And We Shall March

'Twas The Night Before ! Death 40-Feet Tall ! Preview @ The Hollywood Fringe Festival 2011

Blog went into Silent Mode only because I've been Insane with Busy getting ready for the Fringe. Scalpel-level rewrites, practicing, press outreach, practicing, postcard "flyering," practicing, scheduling stuff, practicing, mapping out the utility poles where I'm going to guerrilla staple the public posters***, practicing, making and then gluing 1,000 QR codes onto the backs of 1,000 postcards, practicing, panic attack(s), practicing.

All fit around doing the other work that pays the rent. All that, and ! Death 40-Feet Tall ! hasn't even opened yet at the Hollywood Fringe Festival 2011.

My preview is Saturday, June 11 at 5 p.m. - ALSO KNOWN AS TOMORROW OMG.

I kinda sucked at getting the other things up about #HFF11 that I wanted to this week - some about Me some about Others - but I swear I will get to all of that before the official #HFF11 opening night...or at least before the shows I want to make sure you know about close so you have a chance to check them out. 

Background here!

Tickets (pay what you can) here!

The lovely image above is the cover of this year's Fringe guide, designed by Gavin Worth. I love his stuff. There are Confirmed Rumors that one of the house ads in the guide riffing off of pop culture? It's the first of four, and the other three are also cool, though not yet Revealed. Ooo!

Big picture of the Fringe here!

Now I have to go and lint brush my costume for tomorrow, because Cuddle Kitty sheds on everything. Weird thing...This particular shirt and pants were just my clothes, but since last year I think of them as a costume - because, in a way, they now are - and I don't wear them anymore unless I am on stage doing this show. Weird.

*** Based on reports from three friends dispatched with posters and tasked with placing them into business establishments in areas I can't get to,  I am afraid people will take the public posters quickly, perhaps even more quickly than last year. I hope not, but if that happens? So it goes. And, I gotta admit, kinda awesome. These things are gorgeous. But I would really like for them to remain up during the run of #HFF11 so they can do what I need them to do. We shall see.

This link is just a placeholder so I remember to include it in the big picture post about Kickstarter and outreach. And this line is to remind me to include Thoughts on why I did not flyer NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory - even though those are My People - when I was there among the Blessed Chosen for the NASA TweetUp. Yes, I didn't mention that event here on the homeport because I had too many other things going on at the time...mainly Fringe Prep.

! Death 40-Feet Tall ! @ The Hollywood Fringe Festival 2011: The FAQs

I'm sorry ... what?

My geek-tastic storytelling show, going up nine times at ComedySportz as part of the second annual Hollywood Fringe Festival!

Oh, right. This is from that Kickstarter thing you were going on and on and on about a little while ago, right?

Yup. One hundred and six people from all over the planet rolled out and made this possible. Thank you all! I hope you like your posters and postcards. I've already started busking people at random.

What's it about?

The story, set against the backdrop of my desperate attempts to become an extra in the first Transformers movie, explores the meaning of Optimus Prime, framed around my relationship with my best friend.

Update (later)! A round-up of audience reviews here; particularly check out this one.

Okay, that explains the whole Fully Grown Woman Raving About Giant Robots thing.

I also talk a bit about alligator hunting, and whole lot about Michael Bay!

... What?

Family friendly! I get through an entire hour without saying "fuck" once.

Fringe Family is one of the new programs at #HFF11 this year. If it all works out, I'll be highlighting three other Fringe Family shows next week. Here are a few questions I answered at another outlet supporting family friendly #HFF11 shows.

Alligator hunting?

Also, my show is storytelling, not a showcase. I'm not an actor, I'm a storyteller. Just fyi...I'm reading in that video because that event is a reading show. I do not stand on a stage for one hour and read ! Death 40-Feet Tall ! at you.

Again, alligator hunting?

