#338 – Curtis Campbell

Curtis Campbell is a writer and theatre artist. Some previous credits as a writer and director include Katherine Is Not A Communist, Imp, BETR With Bevan and Color Me Pablo. His novel Dragging Mason County will be published by Annick Press in the fall of 2023.

Check out Gay for Pay, co-written by Curtis and Daniel Krolik at Streetcar Crowsnest, Nov. 16-27.

Twitter: @Alanis_Percocet
Instagram: @gayforpayproductions

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Transcript

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Phil Rickaby
Hi. I’m Phil Rickaby, and I’ve been a writer and performer for almost 30 years, but I’ve realised that I don’t really know as much as I should about the theatre scene outside of my particular Toronto bubble. Now, I’m on a quest to learn as much as I can about the theatre scene across Canada. So join me as I talk with mainstream theatre creators, you may have heard of an indie artist you really should know as we find out just what it takes to be Stageworthy.

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My guest this week is Curtis Campbell. Curtis is a writer and theatre artist based in Toronto. He joined me to talk about gay for pay with Blake and clay at the streetcar crow’s nest from November 16 to 27th Growing up in a town with no theatre programme at school promoting Theatre in a rapidly changing media landscape and much more. Here’s our conversation

Curtis Welcome to Stageworthy Thanks so much for for giving me some of your time today. So you describe yourself as a writer and theatre artist. One of the things I described myself as a as a performer other people describe themselves as a theatre makers, theatre artists to you What does theatre artists mean?

Curtis Campbell
It means I don’t want to spend a good five minutes divulging every last bit of detail about the many things I am forced to do in this industry. So to sum it all up with theatre artist because you don’t need to know that I spent last night sending out a bunch of press releases because I’m kind of like extensively the producer of the thing you know, it’s not really fun to listen to I think theatre artists is a is a lovely umbrella term. For the most part for me, it just means I write and direct my own theatre.

Phil Rickaby
When did you I mean this is I think it’s it’s become a very necessary part of of everyone’s theatre Arsenal the the need to create your own work for you what what what first drove you or sparked the desire to write and create your own work?

Curtis Campbell
Probably the money probably the money there’s just so much of it. I oh my goodness it I started writing my own silly little plays when I was in high school. My theatre didn’t my high school did not have a drama department. So I elected to become the drama department and rule with an iron fist and discovered a love for you know, ruling with said Iron Fist. So it all sort of that sort of became it for me.

Phil Rickaby
Why did why why did you school not have a theatre programme like not even like Theatre Arts? Not an English teacher teaching theatre? Nothing?

Curtis Campbell
No, I’m from a very small town in southwestern Ontario with a you know, I the little strip of land that I am from is like the if we you know, we’re on a theatre podcast. So we’ll just we’ll name names like the Stratford Festival, Blythe festival, grand bend Playhouse are sort of the theatre things going on, but it’s very summer stock theatre. And the A friend of mine described my high school very aptly once by saying that we were a sports school but not the sports school. And that’s stuck with me. And we we had one we had, you know, a English slash drama teacher who was sort of holding it all together by the time he retired, but by the time I rolled around that had all gone to shit I remember the drama room becoming storage for the the gym department

Phil Rickaby
They just decided they weren’t even going to put any effort into it anymore.

Curtis Campbell
No, no, no, nothing. No, no, no, nothing, no

Phil Rickaby
how much how much of a struggle were it was it for you to get back into that theatre room and to, to start the theatre programme or the Theatre Club back up again?

Curtis Campbell
Oh, I did so many things in that theatre room that I should not have been doing on school property. But it was interesting, it was one of those, we just sort of started doing it. And we were lucky enough that a total ally of a math teacher took pity on us and sort of signed our paperwork. And we just sort of did our own thing. And then we won a bunch of awards. And at the, at the the formerly known as the Sears Drama Festival. And that was sort of when the administration was like, Oh, this, you know, I guess this is something they did sort of take notice of us at that point, after we had, of course, proven ourselves able to do it. That it was like just me and my buds and people that I could wrangle into it just being like, I wrote a thing. Let’s do it. You know, and all high school theatre is excellent theatre. So I really should bring the scripts back whenever these days.

