I’ve never cared for or about musicals. This may be a bias picked up from my father, who tended toward the literal and couldn’t figure out why a guy in a movie would break out into a song while getting drenched in the process. (“Hey, dummy — get outta the rain!”) It’s surprising to say the least that I’m seeing three musicals this month: “1776” (which I already saw, at Actors Co-Op, and loved), “Sweeney Todd” (seen last Friday night at the Ahmanson. in a not-good production), and, this Friday night, “The Dead” at Open Fist in Hollywood. I saw “The Dead” about five years ago at, again, the Ahmanson, and although my seats were somewhere up on the surface of the moon, I was completely drawn in to this musicalization of the story by James Joyce; it was utterly moving without being sentimental. (Treacly sentiment being one of those things that tend to keep me away from musicals.) I hear that production by Open Fist is good, and I’m greatly looking forward to it. But three musicals in one month, and all by choice? That’s unprecedented.

And actually, it winds up being FOUR, if you count this one:

Just because I didn’t blog yesterday or today doesn’t mean I wasn’t thinking about what to blog about. So here are the things I thought about blogging about that I didn’t blog about:

1. That it now occurs to me that counting students, thesis students, workshop members, private dramaturgy clients, and me, I’m knee-deep in 19 different new plays — and exactly one of them is by me.
2. That I’m reading three books — and not at the moment writing either of the two I’m working on.
3. That “John Adams” on HBO leaves untouched the great question: How someone like Paul Giamatti gets someone like Laura Linney. And then leaves her behind for years at a time.
4. That yes, I can do a baked dijon flounder at home and have it come out well — but it will never be the baked dijon flounder at Smith’s Clam Bar in Somers Point, New Jersey.
5. That while Eliot Spitzer is a hypocrite who needed to go, I have to wonder again how many violent crimes could be prevented and how many roads and bridges and schools rebuilt and able-bodied productive non-violent people released from prison to help feed the economy if we legalized prostitution and decriminalized marijuana and taxed them both.
6. That Wizard World was in Los Angeles this weekend and I didn’t go because Comic-Con comes but once a year and Wizard World ain’t it.
7. That the Fed bailed out Bear Stearns, and it was those “free marketers” who cheered. In a free market, failing businesses fail. We had NIMBY (Not In My Back Yard); now we have NIMBA (Not In My Bank Account). By the way, the Fed funds that backed up Bear Stearns came from the Treasury — which means they were tax money. Which means you and I bailed out Bear Stearns. And yet we never got any of those windfall profits. This seems like something potentially more worthy of a federal investigation than call-girl rings.

I’m sure more will follow as I think about it.

Just today I was complaining again about the one unfortunate constant in David Mamet’s otherwise often quite marvelous dramas: the secretly scheming woman. We see it in “Speed the Plow,” we see it in “Heist,” we see it in “Oleanna,” we see it in “The Verdict,” we see it in “The Edge,” we see it again and again; when it’s unclear who the villain is, look to the woman in the cast. Those men may be crooks, but somehow they have better morals than those women whose intention is to emasculate them.

Then this afternoon I came across this piece in the Village Voice, in which Mr. Mamet’s other, less-visible, fault reappears: that of setting up false targets so he can easily knock them down. In this case, he equates liberalism with being brain-dead and attacks liberals for arguments I don’t hear them making.

(And you will note that I use “them” as the pronoun for liberals, rather than “us.” Please don’t think I dislike Mamet’s thin argument because my own group is being attacked. It isn’t. But I do wonder at how negative the connotations of “liberal” have become, when once there was a fine tradition of liberal humanism that cut across the political spectrum on these shores. Where once liberals were strong and proud standard-bearers of the improvability of the human condition, now they are cast as appeasers to tyrants and abettors of the disenchanted and ungrateful. In other words, they seem weak — which may be why the famously macho Mamet has jumped ship.)

Mostly when I listen to liberals I don’t hear a nostalgia for Che Guevara. What I hear is concern over a loss of civil liberties (an issue I would think both conservative and liberal and an issue, therefore, unreservedly patriotic and “American”), a bemoaning of the misconduct and malpractice of government (Katrina, Iraq, Afghanistan, etc.), and a great economic unease as enormous stockpiles of wealth are slushed over to an often incompetent few presiding over the ruin of major corporations while hundreds of thousands suffer from their daily mismanagement. If those complaints are liberal, then statistically we are all liberal. To me, a believer in free markets and friendly relations, someone who chokes up over the founding notions behind this nation and wishes we would get back to them, these complaints are commonsensical.

