside and says: Where did you get her? How did you find someone so right for this part?

And I ask myself the same question about all of them: how did we find these people who are so right for the parts/the parts are so right for them? How did they find us?

Producing

I addressed the troops yesterday (Saturday) in my capacity as producer. I said we needed to spend the day on ourselves and the play. Stay close to home, tend to ourselves. We still had two more full days of work (including the Gala). We’re representing EAT and New York companies, and yes, Americans. We have a job and we’re not finished with it yet.

Among the Epiphanies (and that’s the title of a memoir if ever I heard one) I had this week was that I’m not here to play. I’m here to work. Of course I was always here to work, but since I came out publicly (as a producer), I have had to remind myself that these are producer shoes and hat I’m wearing, not the playwright’s wardrobe. Though I’m constantly diving in and out of phonebooths changing costume.

I look at the actors each time I’m here and think “where do they get the TIME to do tourist stuff?” I’ve got meetings and press releases, and emails and blogs and I look at things on my way places, and talk to people, and listen to their stories, but this is my…fourth or fifth trip here and the list of must-sees I must not have seen is long.

My imaginary assistant missed some things, and I would have fired her or at least docked her pay if she existed. Epiphany: next time bring an assistant. I usually see many shows when I’m here but was torn between that and wanting/needing to see our show. Epiphany: I brought finished shows here before; this is a work-in-progress. I DO need to see it as many times as possible so I know what to work on next.

And there is still work to be done (epiphany) and I know what we need to do and what we need to ask for to take the play to its apogee.

We did not have the houses I would have liked, though the audiences were enthusiastic. I actually didn’t have much of an epiphany about that one. It keeps me up at night in Ireland and in New York. I’m getting better at this, not so much because it’s a natural skill, but because I like the people I work with, and want to take care of them. Whether they’re the American family or the Irish one, it’s my job to keep them all safe.

Unlike the character of Patience in the play (whose nighttime mutterings I just quoted), I don’t have as much of a problem saying “I love you” to the people I love.

I love them, individually and as a group. They are the ones who said: What’s the big dream…yours? And then said: “Of course.”

Another Opening, Another Show...

Behind this door lies theater.

Monday, May 14: This is my third opening in Dublin and they don’t get any less fraught, less exciting.

But what do you do on Opening Day, when everything’s just marking time until curtain, and the playwright’s become a useless appendage, like a vestigial tail that drops off as the organism evolves. I don’t feel redundant (that’s a line from the play). Also, everyone starts talking in lines from the play.

I remember the day, the moment, “Outlook” was born. I was on my way to work, fussing at myself because there was a deadline for the EATfest looming, and I didn’t have anything new. I’d already worked my way through my “trunk” plays that might be suitable for a one-act festival; while I generally think highly of the plays I send out, sometimes the artistic directors don’t. So I had nothin’. And I thought: It’s not like there’s a magic wand. Then: wouldn’t it be great to have a real magic wand? I almost stumbled on the steps up from the PATH train as the idea hit me. I clutched the rail and went on.

I was on my way to a training session for Outlook, the email program that our company was transitioning to; and one of my colleagues had to shuffle us in and out by the hour, in groups of 30, and teach us the rudiments of our new software.

I didn’t pay that much attention to the lesson, because I had started writing the play called “Outlook” in my head. I realized I knew there was a woman named Susan who spent her days teaching people in a corporation how to use software; and there was someone from UPS who came in…with a magic wand. I tried to keep the details in my head.

And I kept repeating the details over and over, and adding to them, and embellishing them, and finding out more about the characters; that night I went home and started to write. I can’t remember how look it took, but soon enough I had a one-act play.

I gave it to Paul Adams, EAT’s artistic director and he said…not for us. And I showed it to Tina Howe, my friend and teacher, and she said: that character of Brown is wonderful, but we don’t know anything about the others. (There were 4 characters by then).

