The Good and Bad of Being Published Getting your play published is thrilling and I get extremely excited when one of my publishers decides to publish one of my scripts. (I work with Dramatic Publishing and Samuel French). The reach of a good publisher is worth its weight in gold. Without a publisher I never would have had all the productions I've been fortunate to have. But one down side of it is you don't really know if people are reading [...]
Stupid People Monday Welcome to Stupid People Monday, where I, against my better judgement, post about stupid people who walk among us. Stupid People: Steve Santagati First up is Steve Santagati, self-proclaimed #1 relationship expert in America and author of the book The Manual. This yahoo appeared on CNN with Amanda Seales to discuss the Hollaback video of a woman enduring hours of catcalling in New York City that went viral last week. As soon as Steve Santagati opened his mouth it was evident that he is [...]
The Last Ship Opening This week my buddy Sting opened his show The Last Ship on Broadway. Besides many differences between the two of us -- okay, too many to list -- here's one of the big differences between Sting and me when it comes to opening a commercial show in NYC. Here's a picture of Sting at the opening of The Last Ship. Here's a picture of me at the opening of Around the World in 80 Days. Can [...]
Daniel Radcliffe Raps Alphabet Aerobics Maybe it's because he had to wrap his mouth around spells like Petrificus Totalus but last night on the Tonight Show Radcliffe showed off his mean rap skills. I mean, when did you ever think you'd see the words "Daniel Radcliffe Raps Alphabet Aerobics" in one sentence? I gotta tell you, Radcliffe does an amazing job with the Blackalicious hit. Check out it out. [embedplusvideo height="360" width="640" editlink="http://bit.ly/1vikhNG" standard="http://www.youtube.com/v/aKdV5FvXLuI?fs=1" vars="ytid=aKdV5FvXLuI&width=640&height=360&start=&stop=&rs=w&hd=0&autoplay=0&react=1&chapters=¬es=" id="ep7710" /]
Literary Starbucks Three Carleton College students have created Literary Starbucks, a terrific tumblr site by taking the old "a guy walks into a bar" set up and turned it into "a famous literary character goes into a Starbucks." The results are hysterical. God I wish I'd thought of it. Here are a few of my favorites. FRODO Frodo goes up to the counter and tries and fails to order a cup of tea. Samwise, who is accompanying him, says, “Master [...]
Losing touch with a friend is never fun. The long dormant pain that comes from not staying in touch can one day reemerge and stab you in the heart. Or the duodenum. But reconnecting with those friends can erase all of the pain. It's sort of like wearing a dance belt. They're painful as hell to wear but the relief from taking one off almost makes wearing one worth it. And yes, I did just liken friendship with wearing a dance [...]
Every now and then I Google myself. And that's not a euphemism. My curiosity gets the better of me and I like to see if I'm doing something out in the world that I don't know about. Seems a lot was going on. So here's the latest on what's happening to Mark Brown. Mark Brown Shoots a 59 A few weeks ago I shot an incredible 11-under 59 during the second round of the Carrus Tauranga in Wellington, New Zealand. I [...]
Meadow Brook Theatre Get Another Rave Review I've mentioned it a few times that Meadow Brook Theatre opened their 2014-15 season with Around the World in 80 Days. The production has been getting rave reviews. Now there's another rave from the Detroit Free Press. That makes four or five rave reviews, which leads me to ask - How many damn theatre critics are there in Detroit? The latest review is from The Detroit Free Press - "A winning mix of [...]
Around the World in 80 Days at Meadow Brook Meadow Brook Theatre's production of Around the World in 80 Days is going great guns. The production has received 4 rave reviews. The latest is from the Oakland Press - “Around the World in 80 Days” is a fun-filled, fast-paced adventure comedy!" Truth be told, I thought the Oakland Press was the name of a wrestling move named after Oakland Moon, King of the Grappling Hold. This production is the Michigan [...]
National Depression Screening Day Today is National Depression Screening Day. I know. And you thought it was just Leif Erikson Day. Oh hvor feil du er, min venn. National Depression Screening Day was started in 1991 to help people learn more about depression and provide screening and treatment referrals for anyone concerned about it. It's a terrible disease fraught with stigma and shame but hopefully that is changing. Depression is more widespread than people know. It is more common than AIDS, cancer, and diabetes [...]