The Quick-Change Artist, or: I've Never Undressed So Quickly

Guest blogging by actor Tammy Batey.  -Ed.

Quick costume changes are new to me. “The New New News” is my third play. In my first, I wore scrubs the entire time. For my second, I changed my costume once but had two long scenes in which to do so, enough time to not only change but also sit in the Green Room for more than an hour chatting with other actors awaiting their cues.

But in “The New New News,” I play five characters requiring five costumes and three of those characters are in back-to-back scenes. This means sequestering various articles of clothing just off stage where I can quickly change in the 30 seconds to a minute I have between those scenes. 

One of the most exciting things about acting is you get to peek behind the curtain. Hell, you get to live behind the curtain for the duration of a performance. And the quarters can be tight. At South Seattle Community College, the play’s home this weekend, there’s not much room offstage and no entrance from stage right. 

That means that between the very short stretch of time between exiting the stage as Elaine the photographer and re-emerging as Reporter 2, I am squeezed in a wee alcove of space on stage right that contains props and various actors’ costumes. I am shucking clothes like a mad woman and putting on my next costume beside a few actors either doing the same or awaiting their next cue. 

Last night, I finished zipping up one of my boots a mere second before I walked to my place for the next scene. All the while I was changing, I was trying very hard – unfortunately, without much success – to not inadvertently elbow a fellow actor who was this close and also changing.

Because of the sometimes close quarters and brief time between scenes, actors must shuck their modesty as quickly as they doff their costumes. At some point and perhaps on many occasions, you will stand backstage in your underwear putting on your next costume. When there is no time to head to a dressing room, you have no option but to embrace your inner exhibitionist. 

It helps that your fellow actors are so busy changing, re-reading their lines and awaiting their entrances that they’re not exactly gawking at you in your underwear. In fact, they can be a valuable help with those quick costume changes – the camaraderie among actors being one huge perk of acting.  One of my costumes is bulky and challenging to move in. Last night, two actors were happy to help me with my shoes and hat when I couldn’t bend over far enough to lift them off the floor. 

This weekend is opening weekend for “The New New News.” Let the quick-changing commence!

Your Audience Awaits (Yes, You There, You Personally, the Person Reading This)

I joined the NewsWrights United team because I believed that a play about new media should use it. Way back in May of 2010 we envisioned a creative process that the audience could actually be a part of, combining the oldest art form (using humans to tell stories in person) with the newest (the series of tubes). It would be a seamless merger of content and form.

So we set up a Facebook page. Arts journalist Jeremy M. Barker used that page to give us a lead on an interview -- and that interview made it into the show.

We unearthed a collection of tweets about #WAShooting -- the Maurice Clemmons murder and manhunt. Then we started contacting everyone who made those tweets in the first place. KUOW thought that was interesting and did a segment about it.

And now our show opens on Friday -- The New New News. The audience awaits.

But here's the hook -- the audience isn't you. It's us.

Our hashtag is #NNNews. You know how to find us. So start talking. We're listening. Were we completely off base? Did we do wrong by some local notable? Was it the smartest thing you ever saw?

And what about the future of the media? Are we doomed? Is this a brave new world of hyperlocal content and niche opinion-making?

There are countless "social media engagement strategies" that are transparent advertising campaigns. That's not us. We're hosting a post-show discussion after almost every performance so you can tell us where you think journalism is going. We might just have a smart little phone in our hot little hands, too, which means that if you ask a question via #NNNews on Twitter, we can answer it live. Plus, we actually give a crap what you think! (Fair warning: anything you say may become a line in our next play)

I'm truly excited to watch our Facebook and Twitter light up with your thoughts. We've done some talking. Now we're listening.

If Clothes Make the Man (and Woman)

Guest blogging by The New New News cast member Tammy Batey. - ed.

When you’re acting in a play, there’s that incredible moment when you try on your costume or costumes for the first time. Sometimes I’ve had vague notions of what the costumer was putting together while other times I’ve been completely surprised. Either way, it’s always been a pivotal moment in helping me become my character on stage.