Phil Rickaby
I do hear a little bit of sarcasm in your voice. And when you were creating those, those shows at that point, what, what kind of what kind of topics were you? Were you dealing with? Or were you just like throwing anything at the wall? No, they

Curtis Campbell
were pretty. Like it was all from a very, I remember at the time being very aware of like, you would go over one of the we beat Stratford one year at Sears, which they were mad about, because who the fuck are these country bumpkins? But the play that they had to they did an original play that was a bank robbery. It was like this, like, high stakes thriller about a bank robbery. And, you know, like police officer is like, you know, a mother of two, written by, you know, like a 17 year old and I just remember seeing stuff like that before and being like, I don’t know, like, I don’t know about those things. I am 15 years old. I don’t know. So, you know, we were writing barrier, I was writing parry things for you know, to perform for my own age. Some like, you know, fun little sci fi stuff and some like two hander. dramas like real time two hander, sort of like gay saltwater moon with swearing. You know, just sort of the the things that were sparking my interest at the time, but yeah, it was I do remember being that age and being like, it’s so fun that you wanted to have a gun on stage, Brad, but I don’t know if it holds up

Phil Rickaby
a lot of that. All right. Now, you leave high school and your, your, your, you know, heading out into the world what, where, where do you go to study theatre? Did you study theatre? What was the the journey that started you to where you are now.

Curtis Campbell
I went to York University. Because I could hold that fork and off I try not to hold that fork at York. And I knew that I wanted a university programme that was a theatre programme. I didn’t I wasn’t overly interested in being sort of locked in any sort of conservatory style thing. And it’s just kind of interesting, because then you go and, you know, if you’re a student like me, you’re only really able to focus on the immediate things that are of direct interest to you. And so the larger university education that you’re getting just sort of fall to the wayside. Unfortunately, but I went to York and met a bunch of really cool people and you know, kept on that path of like, self producing my own plays. And one day, I may stop that and someone else may produce them, but we’ll see.

Phil Rickaby
Now, I know I know. Now York has programmes in device theatre and things like that. Was that something they were doing then? Or?

Curtis Campbell
Yeah, yeah, I Did it really was the York is a, you know, a Total Security Board of good and bad things. But I, my sort of build it yourself degree was focused on device theatre and playwriting. So those two tracks, so I studied under Judith Rita cough in the playwriting area of York, and was sort of in that little intense bubble as well.

Phil Rickaby
So, here’s a question for you, as far as like, like, like doing that, that programme, and going to a university rather than a conservatory programme when you left the school? Did you? Did you feel prepared for the industry? Or, or because I went through a conservatory programme that had like a business of acting programme and that sort of thing. So I’m curious about the university experience.

Curtis Campbell
Yeah, I mean, the, the York while I was there, like they really do value, the prestige parts of it, which are the acting Conservatory, and those are, where their resources go. So we were in a very DIY part of the programme. Which is great, because, I mean, it’s awful. And then there are really great parts of it. I think the best the most talented people I know are the most you know, I think the, the, the most clever people I know, came out of that, and we’re very ready to be resourceful when it came to, you know, making their work and actually creating stuff. But yeah, it was a it was a fairly figured out for yourself in terms of the industry stuff. But the well actually, that’s not true. Judith Ritter cough very much prepared you for the industry. Very much so. And is is just a wonderful teacher in many regards. That being one of them. But I was really making a point to start dipping my toes out into the industry and into the, the community. Before I was always very worried about that jump between fourth year and being in the industry. And so I started trying to close that gap while I was in it. So like I was working, you know, I was working my sort of part time I was working part time job and buddies and bedtimes I was you know, fairly involved with the mid to end video FG. We had started, some friends and I had started producing our own stuff. Downtown, come third year, like we were really trying to, by the end of it, we were trying to be I was trying to be out and about. So that it would feel like my degree had come to a close and it was just time to keep going. But it’s you know, it’s sort of a conscious choice you have to make I think.

Phil Rickaby
Sure. Yeah. I mean, because you can wait to like you can be like I I should. Because sometimes schools frown on that sort of stuff. Like they frown on you. I know, the school I went to, didn’t want us doing too much outside of the school until we were done.