Somewhere in there, it became clear that the play was meant to be longer than one act, and I started making mental marks on the script: here would be a place to let out a seam, here would be a place for an addition. What would make the ending work? Which person would Susan end up with at the finish? I thought I knew, but then the character I was writing took over, and in no uncertain terms made it clear she was unsatisfied with the ending. And when they start talking, I listen. At that point, it feels more like taking dictation.

Susan acquired a daughter, and I had a cast of 4, all women, and I even had in mind which actors I was writing the two leads for. I started to bring it into Playwrights Circle at EAT, and as often happens with my plays, the main critique was: nothing HAPPENS. And I said: a woman falls in love, loses her girlfriend, her job and her home, and acquires a wand with magical powers and NOTHING HAPPENS? Sometimes, this is what it feels like to be a woman playwright.

And, I think what drives me, if not a lot of other playwrights, is that I know, in my heart, if I can just make the audience see what I see, they’ll get what I’m trying to say. So you can tell me “nothing happens” and I can try to make it clear that EVERYTHING happens. Somewhere in there, we went to Dublin again (with my play, "The Adventures of..."). And before we left, I asked Mark Finley, in his capacity as TOSOS Artistic Director, to schedule “Outlook” for a reading sometime in May after we got back. That would give me plenty of time (I thought).

I wasn’t finished a draft. Oh no, not me. But a deadline…now there’s something to get you writing.

When I got back from Dublin I thought: oh shit. I have a reading of this thing in a couple of weeks, I’d better finish it. (I don’t think I’m revealing a big playwright secret here. Many of us are like this).

Outlook: The Original Cast (TOSOS, May 2009).

And in the meantime, the actors I had in mind weren’t available. They’d either moved on (physically, to another state), or weren’t available on the day. In a brief discussion with Mark, I suggested Meghan Cary, who’d already worked with us on a couple of full-length readings and a short play reading, and been in a short play of mine. She was a bit young for the part of Susan, but 1) you can do that in a reading; and 2) she said “yes.” For Patience, Susan’s girlfriend, we went to our EAT larder (the deep and talented acting company), and Mark and I looked at each other and said…what about Danielle Quisenberry? And to look at her fiery beauty you wouldn’t think of her as playing an uptight WASP, but it was, in fact, what was underneath the character’s surface that suited her for the role so well. We had Irene Longshore for the ingénue, because she’s the one you call up when you need a good actress who can play young (who is young) and you can HEAR her. (And she’d also been in one of my short plays where she made her singing debut playing a tween star).

But for Brown, the mysterious catalyst…fortunately, I’d made the acquaintance of Lisa Kron, the wonderful American playwright (and founding member of the Five Lesbian Brothers) a couple years previously at a New York Innnovative Theater Awards party (I think Lisa was the host that year). And I was telling Lisa about “Outlook” and worrying that I could not find the right actor to play Brown, and she looked over and called “Donnetta…there’s someone I’d like you to meet.”

Donnetta walks the stage preshow.

And Donnetta Lavinia Grays turned out to be the whole package: actor, playwright, fellow South Carolinian. We’d even done a reading of her play “The B Factor,” at TOSOS, and Doric had made her a member by the time she came onboard with “Outlook.”

 So the names were in the blanks, and we rehearsed once, as is our TOSOS custom, and Mark looked at Danielle and said: “let’s hear the monologue.” THAT monologue… a long and complex bit that goes from superego to ego to id in the space of one page. It came to me in a dream (after seeing Staci Swedeen’s show, “Pardon Me For Living,”) and I had to jump out of bed and run into the next room and turn on the computer and write it down. I never do that.

And Dani nailed it in rehearsal and in the reading and we watched as she hit that sucker out of the part and gave notice that NO ONE else was playing Patience. And Mark and I were fine with that.

Everyone else brought it as well, and Doric loved it, and I knew I had a lot of work to do, but it seemed like I finally had a good piece of marble to carve, so to speak, and to follow Michaelangelo’s advice, I would try to cut away anything that didn’t look like a statue.

And then, you know, time goes by. And I kept working on Outlook and taking it deeper, and peeling away the layers. Not every night, or even every week. I’m pragmatic enough that I pull it out when there’s a chance that someone might see it, or hear it.

