Revolution

For obvious reasons, at least I hope it's obvious, I have been thinking, talking, writing about Revolution. 
What is Revolution?
Why do people Revolt?
What is a Revolutionary?
Who are famous Revolutionaries? Are there revolutionaries that aren't famous?
Are there people today revolting that will be revolutionaries tomorrow?

Today, is the comfort of my warm home, with an aging dachshund across my lap, I inundate myself with media trying to suss out these questions.  I imagine, I try to imagine the mindset of, a woman 28 yrs of age in Tripoli on February 25th, 2011. Today. 

I am not, I believe, successful in my imagining.  If I were, I think it would be very hard for me to carry on with me day today.  How would I do my errands? Wash the smelly dog on my lap?  Call my friends and make plans for the evening?  Take a nap? Do my taxes? 
I highly doubt I could do these things with a more active imagination. 

"Wake up and Pay Attention!" I tell myself.  "History is happening right now."

Yet, the dachshund is whining, and we both could use a nice long nap as the rain beats against the house, and the wind barrels through the trees sounding like a runaway truck. 

Providence Peeps:

Head down to the Firehouse 13 tonight and check this out.  It seems apt for this particular day and sounds like it's going to be awesome.

Firehouse 13
Coming Attractions:  
2.25| 8PM | 8. adv | 10.dos
Village Drums of Freedom, AS220 Criss Cross Orchestra & Eastern Medicine Singers

FIREHOUSE NO.13 is a forward thinking urban project appealing to experimental artists and creative innovators. Established in an old firehouse, FH13 is connecting artists, musicians, designers and entrepreneurs 41 Central St, Providence RI 02907


(I'm going to try and be more consistent with my postings for those of you who are actually following.  Consistency has never been my strong suit, it's always seemed a bit too boring.  Don't worry though, I don't think this blog will get boring if I'm more consistent.)

Malabra's Lament

February 15th is not one of the easiest days in the year.  The day after the dreaded "Valentine's Day", and bitterly cold if you happen to be in New England.  Bah.  Bah I say.  Ahh well.  Prophetic words are rarely thought on such a cold and blustery day.  Or perhaps that's just another excuse. 
We writers have infinite excuses not to write. 

Here's a bit of something.

Let me introduce my dear friend, Malabra. 

She dearly loves a glass of wine. 



In this short puppet play, Malabra converses with her friend Annibelle.  

For Whom the Belle Tolls, Malabra’s lament. 

            (Malabra is alone onstage sighing into the void.  Annibelle rushes on.)

Annibelle

I had some words to say to you.  They were happy.  Now they’re gone.

Malabra

One can’t be more than 50 miles from the ocean.

Annibelle

They say you change every seven years.  Do you think that’s true Malabra?  Twenty, Twenty-Seven. 

Malabra

I think we expect too much of other people, Annibelle.

Annibelle

(Burst of energy.) I want sunshine and flowers and grand opening nights with gorgeous outfits.

Malabra

The hue of the sky is important.  I seem to have mostly cloudy days. 

Annibelle

Malabra, really? 

Malabra

 What words were they? The happy ones?

Annibelle

I told you, I’ve forgotten. 

(Pause)

Malabra

We, fallible creatures, fall in love again and again hoping for a new completeness that we didn’t have before.  It fragments out into dinners, hugs, kisses, sighs, tears, frustration.  The bits are visable now and you look for the next moment where you’ll be safe.  But there’s only that moment, pushed up against a whole lot of other moments. 

Annibelle

So this is what we get -what’s available-pills for incontinence, cups of coffee with friends, walks down litter strewn streets, (melodrama) hope in the eyes of a child.

Malabra

(cuts off A) But no answer.  No completeness, who told us this lie?  I think it was those that find their answers in the intangible, in the lie of the ages, in faith.  Where’s the completeness for the rest?  The ones who perceive that there is nothing…feel only the energy. The sadness in living. 

            (Annibelle is setting up her pills)

Annibelle

Fe, Fi Fo Fum

Malabra

Annibelle!

Annibelle

I smell the blood of a…

Malabra

(abrupt) You asked a question?  Every 7 years.  If it’s every seven years, then why say 20, 27, not 21, 28, do 7 and 14 not count?

Annibelle

Well I don’t know.   Someone said to me, “you are in for big things this year, 27 that’s when things happen.  Every 7 years you know.”  So I was just thinking of it in those terms, but no matter, 27, 28.  What do you think?

Malabra

I’ve been trying to say, to divulge the answer from my breast.  (dramatic)

Annibelle

But have you?  (reality)

Malabra

I suppose not. (reality, acceptance)

Annibelle

Well, I say it sounds likely, seems possible. We shed our skin. Why not?  Believing in one thing is just as important as believing in an other or… (She trails off having lost the thread.)

Malabra

(Biblical, preacher style.) Slashed into the world we are left piece by piece by the mouth of god to be devoured.

            (Annibelle is startled back into reality.)

Annibelle

Piece by piece. (physicalizes the pieces.)

Malabra

Piece by piece. 

Annibelle

Devoured.