If clothes make the man (and woman), they certainly make the character. We make quick judgments all the time based on what someone is wearing. What people wear provides important clues to their age, income, destination, attitude, fitness level, profession and personal style. 

The same holds true for characters. Would Maggie in Tennessee Williams’ “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof” be so quickly characterized as a seductive young woman with unfulfilled sexual desires if we didn’t see her strip down to a sexy slip and stockings in the first scene? Would Eliza Doolittle’s huge transformation in Bernard Shaw’s “Pygmalion” from an unrefined Cockney flower girl to a supremely elegant toast of society be as obvious without those incredible costumes, including that sublime gown at the ball?

For “The New New News” – as well as for “The Crucible, my last play with Stage One Theater – the costumer is Kim Newton, who possesses a gift for finding inexpensive treasures at Goodwill, pulling together the perfect outfit for each character and sewing the most wild costumes (See the play to find out what I mean by that!). 

For “The Crucible,” set during the Salem witch trials in Puritan times, the heavy, restrictive clothing helped me get into the mindset of the dark, restrictive time period and also helped audiences see the world that I and the fellow actors were creating. 

While “The New New News” is set in modern times, the costumes serve the same dual purpose of helping my fellow actors and I get into our characters and helping the audience accept us as those characters. 

I play five different characters. One of them is Police Dispatcher. Embracing the authoritative intensity of Police Dispatcher was greatly helped at Saturday’s rehearsal by the fact I was wearing my costume for the first time – navy slacks with a black belt; a navy, long-sleeved shirt with a badge; and black combat boots. I noticed it was easier to adopt the rim-rod straight posture of my character and her authoritative manner while wearing that costume. In that costume, I really felt like a police employee for the first time. And at least for that scene, I will be.

Re-Posted for KUOW Listeners: Twitter Archeology

Greetings KUOW listeners! If you're visiting because you caught Paul Mullin on the radio, here's some more information on how we got ahold of our trove of Tweets. It's re-posted from the original publication in September. Of course, if you want to see these Tweets in full-blown theatrical action, you'll have to attend The New New News, opening February 18th!

-Wes Andrews, New Media Analyst



The amazing thing about Twitter, and its user-created hashtags, is that it lets everyone see what the hot topic is right now, this very instant, and maybe the instant right after this one. But how good is it at archiving those conversations so we can examine the hot topic at some later date?

As part of the writing process for The New New News, Paul Mullin asked me to find “all the tweets about Maurice Clemmons.” So, just like Indy, I donned my Stetson hat, clipped my whip to my waistband and went out adventurin'.

First thing I did was log in to Twitter and type “Maurice Clemmons” and the associated hashtag #WAShooting into the search bar. No results. Next, acting on a tip from Paul, I scoped out the Library of Congress, who has a deal with Twitter to archive all of the tweets, ever. You can't search this archive online. I emailed the LOC help desk and they said that they can't search the archive, either. Because the archive isn't actually in their building yet.

Then I did other things for about three weeks.

Paul wondered what had happened, so he emailed me, and I dusted myself off and journeyed into Google. You can now get tweets in your search results, and they backlog them as far as they can.

Unfortunately for this project, the Google search results don't go back in time far enough to capture the moment, and they aren't comprehensive. So then I searched for #WAShooting.


"Was hooting." I didn't get it at first.

I scrolled a little further down the results page...


And I was led to a site called Twapper Keeper, which, as it turns out, does exactly what I need: it archives tweets, sorts by hashtags, and creates archive files that export as .csv. Perfect! But the only reason I found it is because @kenrufo was on the same archeological expedition, just a few days before me. If I had taken this trip in June, I would have come up empty-handed.

I now have 5,700 tweets containing #WAShooting. I'm guessing there's more out there, and certainly many thousands with the phrase “Maurice Clemmons.” This will have to do for now. Sort of interesting that this obscure little site did for me what the Library of Congress couldn't.

Recently Said To My Face by Dawson Nichols

"I think of you as being smaller, somehow."