I’m also someone who has to “sell” my plays a lot (except to audiences). Audiences generally like my plays.

So we read “Outlook” again at EAT at last year’s “First Taste” series, which coincided with the EATfest (in which I had another short play in which people complained “nothing happens” except EVERYTHING happens). The idea of that program was that you’d hear the play, and go away for a month or so and come back with the feedback incorporated and the next draft. I could get on board with that, so we read Outlook in May, then in June, last year. The second reading was over at the Dramatists Guild, and as we walked over to our headquarters (Zuni), I listened to Paul’s suggestions that the epilogue could go, and that Brown needed more moments which established her own wants and needs, and made her less mysterious but more human. And I started thinking how to do that.

Then late last year, I asked Paul: Can we go to Dublin again? And we hadn’t the previous two years what with the economy and all, and battling life for art and vice versa. And I told him if we brought the puppy home, I would walk it and feed it, and brush it. So he said yes.

And I applied for Dublin again, and no one heard from the festival for awhile, because (we were told later), the Irish government wanted to charge a hefty tax on the visiting companies, and Brian Merriman (the artistic director) knew if that happened, he wouldn’t have ANY international visitors. Great idea! When your economy’s in the toilet, charge the ARTISTS. That’ll make up your deficit.

But Brian fought the law…and HE won. So we got the invite and began a three month Chinese fire drill that brought us here today. Or whatever day it is.

Opening Night presents!

And on opening night I didn’t think of all of that as I woke at Jurys Christchurch, and walked down the street to check in at Trinity Capital, and I know it was only Monday and today’s Wednesday, but I can’t really remember how I spent the rest of my morning. I ended up at the apartment where the cast was staying, and I did some shopping for Opening Night presents, because it’s NOT an opening night unless there are presents. Chocolate, t-shirts, chocolate, coffee…little souvenirs (to remember). The only wrapping paper I could find was wedding paper, so I bought that.

And walked to the theater in my red velvet dress and flats, hair (at least starting out) in a shiny, flat style, and makeup on my cheeks and lips for the first time in many moons.

I sat at the back of the theater and wrapped the presents, and watched them set up the lights, and the early arrivals, and gave the presents, and got one of my own (a literary pub crawl! Two of my favorite things!) and wondered…canwe pull it off?

The folks from the US Embassy arrived, and a decent crowd of both men and women. Would they get it? Would they laugh?

Mark and Jen in the back row before the house opens.

Spoiler alert: they got it and they laughed, and they listened when they needed to, and knew what was going on, and nodded “yes” when they liked something and shook their heads when they didn’t. Great applause at the end, and I decided I liked the shorter version of the play (we’d cut it down by a good 20 minutes or more in rehearsal) better.

Beautiful actors, great director, backbone of a Stage Manager.

Then off to find food, and to the First Night party at the Arlington Hotel. And dear Brian was there and we hugged for a long time, and I worked the room because that’s the kind of producer/playwright I am, and inside I was humming and buzzing and my heart was overflowing because we know what we are doing, and they knew what we were saying, and it definitely is a play where something happens and everything happens and we are here in Dublin doing it.

The cast of "Outlook," Dublin, May 2012.

And You May Ask Yourself: How Did I Get Here?

Sunday, May 13 was our tech rehearsal. And even before then, I had lots to do: check out (regretfully) of the lovely Merrion, grab a cab to Jurys Christchurch. As always, I chatted with the cab driver who began to ask rather pointed questions about the play. When we got there, he tucked the card into his pocket and said: maybe I’ll have a look-in, I’m bisexual. (I refrained from saying: Good for you! After all, there are some who say that bisexuals, like leprechauns don’t exist).

To the sound of church bells pealing, I unpacked in my room across from Christchurch Cathedral, and dressed for the panel on gay theatre (there is a fine line between serious theater person and slob). Then headed toward Temple Bar, with dead computer, aka craptop, aka Important Prop and xylophone aka sound effect, in my bag.

View from my hotel window.

