Gonna hit up the legitimate theatre tonight:

For the past four weeks, Dell’Arte teachers have guided the actors through the Melodramatic territory, a style normally associated with twirling mustaches and maidens tied to railway lines. Six, student-devised, 15-minute plays explore moral dilemmas, neurosis, obsession and the struggle against repressive forces.

Sounds like my kind of thing. I like watching people perform stuff they create, and the fact that it's at bunch of 15-minute vignettes means that if any one is kinda awful -- which with student work is virtually guaranteed, and as it should be -- it will be over soon and the next one will be better. I think it'll be nice.

In nerd news, comment spam has reared its ugly head. I'll be tweaking things to try and change that so my apologies if that prevents you, my beloved readers, from yakking back at me.

And now, a grab-bag of thoughts with spring in the air.

For starters, here's a pointless 20-second video of my man Mark's "outdoor bike garage":

Click To Play

There's more here at The Kevin Murphy Show. Apparently the real thing will begin to air soon. This is a collaboration between a whole lot of folks I know back in BKLYN. Sassy bastards.

Thanks to Frank for the recommendation of Brick, which takes an improbable melange of genres -- the high-school drama and film noir -- and hits it out of the part. It's just very well-done cinema. Recommended!

I'm pretty sure this is actually from Eyes on the Prize. I've got a torrent file for that here (broken link before), and I strongly suggest you grab it and seed.

Not only do we all owe this man for a large portion of the level of racial integration we have today, anyone who wants to change the world also owes him big time for the path he laid down. You want to see how it's done? Check it out.

I mean, listen to the oration. Where the hell is that kind of voice in today's turbulent and troubled times?

Two years ago, the saintly leaders at DownHillBattle did a nice little bit of copyright and general activism by organizing screenings of the seminal Civil Rights documentary Eyes on the Prize, which has not been available for sale for some time because of all the clearances necessary for the archival footage.

Their action was called Eyes on the Screen, and it used BittTorrent to distribute the first two episodes of the video series. I participated in SF, torrenting the first two episodes and setting up a showing at this anarchist loft I had a couple of connections with.

It was probably one of the single most rewarding pieces of activism I've participated in, as it drew a very diverse crowd both young and old, and people were very moved by both the documentary (which is GD amazing) and the circumstances (internet wizardry) by which it was presented.

That event was one of the rare moments in my time as a velvet revolutionary where I really felt like my work was building on, rather than digging itself out from under, the legacy of the 1960s. It was fucking inspiring.

Holmes and Nick and Tiffany got some serious pushback from the original producers who claimed they were really working hard on getting everything together for a DVD re-issue, and that this "stunt" was putting it all at risk. In response, they took down the torrent link and instead encouraged people instead to get the video from a library for screening.

Fresh home from LA and posting this more or less straight from my journal in a brazen attempt at intentional reification.

An idea for new artistic process:

• Workshopping text online, possibly backed with quick audio recordings of readings.
• Workshopping performance for small intimate trusted live audiences.
• Creating finished artistic product for online video (YouTube, etc) distro.

A lot of what I did for Axiom, spoken-word pieces directed at the audience, would adapt well to this form I think. It fits with a lot of my thinking, both about what will work and what I feel like doing. I also think that creating a process for this will help me actually do it, and to produce a high-quality result when I do.

Any comments from the peanut gallery?

So here's an idea. I've been thinking more and more about the video medium. I liked making that commercial for my work, and I want to do more. I'm also attracted to the power of the form, and the fact that I'm still paying (and will be for a while now) for a shmantzy education that should give me some kind of edge on screen.

So it's resolved. I'm gonna learn me some final cut and eventually get a better camera -- the one I have makes a really annoying buzz on the audio -- and start playing with the medium more extensively. The question is content.

What about just reading some of the better prose being written on blogs already?

It would probably be mostly political stuff. I don't think I can really go for the emo/confessional personal videoblog, and I think the most important political contribution I can give is to push progressive ideas among the younger set. I've got plenty original content in me for sure, but part of building an audience is posting often. I'd need other sources. It seems like a natural fit.

I think of this when I read Gelnn Greenwald and Digby and a bunch of others from time to time. There's a bunch of really good language out there and the performer in me wants to make use of it!

And now, an unrelated webquiz:

So, I posted a little commercial-like video for my company extolling the virtues of Drupal using elements of my daily life in the State of Jefferson. Good times.

Here's that video:

One thing I want to call attention to is my facial expression in that last slot-machine shot:

That's about as sleazy as I get, what some affectionately call "crazy eyes." It's the epitome of why I'm feared by mothers and hated by fathers all across this great nation. In the final cut I wipe away from it pretty quick, but the original take is pretty interesting. You can see the acting!

Oh man. This should be AWESOME.

This is brutal:

It's heart-wrenching, but he also nails the pronounciation of "Missouri." That's training, baby. That is motherfucking training. Hats off, Michael.

This is personal too. My g-moms has the Parkensens, though thanks to good medication she usually does a little better than Mr. Fox looks here.

Michael does the nice-guy thing, so I'll fill in the bad cop.

Seriously, fuck Jim Talent. Fuck him with a spiky sandpaper dildo, and deny him even that brokeback spit-lube. He's a corrupt, sold-out hack who probably doesn't even personally give a shit about Stem Cells, but he knows what his fundimentalist freak base wants to hear. I've had it with these faux-pious anti-science bastards shitting all over our country.

It's time to take it back.