Aaron Johnson: On Technology, Collaboration, and our Summed Parts.

Aaron Johnson serves as La Fenice's Artistic Director, and is currently playing Orlando, the male lover, in our next show.  In this interview, he speaks with Managing Director and long-time collaborator, Kate Meehan.


You had your laptop out the entire rehearsal.
Well, not the entire rehearsal, but for a significant portion of it, yes.


Were you looking at pornography? 
Yes, if by pornography you mean our scenario.

We're using technology this time around.  Talk about that.
We're chronicling the way we work in a way that probably isn't entirely new to us, but we're employing it more consistently.  We have the scenario, which was started as a very simple sketch of a plot, and over the time that we develop new material, we're now able to do live updates through Google Drive.  In fact, while you guys were working on the song, Tate and I were actually making jokes back and forth together, editing one of our scenes in the scenario simultaneously in real time.  So, he would enter a line and would suggest my reply, and I would edit it to say "what if I said this instead."  It's pretty nifty. We didn't want to interrupt the good work that was going on, so we worked collaboratively by typing.

So, when we called you out for having your faces in your gadgets in rehearsal, we were being jerks.
Yeah, we were actually working.

Probably a little harder than the rest of us.
But yes, I also had a side window up that was porn.

Was there a woman in the porn?
I think so.  Maybe?  Yes?  Moving along?  Actually, I do prefer my porn XX.

Um.  Does that mean Diet Porn?  Like a 100 calorie porn snack pack?
No, I was referring to chromosomes.  But that works too.  1/3 less the guilt.

As the Artistic Director, you tend to get bullied by the rest of the company.
That's okay though.  I mean, that's the nature of working in a collaborative form.  Different people drive at different times.  Everyone tends to be very open to ideas, but also has to be responsible for shutting a process down if we're getting off track or if things aren't working.  I've studied a number of groups working collaboratively over the last year, and in class last semester we watched some behind the scenes production work from a company called Mabou Mines up in New York.  It was really interesting to watch their collaboration process alongside more traditionally trained actors, because they found their process extremely creative and innovative, but I found it to be very natural, the sort of interactions.  It's the same thing as here.  You're in a room full of people with very strong personalities, and you're sort of editing toward the best idea for the work that you're doing.  As a result of that, I changed my designation on our Facebook page.  I believe I was originally called the Artistic Pushover, but I changed it to Artistic Distractor, because I thought it mirrored the word "director" a little better and it's probably more accurate to what it is that I do.

Well, the tasseled pasties you wear to rehearsals are a bit distracting.  Especially when you set them wagging in opposite directions.
Hey, when you've got skills, you don't always know you're displaying them.

But to talk about the group we're working with, I feel that everyone in this show comes playing their A game whether they want to or not.  We've certainly gotten older and potentially wiser, but we've also gotten more efficient.  People are able to work fast and funny.  We're a commedic version of the Borg.

No way, dude.  We're summed parts.
The newest performing member of our troupe is Gian [Giacomo Colli], who has more experience than most of the rest of us combined.  I know he's having to learn a new process, - oh wait.  He's right behind me, isn't he?

Don't worry.  He's looking at porn.
Does he have his laptop open?  Oh, okay.  Good.  Well, I know we work in a way that's very different from how he likes to work, but he's picked it up very well.

I'm really enjoying working with Tate [Green].  It's my first time working with him, and I'm amazed at how quickly he and I work together and how well we jive.  I was talking to Adam [Rodriguez] the other day and remarking how much working with Tate is like working with Paul Joiner.

Both of them have Yes, And in their bones.
Adam is playing Capitano instead of Pulcinella, and I think that every show that we've done at this point.  He's behind me too, isn't he?  Is he looking at porn, too?

No, he's slurping soup.  Which I guess is a sort of Adam porn.
There's a website that charges money for that.  Adam's playing Capitano as the heavy, the dangerous Capitano, which seems increasingly to be our choice.  Theoretically, the Capitano in Sloop of the Damned was also dangerous, even if he was a Don Nazi.