I went to find the venue, the Exchange Cultural Center, which like many places in Dublin has no numbered street address. On my way, I stopped at Tesco and bought a burner phone (the definition of which according to UrbanDictionary.com is: “A prepaid cellular phone, replaced frequently (weekly) (monthly) to avoid leaving a trail and getting caught up in illegal activities.”)

As if calling your mother on Mother’s Day is an illegal activity!

And I found the venue good and early (always my first order of business when I’m on a panel or going to a show in a new place), and then sat down to make the phone work. Couldn’t figure out what the PIN was…couldn’t call to ask them…when I came back to the venue, Callum, the producing director of the festival, pointed out that the PIN was on the bottom of the box. This is why he’s running the festival.

So we paneled on “whither gay theatre/er” as we are wont to do in gay theater/re. The other panelists were me, Callum, playwright Lisa Saleh (who has a piece in the shorts), and a guy whose name completely escapes me who had by far the most credentials and gave the actual Aiden Clarke Memorial Lecture on Gay Theatre before we opened it up to questions.

Gareth Hurley moderated the panel; he’s been with the festival practically since its inception, and has been taking on additional duties with artistic director Brian Merriman out of action due to a family emergency. So we discussed the usual intangibles and problems that will never be solved: Is gay/queer theater something that still needs to exist apart from the mainstream (I say, yes); is the mainstream a place for plays that have predominantly gay content or themes (yes); and can straight playwrights write gay plays (yes again). I’ve been on many panels over the years; on all kinds of topics, and I can hold my end up with stories, quotes, pithy rejoinders and anecdotes.

So we passed a pleasant 90 minutes or so on a street that turned out to be a lot busier than it looked…people passed by and banged on the windows. Two little kids wandered in and out of the room, and loudly chatted with each other, and of course when it finally got to be the audience’s turn to ask questions, there were a few people who confused “question” with “statement of my own beliefs.”

And then it was over to the Joyce for the tech rehearsal, already in progress. I took a cab and the driver knew pretty much where it was…but not exactly. And heading up Great George St., he pulled over and asked a lady if she knew, and she pointed back down the street and said: next to the for sale sign. And the driver did a u-turn and went the wrong way own a one-way street, but nobody was coming towards us.

And I got there, and brought the all-important xylophone into the controlled mayhem that is a tech rehearsal. The room I thought, was lovely. And one of the most acoustically “bouncy” I’ve ever been in. Every word, every step, every movement seemed to reverberate off all the surfaces simultaneously and come back and echo itself a few times. It’s a beautiful room: wide wood-paneled floors, huge windows with wooden shutters, pocket doors to the next room, and a lovely ceiling painted a kind of peach/orange with white moldings of classical freizes. Gorgeous and LOUD.

With the shutters open, the outside light was lovely, and it gave the room the feel of being lit by Vermeer. Shutters closed, they worked 'neath artificial lighting.

Jen sat at the back with our lighting guy, and two stands of stage lights had been erected on either side of the room. At the far end, the playing area had a piano, two tables and two chairs. That was our set. And one Mr. James Joyce glaring down from a portrait to the right of the fireplace. 

What Would JJ (James Joyce) Do?

Watching the actors take possession of the room and tame it and fit their craft to the structure was to see what actors really do. They rasied and lowered their voices walked on their heels and their toes, turned and spoke with their faces at different angles, bouncing the sound off the walls like an outfielder taking a carom and turning to throw home.

Rows of chairs awaited an audience; the next room quickly became a prop/dressing room, and the chill of the late Dublin spring seeped in. Books…most of them by or about Joyce were piled on a table, and carefully put into a corner to wait for their eventual restoration. Ulysses, Ulysses, Ulysses…

In the hallway, on the staircase, were reproductions of theatrical posters, and another bookcase filled with translations of Joyce’s works. There’s another staircase to a third floor…which I haven’t yet taken. On the first floor landing, there’s a statue of Narcissus, light streaming over him from the tall, arched window.

Himself also watched from backstage.

