Last night was closing night. We didn't quite sell the joint out, but we came close. Yours truly had some friends and family make the trip from Michigan. It was especially fun before the show when I finally got the chance to introduce my mom to Mark. Mark loves to make mother jokes, and I am often his intended target, which means my mother is actually his intended target. As I explained to my mom that Mark loves to make jokes at her expense, the rest of the room cracked up, and this was the first time I can ever remember Mark blushing. He blushed through his beard.
With that out of the way, we made our final pre-show preparations. It was an unseasonably warm day yesterday, and the theatre felt pretty muggy. It was even worse backstage. It was also St. Patrick's Day, so we were curious to see if our audience was going to be under the influence.
Those of us who have continued in the writing program were happy to see our current instructor and the director for our Writing 6 show, Joe Janes, in the audience. We waited for Guffman and he arrived! We even caught him laughing during the show.
The show got off to a great start with "America's Biggest Douchebag." Michelle and I ran the lines earlier in the week, and we kicked around some ideas for my character to say when he's supposed to be on his cell phone while he's being introduced. The line "yeah, definitely bangable" was directed at Michelle's character. The audience liked it, and they were very generous with their laughter throughout the night.
Once again, "Twilight Fan" killed. I was actually able to listen during "Alpha Dog" this time. It really needs to be funnier during the early parts and it goes too long. However, the audience laughed at the crowning moment of the sketch where the upstart gets owned by the so-called alpha bitch. That made me breathe a little easier.
I was busy reviewing lines for the next three sketches (New Procedures, Douche #2(Truth), and Workout Barbie), but I heard laughs, and that's all that counts. I was more jittery than usual for "Glazed, not Smothered," but all of that evaporated as soon I walked through the curtain onto the stage. Once again, that sketch went swimmingly. The audience laughed often and loudly. Mark was so happy when we got back stage.
Cocky was up next, and it seemed as if it got the loudest laughter of the three times we performed it. Dan and I almost knocked heads when my character was being introduced. That would have hurt, but it may have also been pretty damn funny. Shane did his euro-trash version of the Russian cock fighting trainer -- Gorbachik. He could seriously go out macking in Portage Park with that get up.
The crowd laughed heartily when Scott was introduced as Douchebag Lenny. He embraces that role to a convincingly scary degree.
"Shot" was next in the line-up. My character is chewing on pretzels throughout the scene. Last night, the pretzel shrapnel was at its most extreme. I wish I'd played it up to that extent in the earlier two shows. The audience was on-board with us, and they were really great.
Minstrels got its usual thunderous laughter, and that set the stage for the crowning of "America's Biggest Douchebag." I thought that Trent had a chance to win because the audience laughed at him during his intro and because I had a few friendly faces in the audience. Not to be. A distant second to Lenny "Big Dawg" Dvorak. Trent threw his bluetooth at Lenny in disgust before flipping off the audience and leaving. Lenny wasn't finished yet. He made a quip about "ridin' train on bitches." So wrong, and the crowd loved him for it.
We had a great party at Shane and Natalie's after the show. It sure beat trying to go to a bar on St. Patrick's Day in Chicago. Shane gave everybody very nice and heartfelt cards. We plowed through a prodigious amount of alcohol and pizza. By the way, Michter's 10 Year Single Barrel Bourbon is a great insobriety aid. We continued our witty banter. We hugged each other. We said awkward things intended to be compliments. It was an honest-to-goodness piss-up.
We're now turning our sights to our Writing 6 show, which should go up sometime in July. The classes have been going well thus far. Last week Shane did a very funny re-write of a sketch involving a musician selling his soul to the devil.
This week we had to write relationship sketches. Detroit Angie wrote an off-the-wall one in which Dan had to read all of his lines with his face puckered. I think my laughter approached snorting levels several times. Dan did a funny sketch involving a first date and a man with alien hand syndrome. It had elements of Dr. Strangelove, which is one of my favorite films. Laura had a take off on film noir that had some very funny lines about used condoms. Mark wrote a horribly inappropriate extended blackout that you'll never see performed on stage. It could, however, make it as a porno short film/cell phone commercial.
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