Review published in
Daily Herald
Performance anxiety
BY BARBARA VITELLO Daily Herald Staff Writer They arrived as strangers. They left as comrades.
Over one grueling day, a group of Chicago-area writers, actors and directors conceived, rehearsed and performed four new plays.
They savored each other's strengths and tolerated each other's shortcomings. And in the end, they departed stressed, sleep-deprived and, most importantly, satisfied.
Producing four new, one-act plays is no easy task. Producing them in a day is unthinkable to everyone except Katrina Bergstrom and Cherie Dikelsky, the women behind The 24 Hour Project.
Since they introduced the unconventional theater event to Chicago, more than 100 writers, directors and actors have produced a total of 26 new one-act plays in the allotted 24 hours.
"What you have is a bunch of people who really like theater, believe it's an important and powerful medium, and want to advocate it," said Dikelsky of the project, which marked its first anniversary last month at Chicago's Storefront Theater.
Former classmates Bergstrom and Dikelsky participated in a similar exercise at New York University's Stella Adler Conservatory. When their paths crossed again, the actresses decided to adapt the concept to Chicago, after noting that local theater companies rarely interacted with each other.
"Chicago has 200-plus theater companies, but people really don't move around," said Bergstrom, who moved to Chicago three years ago from New York City.
Bergstrom noted that newcomers had a particularly hard time getting to know the rest of the community. So the duo came up with
The 24 Hour Project. "It was a way to introduce all of these people to each other and have them collaborate creatively," said Dikelsky. Since not everyone could commit to an extended run, Bergstrom and Dikelsky limited its duration to 24 hours. And a stressful 24 hours they are. But project veterans say every one is well spent.
"It's an orchestrated breakdown throughout the day," said co-producer and casting director Jason Kae, only half joking.
But it has benefits, both personal and professional.
"There is always somebody who gets a job out of this," said Kae, who directed "Waiting for Management" for last month's project co-sponsored by Chicago's Department of Cultural Affairs and Office of Tourism.
Enter stage left
The process began in early February with a preliminary audition from which Kae chose 14 actors, including several veterans of previous incarnations.
The actors arrived at Chicago's Storefront Theater a little before 8 p.m. on a Sunday night in late February to audition for four playwrights to whom they had been randomly assigned. Instructed to do something to showcase themselves, most auditioned with monologues, several performed pieces they'd written themselves, one sang an original song and another taught everyone the "Roger Rabbit" dance.
Each of them contributed a quirky prop - everything from an alarm clock and a half-dead amaryllis, to Mickey Mouse ears and a smiley face balloon to a violin case and a bottle of Zoloft. Those items, together with the auditions and a photograph of two blonde toddlers, served as inspiration for the writers.
After the auditions ended about 9:30 p.m., crew members set up tables and chairs while Dikelsky informed everyone the show had sold out. Playwright and project veteran Spike Kunetz huddled with his actors, while newcomer Jacob Juntunen, a writer with a penchant for dark comedies, set up his laptop.
"It's as close to improv as a playwright gets," said Juntunen, a Northwestern University Ph.D. candidate, whose plays have been produced in Houston and Portland.
"The biggest challenge for me will be speed," he said. "Normally my working pace is slow."
But with a 6 a.m. deadline looming, he can't afford that luxury. Brandy McClendon understands that. One of the original producers, she wrote for two other projects, but - worried that her earlier success was a fluke - admits she has the jitters.
"What if it doesn't happen again?" said McClendon, who surrounded herself with "good luck stuff," including a quirky lamp, a favorite cowboy pillow and her lucky "Don't Mess With Texas" pen to improve the odds.
In a corner of the stage, Anita Chandwaney unfolded a portable mattress and spread the headshots of her cast before her.
Quiet descended on the theater as the actors left the writers to their work.
Scene changes
At 8 a.m. the following morning, directors Kae, Chris Arnold, Carrie Gilchrist and Lila M. Stromer pulled from a hat the play they would direct. "The first project we were very green," said Kae, and not always efficient. "Directors were doing improv, which eats up a lot of time," he said. "And time is your enemy."
So actors and directors rely heavily on instinct.
"It's a matter of making a choice and hoping it works, trusting the director, trusting your instincts and hoping they serve you," said Scott Haden, a 24 Hour Project director-turned-actor who praised Gilchrist's analytical ability and able direction.
Gilchrist, who directed Kunetz's "Housewarming," applied a paint-by-numbers approach to directing the show.
"You start with blue," she said. "If you can recognize (the picture), you don't add anything else."
If she can't make out the picture, she adds colors until it becomes clear. With only eight hours of rehearsal time, she doesn't have time to paint the whole picture. She and the cast can only hope they choose the right colors.
"For a writer, there's a delicate balance between giving the audience too much information and not enough information," said Kunetz, who teaches comedy writing and improvisation at Second City.
"We're laying the groundwork. It's up to (the actors) to finish it."
Places everyone!
Within a few hours, the actors and the directors have built a foundation. The actors know the characters somewhat. Now if only they could remember the words.
"And the meltdown begins," said Kae, as he watches an actor fumble his lines during a late afternoon technical rehearsal.
"Come 8 p.m., he'll be as good as gold," Kae added confidently.
Huddled in dressing rooms, hunched over tables in the lounge, anxious actors study their scripts.
"It's the actor's nightmare: I'm onstage and I don't know my lines," said Kae.
"It's pretty much the playwright's nightmare, too," added Juntunen.
So far everyone has managed to keep it at bay.
"I thought it would be more stressful than it was," said Dikelsky, but "nobody's getting frustrated."
That they handle the pressure doesn't surprise Kae.
"It amazes me the performances the actors end up giving. It's amazing everyone pulls it off," he said. "There will be lines dropped and scenes dropped, but we will persevere."
That perseverance pays off later that evening with the premiere of four new comedies.
"Twenty-four hours earlier, none of this existed," said Kae, "and now it does."
The finished product never looks like you imagined it would, said Kunetz.
It looks better.
"It's the coming together of the creative voices - actors, playwrights and directors - that make it better than any one part could be on its own," said Kunetz.
"That's the great thing about theater."
Posted Thursday, March 04, 2004