coolmcjourneys

I write from the back of a train headed back from Greystones to Dublin, figuring this would be a good spot to put together the story of Saturday’s escapade on the train, which I alluded to in my last entry. Buckle your seat belts, folks.

Jo and Tom kindly dropped me at the Leixlip station (leaving them with a copy of this CD for their troubles), and I waited about twenty minutes in the light drizzle, catching a breath and aware of my newfound solitary-ness after the long week surrounded by vibrant and creative people. I get on the train, maybe 40% occupied, and nestle into a double corner seat, my backpack on the right seat, myself, my laptop bag, my camera bag, and a trash bag containing two pairs of wet jeans all wedged in underneath and around me. I’m tired and have about a 30 minute ride before transferring at Connolly Station to catch a train to Greystones, so I make like an experienced traveler and hook an arm around my backpack, laptop, and camera straps, dial up a nice Mozart Piano Concerto on my iPod, and settle in.

About five minutes into my slumber, I’m awakened by a tug on my backpack. A ruddy and swollen-faced man, maybe early 30s (going on 50) has taken my backpack off the seat and dropped it in the center of the aisle. He plops himself down on the adjacent seat, wedging me into the corner, without acknowledging the backpack maneuver. Well… THAT’S odd, I sleepily think, a bit confused as to why this is necessary when there appear to be plenty of open seats. He begins talking with the two people across the aisle from him, so I figure he’s a friend of theirs and wanted to sit next to them. He asks me in a thick, slurred brogue “Is dis yerr bag herre?” Bit of a dumb question, but I nod yeah, and he hoists it up to the storage space above. What a kind fellow. He lands back down in the seat, and I'm assaulted by the unmistakably strong scent of liquor and cheap cologne. My camera bag is stuffed behind me, which with an extra seat wasn’t uncomfortable, but with Stinks of Liquor Man now taking up the extra space has become very cramped. After about two minutes of sitting there wedged in uncomfortably, I see an open double seat across the way and decide to get up and move, giving up my seat and letting Stinks of Liquor Man carry on with his friends. I calmly say, “Sorry, I’m just gonna move to that seat over there, man.” He lets me out, and I move across to the corner of the train car. No big deal, right?

Well… apparently this was a big deal to SOL Man, who takes my motions verrrry personally and within a minute starts passively complaining to everyone in the immediate area. There’s an elderly couple sitting in front of me. He approaches the man, extends a crooked hand and blathers “You peoples arr nice… but this guy (points to me)… nooobody likes him.” There are about ten people in our area. No one says anything. He sits and continues, sending his voice to me: “Was aye not good enouff to sit wid, man?” At first I ignore him, not wanting to give him reason to continue. He keeps asking, and people are starting to get really uncomfortable. I finally respond calmly: “No, man, I have long legs, I just wanted to have enough room.” He gets up and approaches me in my corner: “Ohhhh… Am I not good enough to sit witch, man? Issere somethan the mather with mee?” He’s building up steam. He stands up and points to my bag in the storage space above. “Is this herre yer rucksack?” “Yeah.” He pulls it down and violently chucks it at me full on from three aisles away. I catch it. He’s comes up to me quickly, now very close, standing, and I’m cornered in my seat. For a few seconds I’m convinced he’s about to take a swing at me, and my brain is firing on all cylinders planning what to do.

Somehow… THANK GOD… he doesn’t swing. Backing off, he devises a new tactic: “How boutchu come back over herr an sitch wid me again. Comon man.” At this point I stand up; though he looks a practiced brawler, I’m bigger than he is and try to convey to him the sense that although I’m not going to engage, I’m also not going to make the easiest target to pick a fight with. I stand there at the end of the train car in a bit of a faceoff, me at my seat, him maybe ten feet away at his, and consider announcing “If anyone has any advice for me in this situation, I’d love to hear it.” Everybody squirms in their seat but all are stonefaced. “Comon man, I’m nauhtthat bad a guyee. Come sit wit me here.” I respond gently, but firmly, “Tell ya what, man. I am just going to… Stand. Right. Here.”