Maurice Clemmons is in the Air

Over the last 48 hours on-line news sources have exploded with fresh stories about Maurice Clemmons, the prematurely released Arkansas felon who, on the Sunday after Thanksgiving, 2009, walked into a coffee shop outside Tacoma, Washington and murdered four Lakewood Police officers as they drank their morning coffee. Clemmons then led law enforcement on a two-day wild goose chase throughout Western Washington before being shot dead in Seattle by a lone cop. In those two days it became clear that local journalism would never be the same, not in Seattle, not anywhere.

It is this very urgent transition which we cover in our latest production The New New News: A Living Newspaper, investigating the on-line reportage of the Clemmons Manhunt in a section we call “#WAshooting” after the Twitter hashtag used to track tweets concerning the ongoing chase. We are fairly certain that our upcoming opening, (Friday, February 18) has exactly nothing to do with the recent rash of articles about Clemmons, but we welcome the renewed interest in the case nonetheless, and not just because it might cause the curious to check out our show. The story of Maurice Clemmons will not go away, nor should it, because its implications affect the future of Western Washington, US national politics and the nature of journalism across the globe.

Certainly the once-and-possibly-future presidential candidate Mike Huckabee is hoping we forget about Clemmons. While Governor of Arkansas, Huckabee granted clemency to the 8-time felon, who otherwise would have been incarcerated until 2015, in part because Clemmons claimed in his application that he came from “a very good Christian family.” (One need not wonder what Huckabee’s decision would have been if instead “Muslim” had been the adjective modifying the subject of that clause.)

Likewise, it is not hard to trace a deterioration of relations between Western Washington police and the communities they serve since Clemmons’ murderous rampage. Had Maurice never left his Arkansas prison would Seattle Police Officer Ian Burk have given Native American wood-carver, John T. Williams, more than four seconds to put down his carving knife before shooting him dead?

We will never know the answer to that, but we do know with certainty that active crime investigations will never be covered the same anywhere in the future. From now on, journalists, law enforcement, regular citizens, and yes, even criminals, will all be privy to instant information, some of it deeply flawed or downright false, as it emerges on Twitter or whatever tool we will be using to share data. We examine this fundamental shift in The New New News. I could tell you how, but really, I’d rather show you. The first copy drops on West Seattle’s doorstep a week from Friday. Why not order your “subscription” now?

Cross-posted at Just Wrought

Playing Myself Again

Guest blogging by Tammy Batey. -ed.

Much of the fun of acting involves doing something onstage that has nothing to do with your reality. Among the future characters on my theatre bucket list are: a killer; a prostitute; a murder victim; a drug addict; and a fighter (and I’m talking knock-down, drag-out fight onstage). The chance to slip into a role and temporarily become someone so different is challenging and exciting.

But playing someone similar to yourself offers its own rewards, as I was reminded on Monday night. At that night’s rehearsal, we rehearsed the press conference scene where a politician shares the news of Wedgewood Witness, the fastest growing political blog in the Pacific Northwest. I play Reporter 2 in the scene.

Having worked as a newspaper reporter for eight years, I slid into the part like I was putting on a much-loved, super comfortable coat. In the scene, I stand, trusty notebook in hand, and furiously write everything that transpires during the press conference. I question the politician running the press conference. In my previous career as a reporter, I covered press conferences and I questioned politicians. Rehearsing that scene felt familiar and easy and real.

My comfortable familiarity with the scene goes further than the setting. Reporter 2 is earnest and takes her job very seriously. Her aim is to report thoroughly so she can write the best article published on the press conference. When I worked as a reporter, I took the job very seriously. That doesn’t mean I didn’t have an absolute blast doing it but if you saw me, you might wonder.

A photographer snapped a photo of me once during a tour of a laboratory. I was working at the Tracy Press at the time. I’m wearing my reporter uniform of silk top, navy blue skirt, hose and flats. I’m holding my trusty notebook and pen and studying the laboratory equipment that the tour guide is pointing to with intense seriousness. I apparently wrote my articles with the same intense look because my co-workers would often tell me, “Relax” or “Smile” when they’d walk by my desk. 

