The Hades Factor - 9/20/05

Shreveport, LA - My God, it's HOT here (and in the van, which is not air conditioned)! Heat indexes for today are predicted to be 105 degrees. And remember, those indexes are measured in the shade! Today we load in the shows at 12 noon (in about 30 minutes, so this will be brief), and then begin our series of performances here at Centenary College. It's supposed to be like this all week, and I checked the weather conditions only to find that we are in the potential path of Hurricane Rita by the weekend. My Northeast conditioning is longing for those 70 degree days back home.

The drive to Shreveport on Sunday was long and hot as well. We went from Birmingham through the western end of Alabama, across Mississippi and into Louisiana. Shreveport is about 20 miles from the Texas border. Sights of interest included the Mississippi River (of course), cotton fields, wetlands and bayous. Of particular note was our gas stop in Meridian, MS, where we saw some of the damage brought about by Katrina. The damage in this area was nowhere near as extensive as that in New Orleans, but there were many buildings with clear damage as well as a number of downed trees along the interstate. There were also two disaster caravans which we passed along the way as well, consisting of power generators and mobile homes.

When we arrived in Shrevesport we pulled into the house set up for us by our hosts, members of the English faculty. As previously mentioned, Shreveport has taken in about 10,000 evacuees, and no motel rooms are available. The house was bought by the college from a retired professor, and is without a stick of furniture save for the dozen beds brought in for sleeping and two dorm-style couches. Another kind soul brought in three camp chairs as well. It's serviceable, and everyone in the troupe is understanding of the situation, even as they wish for a few more small amenities. I did spring for a coffee maker and stuff to make morning coffee, and that's been a great help.

I will publish this small amount now, but will expand later. I hate to miss call, and the van should be arriving in a few minutes. More later. -TWL

Later the same day - Just got out of a workshop with a group of freshman taking an basic English class, teaching them something about Shakespeare's language. A bit dull, I think. Everything always depends on how active the students are, and these are kids barely out of high school.

Anyway, the evening we got into Shreveport we had a very nice dinner. George, who is from Jamaica, made a terrific meal of jerk chicken, dahl, a rice dish whose name I can't remember, wok-fried vegetables and potatoes. Very delicious. Then I found out he played the steel drum, so we convinced him to break it out and jam with us. That was quite fun as well, sitting in an almost empty living room and jamming on simple progressions. I also got in Sloop John B because that's a great steel drum tune. So it wasn't a bad first night.

Monday was a day off, since I had no workshops to do, so I wandered a bit around campus. Centenary College is a small United Methodist college of about 900 students set in about a two-block area. Small but intimate. The English faculty have been very gracious to us all, and as far as I have been able to tell every show is about sold out. Shenandoah Shakespeare has been coming here for 15 of its 18 years of existence, and the faculty here are quite familiar with founder Ralph and Jim. There's even a member of the faculty, Heather, who is a 3-year veteran of SSE herself. I'm writing this from the Java Junction, a small coffee shop across from the college, and people walking in have been welcoming us to town. We seem to be considered a big event, and tickets are hard to get. Not too shabby.

The space we're working in, however, is not the campus theatre. It's an auditorium in the Religious Studies building which has a small stage extended by platforms. It's actually a small but intimate space, rather like a large lecture hall. But the platform situation is such that Tyler cannot skate as Ariel, which of course is a disappointment. I'm sure he'll just as good, but he felt he'd be concentrating more on skating than performing if he stayed on the skates, so he abandoned the skates. We have two shows on Wednesday and Saturday, but I won't have to push my voice too hard in this space.

Last night we were guests for a reception featuring a port/sherry tasting, English cheeses and desserts. We had a welcoming speech and then we performed about three minutes from each play. A very dressy affair. I often volunteer to be the designated driver when we go to a drinking situation, and I did so here, even though I knew I was going to miss all the port tasting. But by the end of the evening not all of the ports and sherries were finished, so the bartender gave us the unfinished bottles to take back home, and Andrew graciously walked me through the tasting when we got back.

I am also getting my first taste of communal living, since all 12 of us are packed into this house. I'm bunked with Chris and Kevin, the other four guys are in another room, and the women are all together in one final bedroom. Each room has its own bathroom. It really isn't too bad. I bought earplugs for my roommates so my snoring doesn't keep them up, and they did not refuse my offer. The living room has turned into the jamming room, with all the instruments laid about for random music making. I try to get to sleep before midnight, and have had no trouble falling asleep. With my DVDs of the first season of Deadwood and a good book I'm all set. But there is no internet in the house (not even a phone line to set up a dialup connection), so there's really no reason to stay at home. This coffee shop is just a wonderful place to sit.

I'll send out a report of our first three shows after tomorrow. In the meantime, I want to say hello to the M.Litt/MFA students at Mary Baldwin College, who apparently have located this blog and are even reading it!! A particular hello and thanks to Mary Beth, who's a Centenary alumna and who's been sending nice comments to me. She told me we'd get a good welcome her, and she was right. In fact, the title of this particular entry comes from her last comment. If you people at MBC want me to write about any particular aspect of the tour that I might be missing, send a comment and I'll be glad to include it in upcoming posts.

And finally, I know I've been lax in vodcasts, and I have no idea if I'll be able to get another out. What I can do, however, is put up some raw footage of videos I've taken. There is one that Olivia took Sunday as I removed a snake from the ladies' bathroom. Others are the jam sessions with George and some video I shot from the van while on the road. If I get those up in the next few days I'll provide a link. In the meantime, if you use Windows, take some time and download the new iTunes 5.0 and Quicktime and install it. It will help show the videos which I'm compressing with the new H.254 codec Apple uses for DV - gets files much smaller with not so much loss of quality. If you install these items you should be able to play the videos with the Quicktime plug-in for IE and/or Firefox. Stay well! -TWL