#369 – Michael Ross Albert
Described by the Toronto Star as “one of Toronto’s most exciting playwrights,” Michael Ross Albert is a Dora Award-nominated writer and indie theatre producer whose work has been staged across Canada, the United States, and the United Kingdom. His plays have been produced in professional theatres, international festivals, black boxes, basements, bars, Zoom meetings, conference rooms, and tents in both small towns and big cities. He has an MFA in Playwriting from the Actors Studio Drama School and has taught new play development at the University of Waterloo.
www.michaelrossalbert.com
Twitter: @michaelralbert
Instagram: @michaelralbert
Support Stageworthy
Donate: tips.pinecast.com/jar/stageworthy
Transcript
Transcript auto generated.
Phil Rickaby
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.
If you value the work that I do on Stageworthy please consider leaving a donation either as a one time thing or on a recurring monthly basis. Stageworthy is created entirely by me and I give it to you free of charge with no advertising or other sponsored messages. your continuing support helps me to cover the cost of producing and distributing the show. Just for people donating $5 A month would help me cover the cost of podcast hosting alone. Help me continue to bring you this podcast, you can find a link to donate in the show notes which you can find in your podcast app or the website at stageworthy.ca. Now, onto the show.
Michael Ross Albert is a playwright, screenwriter, indie producer, dramaturg educator and all around theatre lover. He joined me to talk about his latest play good old days appearing this summer at the Toronto fringe, having four productions in three countries on two continents in 2022, the magic trick behind his play the Huns, and much more. Here’s our conversation
just to get started properly. I want to talk about your new show that’s going to be at the Toronto fringe good old days. What can you tell me about good old days?
Michael Ross Albert
Well, you know, we’re recording in mid May, and the Fringe is still a couple of months away. So I am still in the process of you know, discovering just exactly what good old days is about. i That’s not to say it is not written. We like the there’s several drafts completed and I’m and I started to work on it with the creative team. But it is that the script is still taking shape. And will continue to evolve during rehearsal process. So all of that to say. This is actually this is the week, where I’m meant to submit our 100 word blur about the play of what the play is. So this is really excellent practice for any succinctly to describing this feat. In I guess you could say that good old days is a a surrealist kind of repeat. Dream, light, adventure, Chase. fears about the fractured world that we live the story of two former roommates and former friends whose relationship ended during the pandemic. As many friendships and close relationships were drained. Theirs was strained past the breaking points. And in the middle of the nights, on a very strange evening in the city. The two of them chase one another in a way of attempting to mend their fractured relationship and throughout the night they encounter various strangers when they have interactions that Have that become wonderful and weird and also a little narrow. And what the play the medically I guess was trying to do is look at this kind of era defining trauma that we’ve all lived through the relation to what, what we perceive to be a simpler time, just three years ago, and questions, you know, if things were ever great, if beautiful days were that and, and it also asks us to think about to look at relationships that that have bent past the breaking point over the course of this traumatic event. And see when there is room for reconciliation, and how we can, how we might go about beginning a conversation about how to encounter one another, again, from with all of the lessons and all of the experiences that we’ve learned and impound Virchow for the last few years. So that’s a very ice that won’t fit into 100 word. But that’s, that is the idea.
Phil Rickaby
The I mean, I mean, relationships, when you live together, roommates, whatever, whether you are a couple or whether you’re just roommates, those relationships are fraught as it is, there’s you know, you learned so much about somebody when you live with them. And pre pandemic, you had time away from your roommate, and then all of a sudden, you did not. And so then things become much more fraught. And the the danger to the relationship, when you truly see who that person is, for example, you find out that your roommate says things on on calls, like, let’s circle back on that you’re like, How can I be with living with somebody who says, let’s circle back or whatever, like corporate speak that somebody is saying, you know, and suddenly, like, I’m really annoyed by this person.
Michael Ross Albert
Yeah. And it’s those little, like peccadilloes that you can excuse for a while when you have space from one another. But as many people I’m sure have encountered over the course, locked down after locked down. Things can really start the the smallest things can start to get under your nerves and under your skin. And the big things are so much more egregious, because personal safety and public duty are at stake. And the, you know, the play isn’t meant to be preachy in that way. But does, it does really, I think, take a look at that. A line that, that people needed to draw themselves and the value system that they had to create and and to the conflicts that differences value systems may have create.
Phil Rickaby
Yeah, yeah. Yeah. It I mean, you know, when you’re when you’re, you’re spending 24 hours a day with somebody in a space that you did not intend, and was never intended to be like a live workspace, but suddenly, like, you’ve both set up offices in the living room or whatever. It’s like, it’s no wonder that you that a relationship would be so fraught and start to start to fray and especially if like, you’re unable to escape the person.