Curtis Campbell
Yeah, I think if your kid paid any attention to me, they might have let it unfortunately, it was not a case. No, I mean, we so I studied. And it was Michael grey eyes and moinian King. We’re running the device theatre programme at the time, I believe. And you know, they were very, they were very pleased to see me out in you know, seeing me at shows, seeing me, putting me on work and sending them invites and stuff. But, you know, I think moinian has always been the type of artists to just, you know, find a fucking way to make the thing happen. So, they seemed pleased. I know, the acting conservatory it was quite a different. It was quite a different story.

Phil Rickaby
Yeah, it’s certainly this is an industry now that sort of needs a lot of people who are, you know, they see a need and they make shit happen, right? This is like what we do now. It’s the way that you get started or even like that can be your whole career like I know people To the fringe circuit has essentially been their career and they’re quite happy with that. Yeah. Speaking of fringe and you know, other future endeavours tell me about gay for play. Sorry gay for pay with Blake and clay,

Curtis Campbell
gay for pay with Blake and clay. It is an acting seminar in which Blake and clay to well season gay actors teach a roomful of straight actors how to convincingly and responsibly play gay roles play gay roles. Because if they’re not going to get cast, I guess it’s fine if straight men are human. And we’ll, we’ll we’ll teach you how the the tagline for this show is representation matters. But their representation hasn’t caught them in ages.

Phil Rickaby
Nice, nice. Now this, this show did play at the 2022 Toronto fringe. So what did you learn about this show at Fringe? And has that changed the show moving forward into its next iteration?

Curtis Campbell
Yeah, quite quite. There’s some some pretty big differences there was, there’s been a quick turnaround on the workshopping and development of the show. There is for anyone who saw it at Fringe. We are now not tethered to an hour long, you know, slot. So we were able to dig quite a bit deeper into Blake and clays. You know, who they are as people where they’re coming from, you know, on top of the many, many, many jokes. And I think we really, I think Daniel, Daniel Kerlick, and I, who wrote it together. I think we, we learned to trust the comedic voice that we have together and that it really works, that people did really respond to everything that we were doing. And we learned that sometimes you if you’re doing it responsibly, and you’re you’re doing it from your own experience, sometimes you have to just make the damn joke about the thing. Be that, you know, certain epidemics that have affected the gay community, the queer community, be that the many horrors and traumas that have been inflicted upon us by Canadian politics and the you know, the Toronto Police Force. And sometimes it’s, you can you can just make the joke and people will stick with you if it’s coming from a real place.

Phil Rickaby
Was that something you were reluctant to do? To go for those jokes? Or was that just something like, fuck it? Let’s do it.

Curtis Campbell
Well, the conversation was always in the conversation is still with with the two of us creating Blake and clay. Because Blake and clay are sort of we’re discovering a bit of a like sort of Ernest goes to camp thing with Blake and clay, like we, we think they they are, they are now going to become these stock characters that we are we have many different things we want to do with them. And the conversation was always with those to only ever joke about something that directly affects the two of us as writers and that we can speak from from our own experience one because it’s always specificity is always funnier. And to you know, this I think, you know, just don’t Don’t be don’t be shitty. Don’t be sad. If you don’t need to be shitty. Sometimes you need to be shady, but if you don’t need to be don’t don’t do it. And there was never a there was never a hesitancy with it. There was never Oh my God. Is this going to be a deal breaker for an audience member? Because it kept coming back to the fact like if it is a deal breaker for an audience member that’s sort of that’s their, that’s their that’s for them to deal with. We are just speaking our damn truths as they have historically been and as they are currently. And I really I think Glen Glen Sumi really got what we were doing. And he said He said something along the lines of in his review. You know, you’re in for a good time. When someone in the audience says, whoa. Which we usually got about once a show was, there’s a few moments in the show where at least one person in the audience as in oh my god, I don’t. I can’t believe you just said that. And yeah, it was it was never, there was never, I think we never wrote anything that we couldn’t stand by, or that we saw as act as actually harmful. And so there never was a question of like, Oh, my God, should we pull that back? But, uh, yeah, I did always it was always coming from a place of Is this a real thing is it’s a real threat to the queer community is is a real, you know, historical issue for us, then what again?