The actors ran and worked, Mark called out changes and gave direction about their voices and movements, and where to put props, and who should strike them. And I began to wonder if it was all going to fall into place. Had we bitten off more than we could chew when I blithely sent in the application back in December? Did I really think we could create a new piece of theatre in the time and space allotted to us by the boundaries of dayjobs and daily living and picking through the emotional and financial minefield of the start of the second decade of the 21^st century? This is how I am during tech.

Then suddenly it was time to go and we’d had close to a runthrough, but not really. And everyone was ravenous, but Mark had to go across the river to the Speakeasy to do ANOTHER tech, this one for Michael Lynch’s show, “Livin’ on the Real.” And Jen went to finish up her first week, by moving out of the apartment she’d shared with Andrea Alton, over to the apartment she’d be sharing with the “Outlook” cast. And we told her we’d email her when we decided where to eat.

I said: I know a place. And we headed for a restaurant at the far end of Temple Bar, just a few minutes across the river on foot.

We were joined by Shalema, Donnetta’s wife, who’d arrived that day and had the dazed look we’d all had the day before. We wended our way to The Larder, a restaurant where Chris Weikel and I shared a memorable meal back in ’09, and which I suggested our authors put into the Ireland book (they agreed), and it’s still there when a lot of other places are gone, and the restaurant said they had room for us, and we told them we’d be there by 7.

Chris Weikel deciding to take his MFA.

The night Chris and I ate there, we talked about what we wanted to do with our work; Chris was there with "Pig Tale" and thought he might apply to the Hunter program for his MFA; I was there with "The Adventures of..." and I had the first draft of a play called “Outlook.” I went to see Chris’s thesis play for his MFA at Hunter last week. And I’m here with “Outlook.”

So there’s an emotional resonance there. Which is good for the appetite. We fell to with great relish and all but ate the plates beneath the beautifully prepared food set before us. Then we looked in at the Front Lounge, across the street from The Larder, where we dropped off more postcards (I don’t want to take ANY postcards home), and then the cast wended their way back across the river, and I went back up the street to Jurys Christchurch, where I stayed up too late. Because even though I’m tired, I don’t want to miss a minute. I’m not sure of what, but I just don’t. The air is different here, and the light, and when I am walking along the streets of a city not my own, and looking out onto landscapes that aren’t the ones I see every day, I feel as though I must make the most of it, and eventually the saner part of me talks me into getting into bed and pulling the covers over my head and sleeping…for a bit. Because there is the wake-up call coming, and the full Irish breakfast, which holds you for…several hours, if not days, and the hotel hopping to the next place, which is why I can’t do morning activities, and the phone calls home (since I finally got the phone to work) and shut down, mind. Why is there no “Sleep” button, as there is on my computer?

And go to sleep and try to remember dreams, or not, if they’re bad, and wonder at the tunes running through your head, and maybe have the TV on for a little just to hear the voices. Think about getting up early…know that I won’t. Tomorrow is opening. Tomorrow we find out what we have (or not), and tomorrow is, as Scarlett said, another day.

Welcome Back...Three Years Later

That's a nice thing about the Internet...you leave something out there, and 3 years later, it's still there. Sometimes.

The last time this blog was updated was the last time we were in Ireland, in 2009. But we're back and the blog is still here, so let's continue, shall we?

Isle: Still Emerald!

First Wind…Friday, May 11

Well, it’s not like there was a whole lot of sleep the night before the day we left for Dublin; rehearsal til sometime after 10pm, and of course, that was the day the President said he supported gay marriage, and of course we had to watch the news and all.

But just-before-7am came and there was still workwork to be done, meaning a few more chapters of Frommer’s New York City to go over; I like that book a lot, and these days, I wonder whether each edition is the last I will edit. That’s the way it is when you look out the window (in Hoboken! Really!) and know you’ll miss the view, and some colleagues won’t be there when you get back because they’ve taken other jobs (what with your imprint up for sale and all that). It’s one thing when you’re not emotionally invested in the job, and you think of replacing it with another paycheck, and another when you like what you do during the day, and enjoy the people on all sides of you, and have a really great view.