What can I say? Even now that I’m in marketing, I attack projects with intense, serious focus, as my cat Zen can attest, when he’s trying to get my attention and I’m typing away on the laptop. So I can relate to Reporter 2. She wants to ensure that every quote is accurate by writing down every word possible. She takes her job seriously. But, never, for even one second, doubt that Reporter 2 is having the time of her life up there. As will I.

New York Times on Wikileaks: One question unasked and unanswered

NewsWrightsUnited -- our motley crew of playwrights, journalists, actors and those three other people we're not sure what it is they do -- are all about examining the current state of journalism.

We've done one play on the death of the (printed) Seattle Post Intelligencer, are soon to do another about the impact of social media on journalism and recently did a verbatim reading of some diplomatic cables provided to the public, through the media, by Wikileaks.

So I thought I should flag a very interesting -- and, for me anyway, kind of annoying -- article in Sunday's New York Times magazine by the paper's executive editor Bill Keller about Wikileaks and the media.

Keller, who has also written an ebook on the same subject matter, describes the NYTimes' relationship with Wikileaks founder Julian Assange largely along the lines of an exhausted parent dealing with a spoiled teenager.

To show even more respect and gratitude to Wikileaks for its part in trying to inform the public, the NYTimes article also features some nice creepy "rendered" images of Assange. Just in case you miss Keller's subtle attempt to show that Assange is, well, kind of a weirdo.

This, I guess, is how Keller and the NYTimes makes it clear to readers that they are clearly not in cahoots with Wikileaks. Keller makes his claim to independence over and over again, emphasizing that the media's job is not to collaborate with a "source" like Assange but to vet and verify his information.

Yeah, like they did with their own Pentagon-mole reporter, Judith Miller, and the NYTimes' promotion of the "big lie" of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. On that, Keller simply says, hey, we make mistakes.

To have simply published the Wikileaks documents without double-checking them for accuracy, and also making sure not to compromise any individual's safety or welfare, is absolutely legitimate. It is what the media should do.

But this sustained ad hominem (i.e., personal) attack on Julian Assange by the media organizations that he initially entrusted to help get this information out to the public is both shameful and dangerous. Dangerous to our right to know. Perhaps the NYTimes' Keller wants to deflect attention -- maybe even his own, subconsciously -- away from a serious question this whole episode raises:

Why didn't the leakers give the documents to the New York Times directly?

If the whistleblowers who gave these documents were comfortable leaking directly to mainstream media, there would be no need for Wikileaks.

The fact that it took a Wikileaks to get out into the public dialogue so many significant new insights into the war in Afghanistan, foreign policy, diplomacy and many other critical areas should cause serious soul-searching in the media.

Instead, the New York Times attacks its "source" and then goes into great detail about how important a role it played. Sheesh.

Tom

Playing the Playwright

Guest blogging by actor Courtney A. Kessler. We wish her the best as she embodies Paul Mullin, a task that even Paul Mullin has trouble with. -ed.

I am playing Paul Mullin onstage in The New New News.

I have known Paul for a couple years now and this will be the third time I have been in a world premiere of one of his works. The first show I acted in at North Seattle Community College was “The Don Juan Cult Concerto. Paul explained to us at the table read that the show was his “love letter to Seattle”. I was cast as Jenny Wolfe, a young, sarcastic ball-buster of a lady . . . who just so happened to be based on Paul’s wife. That’s right, trivia lovers, I played Paul’s wife. There is a surprising amount of pressure that comes from being cast as a real person, especially when that person is the playwright’s wife and the playwright is sitting two seats away from you.

Oh, and you know for a fact that that person is going to come see the show.

Awesome.

Now, I am one of three current actors in NNN that were part of the world premiere of It’s Not in the P.I. in 2009. While there were real people portrayed as characters in that show, I did not play any of them. If I played a real person, I was unaware of it. I am glad of that. I can hardly do imitations of my friends I’ve known for years; how on earth would I pull off playing a real person I’d never even met before? It wasn’t easy the first time, but I was able to pull through knowing that she was a character inspired by a real person.

I don’t have that excuse this time around. I’m playing one of the playwrights.