Phil Rickaby
Is there any audience participation in the show? Yeah. I always feel like it’s one of those important questions, because the premise sounds like like this is this is like, you could have some audience that direction. And some people really dig that. And some people don’t. Where, I mean, what do you when you are deciding who you are going to target for your audience participation? Whether it’s like one person or a group of people? How do you make the decision as to how far to push someone who looks like they don’t want to participate? Or how do you make the choice of who you want to.

Curtis Campbell
I’ve never been overly interested in a forced audience participation, I just don’t think I have any memories of it being a good, like a well crafted moment in a play or a performance like it, it feels like if you can’t get and, you know, maybe this is me being horribly pretentious. It feels to me like if you can’t get the audience to want to participate in the thing, the way that you have curated it and created that moment, then you’re not doing your job well. And maybe you’re forcing the moment. And maybe you need to workshop this a bit more. Because I think the best moments come from not forcing the audience to interact, but the you know, inviting them to interact in a very in a very active way. So we don’t there, there is no moment of my my boyfriend is terrified and nauseous at the idea of audience interaction. And I kind of kept coming back to the idea of like, is this did I create this in a way that he would still have a good time. And this that this would not sort of ruin his, you know, his enjoyment of the show? Because again, I just don’t think it’s a good, very good show, if, you know, we’re all about making the audience uncomfortable. And I don’t think anyone who has seen this show would say that they were comfortable for the entire performance. But the way that we the way that we created it was we open things up for the audience to participate. And it is more of a group participation, rather than any one person being implicated or instigated. And then on top of that, the, the invitation that I keep giving to Jonathan Wilson and Daniel Kerlick, as the performers is, they know this show so well, there, it is such a low tech show, there’s no there’s no pyrotechnics for them to you know, factor in, there’s no there’s nothing flying in and off the stage for them to have to know Mark for them to have to hit. This is their show to control. And they know it so well that if at any point an audience member wants to engage or they want to engage with an audience member, they can go they can go for it. So like when we were doing the fringe run. We were in the factory, the the Terracon extra space, which is a small space, lovely space, wonderful space, but small space, and we were very adamant about everybody wearing masks. I don’t think you can do a show that at any point talks about AIDS or makes an AIDS joke and still be cool with people being maskless during a pan Dominic, I think that’s a failure on your part. So we were really adamant about that. So at any point during the show, if the, if the boys saw there, anyone taking off their masks, they are invited to stop the show, not even stop the show, really, because they can kind of do whatever they want with these characters to end character, just engage with that person. And, you know, say like, I’m sorry, did we not make enough aids jokes for you to get the point of like, public health is important. So there’s a lot of, there’s just sort of a baked into the show, there’s quite a lot of malleability for them to engage with the audience.

Phil Rickaby
Now, I have to ask, because of course, you know, COVID is not over in terms of this show

Curtis Campbell
any day now. Any day now?

Phil Rickaby
I know. I know. It’s going to feel it. It’s around the corner. What about how are you dealing with masks? And are you requiring masks for this performance? Or was that just a fringe thing? We are requiring

Curtis Campbell
masks for this performance? This is an even smaller house than we had it fringe.

Phil Rickaby
Hmm. Yeah. That’s, I mean, I know that folks at the red sand castle are still having, like, they are such a tiny space that they, you know, they have HEPA filters, but they’re like, we’re so it was such a small space, you have to wear a mask, they still get like hate voicemails cool. After all this time. You know, that’s great. But, you know, it’s important that, you know, the front of house, yeah, he’s prepared to enforce it.

Curtis Campbell
And the new is front of house and enforcing that TPM right now. I, you know, I am happy to say, I’m ready to enforce that, whether I’m, you know, an artist or the person who takes the trash out at the end of the night.

Phil Rickaby
Ya know, and that was, I mean, one of my frustrations for friends, I don’t think it’s something that volunteers that have had to deal with. But there were a number of times when I as an audience member, was frustrated at the abdication of duty of the paid staff of the fringe who just let people who were unmasked, walk into a space. Spaces are so small, for the most part that doing so put the artist in danger. And I was I was appalled to see situations where somebody on the staff would walk by somebody clearly unmasked, and just ignore

Curtis Campbell
it. Yeah, I mean, I’ve been I’ve been in front of house for front for fringe. And it was pretty astounding to me how quickly I stopped caring. But, you know,

Phil Rickaby
I mean, I get it, I get it, because you get I mean, in past years, it’s been bad enough when like, somebody’s yelling at you about the late comers policy,

Curtis Campbell
map, beautiful tradition for the fringe from the house, you know? Yeah, I know. He’s one that they think that by Carol and Craig, who came in from Richmond Hill.