And there are last-minute calls from some of the others who are also packing and ticking off their lists, and need to know things like whether to take a taxi from the airport, and whether it’s still possible to change a seat. It’s part of my job to know these things.

And then Filezilla sucks  the files from my desktop and spits them out on the server where the production editor will move them right along and they’ll be in a shiny, color book in August.

Then it’s time to really pack, really get ready. I’m leaving for Dublin in six-ish hours and there are miles to go before I sleep. At least 3,000.

Shopping, packing, remember the adapter, printouts of reservations, more calls, camera, laptop. Which dress(es)? Have to dress up for openings and closings. Good shoes to walk in, scrape the dust off the makeup. This pill, that pill, socks, books, jewelry.

Somewhere in there, maybe after a hoagie and too much coffee, I get the second wind.

Second Wind…Friday, 3pm

I hate to leave my wife behind, but I’m so ready to be away for a bit. She comes home, full of packing advice. “I am a Travel Professional,” I tell her, before I mislay the bottle of Tylenol. Then I trip over the suitcase.

I remember I had a piece of jewelry repaired…we run up to get it, and the place is closed. Yes it’s that late. We need to get to the airport at least two hours before departure (as recommended by my travel guides) rather than the 3-plus hours recommended by the airline. And yet…we leave our part of the borough of Queens at about 7:15-ish. My wife could be a cab driver, she’s that nerveless. We get to the entrance of JFK by 7:35pm. And as we circle round to the terminal she suddenly points and says: “THERE’S THE SPACE SHUTTLE.” And there it is! It’s still sitting on the back of the 747 that brought it up to New York just over a week ago. It flew over our office and everyone ran to the windows by my cube, and took pictures of it buzzing the Intrepid and the Statue of Liberty, and it was truly the coolest thing all week.

At the airport, Danielle Quisenberry (fine actor) and I see Irene Longshore (fine actor…we don’t see Meghan Cary and Donnetta Lavinia Grays (fine actors both) yet. Modern travel: take off the shoes, take off the jewelery, put the computer in a separate tray, untie, undress. Then put it all back on hopping on one foot, with the computer under the arm on the other side.

We reach the departure lounge, I yell MEGHAN and no one answers. But she & Donnetta are already there and then the gang is standing next to each other, running lines. I have a pizza and it’s good.

We’re called to board and I get into my (paid extra for) emergency exit seat, which turns out to be half a good idea; one of my legs stretches out in full; the other’s right up against…I don’t know, whatever part of the plane sticks out from under the emergency exit. I have my magazine and the fellow sitting next to me has his Harry Potter, and we start talking. He’s Irish, and our conversation ranges from places he recommends in Dublin, to places I recommend in New York (because his company sends him there regularly) He stays at the Ace Hotel, and I say: Hipster Central and he says, oh yeah. I end up taking notes on the conversation because he tells me about places that aren't in the book that are worth investigating.

We talk until my eyes grow heavy…but there’s only so much you can sleep in coach on an overnight flight. So I doze or something until my body says it’s 4am, and the clock on the other side of the Atlantic says it’s around 9. No breakfast? I know the airlines are skating on the thinnest of margins, but it would be nice to have a roll and coffee.

Third Wind, Dublin, 9:30am (4:30am, EDT)

Top o' the Airport Bus to ya!

We roll out of Customs and into the daylight in Ireland. There’s an aura of exhaustion that surrounds us all, except Irene, who can sleep on planes, and it’s like a thick stuffing that gets between reason and action. There’s some kerfuffle about the bus tickets. And we buy some chocolate and water. Breakfast of champions. And hop on the upper deck of the bus. I have to drop the gang off at their apartment, and we get off at Parnell Street; and my map smarts and street memory are ALMOST good enough to get us where we need to be. A kind young man offers to show us the rest of the way, but it turns out he just wants to talk to a bunch of American women, and we end up in front of the restaurant where he works and he gives us coupons for discounted meals.