Oh, man.  No, that went straight to the cutting room floor.  Thank God.
Genevieve is getting to go back to Columbina, which is something she's wanted to do for a long time.

We're actually a bunch of Fascist jerks for not including that burning desire while we wrote our scripts.  By "We" I'm using the Royal We.  But I'm including Adam.
The Royal We is a total pain in the Us.

Truth.
Genevieve is getting a chance to play Columbina, but because of the construct of the show, she's now in the position of playing Columbina in a very different way than she ever has before.

How many shows have you and I done together?

I can't even start to count them.
More than a couple, basically.  I'm actually enjoying doing Lovers with you again.

I think the only time we've played the Lovers together was the pick up show we did of Family Jewels where I kneed you in the jimmy in the middle of the show.
Yeah, where you were drunk?

Yes, totally.  But, to be fair, it was my 21st birthday and people kept buying me shots before the show.
And you didn't actually get me in the junk, you frogged me on the top of my thigh.

Really?  I had this huge bruise on my shin afterwards.  I wonder how I managed that.
Yeah.  You didn't get me in the junk, because that probably would've stopped the show.  You were flailing about quite a bit.

Ah, youth.
But yeah, I think you're right.  I think that was the only time we ever played Lovers together.

Bruce, of course, doing music, is a great comfort.  Working with a musical genius is awesome.  I mean, we just sort of hummed some stuff to him and sent him away, and by the time he came back, we pulled together a three part operatic number.  It's encouraging, but not surprising when you've got Bruce around.

Am I missing anyone?

I hope not, or you'll look like a real jerk.  Any parting words?
Um.  People of the Philippines, I shall return?  Old soldiers don't die, they just fade away?  Thanks for this interview?

Kate Meehan: on Aesthetic and Being Totally Lovely

Kate Meehan has been performing with La Fenice since it's very first show as Austin Commedia Society back in 1999.  Over the years, she's played a number of the Commedia stock characters with us, and currently serves as Managing Director.  Before joining ACS, she performed on many famous Chicago improv stages, including ImprovOlympic and Second City.

How does La Fenice's approach to Commedia differ from other Commedia dell'Arte troupes?
Well, I've really only created Commedia shows with La Fenice, but for the last few years I've been in touch with a whole lot of different performers.  Apparently, we're pretty unique in the United States in that we're performing Commedia outside of Renaissance Faires, the confines of a Goldoni script, or a proscenium stage.  We perform in bars to keep things risky - usually at least half of our audience was unaware there would be a show that night, and it means we don't have the luxury of a trapped audience.  They can ignore us, talk over us, throw bottles and loose change or just leave.  Our job is not only to keep their attention, but to convince them at the end that what they saw was valuable enough to dip into their wallets.

How well does that work, with the masks and such?
Pretty well, actually.  We've morphed our aesthetic over the years to suggest a sort of vague historic past, with stock characters pulling visual references from characters our audience already knows.  Pantalone, for example, is based off the Monopoly guy.  The masks and big shiny costumes cue our (likely drunk) audience in on the kind of over the top theatricality of our shows, and sort of prepares them for some of the bullshit conventions we try and pull later.

You're playing the young Lover this time?
Yes, a bit of a stretch, huh? At least I'm paired with Aaron, who is even more elderly than I am, instead of young Tate.  Sloop [of the Damned] made me feel like total a cougar.  I began playing the Lover with Austin Commedia Society back when I was, more or less, the Lover character in real life - obnoxious, loud, and with limbs a little too long and spindly for any real grace of movement.

Not much has changed.
That's totally true, except now I've got a lot more person to cram into the corset and am sporting these grey racing stripes.  Genevieve [Kinney] usually plays our lovers, and she somehow manages to explore various permutations on the Elegant Lady every time.  This is the second time I've picked the Lover back up since La Fenice reformed, and I'm trying to keep from making her too crusty, to just allow the character and myself to be lovely without making any commentary.