LALALALALALALALA I CAN'T HEAR YOU BECAUSE I'M LISTENING TO THE TWO SONGS JOHN BOSWELL COMPOSED FOR MY SHOW. LALALALALALALA

Fine. So, if I want to see your show -

Go here to buy your tickets! Suggested price is $10, but I'm taking the advice of the magnificent SavitriD and doing "pay what you can" for all nine performances. In these times of economic strife, that's the right thing to do. Why should only people who aren't broke have all the fun?

Even better, some of my awesome Kickstarter donors contributed at levels that came with tickets to the show, but because they live far away in places such as New York City, Ireland, Texas and Wales, they're not coming. Many asked that their tickets be handled Pay It Forward style. Those tickets are going to underserved youth of diverse background here in Los Angeles, and (almost) each will also get a HotSpot  button. Again, I love The Kickstarter 106!

I will also be participating in the Fringe Caberet   soometime during the festival's run. Details to come, but I'll probably tell my Prom story for that - unless they say that's not allowed. That one's about 10-15 minutes long, depending on how fast I'm talking.

Schedule details! I will participate in the Fringe Caberet on June 20 during the 9:30 p.m. slot (for 10 minutes) and on June 23 during the 8 p.m. slot (for 15 minutes). June 20th will be a slice from my Fringe show. June 23rd will be a stand-alone story about my Prom.

Fringe Caberet is another new program for the #HFF11. All of those are free performances that will take place in the outdoor pop-up bar, so it should be fun.

Can we go back to the posters? I want one. They're gorgeous.

Aren't they? Those delightful, handmade letterpress works of Pure Art are for my Kickstarter backers, media and Hot Spot/venue outreach only. I can't stop you from "liberating" one once I start putting them around town, though. Last year several were "liberated," which was kinda cool, actually.

But the 1,000 postcards Amos Kennedy, Jr. made along with the posters are just as amazing, and those will be available at various venues throughout town, free for the taking! (Psst: ComedySportz is getting the best ones.)

If I see these things on eBay, I will have you killed, just so you know.

Now I would like to talk about -

Too bad! I've got to go practice with the magnificent Konstantine Anthony, who is guiding my show this year. But I'm not remotely done talking about my show or other people's shows, so stay tuned!

And, as ever unto the end of all time, thank you Molly Prather.

Roll out!

 

 

 

"One Thing I Can Tell You Is You Got To Be Free!" Time To Step Up And Directly Support The Hollywood Fringe Festival Admin Team!

Fair warning! This post, which will remain all by itself on the site for the rest of the week, is the start of my soon-to-be relentless push to get You out of your house and into one of Our audiences. Next month I'm not going to be talking about anything around here except for my show (I'm doing nine) or other people's shows.

If you can't stand that sort of blatant promotion, come back in July.

This post is open to anybody who happens to read it of course, but it is particularly directed at my fellow participating producers, performers  and venues of the 2011 Hollywood Fringe Festival.

It is time to come together and kick in some moolah to the administrative team that made it possible for You to to get up on a stage and do whatever the hell You want without a single string attached. You owe them. Yes, you do. We all do.

The Hollywood Fringe Festival admin team needs to raise $10K within the next 23 days to cover the costs associated with Our Festival. They are using Kickstarter to do that. You can give as little as $5 or as much as $1,000, and you should. Right. Fucking. Now.

Because what the Hollywood Fringe Festival admin team pulled off by showing up out of the blue and making this thing happen is A Confirmed Miracle. Nobody in this balkanized town has managed to pull off what they've done. They created a unified performance space/event that is open to absolutely anybody who has a Thing and can pull it off.

Generations have tried and they all failed. It took "outsiders" to make this happen. From what I can tell, they did it for no other reason than they saw a need and decided to put themselves through hell to fulfill it. They got the permits. They got competing venues to work together for You. They got viciously competing news outlets to work together for You. They negotiated deeply discounted advertising opportunites for You. They built a website from the ground-up for You to use to promote your show and talk to each other behind the scenes. They put together detailed information packets to spoon feed You through the process of setting up a project, finding a venue and promoting that project. They sent out a team of reporters armed with video cameras to do spotlights on You. They put together a pop-up outdoor bar for You to hang out in, and stocked it with delicious sangrias.

