Blind Leading the Blind Part 2

OjO was mounted in Pittsburgh in 2014, then again at La Jolla Playhouse’s Without Walls Festival in October 2015. This blog is the second entry in a series elucidating the process from the creative team’s perspective, beginning with our initial iteration in Pittsburgh to our sold out run at the Festival in La Jolla.

Of all the rides at our beloved hometown Kennywood Park in Pittsburgh, PA, my favorite from childhood was always the old time classic ride The Whip. In exchange for two orange tickets each, my siblings and I would pile into the half-moon shaped cars, four across on a curved bench with a bar in front and a tall curved winged back, like a big chair. The beat of our hearts would immediately begin to build with anticipation, as the chair lumbered and labored into motion along the long stretch of track, for what seemed like forever. Excruciatingly, we slowly moved. Our knuckles whitening, we gripped tighter around the bar as we made our approach to the end, and then finally…howls of absolute, ridiculous glee, as the chair, with tremendous velocity, whipped us to the other side in the blink of an eye—only to start the long, slow process all over again.

October 2015 La Jolla, San Diego, CA
Tuesday, Sept 30
Day One: Arrival to La Jolla Playhouse

From the moment the creative team hit the ground in San Diego, we dropped off our personal items at the hotel and got right to work. There were five of us, including four creative team members (myself, Tami Dixon, Gab Cody, and Sam Turich) and our MVP rock star, Production Manager Alicia DiGiorgi. We piled into the “gold bar” (our nickname for our rented golden minivan) and headed up the hill to the Playhouse grounds, all of us with the same thing rolling around in our heads. With staggering views of the Pacific Ocean, and inland views to the Laguna Mountains, one of the highest points on the California coastline, the Playhouse grounds offer the perfect setting for the West Coast premiere of our latest immersive project OjO: The Next Generation of Travel. And tonight our mission is to find the perfect ending for our piece—we’re in search of the final reveal. But alas, we won’t decide tonight, not for days yet to come.

We are still waiting for the rest of the creative team. Member Hannah Nielsen-Jones and sound designer Brendan Kepple are scheduled to arrive late Thursday afternoon. The rest of the Bricolage team will arrive with actor Ann Lapidus at the beginning of next week. With a timeline of just under two weeks, the schedule breaks down like this: fourteen to sixteen-hour days with one day “off.” Tonight, we have a “walk-through;” then two days of prep; load-in and build; five days of rehearsal with a new cast (most of us have yet to meet), and then—go! Forty-eight shows in one weekend. We’ve spent sixteen months of planning for a three-day run. Ah, theatre people...

Often in our work we begin with creative imagination, or the wild idea in our head. We plan, we ponder, we hypothesize, and we scheme. Then, there’s always this moment when our vision must be whipped into reality of life.

Wednesday, Sept 31
Day Two: Prep day

So far the team loves the accommodations at the La Jolla Residence Inn. The suites are clean, well-equipped, each with a kitchenette, living room, two-bedrooms, two baths, and a daily complimentary breakfast buffet that will become the source of most of our sustenance for the next two weeks.

Our first prep day begins with a “gold bar” trip to pick up the Perkins Brailler at the Braille Institute’s San Diego Center. We could not have planned a more inspirational way to begin our time than to tour this wonderful facility. We witness first hand the enormous impact the work that Vint Bradburn, Vicky Zimmerman Fox and the rest of the amazing team are making to enhance the quality of life for their students. When the tour is over, it is strangely hard to say goodbye.

But there is much to do today. Brailler in hand, we head off to the Playhouse to talk about load-in. As we drive, we note the absurdity that almost two years of planning now hinges on a sixty-three year-old seasoned, truck driver named Dennis. We last saw him and his fifty-three-foot “rig” in Pittsburgh on Monday afternoon when we packed it with the contents of our theatrical fate. He is scheduled to arrive, coast to coast, on Friday morning for an 8:00 am call to unload and begin the “double tunnel” installation. Alicia and I attend our first production meeting with the La Jolla team to iron out the load-in schedule, and discuss some outstanding logistics, questions and concerns. Tami uses the time to explore more options on campus for our perfect ending.

During the creative team huddle up later in the day, the four of us immediately drop into the deep end—wrestling with some gnarly questions around one of the central through-lines of the piece. I note with gratitude and amazement, as we hash it out, how loving and caring our creative team handles each other’s passions, actively listening to one another; fighting for consensus amidst opposing viewpoints; and united in a desire to make a better piece. Even with so little time and with so high stakes, we are constructive. I think, "This is the culmination of over three years of slow, steady creative collaboration." But it is still such difficult work.

Then the actors begin to arrive. Most of us have yet to meet the actors face to face. The show was cast in July by Gab and Sam who were already in La Jolla for the Dramatist Guild conference, leading a large group audition, with Tami and I joining in via Skype from Pittsburgh. Not ideal, but the outcome was simply miraculous. LJP Casting Director and Artistic Assistant Teresa Sapien was our “direct report” for the Festival and somehow pulled off a miracle. She assembled twelve of the most incredibly talented, multi-faceted, multi-national, and multi-lingual performers. This group had some of the greatest human beings I’ve ever had the pleasure to work with—each one perfectly suited to their roles. 

Every person who entered the room is like a gift to be unwrapped. Each entrance confirmed a growing hunch that this piece is shaping up to be one of those truly special projects. Between all of us, we count almost fifteen different languages and derivative dialects.

There’s that saying about luck by Roman philosopher Seneca that goes: "Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity." Often in our work we begin with creative imagination, or the wild idea in our head. We plan, we ponder, we hypothesize, and we scheme. Then, there’s always this moment when our vision must be whipped into reality of life. Too often, the two meet with great discomfort and pain; we experience our wild ideas literally forged, or broken by the limits of reality. But every once in lifetime, a project comes along where the wild ideas inside our heads, whip into real life, and a great howling with ridiculous glee happens. Forces merge to create a new reality, an artistic reality that’s wholly alive to those who encounter it—like a lucid dream that’s super real. 

And God escapes from her hiding place.

To be continued...