What do you mean?
Well, there's this strange attitude that's apparently pervasive among female comics.  They can be attractive, but you don't run into material from Cloris Leachman or Lucille Ball or even Tina Fey and Amy Poehler about how good looking they are and some of them will go out of their way to actively remove their femininity from their acts, talking and behaving in more masculine patterns, but there's no denying that they're all a bunch of total foxes.  In part, I think it comes from tending to be one of very few ladies in a dude's world - no matter how many manicures you get or how well you walk in heels, your testosterone starts to pique and you become less comfortable playing femininity in truthful ways.

I assume you mean the Royal You.
I always do.  Unless we're talking about doing dishes or picking up squished cockroaches, in which case, I mean Actual You.  I did a show during the Great Commedia Hiatus where I played this punky angel for the first act of a show, and a rapist-tormenting succubus during the second act.  The succubus role was really hard for me.  I remember being fairly confident someone would stand up in the middle of the show and call me out for farting into my corset and bustle, or point out how wildly uncomfortable I was with the slinky vixen thing.  I've never felt so exposed and awkward in my life, and I've done some really ludicrous things on stage.

Back up.  You were farting into your bustle?  Is that what chicks do into those things?
Well, yeah.  With all those voluminous folds, it's hard to resist filling them like a hot air balloon and there's  a lot of gut squeezing with corsets.  When the review came in for that show, the reviewer said I had played the role of a succubus too narcissistically, but playing the angel like I had just been hit in the head with many hammers and was suffering from Tourettes was called "spunky," so I guess it reinforced the notion for me - stick to what you know, and cling to the fart jokes and on-stage jitterbugging and leave being ladylike to the dancers.  So, you know, the first Lover I played when we re-formed was a sexual being, but in an aggressive, hyper-masculine way. It was actually a totally cowardly move. 

So this time?
Well, first of all, I'm going to sing like a freaking Disney princess.  Then I'm going to be so damned lovely, you're going to want to paint my picture like one of your French girls, Jack.  And somewhere in there I'm going to be funny, too.

Meet Tate Green, La Fenice's new Arlecchino!

Tate Green is our sprightly young actor playing Arlecchino - the first since it was retired by Jason Fawcett back in 2002.  Tate was last seen as Ottavio in Sloop of the Damned, and is the creator and host of the wildly popular YouTube Gong Show.

How has the process of stepping into the fabled shoes of Arlecchino been?

Well, all of the tales of past La Fenice Arlecchinos – shots lined up across the stage and all – I’m feeling it’s the perfect role for me. Although I don’t think I can handle a shot thrown in my eyes.

Don’t worry, that wasn’t Arlecchino’s eyes.  Those were mine.

Yes, but you threw it in your own eyes, right?  

Yes.  But that’s neither here nor there.  Tossing liquor into your eyeballs is not a requirement for the role, unless you’re into that kind of thing.

I enjoy the experience of playing Arlecchino a lot better than playing the Lover.  I’ve been having more fun with it.  I’m not sure if it’s the character or the process that’s just a little more comfortable for me, but I’m having a lot more fun this time.

Yes.  You appeared to be pretty dour about playing Ottavio in the last show [Sloop of the Damned.]

Well, more than anything I was really nervous all through rehearsal for Sloop.   I don’t know if I didn’t fully understand how the process was supposed to go when we started or if it was just trying to do some fancy new kind of theatre.  I mean, Commedia’s weird.

It’s funny that I’m less nervous for this show, while I’ve got Gian Giacomo Colli breathing down my neck during rehearsals.  I suppose he’ll get a lot more terrifying when we start to layer in the larger physicality.  I’ve been practicing Arlecchino’s particular walks and my movement in my classroom just for that occasion, and my students have started calling me out on it.

So what is your most favorite thing about the way La Fenice puts its shows together?  Ha.  How’s that for a leading question?

Yes.  “What do like best about my lovely face?”  

I like that it’s all super relaxed until – see, I got half way through a sentence before I got negative – it’s all very relaxed until we get hung up on something, and then you see people get passionate about the construction of some bit of material or other.  The way people debate the nuance of a fart joke or fight for the inclusion of one of your weird history references is really awesome.  The collaborative nature of the story building process is great – the fact that rehearsal is totally interactive, and we all help each other in creating and structuring each others’ work.  You don’t just build your own character and material, it’s all a result of everyone sharing ideas.  I think the whole process has made a lot more sense this time around, and that’s made it much more fun.