At the time, these people didn't know You from Adam, and still they did this for You.

Miracles.

As someone who, until last year's inaugural H'wood Fringe, pretty much restricted my theater activites to being Audience? Here's what I know, informed by eavesdropping and occasionally asking direct questions:

• You feel live theater is underappreciated in Los Angeles.
• You cannot stand the gatekeepers keeping You away from the stage you want to trod...even though you have gatekeepers of your own deciding who is/is not Legitimate enough to trod upon them.
• You want a "community," though truth be told, I have trouble trying to suss out precisely what you mean by that.
• You want to get paid.
• You want to be seen.
• You want to do your art, whatever it is.

So. The Hollywood Fringe Festival admin team parachuted into town from elsewhere about two or three years before the inaugural 2010 event and began doing the grunt-level work needed to give this glorious city its first ever fringe. By doing so, they gave You the space to roam Free.

They did not give You a guarantee of full houses, adolation, media coverage or buckets of money - 'cuz that's not their job. What they did was give You the opportunity to do what You wanted, no strings attached, along with all of their heartfelt emotional support and advice to help You pull it off.

For me, the opportunity provided by the Hollywood Fringe Festival admin team changed my life. Audience rat though I am, I had longed to be part of live theater at least once before I die alone surrounded by cats nibbling on my corpse. When I heard that there was a fringe in the works, I turned to Molly Prather to learn how to put together a story designed for the stage instead of the page, because this might be my only chance.

Even though the Litany is intrinsic to my DNA, was so very terrified. At one point I was going to drop it all and back out. But because of the landscape Our fringe admin team laid down for Us, I had met the amazing people at ComedySportz LA, who talked me down from the ledge and convinced me to continue on. They did this even though they didn't know me from Eve at the time.

Once the 2010 fringe began, I met people like Abie and Nik and Laura, who were so incredibly generous with real-world advice to a newbie. And as audience I saw a Welshman throw down as Richard Burton; and a phenomenal musical that combined my love of roots music with my love of the social justice history of this nation; and two hilarious hippies improv true life tales of sex, drugs and audience participation; and a former NYC taxi driver share his stories of the mythical era of NYC; and and and. I went broke with delight seeing so many wonderful things that probably never would have been staged otherwise in Los Angeles if not for the work of the Hollywood Fringe Festival admin team.

Now that team is asking Me and You - people who directly benefited from the brutally hard work they have done to give us this event - to help them raise the funds needed to keep the Hollywood Fringe Festival rolling Awesome. I say it is Our Moral Duty to kick in as little or as much as each individual participating performer, producer or venue can.

Take a look at their Kickstarter video below. You can donate directly at the page.

 

Roll out, people. You owe them. You do.

#HFF11 (and onward) forever!

And While I Was Wandering In The Wilderness

Amos was throwing down! Looks like he got some help in the shop.

Why yes, I am super excited to bring ! Death 40-Feet Tall ! back to the Hollywood Fringe Festival and busking everybody with my postcards!!

But for now, a day of sleep.

Roll out!

The Bit I Don't Want To Get Lost: Thank You

As I'm working on the sure to be overly-long Kickstarter post, the thought hits that I don't want this bit potentially lost to the tl;dr eyeballs of that entry.

I pulled this off in part because of the massive levels of signal-boosting by people I know and even more that I don't. If I try to name-check them all I'm going to screw it up, mainly because I could only track part of it. Some of the signal boosting happened in places I don't have access to, so I couldn't track back to see where it possibly came from. So instead I offer this blanket statement!

Each and every one of you, thank you ever so much.