He sits down and I make my move, swiftly passing him for the opposite end of the train, trying to create some distance, but I’m carrying four bags so I’m not the most graceful sight. Not surprisingly, he gets up and lumbers after me. Mind you, the train is moving and there’s no place to go. The people on the opposite end of the train surely have been watching with interest, and seem not terribly excited that the action is now coming their way. I position myself behind a pole, so that if he takes a swing he’d have to get it past a bit of metal as well. He approaches and puts out his left hand to shake mine; I keep the pole between his right hand and my body.

“Whididye have to get upp an embarrass me like dat in fronn of me mates like dat, man? I’m not a bad guyee, I’m not.” “No, no, not at all, you seem great (lying); I just wanted some space for my legs.” “But eyy jus had a few pints for me brotherr’s burrthday last night ya know.” He's retreating on his anger a bit. I’m talking him down. “Oh yeah, did you have a good time?” “O yah it was grand. But can ye come over therr and tell me mates dat I’m not a bad guyee, can ye?” I sense the train is about to make a stop. “No, I’m getting off here, man, have a nice day, cheers.” I run outside the train and make a mad dash to get on the next car before the train moves again. I push the button, get on, and walk to the opposite end facing my original car so that in case SOL Man decides to cross in between I can see him coming.

At the next stop a horde of people get on coming from a rugby match, and a father and son sit across from me. For the first time in about 15 minutes, I feel safe; there’s too many people around for him to bother with me. The father and son are friendly and I tell them the story. Though my heart is still pounding madly, it’s nice to encounter normal people and they’re in great spirits (Leinster won handily), and we talk about America. I get off at Connolly Station to make my transfer, and look behind me and there he is, barreling toward the exit ramp about 20 feet behind me. But I don’t think he saw me behind the crowd of people? I run up some stairs and find a security officer and briefly explain the situation; mostly so that if SOL Man attacks me on the platform at least someone will have an idea of what’s going on and not have both of us thrown in the clink. I ask for directions to my platform and cross over to the same platform I just got off at, but enough time has passed that my adversary is gone. Some nice elderly ladies confirm that the next train will take me to Greystones. I get on and watch the gorgeous Irish Sea pass by, thanking my lucky stars that I found the wherewithal to withhold what could have been a really nasty situation. For the next hour, I can smell the scent of cheap cologne on my hand.

Solo travelers, be forewarned: KEEP YERR WITS ABOUTCHYE!!!

How strange, unexpected, familiar, slightly bittersweet, and overall quite pleasant it is to be writing from this bedroom on the coast in Greystones, about an hour south of Dublin, a room where I stayed with my ex during my trip here in August of 2008. During that trip we had the chance to stay with Peter, a terrific gent (and Irish Times editor who Kirstin’s father had met while walking the Camino in Spain) and his lovely wife Moira, responsible for one of the most legendary meals these eyes have ever feasted upon. (I can’t believe I never got photographs of that spread!) With the uncertainty and last-minute changes to travel plans this weekend (Rachel and Stacy and I had initially, albeit loosely, planned to hitch a ride to County Kerry with Collette), I phoned Peter this morning and asked if it would be OK to come and stay, and I’m quite fortunate this seemed a good weekend for an under-announced visit.

But perhaps I should start with the morning. After snagging only around 3 hours sleep Saturday night, I woke and decided that though my body certainly craved more rest, it’d be more worth my while to get situated for the day’s travels. I began by throwing a week’s worth of clothes into the tiny kitchen washer/dryer. Having really only brought a fairly small amount, this was a bit of a necessity, though I should’ve known the dryer would take approximately forever to dry anything, thus holding up my morning plans. (Also notice the photo of me in a t-shirt and towel; I put everything in so was wandering around in this get-up while Jo and Tom came over to reclaim the bed they had set up for MJ in the downstairs bedroom.)

While Tom took MJ to his train, I tried to dry just a few items and talked with Jo a bit. Tom had come in that morning with a copy of the Irish Times, announcing that Jo had just been nominated for Best Director in the country-wide drama awards! (Performance Corporation also snagged nods for Best New Play and Best Actor!) So that’s fun to discuss, and certainly well-deserved, if our process is any indication. Tom comes back and I pack my final things, including a backpack full of still-wet clothes; I’m hoping to dry them in Greystones.

[INSERT STORY OF CRAZED MAN ON TRAIN HERE. Cuz that kinda needs its own entry.]