Phil Rickaby
Yeah. Yeah, just to hold the show for me hold the show from your right.

Curtis Campbell
Eye. My big issue. My big issue, coming out of such unprecedented times, was that everybody demanding and sort of bemoaning, and speaking such, you know, mealy mouthed eloquence about, about the importance of live art, and we have to get back into the concert halls and we have to get back into the live theatre and live music was these are the same people who are, you know, but going on and on about the cultural importance and the have of these institutions who then show up maskless and yeah, are the first people to take their masks off once the show start. And you know, you don’t care all you don’t care about the art. Because if you did, you would care about the people making it and you don’t, and fine, I can’t tell you how to feel about that. But how I feel about that is that you’re viewing this cultural thing that you just wax so philosophical about as a another product that you can purchase. And you know, you know, this is a this is a commodity to you. You don’t actually care about the cultural exchange happening right now. So please stop acting like you do.

Phil Rickaby
Yeah, yeah. I mean, it’s it for me. It was one thing when people would go to a movie theatre and they would take off their masks. It was shit. It’s one of the reasons I didn’t go to movie theatres that often. Yeah, but

Curtis Campbell
I was scared the whole time. And not just by Timothy shallow May. So I only

Phil Rickaby
went to like small theatres. Like if the room was small. I would go when there was nobody there. And and that’s the only way I would see movies. Yeah, just

Curtis Campbell
Marvel was gonna you know, I was like, Is Marvel going to be okay without my money?

Phil Rickaby
Should I be I know it’s so hard. To know if Marvel for them

Curtis Campbell
will be nice, like, is moon night? Going to turn it out? Is that going to be enough? Like, should we be supporting the feature releases? Because I can’t just rely on my money watching Oscar Isaac running through the desert with a British accent? You know? These are the things I worried about.

Phil Rickaby
Of course, I mean, the difference, the difference when people take off their masks in the theatre is, is you know, they’re only infecting other audience members who are not going to be there, which is terrible in itself late. But when it’s in the live theatre, and we saw this in New York, in Broadway when they were open, and audience members, like the cast members, were were like out there pulling in people who aren’t even in that production. They were like flying in somebody from the tour from Chicago to cover a roll because too many cast members are sick. Like though everybody every actor during the pandemic, every performer puts their physical health on the line. Yeah, and audience is

Curtis Campbell
doing it backwards and in heels, honey, they’re doing it backwards and in heels, and they need you to wear that mask to protect them. I do think that people who were so adamant to be massless are also just very ugly. By and large. I think they’re very physically unattractive people, and I don’t understand their need to uncover their face. You had an out people, you finally had an out and you gave it up. You

Phil Rickaby
decided they decided to give it things like like, they would say like, I don’t want to wear a face diaper. Like that’s the thing that’s that’s like, like, they’re even equivalent, like,

Curtis Campbell
oh, and they’re spewing shit. And that’s the irony. Yes. Yeah. I’m sure if you can tell. I can tell. I can tell him how I speak such eloquent such you know, I speak truth to these situations so beautifully. Yeah, it’s all infuriating. And I lost my ability to be polite about it quite quickly. Yeah.

Phil Rickaby
So the Toronto French finishes at what point did you decide that you wanted to do another run for gay for pay with baking clay?

Curtis Campbell
Um, the word I think that the heterosexuals hadn’t been educated quite as much as they should have been, unfortunately, because it was such a small house. And tickets did sell out so quickly, because we were a you know, a runaway success. Which, you know, for me is every day. So it truly was just another another weekday for me. We wanted we knew that the show had legs. You know, covered these legs were covered in fish nets, they were wearing tap shoes, and they were ready to go. And we started to poke around. And, you know, eventually we poked the right I’m so lost in the weeds as my own metaphor. Right mix them up, mix them up healing God. Um, sometimes you just have to answer the question Curtis? Um, yeah, we pretty much immediately we knew that. There was you know, we weren’t done with this thing in you know, like I said, there’s more even more Blake and clay that we want to write so we started looking into it pretty quickly.

