February 14th: massmouth Story Slam: "The Errors of Eros"

Join me as I co-host the massmouth Story Slam with storyteller, Laura Packer at Ryles Jazz Club in Cambridge. The theme will be "The Errors of Eros."

What's a story slam? It's a competitive storytelling event in which ten storytellers are given five minutes a piece to tell a story based on a suggested theme. In between stories, Laura Packer and I will tell our own stories and lead improvisational games. I attended my first story slam last week, and it was certainly a great way to end my weekend.

massmouth is the network of Massachusetts storytellers.

Seems as if I am back to where I was ten years ago when I was hosting the annual "Love, Sex & Disappointment" spoken word show at the sadly defunct Bad Girrls Studios in Jamaica Plain. Still, it proves that I will do anything to thumb my nose at any perceived obligation to go on a date on Valentine's Day, but don't let me stop you from bringing your own.

Enough: I need to save some material for next week.

Doors open at 3:45pm.

Ryles Jazz Club
212 Hampshire Street
Inman Square
Cambridge, MA

Tickets are $7, $5 for students and seniors.

Facebook users can RSVP here if they like.

Not Only Do I Use Facebook...

Not only do I use Facebook, but I am in the Facebook movie.

Earlier this week I was in a scene in the upcoming film about the creation of Facebook, The Social Network directed by David Fincher and written by Aaron Sorkin. I was hired to play a mime performing in Harvard Square in 2003. Interestingly enough, I did perform mime in Harvard Square in 2003 and since I was using my own costume, it could be argued that I was playing myself.

It was an interesting experience and very different from working in theatre. I signed a confidentiality agreement so don't ask me for plot details (note: I am only confirming that I was employed to play a particular role in a particular film) and I didn't take photographs while on the set (part of the contract) so don't expect me to show you any either.

First rule of the confidentiality agreement: Don't talk about the confidentiality agreement.

One thing I will note is that while standing around the square with the crew and cast while the shot was being set up, passers by, and indeed some actors, asked to have their photos (I guess the main cast are allowed to take photographs) taken with me. Out of the whole evening, I saw only one genuine instance of coulrophobia when a woman had a panicked reaction upon seeing me, which tells me that it's not as widespread as one would think by reading the internet.

April 26th: A Staged Reading of "Total War" @ Outpost 186

Cambridge, Massachusetts, Sunday, April 26th, 8pm:

Ian Thal hosts a staged reading of his play, Total War, at Outpost 186, located at 186 1/2 Hampshire Street, Cambridge MA.

Total War was recently named a semi-finalist in the 2009 Dorothy Silver Playwriting Competition. The reading is an opportunity both for the author to develop the play through listening and for an audience to experience a stripped-down version of a work-in-progress. A talk-back will follow the reading.

The reading will feature the talents of local actors including: Dale Appel, Anika M. Colvin-Hannibal, John M. Costa, Anthony DiBartolomeo, Mikey DiLoreto, Lou Fuoco, Kate Heffernan, Andrew Hicks, Lesley Anne Moreau, Krystle Spoon, and Tom Sprague.

Total War is a five-act play set at a Catholic university where the student newspaper has published a Holocaust denial advertisement. While faculty and staff attempt to show solidarity with the small Jewish community on campus, an anarchist-cell using the nom de guerre of “Total War” begins a campaign of guerrilla art attacks before a predictable dialogue on free speech and religious pluralism can begin.

Though a work of fiction, Total War was inspired by events Thal witnessed while attending graduate school, exploring the history (and potential futures) of Jewish-Catholic relations, historical memory, and the conflict between grass-roots activism and institutional power. It is a story made timely after the scandal surrounding Vatican’s recent lifting of the excommunication of the anti-Semitic Society of Saint Pius X and its Holocaust-denying Bishop, Richard Williamson.

Facebook users can RSVP here


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Call for Actors For Staged Reading of "Total War"

As part of my development process, I have decided to self-produce a staged reading of my play, Total War taking place on Sunday, April 26th at 8pm at Outpost 186 in Cambridge. I am now recruiting actors to assist in this process. As this is simply a reading of a work in progress in front of a small audience, there will be no blocking. I will not so concerned about the look or age of of the actors. I will be more concerned with their interest in the story, and their enthusiasm and insights into the characters. I will be available to answer any questions actors have about the characters prior to the reading.