Okay, back to trying to figure out why I can't seem to do a simple thing like send a download link via a file sharing service. I can't use my normal file sharing service due to the volume involved. Arg.

 

Phase 1 Of Getting ! Death 40-Feet Tall ! To The Hollywood Fringe Festival In 2011 Is Complete! And Also OMFG.

This:

Is why I'm feeling like this right now:

 

Post-fundraising wrap post to come. I love you, man.

! Death 40-Feet Tall ! Needs Only $966 More To Get To The Hollywood Fringe Festival, And That Moola Must Manifest By 8 p.m Pacific Time Zone On March 16, 2011. Details, With A Bit Of Dog Attack Drama And Secret Project Revelation, Within!

Update! Make that $661 $577 $492 $417 $422 $342 $192 $172 NEGATIVE $127 more to go!

To be clear, the Negative $127 thing means I MADE IT. Provided, of course, that all of the credit cards clear at 8:06 Pacific on March 16.

OMFG I am a nobody practically speaking and I PULLED THIS OFF.

Explainer for $417/$422 bit: Sometimes you lose backers for whatever reason. I was warned about this ahead of time by others who have used Kickstarter. That it happened to me is no big deal. More on this in the wrap-up post to come.

This information I planned to share only once I got to 75% funding in my Kickstarter effort. Since that happened sometime Saturday while I was at work,* time to spill the last of the beans!

As you know, Bob, at any donation of $25 or above you get a gorgeous letterpress show poster created by Amos   Kennedy   Jr., on the back of which I will write a custom story just for Your Beautiful Self based on either one thing you tell me about yourself, or a 3- to 5-word prompt you will provide.

Thing is, these will not be entirely random stories.

My Secret Plan from the start has been to take however many micro-stories I needed to write for the $25 (and above) Kickstarter backers and stitch them into one complete narrative. I do this not because I am Insane (no matter what you've heard), but Because I Can! I am a writer, and a good one. This big-story-created-from-random-Kickstarter-input is a challenge I very much want to meet.

I don't know what the story will be about. I need to first get the data from all of my backers once this effort ends, see what I have to work with, and let it flow from there. I also haven't yet decided if I'll release the complete work to backers via the restricted-access production diary, or if I'll simply tell them that each story segment on their individual posters is but one part of a whole and let them Suffer wondering how their prompts play into it. You know, kind of like how Michael Bay hired an asteroid expert from NASA and then completely ignored him, which is my fave commentary track on the Criterion edition of Armageddon.

All I know is that you will TOTALLY want to be in on that, but the only way you can is if you hit up the Kickstarter page and donate at a level of $25 or above. As much as I want to create the ultimate story,  I also know it will not happen unless I close the final gap of $966 to get ! Death 40-Feet Tall ! to the finish line.

That said, every single penny counts with this Kickstarter effort, which is why my incentive offers below the $25 level are cool. Below the $25 level I'm offering postards from Kennedy and downloads of John Boswell songs. We live in times of recession-fueled economic scarcity, which is why I very much appreciate any little bit someone throws into my project. My incentives are structured so that even if you have only $5 to spare, you will get something quite nifty.

I am only $966 worth of donations from reaching the goal a.ka. I'm 25% out from complete funding. OMFG. 

Kickstarter is all or nothing - you come up $1 short? You don't get any of it. Over this past month I have done Absolutely Everything I can think of behind the scenes to successfully cross that finish line (deets of which I will discuss in a post once this is over - not matter the final result). I believe I can get there, but the practical side of me is fully aware that whether or not I do is partly out of my hands. It's up to you reading this, or the Signal Boost notes sent on my behalf by an astonishing array of folks, for whom I am Grateful.

Here is my Kickstarter page. Here is a video of me telling a geekly Christmas story from childhood to demonstrate my Live Storytelling skills. Here is an FAQ answer to a common question about that video, and related to the effort. Here is the background on that video shot last month. Here is the FAQ answer about the posters.

Whatever you can or choose to do, I appreciate it muchly!