Phil Rickaby
And your your book the streetcar crow’s nest the with the smaller theatres there, I assume. Yeah. Well,

Curtis Campbell
we didn’t book it. Oh, it was yeah, this was this is the first time in my in my career that it was not a straight up rental. It was we are produced in association with crows. We struck a we struck a damn deal. Nice. Yeah, that’s great. I know. i Yeah, it’s been it’s been a wild ride and we’re coming back with a much more in depth I think a much more in depth show. And I think it’s gonna be really fun. It’s a really it’s a really fun show despite all of the politics hanging over it.

Phil Rickaby
What’s been the what what’s it been like working like in association with a theatre like crows like as I don’t know about you but I’ve mostly like produced on my own so what what changes when you’re producing in association with a company like Kronos?

Curtis Campbell
Well, it’s, you know, they, they were not able to slot us into their season in any so it is like, it’s not a it’s not a full it’s not a rental but it’s also not a pickup, I guess. I owe you so yeah, it is still. It’s a lot of you know, gayford Good for pay Productions is still putting the call in the train. And good God one day I’ll answer a question without reverting to such a basic commentary. Yeah, it is it is, it is a middle ground that I we are you know, first first experience for me, but we have Rachel Kennedy from from the, you know, Toronto theatre ecology, I’m sure many, many people know her who is just whip smart and so so, so savvy, who has been sort of teaching me how to bridge that gap of like, you know, self producing, but with another company sort of involved and yeah, so, you know, we have Rachel Kennedy, thankfully.

Phil Rickaby
Because it I mean, it’s good that you have that because it is different, like producing for fringe, and then producing outside of frames, they are different animals. So yeah, yeah.

Curtis Campbell
Yeah, you really do. I, I hadn’t, I hadn’t, officially this was, this was officially my first fringe play. And, you know, I had been involved in other productions and other, bring your own venue shows before. But this was my first like, it’s so play in the venue. I wrote it and directed it come on out. So I think, you know, even just today, I was like, Oh, wow, the ease of the fringe tent. Here truly does get really does a lot of work for you.

Phil Rickaby
Huh? Yeah, that’s for sure. Yeah. Now, you mentioned earlier that you were sending out press releases earlier today. One of the things that I’ve generally noticed is, it is getting harder to get reviews for shows it’s harder to get media attention in the landscape, especially with Mooney on Theatre on hiatus. With the future of now magazine in the air. It’s so hard to know, any of that. So what do you what do you like? Do we do you just do we just like send out press releases? To the usual and hope they’re coming? Or what’s what’s the strategy now that that landscape is changing? So drastically?

Curtis Campbell
Yeah. I guess my question to the room is, is it too early to make them jokes when people say now? We ran out? We cross that threshold, I guess, is my question. I Yeah, it’s, I think this sort of it is a weird moment. And I have been sort of like, in my own depression, at you know, about a lot of career stuff lately. But part of it is I am you know, I think we all constantly compare ourselves to the generation of theatre, people who came before us who were living cheaper, and, you know, not living in the hot Anthropocene, you know, the throbbing mess that we find ourselves in currently. And also, you know, could sort of put stuff up quicker and dirtier than then we can now that we have the internet, Curtis, and you tell me, I know. So I, you know, we are kind of constantly comparing ourselves to that, and then even now, constantly comparing ourselves to, you know, four or five years ago. And the Yeah, the sand is really shifting beneath our feet so quickly right now. And it’s our approach to it has been to blast all the usual places, work any of the connections that we might have. You know, and Rachel Kennedy knows everybody so that is a quite a boon. But I don’t know I really wish I had an answer for you that wasn’t just like cleaning and screaming and crying, but I think that is my answer. Am I, you? Oh, okay, here’s here’s an answer. I have really been leaning further into word of mouth than maybe I would have a few years ago I’m, I’ve been trying to get like internet outreach like influencer calm so like people who have a wide internet reach, who are maybe have the gay persuasion and funny. I have been reaching out to them and saying, Hey, we’re trying to get funny people out to the show. I’ve got some, you know, media comps that I would love to give your way in exchange for like, a tweet of our trailer, or our poster and trying to use the, you know, warm our hands on the trash fire that is the internet a little bit more, as we all gather around it, and watch it burn to the ground. You know, and while you’re over there watching the dumpster fire to I’m gonna say, Hey, have you heard about Blake and clay?