Peter walks over to the train station to get me in a light drizzle, and I’m starting to feel tired and headachy from last night’s fun. We get to the house and its just as I remember; Peter and Moira are a delightful, worldly couple and it’s terrific to see them. There’s a subtle and slight personal sadness in the air, however, as when I was here last (slightly under two and a half years ago) it was through a connection made by my ex, and stayed here with her. It’s fascinating to be back in a place where I suppose I assumed I wouldn’t ever be back again, and my hosts are just as gracious and welcoming as before. Also like last time, their son is away and their now-in-University daughter is around.

Especially after the shenanigans on the train, it’s nice to settle in and catch up. I sit at the dining room table with a glass of water and tell the story of the week’s rehearsal, and the story of the train, and I’m amazed at how much adrenaline I still have pumping through me because of the near-incident. I sit at the long wooden dining room table, site of an epic feast in my memory, and also the setting where I heard the news that Barack Obama had chosen Joe Biden to be his VP running mate during the 2008 election. (I about leaped out of my seat at that news – I’ve always been a fan of Joe!) I’m still reeling a bit from the train incident, and feeling pretty queasy, so after a glass of wine (ha!) and some quick catching up on the rehearsal week and train story, I go up to take a nap, and sleep soundly for about an hour. When I return, Moira has some tomato lentil soup, feta salad and beans made and it’s all delicious. After some lengthy, erudite discussion of politics, the Irish economy, and the ills of social media, we head to the anteroom where a nice fire is keeping the Irish winter chill away. I ask Peter for the book that we gave to him on the last visit; it’s a book of photographs of then-candidate Obama taken by Pete Souza, and we gave it at the time in the desperate hope that he would become President. It’s nice to sit and actually browse through it, which I hadn’t taken the time to do previously.

I turn in early and spend some time catching up on blog writing. The bed is incredibly comfortable and the electric blanket is a godsend and I sleep like a fallen tree. The following morning I sleep in, and write more before getting up. I've got a full week ahead of me, and I'll be in Spain and France! And nothing will involve the word planks.

As was to be expected due to our trip to town the previous night, Friday was the most difficult day to get up and out to rehearsal, though the adrenaline of the final rehearsal day took over. On my final morning walk through the mud to Castletown, I take some B&W photos, and after we begin, there's celebratory gifts for Marketa, who is leaving Performance Corporation after working hard for a year and a half. Over the week we've settled into a nice routine with the physical warmups, adding core and voice work along the way, and the balance (literally) brought by our final group warmup is needed. Though I must admit I will very much look forward to not having to do 60-second side plank positions until mid-April.

We’re brought outside and split into two groups, and told to stage pieces which use the substantial balcony-like entrance to the estate, as a way of connecting to the large bleachers sections of seats which we will eventually see in the Uline performance space. (And also that we should try to implement languages apart from English!) The first group sets the audience over by the pillars so that the entrance is viewed from the side and from a bit of distance, and we’re viewing a sort of political demonstration. MJ, Stacy, and Clare pretend to be led down the stairs in handcuffs, shouting and struggling, and they’re led away, while Rachel stays on the stairs and shouts in French. I love the clarity of the use of space to frame the drama.

Our scene begins with Chris, Karl, and I all balanced as statues on small circular road barriers which look out straight on from the entrance, while Adrienne sings a love song in Russian all the way at the door at the top of the entryway. Steph leads the audience into the space, while we three break our poses, run past them and break out into a raucous football match, hurdling into each other like bumper cars. Steph approaches with a large sign which happened to be there proclaiming “No football allowed!” which she screams out in Irish ("Cosc ar imirt peile!"). One by one the footballers see the figure singing on the balcony, Chris and Karl make their way to her, then proclaim “I love you!” in French and Irish, but she rebuffs both of them and they fall down the stairs. I approach with my “I love you” and she doesn’t resist, then we embrace at the top of the stairs. Steph comes back with the sign. It’s tough to convey the excitement and drama of some of these pieces via the written word, though I imagine the “anything goes” part is coming through?

We return indoors and Tom goes around with a video camera interviewing groups about what the week’s experience has meant to them, and about what they think the project will mean to audiences in DC. After lunch was our final exercise of the week. We’re put into three groups and given four slips of paper and an image from an art book to create our scene. The first group (MJ, Steph, and Rachel) stages a boxing match with a coach in the corner, and the boxers get tangled up. The second group moves us outside to the small parking lot and begins with Karl sitting in an office chair in the middle of the lot, drinking coffee, then Chris and Stacy approach on either side, singing “Hello my baby, hello my darling…” which evolves into Stacy leading a gospel meeting, and Karl notices none of this as he drinks his coffee. Chris and Stacy walk away, and get into a car which backs up and picks up Karl and his chair, though we’re blocked from seeing him get in. Brilliant and fun.