Malabra

Yes, devoured Annibelle.  (Turns vaccume back on) Now stop messing with my dramatic moment!

Annibelle

Aren’t they all dramatic with you, Ma-la-bra? 

Malabra

I relish the moment before a breakup when it feels, that pure feeling right before you say the words you’re not actually sure you mean. 

Annibelle

Dra-ma.

Malabra

Exhilarating.

Annibelle

I want it easier. 

Malabra

What’s that dear.

Annibelle

I want it easier.  All of it.  I want things to come easier. 

Malabra

Well don’t we all?

Annibelle

I think I’m better than the world that I’m in.  I think I should just be able to get anything I want right away, no questions asked, I want to have it all without any limitations.

Malabra

Well who wouldn’t, who doesn’t?  Are we really unique?

Annibelle

I need money!!

Malabra

Well who wouldn’t, who doesn’t?  Are we really unique?

Annibelle

The thoughts.  The means that I have to obtain money are limited.  I want it easier.

I want it all.  I want to travel.  I want to live in a way that is just not possible.

I want to be in one place but go to all places.  I want to hope and dream and not be frustrated.  Foi Graus!  I want more.

Malabra

I find it far too difficult to remain in my present situation, condition.  Have you remembered the words, the happy words?

Annibelle

I want to eat but I don’t want to get fat.  I want lasagna but I don’t want to make it. 

Malabra

I love him.  How much does that matter.

Annibelle

I want to live on a farm.  I want to live by the sea.  I want to go to the city and not feel inferior. 

Malabra

When you look into his eyes and see the whole world of hazel, then a blink and a black hole of feeling, sucked back down into the reality ‘of this will be gone’ as if the comfort you seek might be found in a pair of baby blues or amber browns. 

Annibelle

(massive) ****I want to eat a pig.***

Malabra

Do we not have capacity to love infinitely? 

Annibelle

I want to be smart and I want others to know it.

            (beat, look to Annibelle)

Malabra

I know it. 

Annibelle

I want to lie on the grass, on the sand and smile at the warmth it exudes.

Malabra

If we exude warmth, exude love in all directions to all people does it diminish ourselves faster than if we focus on one person?  Is that why we choose to be monogamous?  What of the notion of loving many different people, accepting that we have that capacity, it’s bound to get complicated, keeping up with all those…

Annibelle

(cut off) I want to swim in the ocean everyday.

Malabra

Anni do you remember when I tried that, do you remember let’s see, I think there were four men total at the point, two were further away, one in the city, one out in the country, two close to home, they knew each other even, although one of those two was moving far away shortly.  I found it all very confusing.  Each had his individual wonderful points and drawbacks, cared for each one, but had a little trouble keeping up, remembering who had called about what, and whom I was meeting later and all of that.  Polyamory they call it.  A bit of a mess I call it.  Perhaps all of that was just the realization that none of them were right for me.  If I could take bits from each, the brains, the charm, the warmth of personality, the risk, the youth, the talent…

Annibelle

Seemed like gluttony to me.  All those good-looking men to yourself.  Not a one of those relationships worked out either, what a waste.  I myself liked the one with the long hair, you should have left with that one.  Moved away with him, he was the nicest, the tastiest.

Malabra

He had many women, one in New York, one down in Santa Fe, probably more I didn’t know about. Perhaps, the more you love the more you feel loved and the more you can give back and all of that. 

Annibelle

Yes, yes, peace, love and hippies.  I need to make some cash. Contemplating love isn’t going to help me.  What I want.  What I need is to be rich.  My main problem is that no one ever taught me how to make money.  I mean I can manage to get a job, but for peanuts  I work my ass off doing these menial jobs, these human service, service industry, non-profit bullshits that help people, make people happy, promote good will or serve them coffee.   Either way it ain’t where the money is.  I’ve got to figure it out and fast cause I’m not gonna struggle like I have been, oh no not me. 

Malabra

Well, your painting.

Annibelle

My painting, Piss!  You know how hard it is to make any money as a painter? It’s a god damn privilege to have the time to paint.

Malabra

Perhaps you should get another degree in something or other? 

Annibelle

I’ve got degrees coming out of my ears, little good it does me.------There will be a day when I shall accept, no, resign myself to being poor.  I will accept the fact that living a noble life means being a broke ass motherfucker. 

Malabra

We need to simplify. 

Annibelle

Yes simplify.  Get rid of jobs!

Malabra

Get rid of men!

Annibelle

Get rid of money and drugs and sex and love and life.

Malabra

That might be a little too simple.

Annibelle

Live in grass huts and sing songs and dance.

Malabra

Dispose of the trappings of modern life. 

Annibelle

Good bye internet, television, modern medicine, toilet paper.

Malabra

Being simple is going to be difficult.

There are the prophetic words I was looking for.  Malabra always knows.  "Being Simple is going to be difficult."  

  For Whom the Belle Tolls, Malabra’s Lament, was performed at Perishable Theatre's Blood from a Turnip in September of 2009 by myself and the lovely Willa Van Nostrand in Providene, RI.  