 ---

And now I go back to nursing my wounds. I got attacked by a neighbor's crazy dog while walking back from the grocery store this morning, and dealing with the fallout from that delayed the writing/uploading of this entry.

On the upside, I now have rather impressive (if still bleeding) fang punctures in my thigh, which I can turn into a more interesting story than what actually happened! Downside, that dog ruined the one pair of jeans I have that fit perfectly!!! I got those jeans at the FiDM scholarship store downtown, they are alleged to be designer jeans** and they only cost me $5!! The way FiDM stock turnover works I will not be able to replace these jeans. #$%^$#$%^!!!!! I'm going to try and repair them, but the damage has been done.

Further upside (now that I think about it typing-from-top-of-head), I'm glad I have quick reflexes and a calm head when in crisis. Once I realized too late that the Crazy Dog's gate was open for some reason and he was racing through it right at me, I flung Moiself back as he lunged, which is probably why he left only punctures in my thigh instead of taking out a chunk of my flesh. I also KONG yelled and swung my canvas grocery bag at him during the attack, chasing him back into his yard/Territory, closing the gate after him. Then I let the family in the house next door to the House Of Problem Dogs that witnessed it all provide post-attack help, even though I was three houses away from my own and already knew what I was gonna do to tend to Moiself. (Sometimes it's nice to let somebody similar to your Mom fuss over you.)

Once home I cleaned the wounds and made a compost from aloe plants in the yard and vodka in the freezer. Lathered that onto a gauze and taped it onto my leg with duct tape. Within two hours the Not Insignificant swelling was gone.

And yes, I did call the Dog Police - aka animal control - to report the attack, but as suspected that call was futile. At this moment of posting it is just over 9 hours since the attack and despite their claims of We're On Our Way, nobody from the dog police has shown up.

But since it's been over 30-years since there's been a case of dog-related rabies in Los Angeles, at least I'm not worried about having to put up with rabies shots.

* I found out I'd hit 75% via a text from The Goddess who monitoring my page. I didn't fully comprehend what she was telling me remotely until I got home in the wee hours and could see for myself.

** Like I know from designers. I'm taking the word of the student salesgirls that the jeans are designer. All I know is that they fit PERFECTLY.

Answer To The Fourth Most Commonly Emailed Question About My Kickstarter Effort To Bring ! Death 40-Feet Tall ! To The Hollywood Fringe Festival, And Also I Squee A Bit

UPDATE: If you're just now joining us CLICK HERE FIRST.

What will the posters and postcards look like?

I have no idea, because that's entirely his decision. How Amos rolls is you tell him what words you need on the posters and your deadline, you pay him, and he will take it from there. I learned a very long time ago elsewhere that when you discover an artist with A-Game you trust him and you get the fuck out of his way. My assumption is the 2011 posters will not look like the 2010 posters, but that's it. All I know is that they will be  gorgeous!

(Note, the pasted on HFF logo in some of the pictures is entirely due to something I screwed up due to 101 Learning Curve ignorance, requiring me to damage the posters selected for posting in the Wild. That mistake won't happen again this year.)

I very much hope I get to see what he creates, because the only way that will happen is if this Kickstarter effort reaches 100%. Which brings us to the SQUEE portion of this post...

WILL YOU LOOK AT THIS SCREENCAP! JUST LOOK AT IT! OMG!

That screen shot means I AM ALMOST THERE!!! Truthfully, part of me is stunned that an unknown such as Moiself got this far, but I'm also extremely proud that all of my very hard work behind the scenes got me this far. Now I've got six days to somehow, from somewhere, pull in the final $1,471 needed to meet the finish line. How Kickstarter works is all-or-nothing. You come up $1 short? That means you don't get any of it.

I'm working these final days hard behind the scenes to get there. Know that, please. I'm not sitting on my tush waiting for miracles.

