When I first saw you, I thought... that's my dream

Matt and I are writing a play this weekend.  It's a whole thing.

Tonight I am going to the Rialto to see La Dolce Vita.  It's the last night, and I've been working all week, so I can't see my friends at Ultimate Improv.  Break legs, guys.  I'll catch it soon.

I have a cast for Shrew.  I had to call in a couple of ringers, since we didn't get the desired male turnout.  Thankfully, I called in Matt and Jensen, who both fucking rocked.  The producers immediately loved them.

Casting Shrew was an interesting and new experience for me.  I am not used to my shoulder being looked over so sincerely.  These guys were all over me.  I was mad at first because they didn't have the sides to me on time, and so actors were hanging out for like fifteen minutes with nothing to look at, which was cool, except I expected to be out by 9:00p or earlier.  There was no reason for us not to be... except for the producers.

Plus John was going on and on thanking the ASM for being so wonderful and getting us the sides.  I gave him the sides I wanted last week!  Why didn't we have them the first day of auditions?  The day of callbacks is fine  if we're gonna get an exact count, so that we don't have to share sides among actors, but no, we didn't get that either.  I got four of everything with nothing marked off.  So I kept getting questions all night like "Where do you want us to start?"  I hate this of course: just go, and if you're irritating me, I'll stop you.  I always want to tell actors this, and sometimes I do, but then sometimes I think I'm being rude.

What's worse is the fact that I could have come up with the cast I have now in about an hour... probably less.  They pretty much all placed exactly where I expected them to.  There was, maybe, one exeption.  Unless you have actors coming out of your ears, casting is a relatively easy thing to do.  I mean, I've been at auditions where it really should have taken a long time and there were tough decisions to be made.  An audition where we're casting 15 out of 25 people is not tough.  Anyway, I'll shut up.  I'm trying to be positive, right?  Right.

Thank you to all who auditioned.  My apologies to those who didn't get the parts they wanted.  I think the most important thing for actors to understand when they go into an auditon is the kind of play they are in.  Shakespeare (and I) mean for this to be a very funny play.  So many people play everything so earnest all the time.

I talked to Linda today for a while.  I love that woman, and I love that she loves me back.  She's so fun and festive.  Every time I talk to her she's mentioning some kind of alcohol.

Speaking of which... this weekend is Drink-a-Palooza with the friends.  There will be a mandatory 2 drinks an hour and there will be people filming and a woman with a clipboard making sure we all play by the rules.  I would feel confident about taking the pot for the last man standing, but Zack Nass is playing and I just don't think I have a chance.  Julie thinks he's an alien that has alcohol-absorbant skin.  It's that bad.  But yay for drinking and yay for good friends.