Our group is given the phrases “political rally,” “parking lot,“ “When will we ever learn?” and “How does this end?, and the image is of a giant piñata made of colorful flowers, shaped like a bear, and like Godzilla, is holding a woman in his jaw who is bleeding red rose petals. Our piece stays outside and splits the audience into two groups, and is staged inside a car in which Clare is a Washington tour guide with a phony American accent, slowly driving people past vignettes that Adrienne and I create. To implement a level of implied discrimination (which the Uline was certainly known for), she first allows any white American men in, telling anyone else they can go in the second run. The car drives past the "Lincoln Memorial," which reveals me sitting like the statue on a tree trunk, then Adrienne becomes Booth shooting Lincoln, I throw blue shoe covers in the air (meant to indicate flowers) and she screams “Sic semper tyrannis!” in front of the slowly moving car. Clare’s narration in the car, however, is all positive and cheery and represents a story which runs opposite to what we’re acting out outside, as a sort of rewriting of historical events. The car wheels around a circle and passes by the estate, and as it reaches a break between the trees, Adrienne and I run out as Vietnam-era protesters, yelling and spitting on the politicians in the car, and she stops me from shooting, and we toss more blue show covers on the dashboard. We sprint to our next location, staged behind a sign emblazoned with what appears to be a singing voice and a rigid hand proclaiming “stop!” (I think it was telling car drivers to not drive into this area?) As Clare drives the passengers toward us, I am Paul Robeson (who sang at the Uline) singing “Old Man River” with a blue shoe cover/flower in my lapel while Adrienne puts out her hand and tries to stop the concert. Finally, as Clare diverts attention in the car (hopefully?), we make a mad dash to Collette’s car which we have parked close to the lot facing out, and as Clare pulls her car nose-to-nose up to our car, we have a tender moment and I give Adrienne a flower. Then we repeat all of the above for the second carload. I have no idea what any of that looked or felt like to people in the car, but it was exhausting and thrilling to do all that running around, and it’s a nice way to go out.

We go back to the table room and hammer out locked-in rehearsal schedules for April and May, then sit for at least an hour talking about the week and moments that stuck out. I open my blog and it’s nice to be able to give an exact sequence of exercises. I offer that I think the pieces that worked the best were the ones with the clearest and simplest structure, things whose concept could be explained in a few words, rather than lots and lots of ideas thrown in. Everyone has something interesting to say and though all have a different perspective on the process, we agree on certain images which stick out from the week. We wrap up and collect our things, say goodbye to the rehearsal room and carve out a plan for the evening, some of us scrambling to find travel arrangements all the while.

I trudge back through the dark field for a final time, taking some shots of the gorgeous moon encircled by light, get home and clean and pack and cook some food, and call home for a few minutes.

MJ and I walk/run to the bus stop where we will meet the others who have already gotten on in Celbridge, and we will all head into Dublin for a last hurrah; this time with no worries about the next morning!

We get off at Merrian Square and walk to O'Donaghue's, a packed pub in which we nudge our way through the crowds and music in the front room past at least three other rooms to a relatively unoccupied room which we claim as our own for the next hour or so. Round of Guinness are floating around and Collette and I trade my camera back and forth; at one point I even pull out my emergency point-and-shoot camera, which I used on my trip two years ago. Suffice to say that between all of us, everyone will have loads and loads of shots to remember this week by. At one point I go to hear the musicians in the front room, and I realize that with the shots of The Dubliners on the wall, I am standing in the pub where this band became famous; I raise my pint to Luke Kelly on the wall and I really want to sing Raglan Road. I had sung the first verse for the group previously as an exercise, as Jo had us go around and each sing a song individually, though I don’t remember exactly when that happened.

The group decides to follow the craic to the next pub, however, and they make the 10-minute walk through the rain to Peter's Pub, where we sit and have drinks and sandwiches and Collette and I have a photo competition to see who can come up with the most compelling shot on one try. (I think its still tied but we will pick up in America.) Note to self: Jo absolutely adores having her photo taken.