Phil Rickaby
Well done, well done. Because I do think I know that lots of lots of artists during this last fringe really felt the the absence of money on theatre and other other other other other media outlets. There was lots of, of there were plenty of people who were reviewing on Twitter, crossfire that it is that sort of it’s harder to get a pull quote out of that.

Curtis Campbell
It’s harder to get a pull quote. And we also have ended the review. Yeah, we also had people I have, I have bones to pick. We had people who had signed up to like, have an actual review, who showed up late in the room, and then sort of just did a tweet went out when we were like, Hey, you took media comps from another way so that Ryan and he didn’t give us a review. What’s that about? So like, even, you know, even the ones that you can get to show up are stretched so thin that maybe they you fall to the bottom of the basket.

Phil Rickaby
But so hard because is it I mean, fringe as an artist is a is quite a marathon. I can only imagine what fringe as a reviewer is I remember many, many, many years, because I’m an old man, I remember watching the late John Kaplan. Yeah, arrive at at a show and then leave the show. Pull out this massive the unfolded like a chart, like this chart that had like this grid of where what he was doing. And, and then he, he found where his next show was on that thing. Quickly folded that thing up, jumped on a bike and sped away. And that was his all day every day for the fringe. Yeah. And that kind of dedication is is commendable. It’s also exhausting.

Curtis Campbell
Can we also talk about the fact that he was somehow managed to just be a lovely unkind person the entire time? He did that? Yes. Somehow. I know how to do like two things in one day and I’m like, I am going to be a bitch. So It’s everyone’s fault, but mine. And he was somehow just wonderfully charming and kind and, you know, really mean it. I mean, I’m just like, giving the monologue that everybody gives about that man. But yeah, you know, just I think as things get more difficult and more kind of impossible. And, you know, as we approach the openings of our own plays, thinking, Oh my God, should I quit theatre? should I should I move to the mountains and just sort of, you know, eat the bodies of the the many dead hikers that I find in sort of a, you know, scavenging cannibalistic situation, is that what I should do, Phil? Should I be a cannibal instead of do theatre? I think it’s important to remind ourselves that you know, sometimes you can veer there are people who are kinda

Phil Rickaby
you know, I speak about how I not knowing how he did it, I have to say that anytime that I have done like a fringe marathon, and I’ve scheduled everything for the day, let’s say that during the I have time, I can see I can from date from morning until night or whenever the French starts. I can see a bunch of shows. Yeah, what I always forget to do in my scheduling is scheduled time to eat. So at some point in the in the afternoon I realised that I haven’t had lunch as my blood sugar crashes as my as my mood drops, everything changes. I’m like, What was I thinking? Yeah, somehow he managed to go and see all of these shows. Be kind and then and not and somehow not have that happen to him?

Curtis Campbell
Yeah, I mean, I don’t I don’t know how he does it i My blood sugar starts to go. I am finding the nearest fainting couch I am. I’m a Victorian woman bound up in boning and corsets. And you can’t tell me that I’m not about to die.

Phil Rickaby
Speaking of Victorian women bound up in corsets I think that would be the most appropriate transition to speaking about your drag Alter Ego Alanna is Percocet. A bye about a Lana’s and how you found her.

Curtis Campbell
That girl showed up at my door one day she was knocking on I have one of those like Marlene knockers, and she was just going to town on it and I was like, Girl what? And she walked right into my apartment. You know what she said to me? Nothing. She just fainted into my fainting couch. Elena’s Percocet is a Bearded Beauty drag diva Jagged Little thrill of Toronto. Has she ever left my apartment I don’t think she has i i had been creating stuff of the theatre performance for IV with my friend, Marla Bordeaux. And then this little thing called COVID hit. And it sort of put a damp a damper on some of our plans. Just sort of a personal inconvenience that we went through. And we’re Lola moved to to this place called Winnipeg, which I’ve heard exists. And we you know, we had this challenge of like, we still wanted to keep creating stuff together. So we started I started developing my own drag persona to do a doubles act with Merola. We do a weekly podcast called Lola and Lonnie it’s about to drag queens who have recently moved to a town populated and built by drag queens you know, it’s sort of a Richard Richard scary meets John Waters is how I bill it. And we local we interview local characters. We sort of will pick a topic and just sort of go This week’s episode was about dinosaurs. I don’t think we once talked about dinosaurs. I think we spent a lot of the episode talking about Clifford the Big Red Dog and his rampage through New York City. In last year’s Clifford the Big Red Dog film where he’s it’s set in New York, which I we haven’t seen it but based on the trailer we think is sort of a Godzilla style film.