To quote the press release:

Ian Thal hosts a staged reading of his play, Total War, a five-act play set at a Catholic university where the student newspaper has published a Holocaust denial advertisement. While faculty and staff attempt to show solidarity with the small Jewish community on campus, an anarchist-cell using the nom de guerre of “Total War” begins a campaign of guerrilla art attacks before a predictable dialogue on free speech and religious pluralism can begin.

[...]

The staged reading is for an audience to experience a stripped-down version of a work-in-progress, and an opportunity for the author to listen to actors and solicit feedback.

If you are an actor and this sounds interesting, continue reading:

Dramatis Personae:

Duane McCormack: Male, early 20s. Editor-in-Chief of The Dustbowl Pulpit. a student newspaper.

Edith Havilland: Female, early 20s. News Editor of The Dustbowl Pulpit.

Donald Crincoli: Male, early 20s. Associate Editor and photographer for The Dustbowl Pulpit.

Jonah Gringer: Male, mid-20s. Jewish graduate student in philosophy at a Catholic university. Andrea’s lover.

Andrea Kunst: Female, early-20s. Junior in geology, Jonah’s lover, work-study student in office of Doncaster.

Father Aldobrandini: Male, early 40s to early 50s, Professor of philosophy, Jesuit priest. Ideologically opposed to Bullock.

Erica Weiss: Female, early 20s. President of Jewish Student Association, at a Catholic university. Senior in political science.

Father John Bullock: Male, early 40s to early 50s, Professor of philosophy, Jesuit priest. Ideologically opposed to Aldobrandini.

Richard Doncaster: (Male, late 30s to 50s) Dean of Students at a Catholic university.

Campus Police Officer: (Male, late 20s to 50s) appears in one scene and likely doubled by the actor playing either Aldobrandini, Bullock, or Doncaster.

The role of Doncaster might be doubled by that of the actor playing Aldobrandini.

A reader for stage directions will also be needed.

I'm sorry that my budget does not allow for a stipend for the actors, but snacks and beverages will be provided.

Interested? Drop me a note about which roles interest you. Resumes are helpful but not necessary.

364.4 Smoots and One Ear

Today, a high school friend of mine and Massachusetts Institute of Technology alumna drew my attention to the fact that MIT was honoring former chairman of the American National Standards Institute and the former president of International Organization for Standardization Oliver Reed Smoot, Jr. for also being the basis of a unit of measurement: the smoot, fifty years ago when the young Smoot was used by his brothers in the Lambda Chi Alpha fraternity to measure the Harvard Bridge that connects Boston and Cambridge on Massachusetts Avenue.

The Boston Globe has run a story on the ceremony honoring Smoot.

In the intervening decades, the story has became such an important part of Boston area folklore that in 2003 that when I premiered my performance piece, "Beacon Hill Panorama with Paper Airplanes" (a piece inspired by James Van Looy's habit of flying paper airplanes off of Bill Barnum's roof during Cosmic Spelunker Theater rehearsals) at Green Street Studios, the passage that received the strongest audience reaction was:

Paper airplanes trace arcs
dragging eyes over the Longfellow Bridge
as it sends red and white 01700s to and fro
a Cambridge cityscape sunset silhouetted
under mammoth crane-hoisting scaffolds
and then towards the three hundred and sixty-four point four smoot
and one ear length of Mass Ave Bridge
spanning the Charles meander meander waters
and past the defunct Citgo sign still flashing
marking Kenmore Square under a Venusian firmament pin-prick.

The full text of the poem later appeared in BOOM! For Real edited by Ian Dooda and Steven Coy and published by Better Non Sequitur.

June 1st: Solo by Sixty: Chhandika's Sixth Annual Student Kathak Concert

It has been a while since I last blogged about my kathak studies under Gretchen Hayden but I've not ceased my studies. In fact, I am performing kathak for the first time as one of the beginning students in Chhandika's Sixth Annual Student Show, Sunday, June 1st. Hopefully, over the next several days, I'll post additional reflections on my training.

Solo by Sixty:
A voyage through the phases of a classical kathak dance concert

Sunday, June 1, 2008
4:30pm - 7:00pm
Peabody School Auditorium
70 Rindge Ave.
Cambridge, MA

General: $15
Children 12 and under: $5
Tickets available at the door.

May 19th: Stone Soup Poetry presents Cosmic Spelunker Theater

As reported earlier, my old troupe, Cosmic Spelunker Theater has reunited at the urging of Chad Parenteau to perform as part of Stone Soup Poetry's series at theOut of the Blue Art Gallery. The show is on Monday, May 19th at 8pm.