Then someone tells us where we REALLY need to go. We give him a postcard. We give everyone a postcard. There’s some more kerfuffle about the rooms and beds and they can put us in the same apartment for the whole stay and it’s certainly worth 10 euro for that. So up we go to the place that the cast will call home for the next week, and when they’re in and getting ready for power naps, I decide a cab is in order, and look forward to one of my own. The cab driver (I’ve found Dublin cabdrivers to be both knowledgeable and opinionated) tells me the hotel, The Merrion, is the best in Dublin, and President Obama stayed there. Good enough for me!

But my room’s not yet ready so they invite me into the Drawing Room where I order a pot of tea, so as not to keep me from my nap. And the room's a beauty when I get there, and I wish I could spend the rest of the day…but it’s time to go back and meet the whole gang and do some logistics for tech and what props need to be bought yet and all that…and in thinking about it. I’m not sure I can remember how I got there. By cab, I think.

Mark smiles...because there's COFFEE!

And there’s COFFEE, lovely coffee at a little shop across from the apartment. And our Stage Manager Jen Russo is there, and director Mark Finley, and I eat something called a Bacon Whoopie, which I think is the first non-chocolate thing I’ve had all day. And we actually have a meeting, much of which I can’t remember, and we decide to go see our buddy Andrea Alton's show, “The F*cking World According to Molly,” which is at 4:30, which seems like a great idea to me, because I can go back to the hotel after and nap.

Fourth Wind, Dublin, 4pm

The coffee has got me on my feet again, and we go across to the shopping center, where the actors buy things for their kitchen and we talk to a lady about getting a “burner” phone. It seems reasonable and we go into Tesco to get them…but Tesco is out of them! Oh Tesco, you disappoint me.

Then we make our way to Pantibar (Yay, Pantibar!) and I decide if I have a whole pint, I’ll go to sleep at the show, but I could probably make it through with a half-pint. And I do love Molly. We laugh and laugh, and I laugh at some things that probably no one else can hear. And somehow, when it’s over, I decide to walk back to my hotel. Because it’s bright now, and I can walk all over! And the combination of coffee and beer has given me great wisdom and genius.

It is a beautiful day, and I take pictures, and feel like I’m in Dublin again, and suddenly walk past a bookstore window filled with the books I edit. It fees like a sign. But at this point, pretty much everything feels like a sign: the red light, the lampposts, the bikes in their racks.

And I’m back at the Merrion and…it’s time to get ready for the event I’m supposed to attend, and the pantyhose seem to swim up my legs, and I put on the little black dress and a pretty jacket (DRESSES!) and make my way downstairs to the Cellar Bar…and we are presented with coffee-flaved treats: a macaron and coffee pannacotta. I’ll take it. They ask if I’d like a glass of wine, and I believe a red goes well with coffee, and ask for a Malbec.

It turns out that it’s Opera Europe Week. Or Something. And we’re going to hear Opera Theater of Ireland do a short piece called “Coffee Cantata.” I’m beginning to think that perhaps my spirit animal is the coffee bean. We go upstairs into the garden, and there’s a lovely fountain and a statue of James Joyce, and artful landscaping. It’s very restful. And the artistic director of the company makes a little speech. She says that they don’t have a home theater so they consider ALL theaters in Ireland their home theater. I refrain from yelling I FEEL YA! Then there’s a cantata. By Bach. About Coffee. And the singers sing of their love for it, and the singer sings (beautifully) about how she can’t do without it, and grabs handfuls of coffee beans and rubs them in her hair and on her chest, and runs up and down the audience, handing coffee beans to people. I’m pretty sure I didn’t dream this part. I love this. This is my kind of opera. And it’s only 40 minutes long! I could get used to this.

Fifth Wind, 8pm (or 20:00 as they say here)

Nope, there’s no fifth wind. I go up to my room and try to set the alarm clock on the TV, but it’s somehow beyond me. I do check the email. And I think I probably posted some stuff to Facebook. And I mumble something to my sweet wife using Facetime. I will get a burner phone from Tesco…tomorrow. And use the steamroom in the spa…tomorrow. And go to sleep….now. And I do. For 10 hours.