When I discovered I’d been cast as Paul for this show, I wondered if that was a deliberate move on Dawson’s part. He knows I’ve known Paul for a while and, to be blunt, Dawson has a habit of casting me as men. At this point, I know I can play a man no problem, and therefore, playing a man I already know should be a cake walk. But playing Paul is not like playing some random reporter in the newsroom of the P.I. Playing Paul comes with expectations. Perhaps they aren’t intentional expectations, but they are daunting nonetheless. The scene in which I am Paul is a transcript of an actual meeting that took place between the NewsWrights. Paul is the one that transcribed it and put it in the show.  His piece, his words, himself.

Awesome.

At the first read, I chose to just read it instinctively instead of holding back out of nervousness. I felt like I knew the character of “Paul” pretty well, had a good handle on him in that scene and was able to convincingly pull him off, at least to my knowledge of the man. Paul is not a shy guy, so my standard “meek, but sarcastic” go-to trope wasn’t gonna play here, not even for the table read. Halfway through the scene, I already had physicality and mannerisms planned out and I began rehearsing them at home. This scene was just recently blocked and beforehand, Dawson showed the actors involved the video from which our scene is based. To my shock, awe and excitement, those 20 minutes were full of the same physicality I’d been practicing at home.  

Apparently, I know Paul better than I thought! However, those expectations I mentioned earlier? This is where they come in. This scene isn’t about how Paul sees himself; it’s real, it happened, and now it’s about how I see him and turn that into a character to play onstage. I can study that footage until my eyeballs turn blue, but whatever choices I decide to make as “Paul” come purely from my observation of his mannerisms, vocal patterns and behavior. These are observations he is going to see, sooner or later. Daunting? Oh yeah, only a little.

Despite the weight of not only playing a real man, but one of the men responsible for the show I’m in, I continue to find humour in the fact that I’ve played both Mullins now. It’s like they’re the bookends of my time at NSCC. Now Paul just needs to write a show with his kids in it next, and then I’ll have the chance to claim the boxed set of Mullin characters!

DIY Munitions in Federal Way

Here's Tammy Batey's original 1999 article in the Federal Way Mirror, as referenced in the previous post. 

Scanned images after the jump. - ed.

Memories of Homemade Bombs

Guest blogging by actor Tammy Batey. -ed.  See her original 1999 article at the NewsWrights United Blog by clicking here.

We rehearsed the photographer scene on Wednesday. It’s night and the police have surrounded a house believing a suspect is holed up inside. The police have cordoned off the area but we’ve somehow made it close to the action. We’re high on adrenaline and eager to get the perfect shot for our respective newspapers before officers catch us and kick us out of the area. 

 

The scene rang true and brought back memories of covering Stratton R. Maxey when I was at the Federal Way Mirror. And it led me to do something I haven’t done in a long time -- dig out an old newspaper article. I suspect this play will supply me with plenty more incentives to dig.

On April 14, 1999, Maxey accidentally blew off his left hand while handling a homemade bomb. Besides taking off Maxey’s left hand, the blast was powerful enough to blow a hole in the floor of the house. 

 

It turned out the bomb was only the start of Maxey’s arsenal, which included a British-made armored personal carrier, 40 firearms, about 50,000 rounds of high-powered military ammunition, several thousand rounds of handgun ammunition and a shoulder-mounted rocket launcher.

Rehearsal Notes on a Thursday Night

Slipped into rehearsal tonight. This is the real, best privilege of the producer.

Mark Fullerton and Robert Agostinelli are working a scene. And it is hitting the trifecta – interesting ideas, funny moments and emotional notes well played.

There’s a moment when one character admits the vulnerability of potential obsolescence, something we all in some way fear, that our lives, our vocations, will lose meaning. Found myself touched by a moment I had already read numerous times.

Gotta love actors. (But don’t tell them – it’ll go to their head.)

More of them are arriving now, and I’m going to sit in for a while longer. Listen to Dawson Nichols giving script notes. Watch the next scene unfold. Need to soak up the energy of theatre in the productive moment.