We close down this pub and find ourselves outside what looks like an apartment complex but is actually a sort of speakeasy/nightclub, and we climb the stairs passing a number of dance floors, on one of which enter, crash a wedding reception, and begin disco dancing! After skipping floors and much dancing, we end up seated in chairs and sofas on the top floor.

At around 3am, we make our way across a few blocks and pick up a large van-taxi in front of Trinity College (one of the few areas I recognize from my last trip to Dublin), and though the driver is only allowed to take 8, all ten of us pile in and two people lose their heads until we get out of the city. We’re dropped off (the taxi was a great deal) and I catch only a few hours of sleep beginning at around 4:00am. This week definitely finished up with a bang, and though it’s sad to say goodbye to people, we all know we’ll be picking up where we left off in three months time.

PS - I've loads pictures to accompany this entry but will hold off until I have time and net access. Am leaving my hotspot in Greystones to have Peter drive me to Bray where I will catch a train to Dublin. In Dublin tonight, in addition to meeting up with a possibly distant cousin and her husband, two words will provide guidance: GO PATS!!!

PPS - Photos are up. And with two days hindsight, I think I may have jinxed my team.

I’ve finally fallen behind in my daily posting routine, friends. On Thursday night the entire group ventured out into Dublin for a meal and a show and a pub, and I ended up leaving my laptop in Marketa’s trunk, or “boot” in the local parlance. Time has whirred by so quickly that yesterday morning seems like last week, and from what I remember of Day 4 (as I’m composing this entry days later, I’ll admit to using a cheat-sheet), it was a day of continued creative exploration, though I finally felt the subtle tug of exhaustion beginning to creep in. But when one is creatively turned on, in love with the work and process, lack of sleep hours are quickly overcome.

[Note: I'm posting this from an internet hotspot looking out over train tracks just in front of the Irish Sea in Greystones, about an hour south of Dublin. I spent a good part of the morning writing and visiting with my lovely hosts who will make an appearance in a later entry. Please note that I have a whopper of a story to tell about something which happened after leaving the group yesterday, but first I must catch up with the previous days in chronological order. STAY TUNED, readers!]

On the way in to the estate, I snap a few daytime pics; its amazing to me how much the area transforms over a few hours by the simple act of the sun lighting the space. Our first exercise on rehearsal day 4 was in three groups of three, arranging small vignettes based on our wall-hung images, which would show a process of rehearsing bleeding into a “performance.” Also, a character should die and the audience should feel something for that character. Running with Jo’s request that we cast ourselves “against type,” I played Margaret Lane, the young daughter of the Irish Catholic family in Swampoodle, ca. 1910. In our sketch, Margaret’s father is killed in a roller derby accident at the Uline Auditorium. (It’s a good thing we’re so focused on process now, rather than on final results!) In another piece, Chris plays the dancer Rudolf Nureyev (who once danced in the Uline) leaping to his death.

We continue with another three groups of three; each group must find an excuse to make use of either a roller derby, a bulldozer, or a marching band. I’m in the marching band group, and we travel from a math classroom (“76 Trombones!”), an airplane ("McNamara's Band"), featuring Adrienne’s sendup of the haughty stewardess who snarled at Chris on the flight from JFK (we have taken to calling her “Nanny McPhee”), and a doctor’s office, where Stacy receives a bit of bad news (“When the Saints Go Marching In.”) The second group stages us in the center of the room, facing outward while they whirl around us like a roller derby, then morph into screaming as if we were the Beatles onstage at the Uline. (Have I mentioned that that Beatles gave their first American performance in the very space where we’re performing our piece? Well it’s worth saying again!) The third group starts with Karl’s unsuccessful proposal to Stephanie at a restaurant, which gets interrupted by… Rachel driving a bulldozer! Karl and Steph become Swampoodle artistes angrily defending their right to use the space to make “art,” while the bulldozer operator (much like our roofer friends the previous day) mocks them. Rachel the bulldozer driver then becomes a dancer. You see where all of this is going, yes?