Perishable Theatre, Home of Blood from a Turnip

Buster Keaton Moves On

This is a video of a performance of Buster Keaton Moves On, which is an excerpt from a larger unnamed play inspired by the plays and poetry of Federico Garcia Lorca. 
This was performed at Blood from a Turnip, Perishable Theatre's Late Night Puppet Salon which has bi-monthly puppet slams on Friday Nights at 10pm in Downtown Providence.
Written by myself.  Performed by Adara Meyers and Myself.

Just a bit of puppet nonsense to get you through the day.

Speaking of Buster Keaton.  Daydream Theatre Company of Providence, RI is holding auditions today 2/9 and tomorrow 2/10 from 7-10 at Bell Street Chapel for a new play by Lenny Schwartz called Buster Keaton: Fade to Black.  They are looking for seven males and seven females ages 19-70.  So, something for every kind of actor.  Oh, and free cookies!
Performances will be: March 31, April 1, 2, 7, 8, 9, 14. 15, and 16 at Bell Street Chapel in Providence, RI.

Making an Effort

I got into a bit of a heated debate with a dear friend the other day because I insisted that he was too attached to his iPhone.  His argument was that I was envious of his instant connection to the outside world, and that I would do better to enter into a more stable relationship with technological devices, instead of shunning them. 

An endless debate no doubt.  Yet here I am.  Making an Effort.  

So...

Myself:  

Amanda Dorothy Weir
Playwright, Theatre Artist, Educator

What more is there to say?  What more is there to know?

Except, have patience with me as I navigate this form of communication, new to me, old to so many.

Here is an excerpt from my play Unfamiliar Comfort(s) which received a production at Here Arts Center's Living Room Series in August of 2006 in NYC. 

Scene 9

(Lights up on Tramp 1 and Tramp 2 on a street corner.)

Tramp 1

Subsequently I don’t see the importance of all this bullshit.

Tramp 2

What do you mean?

Tramp 1

Everything and nothing all together, all together bullshit.

Tramp 2

Could you be a little more specific?

Tramp 1

Like burning an American Flag.

Tramp 2

Excuse me?

Tramp 1

They make the flags these days out of some polyester, synthetic, non-burning material. Try as you might, you can’t burn it, might melt, but not burn.

Tramp 2

So?

Tramp 1

So what if you need to burn it, break the law, there’s just no other way to express, burn the flag. The good old red, white and blue. How you going to do it? It won’t burn, just melts. I’ll tell you what you’re gonna do, your gonna have to climb up in your grandmother’s dusty, moth ridden attic and search through all the boxes of discarded, hidden away nostalgia until you find the flag they put over your uncles coffin, the flag that the good ole U.S. government gave him for dying in the World War Vietnam. A flag for a life, is that the way it goes? That flag will be made out of Virginia cotton, American made and hand stitched in the Philippines by a child in a sweatshop with only three fingers. Only three cause he lost the rest, working in an ammunition factory making cell phones for the president of Chickin Lickin Good finger sandwiches. He was only seven.

Tramp 2

Only seven sandwiches?

Tramp 1

Only seven when he made the sandwiches that lost him his fingers in that ammunition cell phone factory, made in the USA that is, all because the flag won’t burn, melting flags is all we got, big old melting pot of racist, bigots, and open-minded environmental liberals driving SUVs to work everyday.

Tramp 2

Work? I thought this was about flags?

Tramp 1

That’s right working flags, that’s what they are.  Flags going to work in their SUV’s, working are Sturbuckian, Greasy Macs and the WalK Mart that was just built over on highway I Don’t Give A Damn, just as long as those red neck Indians don’t get a say and we’ve got enough guts to go and steel their oil and kill off the ones who are screaming for peace. Cause that just won’t do, god damn hippies, with their peace and their pot, big pot of liberal junkies from Texas, can’t trust a damn one of them, always trying to make my money, and spend it on starving children in East Who Cares Anyway, I’ll show em who’s starving, Me! I’m starving. Can’t you see I’m skin and bones, melting away, yes I’m melting, I’m melting just like that wicked witch American Flag.

Tramp 2

Are you okay?

Tramp 1

Don’t touch me, just let me melt, melt away and leave my bones where they lie. Next to the broken cell phone with a thousand unused minutes, and the pool of red, white and blue synthetic, bubbling goop.

(During this last part of the monologue, Tramp 1 proceeds to melt as though acting out the death scene of the wicked witch in the Wizard of Oz. Tramp 2 is left to pick up the scrap of the melted flag that lies on the ground and pound the keys of the broken cell phone.)

Tramp 2

(Yelling into the cell phone)

Help, my friend, she she’s melted, I think the government killed her. (Long pause) No I don’t want a cookie.

(Lights down on the tramps and their street corner.)

 If you are in the Providence Area.  Check out new works by the Brown MFA Playwrights.  

This Festival Runs through Feb. 13th.  Do yourself a favor and go and see some good theatre.  

(Yeah, it does exist.)

 Writing is Live Festival Brown University

So There was my effort.  However minimal.  More to come.