rusty razors.
a last-minute short rehearsal session last night went fairly well. there were four of us and, although the scenework could definitely use some sharpening, the overall vibe was pretty loose, which i think helped up the "actually having fun" quotient.
after an hour and a half, one person left and one person opted to watch, so Jay and I went into
Hovercraft mode, which basically just means doing songs and scenes since we really haven't put much thought to what our format will be.
we warmed up with a song, which ended up being "The Janitor" - a song about an old maintenance guy who laments his life, but also relishes his place as an example for the kids of what not to become. in hindsight, it was a bit cliche' ...
from the suggestion of "massage parlor," our fauxpening begin with just a regular conversation as ourselves. the last time we worked on an opening, it consisted of getting an object and having some kind of conversation where we were just making stuff up and discussing our thoughts in equal measure. this time, though, it mostly revolved around me telling a story about the other night. (i had shown up for another impromptu rehearsal a bit early and one of the girls from the massage parlor a few store fronts down was sitting outside reading. she saw me get out of my car and immediately scurried inside. it just made me wonder if it was anything about me that bothered her, just the fact that i was a guy and there wasn't another soul around, or that she just realized that she left someone stewing in the sauna room)
Jay played support by asking some questions to squeeze some details, but the opening had a quasi-mineminemine quality to it (something that i wanna work on avoiding, because that same quality crept into the subsequent songs). the overall tone of the skeleton
Hovercraft was mostly dark and stormy.
that opening led into:
"massage parlor slut"
*cringe*
the song was a bit of a twisted ode to the swedish-techniqued backrubbers who work in seedy places. the guitar seemed to take it to that mode of oblongness. the second verse actually got a bit more interesting as it was from the p.o.v. of a patron who was obviously sleazely tiptoeing around the fact that he wanted more than his lats stroked. it made for an interesting, if too brief, contrast between the servicer and the customer, especially since the song immediately fell back to its female subject.
besides a few lines here and there ("you're like a flower ... pretty, but you're wilting rather quickly" - trust that it was more the melody than the actual words), it was mostly forgettable, but in a way enjoyable.
the song's title does have me thinking of misogyny ... like, i don't think i've ever consciously avoided playing an overtly misogynistic character, but it's entirely possible that there's been avoidance by way of the subconscience's influence. i'm decently aware (i think) of how women have been shit upon throughout history and in general, so really there's not much of a need to blow it up on stage (although, there seem to be enough people willing to do so). at the same time, the exploration of fears and things uncomfrotable is something that often happens within improv ... which is one of the great things about improv.
curiously enough, thanks to a friend, i'm fine with having a
cunty fresh time.
"massage parlor sluts" led into a scene about a nail parlor lady and a regular customer, a female construction worker, who's decided to do her own nails to save money. mostly average.
"beauty magazine"
a song from the perspective of, um, a women's beauty magazine. i'm not sure exactly if the song was any good, but it felt great being this hateful load of advertising/advice telling young girls that they (and their bodies) were less than desirable and that i had all the answers they needed. having grown up around a slew of older female cousins and hip aunts, and being a lad who would read nearly anything i got my hands on, i had more than my fill of YM & Cosmo (although Nivea ads were quite the heart-accelerators back in the day).
one of the worst things i read (i think in Teen Magazine) was one advice column whose general theme that month concerned self-esteem and self-acceptance, the importance of being different, etc., and a few pages down an column answering a lass' question about looking cool around her friends when her nerdy cousin was around. the advice doled out was something lame about ditching the barely-younger relative whose only crime was being just slightly square (in her cousin's eyes).
"beauty magazine" led into a scene where a young paddle-ball-playing boy is approached by a man in a car. while the boy initially screams out "STRANGER DANGER!," the man eventually earns the boy's trust by bringing out his own paddle ball. with the paddle ball in hand, the man jogs the kid's memory -- it's Ryan McKenna, three-time cover-getter of Paddle Ball Monthly! McKenna offers to sign the kid's paddle ball and duly snatches the kid up through the driver's side window and speeds off.
"Timmy the kidnapped 13-year-old"
Timmy sings his heart out about how much his parents hated him, and how great heaven is, where he watches his own headless body being discovered in a ditch by the authorities. Jay came in as the kidnapper ... but unfortunately, he didn't find his way back into the song after my second verse. anyway, in light of the recent rash of kidnappings, it was pretty creepy and disturbing, especially when the song was ended with the fading repitition of the faintly-voiced word, thirteen.
the next scene was about two old salts who were secretly garnishing the crew's wages. when their embezzlement becomes known, someone has to play the sacrificial lamb to atone and quiet the coming mutiny. the admiral sends his first captain (?) to jump off the plank and asks the passengers of this Carnival Cruise to ignore the swarthy, club-wielding mass. eh.
"old man's end @ sea"
depressed elderly gentleman warbles about hating that he's been abandoned on this cruise by his wife for shuffleboard and by his adult children for libations. fretting over not being at home in his comfy chair and watching tv, he sends himself overboard, accidentally opening a gash in his leg. he just kinda floats toward the inevitable. hm.
so, yeah.