After a quick lunch, we’re taken on a tour of the estate by a friendly employee who knows lots about the history of Castletown House and has many stories to share along the way. I had no idea about the opulence which laid underneath our rehearsal rooms, but its all pretty magnificent. We’re asked to not take photographs in one special room which contains fine imported drawings framed on the walls with a mixture of flour, water, and arsenic, which kills all bacteria, an 18th century glue which sticks to this day. Our guide tells us its one of the finest rooms for this style in all of Europe. There’s also a rare statue of George Washington's head currently held in a storage box, and a fun story about the cracks in the mirror and fireplace in the lavish dining room coming from a battle between the local priest having thrown a Bible at the devil, whose cloven feet had been revealed while cheating at a card game. So apparently there’s precedent for the free-range storytelling we’re carrying on a few floors above?

Next we’re introduced to Niamh, our costume designer, and Ciaran, our lighting designer, who are swiftly integrated into our madness as we're split into two new groups and given some text from Tom. The first group tries on a selection from Niamh’s colorful costume pieces while sitting around a table, and their text focuses on “I want to be remembered for…” Our text is concerned with history, and realizing the history of a place and its connection to the present moment in that place, presented as a list of “History is…” For staging, I suggest the outside courtyard adjacent to the side entrance we’ve been using to enter the estate; it’s diagonally shaped and rife with interesting playing spaces. We have Ciaran lead the “audience” into the center of the area, and one by one the actors pop up at different places, reading individual sections of Tom’s text.

The final exercise is focused on sound, and we’re put in two groups and given more text. The first group puts us in the architecturally fascinating brick room in the center, which was remodeled to serve as a stabilizer for the entire estate. The group is spread around us, the lights are turned off, and soft whispering and breathing g on all around us, which lead into Rachel leading the others in a gorgeous, simple, original folk melody (inspired by “Oh Brother, Where Art Thou?,” she later claimed)… “See the women working… still, still… smell the bread baking… still, still… hear the children playing… still, still…” It’s a wonderful, magical moment to hear that sound and I close my eyes and try to stretch my awareness of the present moment, just as I had when I crossed the dark field the other night. Our group, staged in a dimly lit, 18th century-feeling side room, starts with me singing some faux Sean nos, following a minor pentatonic pattern (I resolve to learn this style!), followed by the sound of brushing paper on the wooden floor (“the rushing of Tiber Creek below”) and a crescendo building to the improvised end.

We end the day with a grueling attempt to piece together a coherent rehearsal schedule for when we meet back in DC starting mid-April. That evening, the group heads out for a fine meal at Wolfe's Irish Artisan Bistro in Dublin, which we order and finish in record time in order to make the curtain at the Project Arts Centre, where a group called Forced Entertainment is performing a new work called Void Story. The piece is constructed as a staged radio play of sorts, with still images reminiscent of a comic-book projected in the center. Though the four actors do a fine job reading their scripts on side tables, personally, the piece isn’t my favorite and my exhaustion is getting the better of me.

After the show, we walk over to a pub which seems to have hundreds of Guinness signs hung in different ways, and its nice to have a pint of the black magic while the group unwinds for a bit.

We stay for two drinks, sing birthday wishes for MJ (what are the chances that out of 9 actors, 2 of them have birthdays during our rehearsal week?), and head back to Celbridge. On the way, Jo and Tom invite our carload (Steph, MJ and myself) into their home not far from Castletown for a quick swig of fine whiskey, the gift of a birthday cigar for MJ, and a bit of fun with their three wonderful dogs. Jo drops us off at the Langley Lodge and MJ enjoys his birthday cigar smoke outside. It's overall a nicely rounded, not-too-crazy night; after all there’s one day left and no one wants to be the only one to show up “under the weather” for our final rehearsal day!

We’ve reached the midway point of our week-long process, and morning has flown into afternoon into evening into the next morning in a gigantic blur. I thought today was an outstanding day in terms of creative work, and the group’s chemistry and trust is coalescing into a rare energy. We’ve all been in lots of shows, but for many of us (myself included) this is the first time we’ve been entrusted with conjuring up the raw material for a theater piece.

