Not Happy

Ugh. Had a not-great show last night. I didn’t enjoy it at all. I was off my game last night, for various reasons:

Just before the doors opened, the Llantiol management informed me that filming was no longer allowed in the theater. I laughed out loud, thinking it was a joke. Iván, the videographer, who’d just spent the last half hour setting up the camera — as he’d done for the last several months — also thought it was a joke, and laughed as well.

It must have been a joke. What theater would be so insane as to prohibit artists from filming their own shows? And why would they let me go through three hours of pre-show preparation and not say a word until five minutes before the show starts? It was definitely a joke.

But it wasn’t. No filming, ever, anymore. “WTF???” I said. “But… why?” No coherent reason was given. “An artist can’t film their own work?” Nope. Not in their theater. “You’ve been filming here for five years, you ought to have enough images now,” was the reply. I went ballistic. Who the hell are they to decide for me how much filming is enough? That my performances must disappear into oblivion, that I should have no document of my work?

“Don’t you realize that videos are publicity in this day and age? You ever hear of You Tube? Don’t you know that people, if they can see moments of the show, and they like what they see, will be more likely to attend it?” Our arguments fell on deaf ears.

So I guess they don’t they want publicity for their shows. Don’t want asses in the seats.

Apart from going against their own economic self-interest, their decision directly interferes in my creative process. I need to see my performances afterward. I need to review what happened: what I did well, what I did wrong, what I can do to improve. How dare they deny me the right to review my own work?

So that was one thing. It was like being kicked in the stomach right before going onstage to entertain a theater full of people.

Then, the lights. The wonderful news about filming hit us right when we were in the middle of adjusting the lights. The ensuing argument ate up the remaining time to finish the lights. As a result. I went onstage with no filters in the lights, and immediately went blind. An hour and a half of total blindness, melting under nuclear-level lighting. I was completely lost. I could see nothing and nobody.

Some performers prefer not to see the audience, but I’m the opposite: I need to see people, to be able to look directly into their faces, to be able to connect. I felt like I was reciting to a void.

En fin: it was a very long hour-and-a-half.

Then, somewhere around the middle of the show, some idiot’s cellphone rings. They don’t turn it off; they just continue to let it ring. “Ring! Ring! Rrring!” So I have to address the issue, because they’ve completely disrupted the monologue and broken my already shaky concentration. It was a replay of the Hugh Jackman video: “Could you fucking get that already? So I can go back to trying to work here?”

Here’s the thing: I can understand if you screw up and forget to turn your phone off. It happens. But then, once it’s ringing — especially in a theatrical production, involving just ONE person, who’s doing MONOLOGUES — I mean, it’s not like a Stones concert; they’re MONOLOGUES in the middle of SILENCE — once your phone rings, you’d better do your damnedest to DIVE on that phone and TURN IT THE FUCK OFF.

But no. The asshole just let it ring and ring until it stopped. I was pissed.

Then I found out later that the owner of the cell phone was one of the members of a very famous Spanish comedy group, who were all there to watch my show. I couldn’t believe it. After so many years of performing, how could someone be such an arrogant prick to another performer?

I finished the show wanting to disappear into a hole. I felt completely out-of-control and ashamed of the performance I’d given. Then a woman came up to me and hugged me. “I just wanted to let you know, I absolutely loved the show. I was on the floor with laughter! Thank you.”

I was stunned. I had to bite my tongue so I wouldn’t say, “You liked the show? But… didn’t you see? It sucked!”

Another person, from Italy, told me he’d never laughed so hard at a show, not even shows in Italian.

So there you have it. I know it was not one of my best shows by a long shot, but that’s the funny and sometimes wonderful thing about this business:

What you communicate, once it reaches others, becomes something else that goes beyond you.

Even if you hate some work you’ve done, others might love it. People find meaning or value in different things. Of course, the reverse is also true: what you truly think is great work on your part may strike others as complete shite.

One truth is absolute, though: anyone who lets their cell phone ring during a performance is a douchebag.

UPDATE: I worked it out with the theater that I can resume filming my shows. Thanks for the supportive comments in the meantime.