It’s less onerous this time than during Sloop?

Well, I still feel like we don’t have near enough time, but I feel like when we rehearse this time around, everything has been tighter and our time has been more purposeful.  We’ve had only four rehearsals, and it feels like we have 2/3 of the show hammered down.  I mean, we just have to toss in a few extra jokes and we’re square.

Bah, who needs jokes?

Good point.  Instead, let’s just take turns reciting facts about the Holocaust?  

Oh.  That sounds experimental. 

Yeah.  We should maybe add puppets.  No, wait, let’s not do that.  It’s suddenly reminding me a terrible formative experience I had as a young theatre kid.

What’s that?

Well, I was trying to learn about puppetry, and somehow I wound up on a website called Puppetry of the Penis.  

“Somehow?”

I could have grown up a totally different person if it weren't for that website.

Fun Facts about Tate Green.

I could have been [puppeteer and Company Member at Large] Dan Raynor.  Hell, that might have been Dan Raynor.  Oh, man.  Now I have to check and see if it’s still there.  [An iPhone is retrieved, and Googling takes place.]  Sweet Jesus, it still exists.  What?  “Now in 3D?”  Don’t put any of this in the interview.  I do not endorse this scary website.  Oh my god, it has mobile apps?

You are, at this very moment, earning yourself a file at the FBI.  Children take classes in this building.  Holy wow.  They just do full on handstands and stuff all naked, don't they? Are you blushing?

Next question?

Ahem.  What sucks about making shows the way we do?

Can I say when Gian doesn’t understand American jokes?  Or English?

Sure.

Also, when Aaron doesn’t understand Kate English, and Kate doesn’t understand Aaron English.  Adam always seems to understand everybody.  I think he always understands everything.  

Or it could be that Adam is not wildly interest in understanding anyone.

Actually, the hardest thing is splitting my time with my job and this.  It makes show homework really hard, especially since I feel like I’m not as funny on my own.   

Wait.  Can we strike all the puppetry of the penis stuff?

No.  We’ll be providing a link for our readers.  That stuff is better than RuPaul videos.

Crap.  So I guess my grandmother can’t come see this show, and now she can’t read this interview. 

Week 1 Begets Week 2

-Aaron Johnson  

If you have a passion for Commedia dell'Arte, then as a performer it’s like riding a bicycle, you never quite forget how. That statement does nothing to account for the shape of the bicycle when you dig it out of the garage years later, however, or the shape of the rider for that matter. We've had to knock the rust of the frame, tighten the brakes, and true the wheels and then, of course, there is the issue of repairing the bike.

We have just begun our second week of rehearsal with Gian Giacomo, charging toward our opening on Friday like an opposing trench, the machine gun positions manned by our audience. It has been an intense process. Il Maestro is kicking our asses gracefully all the while wearing a gritty, but relaxed smile, like one that follows the first slug taken straight from a bottle of properly aged Chianti. For his efforts, one expects applause and laughter at each moment it is clear that our heads have been gently coaxed from their collective rectal confines. Ultimately, that will be for our audience to determine. Until then, as our reward for the hard work hill we still have left to climb, we shall savor the memory of this past Sunday when we took a break from rehearsal to enjoy the excellent marriage of fine wine and Gian’s homemade risotto.

Home from Rehearsal

- Paul Joiner  

Late Sunday evening we're home from an exhausting but productive rehearsal. Three sessions in and we've improved through the whole scenario. We've roughed out the choreography of the final fight scene. We've made the funny.

There's no more vicious and exacting beast than comedy. We ride her as she bucks and throws us, biting and kicking the whole time. Sometimes it's hard to tell whether it's the comedy or us that's doing the biting and kicking.

The ideas run like fire in the California hills. Each spark triggers another and another until it all devolves to ashes and giggling. I had no idea how much I missed it.