After our ritualized physical warmup – those plank positions kill me, folks – Jo tells us that “today is Uline day!” and we separate into groups of three, each of which is given a photograph and a page of text from Tom. Working alongside Adrienne and Stephanie, my group’s photograph is an industrial wasteland, possibly taken from a modern art exhibit, cluttered with broken clocks and computers, and our text is a circus-like incantation recalling a few quirky events from the history of the Uline Auditorium. Again, we can use anywhere on the estate to stage this. We take the lift to the elevator and on our way out notice that just at the spot where a hallway corner turns right, some windows look out on the main entrance. We’ve found our viewing area, and we stage the audience in the hallway while we three performers are outside. We all come up with some ritualized, mechanical motions for the text, and during the imagining process I shoot three videos: two on my camera and one on cell phone. The first piece, which was to represent a ballet studio, used Rachel’s dance training in a room neatly organized into rows with chairs, which Jo compares to the Philip Glass/Robert Wilson set for Einstein on the Beach. The second piece began with Karl leading us through a dark room, under a table covered with a large sheet of paper, and at each “stop” he played a recording of a spooky, disembodied voice reading the text, off of his iPhone (i.e. “this is where John Lennon strummed the first chord to ‘I Want to Hold Your Hand’). We’re led through the room, under a table and into another room, with stops along the way and I feel like a kid being led through a haunted house. (Who’s going to jump out at us behind a corner?) We get to the final room, and there is Clare standing on a ladder, pirouetting an umbrella in front of a table on which old books pulled from the walls are left open.

Before we performed, I rushed outside, placed the cell phone (with video loaded) on the window ledge, hung the camera (with its playscreen facing the hallway) on one of the iron window crossbars, and after loading the third video onto my laptop, balanced the laptop vertically on top of the bench next to where I entered the sightline. All three videos played as we mechanically intoned the text and followed our ritualized, repetitive movements, and we sensed the cold removal from our audience beyond the window in the hallway as part of the aesthetic.

After lunch, Jo tells us Tom will see us one by one in the side room in order to record us giving accounts of our daily routines. I’m asked about what my typical day after 5pm looks like. While waiting, we’re to pick out an image from art books which they’ve laid out on the floor. I find my image instantly (its Angelina Jolie, her mouth turned up in an expression of joy and ecstasy), and since I’m done with that I take to gazing out the window at the enormous field in front of the estate. When the recording is done, we’re arranged in a V formation and told we’re panelists on a TV show “in the year 3000” and proceed into a group improvisation in which we’re played our own voices back, and we analyze what the voices are saying from an anthropological perspective. We’re all over the place, but if one fact is established it is that Chris needs to clean his pod.

We’re put in groups of three again and tasked with creating a piece using our images, I’m with Chris, who has found an image of a sculpture of a deserted city which is being fed crude oil, and Clare, whose “land art” image reveals a snaky pattern of bushes laid over a grassy field. Given my previous experience at the window, the staging of the piece seems obvious to me; I take the group to the window and we plot out where we would trace the Clare’e squiggly pattern in the field outside. As we stage the audience at the three windows of our rehearsal room, we imagine two pillars on either side (Clare and Chris) representing the stark oil city, while I would be in between the two dancing and singing “I Want to Hold Your Hand.” (The relevance, of course, is that the Beatles first US appearance was given in the very building where our show will take place.) I have Tom sync up the song on the speaker, and luckily, I have the song on my iPhone. From behind a bush outside, I give the signal and starts the music in the room as I start it on my phone, and start dancing and singing with ecstasy amidst the two pillar people, all of us tracing the squiggle. (Though as I shake it my iPhone leaps to the next song and I keep having to re-find my place in the song; though I don’t imagine they could tell this from inside.) At one point some roofers from the adjacent building stop what they’re doing and shout “Shut up, ya f---in eejit!” though I couldn’t hear this – I was having too much fun! A few workers at the side door congratulate us for our singing as we reenter, and I apologize for singing a British song in Ireland. When we get back upstairs, Rachel says, “I felt like a little kid screaming with joy at the window!” Obviously I can’t speak about the process of the other two groups, but the end results, including a morphing images set to random bits of music once heard in the Uline, as well as a shuffling trio of emotion-shifting huffalump creatures set to Tchaikovsky's "Nutcracker." What outrageous fun we’re all having doing this work.

We end the day and I get a lift back to the hut for some pizza and Irish cheese around the kitchen with MJ. I make the long trek over the field through the mud over to the “Round House” for wine and craic and loadsa photo taking. I bring over the nice bottle of Bordeaux. Our lovely and helpful friend Collette should take credit for many of the very good photos which came out of last night!

PS - Gotta run as we're all heading to dinner and a play in Dublin... will post photos from yesterday tomorrow! Cheers, all.