I might not succeed with this first attempt to step up my game and produce a show at a professional level, but I am not afraid to try, and possibly fail, in public. This part - the raise the money part - is intrisic to the process. If I am too afraid to talk about it then I have no business stepping out on a stage to begin with.

I'm also hoping that more people claim the $25 (or above) incentive, because for that one (or above) I'm going to write custom micro short stories on the back of the posters based on the three- to five-word prompt provided by individual donors. Gotta say, I'm *seriously* looking forward to doing that! How do you write a good story for people you don't know? I've written micro shorts for people I know, but never for strangers. I want to meet the challenge.

Okay, I gotta go Roll The Fuck Out now. And also look at the email my Mom sent about the video. My god, that woman is the greatest source material in the history of the universe.

Answers to the other three most commonly-asked questions here.

More later & xo.

Answers To The Three Most Commonly Emailed Questions About My Kickstarter Effort To Bring ! Death 40-Feet Tall ! To The Hollywood Fringe Festival

You're reading in that video. Do you stand in one spot behind a podium for an hour and read at us?

No. Rant 'n Rave, like many of the storytelling shows in the area (that I know about), are reading shows primarily designed to give writers a platform. Yes, actors do often participate, but whatever they show up with is something they have actually written. For storytelling shows the producers prefer that you stand there and read something from the page. Which is great, because it allows you to try out lots of new material. (For me, it's also supremely good practice for down the road when I go on book tour.) For ! Death 40-Feet Tall ! I am "off book"*** and I actually move around quite a bit.

You didn't say how much of the Kickstarter funds you keep for yourself?

None. As detailed in the pitch, all of it goes to cover the production costs. If this works and I am able to mount the show, I get paid months from now after the Fringe is over. How much I get then depends on how successful I am in the second round of work - getting butts in seats - and whatever deal to split the house worked out with my venue.

What is a showcase?

Yeah, I had never heard of the term either until last year. It's a different type of thing than what I'm doing.

*** That's the Theater People term for "memorized"!

Background (with bonus video and more links) or just skip to the Kickstarter page itself.

Eight days to go! Woo!

 

I Have No Idea If I Can Raise $2,361 Within The Next 12 Days

UPDATE: If you're just now joining us CLICK HERE FIRST.

--

But I'm sure as hell going to try, because I want ever so much to return to the Hollywood Fringe Festival in June with my show ! Death 40-Feet Tall ! but can't unless I raise the full production cost of $4,100 ahead of time. I'm using Kickstarter to do that. My campaign ends March 15 at 11 p.m. eastern standard time. That's 12 days from right now.

If you've been reading my homeport for a while, you know I can write. But I'm asking you to part with hard-earned dollars in this scarcity economy so that I can do something most of you reading have never seen me do.

So!

I give you 10 minutes, 56 seconds of my debut at Rant 'n Rave last month, in which I perform a freshly-minted story I was still tweaking moments before I had to get on stage (full background on that can be read here):

Like it? Go to my Kickstarter page, check out the awesome incentive offers, pick one and donate! Send the link to everybody you know who might be interested and ask them to do the same. Here's a handy guide to the sorts of people you can share the link with.

And now I'm off to prep for tonight's performance at WordSaladLA. I'll be doing a piece about my prom, and if I can figure out the itty bitty camera, recording it for use as a dvd extra for my Kickstarter backers.

Thank you!

Further context: One thing that makes me giggle in that vid is the Lone Voice In The Darkness shouting WOO when the host says my name. That was a shout-out from the one friend I had sitting in that audience (of what turned out to be more like 200 people), who showed up for the event even though I had not told him or anybody else local about it...for reasons that are Stupid. Turned out he's on the venue's mailing list, and so he showed up to support. My friend showed up to WOO Support at me, not knowing if what would come next would suck or not ... and video evidence shows It Did Not Suck, actually. That's what friends are for! I <heart> my friends.

Also, check this out, which popped up SEO-style on the siderail of my YouTube page. #hee