Because, I’ll be honest (and any theatre practitioner that disagrees is being dishonest), producing a play is a difficult, strenuous, exhausting process. Producers and playwrights bicker. Actors put in long hours being hectored by directors. Every single one of us questions our participation in the process at least once.

And, damnit, it is totally worth it. This is just the best way to tell a story.

And we’ve got a damn good story here.

Now We Are All Brand Managers

Why does this project matter? As I said in September:

We can customize, personalize and pre-editorialize not just our opinions, but our facts, too. Inconvenient facts therefore need not exist. This can all be accomplished without reducing the quantity of knowledge whatsoever, creating an alternate but seemingly complete reality, unique to each person.

I was talking then about the information that comes to us. But what about the information that flows from us?

If you're like me, you use Facebook as your own personal PR firm. You talk about your successes, your projects, or whatever will make you look charming and draw comments. You develop your own personal brand, exclusive to the 400 or so people who are closest to it.

Isn't that a little gross? I mean, these people are supposed to be my friends. Can't we just hang out without all this brand management? And don't think I don't notice that you're doing it, too.

The characters in The New New News are straddling the gulf between their personal and professional lives and watching as their feet get closer and closer together. Is this normal human stuff translated to online space? Is this something new?

Do you thing I'm charming and successful?

The Table Read

Guest blogging by Brian Thomas Gould, actor for The New New News.  - ed.

The table read is always a funny experience for me. Every time we (the cast) are done with the initial read, I’m always disappointed. Not with the director, or the producer, or the playwright(s), or my fellow actors, but with myself. All my disappointment with those other departments comes eventually though. I probably should have seen all this coming back when I was voted, “most likely to be disappointed” in my High School graduation class. I always thought they voted me that as a joke, but after staring at myself naked in the mirror, soul searching for six and half hours last night after the table read, I realized that maybe I am most likely to be disappointed and I can’t escape my fate. The table read has always been just an uncomfortable experience for me. 

Most stage actors if you were to ask them what the worst part of the entire process is, they’d most likely say, “Auditions, tech day and or week, preview, or the dreaded opening night”. None of those bother me. It’s that dammed table read. The table read is a creative badger. Sure, the table read looks all nice and cuddly, but that table read will rip your throat out if it has the chance. . .in my opinion.

You are probably asking yourself, “What does this minor league blogger have against table reads? My Dad is a table read!”. Calm down, I didn’t mean any disrespect. The table read for those of you who are not “hip” on the theater lingo, is the first time the complete cast gets together and reads the play. We get our assigned characters, and we read them at a table. 

Hence, table read. In my experience with theater (this is my 6^th show currently) I never know who my character or characters are until the table read. So, I walk in not knowing whether I’m the lead or I have two lines. . .sadly, offstage. For this show, I’m in neither category. And, I’m not disappointed with my line load. 

But, for me, the man voted, “most egotistical” in his high school graduation class. I want a lot of lines. And, I have been in plays where I have a lot of lines. Then of course, I’m disappointed because I have a ton of lines to memorize. So in the table read I either don’t have enough lines to fill my grand canyon sized ego, or too many which freaks me out, and the director has to search for me around town. Eventually finding me in a, “pay by the hour” motel on Aurora, four days later. I think the solution is to become a professional table reader. Give me the biggest parts, not only does it fulfill my need for a huge line load, it won’t freak me because I don’t have to memorize it anyway! Muhahaha! Unemployment here I come!

Last nights official table read went really well. Everyone was on time, friendly and read with FEELING! The cast seems very willing to work hard on this production to make it the best it possibly can be. Not at any point during the table read did I get the feeling that someone in the cast was a, “weak link”, or a “wild card”. I’m usually pretty good at that observing that kind of stuff, after all I was voted, “most likely to judge you, before actually knowing you” in my high school graduation class. 

The table read is a vitally important part of the process of creating words on a page into life on the stage. Damn, that rhymed. That’s copyrighted. . .by me. . .no one else. Anyway, I’m really excited for this production, and how all of it comes together in the next 5 weeks. And, if this table read is any indication of what’s to come. I think The New New News is going to be a great show.