The Environmental Protection Agency’s “Rulemaking Matters!” contest invites filmmakers to submit short videos that explain how federal regulations touch our lives. The best video wins $2,500!  Presenting a reason.tv submission: “Rulemaking Matters!”

The EPA webpage for the contest is here.  Check out Reason.tv’s other two entries for the “Rulemaking Matters!” contest.

Also check out this entry from the Competitive Enterprise Insitute, A Day in the Life of the Regulatory State:

Boulder’s Sacred Heart of Jesus school has decided that two schoolchildren cannot return to their private, Catholic school after this year because their parents are a lesbian couple. … What do you think?

My response, published in the Camera on March 14:

The Sacred Heart school teaches that “gay marriage is against the will of God,” writes the school’s pastor Bill Breslin. “Why would good parents want their children to learn something they don’t believe in?” he asks. Good question. Parents consider many factors when choosing a school. Maybe other factors outweighed this one — especially since the two children are in preschool and kindergarten. What would Sacred Heart teachers do, present a puppet show about human sexuality?

Puppets or not, parish schools like Sacred Heart seek to, in Breslin’s words, “to assist children in becoming disciples of Christ and to stand as a light shining in the darkness that has rejected Christianity and the truth of being human, including the meaning of human sexuality.”

To distinguish light from darkness, students must learn about, discuss, and debate both “dark” and “light” ideas.  Imagine a “Defense Against the Dark Arts” class from the Harry Potter novels – without the physical danger, of course. Not that school officials would approve the title. The syllabus could include the Wikipedia entry on “biology and sexual orientation.”  Students could debate the documentary “For the Bible Tells Me So,” which shows how gays suffer from religious moralizing and presents tolerant interpretations of relevant Biblical passages. Advanced students could view the South Park episode that mocks “conversion therapy” aimed at “correcting” a homosexual’s sexual orientation.

In such a class students might become critical and independent thinkers, and not substitute their own judgments with those of scripture or authority figures.

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Scene from the South Park episode:

http://media.mtvnservices.com/mgid:cms:item:southparkstudios.com:155505

Watch the whole episode.

(Via the Texas Public Policy Foundation)

Check out the blurb about the show in Westword. The dates weren’t right, but we did change them around a bit.

There are five sets of eight-week classes that culminate in three performances.

Level 1 begins at the basics – learning to be on stage, working with imaginary objects, noticing small changes in our partners on stage, and many exercises that do not involve speaking. I wrote about some of these in a previous post.

Level 2 is about developing characters. Some exercises I recall involve getting a character from many different sources: colors, songs, ways to walk, types of car, etc. I remember an article in the New York Times magazine (thanks, Mom) where a professional said he’d get his characters from a type of voice. As long has he stuck to the voice, he’d be in character. It was like an anchor. The facial expressions and posture would follow.

I found that staying in character is challenging, and hence something I can improve on. It’s essential to a good scene, as it makes it easier to do what’s “natural” for the scene, and makes it more believable, and yet more absurd and hence funny. Being a character, as opposed to myself on stage, also gets me out of my head. It doesn’t matter whether what I do “makes sense” to me, as it’s not me on stage, but the character.

Level 3 and 4, roughly speaking, are about scene work. One exercise I recall is being off stage during a scene with two people in it, and just listening. It was a way to learn what the scene needs to be interesting. For example, one trap is for characters to talk about what they are doing. That’s boring. They should move from that to what’s going on between them, i.e., their relationship, and why this scene is about a pivotal turning point in the relationship or in one of the character’s lives.

Two related concepts of scene work are “yes-and” and a specific application of it, “make it worse.” “Yes-and” is a core concept, and the name of a website about improv comedy, which has a good article on status, another key concept for scenes. “Yes-and” is about accepting what is happening on stage — what other characters bring to the scene with their words and actions — accepting it, building on it, and hence moving the scene forward. That makes something happen instead of being stagnant like an airplane delaying a landing my circling the runway.

“Making it worse” is a fun way to both mess with your scene partners and create a funny scene. If a character is in a somewhat awkward situation, even a little, add something to make it even more so. It’s a way of accepting what’s going on (“yes”) and adding it (“and”).

One of my favorite, and difficult, exercises was “New Choice,” where Eric Farone, our instructor (and founder of the theater) told a character to make a new choice if his line did not move the scene forward. Our class did that for about an hour, and speaking for myself, I would have benefited from more.

Another favorite exercise was “bore the audience,” which Keith Johnstone talks about in his book Impro. It illustrates that the worst thing to do in improv is to try to be entertaining or funny. It doesn’t work, and backfires. When “trying” to bore the audience, the characters play the scene slowly and really absorb what’s happening. Relationships and tensions develop, and which creates the potential for truly funny scenes. Eric stressed again and again to “play it slow.” It’s OK to be out there on stage and not know what’s going on – the other players don’t know either, and neither does the audience. That’s OK, so long as it begins to make sense slowly and seemingly naturally, with nothing being forced.

Level 5, the final level, is about developing a form for a show. The first act of our form was loosely based on what’s called a Harold. In about 45 minutes each member of the group plays the same character, and the characters in the initial three scenes (w/ two people each) eventually interweave into a coherent story where all the characters are related in some way, and there is some kind of story arc that is resolved by the end.

Our second act had fewer constraints. We more-or-less based the next scene off of the previous one, and did not have to be the same characters.

I admire Eric Farone for starting this theater from nothing, and having the courage to phase out a job that was paying the bills (but not inspiring him) to do something that he loves.

Then we played some games where our character had a mantra, and everything was interpreted through it. I suspect these were inspired by Viola Spolin. That works because, of course, that’s how people are in a stylized sense. Eventually that clicked for me. By the end I’d entered each scene with a song in my head, and responded appropriately according to whatever song it was. This works well because songs embody emotions, motivations, attitudes, etc., the basis of a character.

When the scenes clicked, it was because each player brought something to it (e.g., a character trait), and neither they or the audience knew what was going on. With each line of dialog the players filled in a picture consistent both with what had been said before and with their character choice. Just as in the first exercise, no one was leading, there were no preconceived paths, and the scene grew.

I’ve been taking the classes since September, and gradually realized the extent to which this is a family-owned and run business – from the actors, bar tenders, servers, to the behind-the-scenes marketing and other business aspects. Check out this televised feature on Metrobeat TV. I don’t know how long this like will be valid – I appear briefly in the part about classes – at 3:11 into the segment. Also, the Boulder Daily Camera has a nice article on it.

Ridicule sure is persuasive – I’m going to start wearing my socks three or four times before washing them.

I’m reminded of the story of Elaine May auditioning with actors for “The Compass Players” in Chicago in the 1950’s. The actors were told that they were to improvise a scene where they were to go into the bar and pickup the girl. The actors would sit down and try to make witty small talk and Elaine would say, “Let’s go back to your place.” If they continued the audition, trying to be funny instead of getting up and leaving with Elaine, they weren’t considered.

In tonight’s improv class we did exercises that brought our attention to status, a which provides fascinating perspective on theater and real life.