Out of the Blue Art Gallery
106 Prospect Street
Central Square
Cambridge, MA

P.S. An interview I gave with Bill Rodriguez of the Providence Phoenix, during the Van Looy/Thal duo incarnation of Cosmic Spelunker Theater is back online.

P.P.S. The photographs are by Elizabeth Schweber Doles. I designed the poster.

Central Square Business Association and the Performing Arts

Last week, whilst in the midst of rehearsals both for my solo show and for Macbeth I attempted to resolve a situation that concerns many Cambridge-based performing artists. It had been my hope to deal with this behind the scenes to ensure good will, but my powers of persuasion were not up to the challenge.

In 2005, the Central Square Business Association sponsored the first ArtsCentral. As with many art festivals that receive sponsorship from the business community, the idea is that by allowing artists working in different media to show their work, the audience will then spend their money not just on the arts but also on the goods and services of the sponsors. Seeing this as an opportunity to build a mutually beneficial relationship between the arts and business communities in the Central Square neighborhood of Cambridge, I agreed to donate my services pro bono for that first year.

Two years later, I was to read the Artist Registration Form and noted that all artists had to provide a registration fee. This is not unusual in the case of visual and plastic artists, since they are renting out space to sell their work as vendors, however a fee is irregular with regards to the performing arts at festivals of this nature. This fee is not a rental of a performance space for a period of time in which the performers can sell tickets in some sort of co-production deal common with some fringe festivals. While the form indicates that performers may sell merchandise to offset the fee they have paid, many performers, notably those working in theatre and dance, often do not have merchandise, or the merchandise they do sell is supplemental to whatever income they might take in from ticket sales and fees when performing for a client. The point is that artists were being asked to pay for the privilege to perform. Typically, when I have performed at festivals sponsored by business organizations, I was paid a fee, and my job was as an artist, to keep pedestrians engaged with the festival so that they would spend that extra time and be more likely to also spend money on the wares and services offered by vendors and storefront businesses. The performing arts simply exist in a different economic niche than do the visual and plastic arts.

Artists often donate their work pro bono to educational and cultural institutions-- often as a way of giving back to the community, sometimes we even donate our work in an attempt to create a mutually beneficial relationship with the business community, but here, it appeared that at best, the Central Square Business Association did not understand the economics of the performing arts.

I attempted to explain these issues to Margaret Farmer, the executive director of the CSBA via email, and after an exchange that began on July 16th and ended July 20th, I became convinced that not only did the CSBA not understand the economics of the performing arts, that they had either not included anyone with knowledge of the performing arts community (especially dance and theatre) in the planning, or that they had not listened to the advice and expertise that was offered to them. Indeed, it was explained to me that one of the reasons performers are being charged a fee is because the Business Association is convinced that performers are more likely to show up as scheduled if they have paid-- not realizing that the fee was a disincentive for performers to even want to be on the schedule.

Perhaps, because I was a lone artist speaking my mind, I was unable to persuade, but if you are a performing artist who presents your work in and around Cambridge, perhaps you wish to express your opinion. Please be diplomatic.

Re: Should Somerville Have a Poet Laureate?

After some debate over whether such a position should exist in the first place, Allen Bramhall has declared himself Poet Laureate of Boston. Across the river, Cambridge is also toying with the idea. While here in Somerville, Doug Holder has begun to campaign for Somerville to have its own Poet Laureate on both his blog and his column in The Somerville News.

[Note: the fellow pictured in Holder's blog is not a 'villen at all, but a Briton named Luke Wright.]

Holder quotes me as saying:

Ian Thal (Poet/Mime/Performer): “The question should be: ‘Would having a poet laureate serve Somerville in a manner that the Somerville Arts Council does not already?’ The Somerville Arts Council does a better job than most cities in Massachusetts supporting the arts/artists (certainly better than Boston). The laureate position should add something to what is already there.”

Just to clarify my statements: Outside of the experience of having my poems in Boston City Hall (the poems were written and submitted while I still resided in Boston), I have found that most of the support I have received for my art inside of Boston has been from artist-run organizations like Mobius or Artists at Large, Inc. while the Cambridge Arts Council and the Somerville Arts Council are very visible in the community, the result being a friendlier and supportive environment for artists relative to the situation on the other side of the river. My experience of Brookline, Cambridge, Somerville are school systems in which the arts are integrated into the curriculum, while in Boston, arts education exists only at the discretion of visionary administrators at specific schools.

The point being that anything Boston might do to raise the status of any art form would be a great improvement while Somerville's proposed laureate position should come with a mandate to further enhance Somerville's efforts.