Phil Rickaby
Trying to remember a film version of Clifford the Big Red Dog. Exactly. I don’t I don’t move in the circles. You’ve been made aware of that.

Curtis Campbell
Yeah. So if you like podcasts where we talk about Clifford the Big Red dogs inadvertent murder rampage in New York City, where we talk about Elmo. I was gonna say Elmo, there’s something something like Clifford the Big Red Dog, but what is Elmo?

Phil Rickaby
He’s a monster. He’s a monster.

Curtis Campbell
He’s a monster. If you like like us, were people talking about Elmo as if she is Britney Spears circa 2007.

Phil Rickaby
You can’t get it to me that she’s not you can’t convince me that she’s well we recently

Curtis Campbell
learned that Elmo in front of the eyes of the paparazzi went into a salon and had shaved her whole body. Red hair everywhere. The red furred creatures was sort of a theme of the episode. So if that is that if that is of any interest to you. Spoken by two men with full on facial hair, who you can’t convince are not beautiful, big, big breasted women. Then that’s the show for you. Yeah.

Phil Rickaby
I don’t see how anyone could resist.

Curtis Campbell
I don’t see how anyone could resist. Yeah, we started I started doing some video drags definitely I started a YouTube page for Atlantis, Percocet. I haven’t touched in a while because I’m a huge fringe success. So I don’t have time for you to but I think my last video I talked about Disney gaze the Disney adult gaze, caring for your Disney gay. I did a video on season two of what if Marvel’s What if I I think there was like, what if the Hulk had IDs? What if? What if? Captain Marvel teamed up with Rachel Hollis? And did the washer face girl sort of collab? You know, I basically I just take pop culture things and put them into blender. To my own delight.

Phil Rickaby
I mean, if you can’t entertain yourself Who are you entertaining?

Curtis Campbell
Oh, I use Exactly. That’s exactly, I think but I do think that is a like, that’s the thing that Daniel and I keep coming back to where as we create gay for pay is it’s been. That was sort of the lesson I one of the lessons I had from fringe this year was if you’re writing well, well, I am writing comedy The I think the most surefire way for me to write is to have someone that I am trying to make laugh and having Daniel Kerlick on the other end of the Zoom call trying to make you know, trying to make him give me more than a high as I guess it’s funny with sort of the thing that made the script come together for me. Nice. Yeah.

Phil Rickaby
And just just as we’re closing off here, just to to make sure that everybody’s cleared so we have a gay for play gay for pay. I keep wanting to insert like the the Ellen in anyway. Gay for played. Maybe that’ll be one of the many sequels.

Phil Rickaby
Maybe it will be for playing Yeah, they play for pay with Blake and clay is at streetcar crow’s nest from November the 16th. To the 27th. Is that right? Yeah. Perfect. Curtis, thank you so much for joining me this evening. I really appreciate your time. Thanks for having this conversation with me.

Curtis Campbell
Oh my god, you’re so welcome.

Phil Rickaby
This has been an episode of Stageworthy Stageworthy is produced, hosted and edited by Phil Rickaby. That’s me. If you enjoyed this podcast and you listen on Apple podcasts or Spotify, you can leave a five star rating. And if you’re listening on Apple podcasts, you can also leave a review those reviews and ratings helps new people find the show. If you want to keep up with what’s going on with Stageworthy and my other projects, you can subscribe to my newsletter by going to philrickaby.com/subscribe. And remember, if you want to leave a tip, you’ll find a link to the virtual tip jar in the show notes or on the website. You can find Stageworthy on Twitter and Instagram at Stageworthy pod and you can find the website but the complete archive of all episodes at stageworthy.ca If you want to find me, you can find me on Twitter and Instagram at Phil Rickaby and as I mentioned, my website is Phil rickaby.com. See you next week for another episode of Stageworthy