Frog in the Pot

The last of four parts

[See Part 1 here, Part 2 here, Part 3 here]

Soon after our return to Madison, we began a series of performances there, along with a few around the state. In Madison we played three shows a weekend for three weeks in October, all of them in the large hall at the Eagles Club.  We also did a live, in-studio two-hour radio interview and demonstration for the Madison affiliate of NPR.  I thought the radio show was going well until the host asked which one of us had never acted before.  He knew damn well, and I hesitated to answer, instead preferring to avoid the subject.  My castmates interrupted the brief silence by whispering loudly and in unison, “Peter.”  I don’t recall the host’s follow-up questions or my answers.

But I did pass that doctoral qualifying exam despite all.

Continue reading “My (Very Brief) Life in the Theater, Part 4: Performing, Professing, Posterity”

A Series in Four Parts

[See Part 1 here, Part 2 here]

We left Madison August 28, 1976, nine people in a white van pulling a trailer with our props, costumes, clothing and camping gear.  We would average almost 500 miles a day over four days, and camp in tents three nights along the way at such locations as Billings, MT, and Coeur d’Alene, ID.  Our technical director, John Miller, did most of the driving.  In the rows of seats sat Joel and six of the actors: Kelly Henderson, Max(ine) Fleckner, Melanie Sax, Frank Furillo, Gary Aylesworth, and Adrienne Rabinowitz.  I resided mostly on the platform behind the seats, at the very back of the van.

I hadn’t been consigned to that space.  I had asked for it. Continue reading “My (Very Brief) Life in the Theater, Part 3: Road Trip!”

A Series in Four Parts

[See Part 1 here]

In addition to our cast-in-waiting for a play to do, we had one of American experimental theater’s magicians.  Of course I had no sense of this as we gathered for those first meetings.  Truth be told, I knew very little about theater at all, let alone this new experimental form that had bloomed around the country as part of the cultural and political revolutions of the 1960s that had shaken many of our institutions, from art to politics to religion.  But given that we needed a finished play in a little over two months, I thought that we were dithering in those first meetings. Continue reading “My (Very Brief) Life in the Theater, Part 2: Making a Play”

In celebration of the passion of our younger family members who are currently pursuing their love of theater in venues ranging from high school and summer shows, through national tours, to Broadway: Ezra, Chloe, Lizzie, Allison, and Julie. And in fond memory of Joel.

The first of four parts.

One sun-filled day in June 1976, near the beach and sailboats of beautiful Lake Mendota in Madison, Wisconsin, I suggested to a friend that we walk over to watch auditions scheduled that day for the city’s prominent experimental theater group, Broom Street Theatre.  I had never seen one of its plays, but I had read and heard that it was a gonzo outfit producing plays ranging from wild adaptations of classical scripts to outrageous original satires of the human condition.  I was not aiming to audition myself.  Instead, I simply wanted an inside look at this operation during its audition process.  At age 26, I had just completed my third year of doctoral studies in sociology at the University and, after having colored for so long between the lines, I was hoping to have a look at some measure of creativity, even if only briefly. Continue reading “My (Very Brief) Life in the Theater, Part 1: With Both Feet”