When liberals attack Rush Limbaugh, whom Mamet almost seems to embrace in this strange essay, surely they recognize Limbaugh as the opportunistic showman he is. (Let us always remember that the cowardly Limbaugh is hiding behind that microphone in his broadcast booth every day; if you were one of the few who saw his short-lived television show and his actual confrontations with a live audience, you will never forget the terror in his eyes and the timidity in his voice.) No, what irks leftists and, well, me about Limbaugh is rather what he represents: the dumbing-down of the dialogue and the debasement of the platform. As incredible as this may seem, many people actually listen to Rush Limbaugh and think he makes sense. Worse, the tenor of how he says what he says feeds an indignation that is misdirected against the sufferers rather than the perpetrators. And that, too, is what Mamet’s essay at times seems to do.

If David Mamet found himself caught up in groupthink and extricated himself, I’m delighted. We should celebrate that; it seems like one of our founding principles. But if he has left behind one groupthink to surrender to another, he hasn’t gone anywhere new.

Yes, that is a bear hanging on for dear life. (Thank God for the internet, where you truly can see everything.) For the full story on the bear and his rescue, click here.

From reading the news, you might say Clinton. But as John Dickerson explains on Slate, it was Obama.

I got a subscription invoice today from Fast Company. Here’s their address, on their invoice:  7 World Trade Center, New York, NY.

No, not the problem of finding a parking spot — as long as you’re willing to pay twenty bucks, you can always find a parking spot in LA.

No, I mean the problem of those tight parking slips — so fashionable and in-demand during our brief fling with econo cars in the late 1970’s and early 1980’s, and so impossible in the present reality of SUVs, pick-up trucks, and, in Parking Structure X at USC, DeLoreans. Just try parking between two cars in, again Parking Structure X, and then actually getting out of your car without having to shed a layer of skin.

Ah, but with this simple improvement we could all do it easily. (And then USC could fit in twice as many spaces.)

Yes, I’m producing two readings, two nights in a row. (And I hope you can join me)

Despite her successful career, Katie is a bit lost. Half Caucasian and half Japanese, and cut off from both parents at an early age, she isn’t sure who she is. But a forced reconciliation with her crazy mother — and then a roadtrip to visit Grandmother — bring her face-to-face with the women she was eager to leave behind.

“Lies My Mother Told Me,” a dark comedy by Connie Yoshimura, receives a staged reading this Monday, March 10 at 7:30 p.m. at Studio/Stage in Hollywood.

Please join me for this free event, with catered reception afterward. I’m the dramaturge on this project and am eager to hear your input.

“Lies My Mother Told Me” by Connie Yoshimura

directed by Joe Ochman

with

Alice Ensor, Helen Slayton-Hughes, and Linde Gibb

Studio/Stage is located at:
520 North Western Ave.
Los Angeles, CA 90004

Click here for directions.

What: rehearsed reading of “Lies My Mother Told Me” by Connie Yoshimura, with reception

When: Monday, March 10 at 7:30 p.m.

Where: Studio/Stage, 520 North Western Ave. Los Angeles, CA 90004

Please join us.

Above we see the bucolic bungalow once inhabited by Charles Bukowski. (And it looks more appropos than ever.)

This is just one of dozens of wonderful atmospheric photos of Los Angeles landmarks one may find on this site, where you’ll find everything from Walt Disney’s first studio (a garage), to the home of Zappa Records (which I’ve passed about a hundred thousand times), to our local stand-in for The Daily Planet.

Thanks to Mark Chaet for letting me know about this.

This weekend I’m producing readings of two new plays by Connie Yoshimura, a playwright I work with as dramaturge.

Please come join us.

Here’s Sunday night’s offering: “Open House.” (Monday night’s reading is “Lies My Mother Told Me”; more about that shortly. And yes, for my purposes, “Monday” is part of the weekend. Hmph.)

What happens when everyone in the neighborhood suspects the worst about you?

That’s one of the questions explored in “Open House,” a new play by Connie Yoshimura receiving a staged reading this Sunday, March 9 at 7 p.m. at the Hollywood Court Theatre.

Please join me for this free event, with catered reception afterward. I’m the dramaturge on this project and am eager to hear your input.

“Open House” by Connie Yoshimura

directed by Mark Kinsey Stephenson

with

Carolyn Hennesy, Ronnie Steadman, Maria Lay, Kip Adams, Liza de Weerd, Laura Buckles, Richard Ruyle, Angie Hauk, Toby Meuli, and Rick Sparks

Hollywood Court Theatre at Hollywood United Methodist Church

(the church with the large AIDS ribbon on the tower)

6817 Franklin Avenue, Hollywood CA 90028

Click here for directions.

There is a large free parking lot. Park in the lot, then enter through the gates in front into the courtyard. Walk up the ramp to your left. Go to your right along the breezeway and you’ll see a set of doors to your left. Go up the stairs to the second floor, turn right, and you’ll be at the theatre. We will post signs directing you.

What: rehearsed reading of “Open House” by Connie Yoshimura, with reception

When: Sunday, March 9 at 7 p.m.

Where: Hollywood Court Theatre, 6817 Franklin Avenue, Hollywood

Please join me.