Michael Ross Albert
Yes, absolutely. It’s it’s a really extraordinary thing that we lived through and over the Last year, I’ve had the, the opportunity to travel to different places. And no one has a story that doesn’t involve some kind of completely out of the ordinary set of circumstances, no one in the world was just like, yeah, things remained the same or made. Everyone really had to get used to a whole different reality. And we’ve come out on the other side of it or are nearing the other side of it. In this world that, to me lately feels quite unrecognisable. And I am not sure how much of that is me. How much of it is you know, I like being on the lookout or something that askew and how much of it is it’s it’s the reality that we’re living in that things have gotten more difficult and relationships with people you’re close to have become more fraught and encounters with strangers have become more strange and hostile. And so the play kind of, I think, tries to take that neuroses, those neuroses of mine and, and theatrical eyes it somewhat surreal, this surrealistic way.
Phil Rickaby
I mean, it’s surreal. Yes, but I mean, let’s face it, the if you were out, if you’re wandering around the streets, you’re, you’re like, let’s say, you know, you’re you’re chasing your former roommate through the streets or whatever, in you know, not in a dangerous way. But you know, anyway, Toronto can be a weird place after dark. And the later it goes, the weirder it gets. And so things can get surreal without even really trying, if you if you’re out late enough.
Michael Ross Albert
Yeah, absolutely. I and that’s, that has always been the case. It’s a big city. And I, I guess, I complain a lot that Toronto isn’t necessarily as weird as it used to be. But there’s something but weird is different than strange, or weird is different than dangerous. And, and so that’s, that’s the that’s what I am hoping to explore. I have been thinking a lot of bouts of artistic movement that happened after the the First World War and the ensuing pandemic. And art got really weird. This surrealist manifesto was published 99 years ago. talks about how in a world without meaning, or a world that lost any semblance of meaning, why should we have these realistic depictions of the environment that we are that we find ourselves in? And that, you know, when in school or studying art? I never really got it? And I’ve been thinking a lot more about how, like, Yeah, I like things, going through a monumental experience, like we all have, yeah. Can really reframe your, your perspective about the world and the kind of work that you want to make in it? Yeah. So that’s the experiment. Yes. It’s stylistically a pretty big. It feels like a departure from the type of stuff I’ve written in the past where people hang out in a room But and solve a problem or try to within a real time. And this and this, this play does not do that. So Oh, yeah, we’re, we’re in an experimental land there.
Phil Rickaby
The the movement that you’re talking about after the after World War One in the in the 1918 flu was, I think, you know, it was, it’s a response to first off, you have an entire generation of young men and people who’ve been through one of the most traumatic experiences of their lives, and that they that they refuse to talk about. And so they don’t tell their families about it. It’s like this thing that they keep inside and it comes out in other ways. In some cases, it comes out in in fantasy novels, like the Lord of the Rings is full of World War One imagery, and things like that. And then you follow that up with a pandemic, where you have to people or state have to stay inside with their thoughts when they were distracting themselves with work and other things and all that sort of stuff. This surreal is movement completely make sense as it as it does now to sort of like, try to get out of the constraints of the one room, the you know, here’s where this is this place sit in the living room or in a kitchen or whatever it might be. And, and also, I think sometimes after a while of trying to keep a play within one space, I think part of the writer sort of chafes at that and sort of wants to try to break out and do something a little bigger. For you, do you find that? Or have you found that this was like you was like sort of breaking out of the room to try to do something bigger and more surreal? Or was it a conscious choice?
Michael Ross Albert
It was a conscious choice. When so Cass Van Wyck who is producing the play, and will be acting in it, as she has with many of my bringe productions. She got into lottery, she got selected in the lottery, once again, I don’t know how we sat down to talk in the winter, about what what we are hoping to accomplish with an opera V that we’ve been given multiple times in the past. What what are our goals? What are the things we do accomplish in this moment, or at this stage of our lives are cast? Her her priorities are about giving performance opportunities to artists that have either recently graduated from university programmes and haven’t had the opportunity to be seen in front of a larger audience yet, or are the city or the she’s very big, very generous in that way of like wanting to provide opportunities. And for myself, I thought that I think I always tend to, to set up a little writing challenge for myself or create a strict set of rules or, or parameters rather, for each play. And I basically said I want to throw those rules out the window that I had recently written through very large ensemble pieces that were set in real time. And I felt like realism was something I was becoming very confident in as a genre or style. And that if we were really to going to embrace the experimental and the challenge of Grinch if I really wanted to, like rise to what that could be. I thought I need to work in a in an arena that I’m not as familiar with. And so the idea to do something that has Not DIRECT address monologues, but has some form of narration, or scene changes or actors playing multiple characters. And breaking conventions of logic, sometimes I got really excited by the opportunity to, to do that. And so that’s what we’re so that’s what we’re doing. I wrote a strange play. And it’s meant to be performed by two actors. And the, the actor who will be performing with casts is named Brianna rights. And she is a wonderful, recent graduate PMU who casts thaw in the, in the general auditions that we that the that were held at the assembly theatre earlier in the year. Or late last year, whenever the winter was. And so we’re so we sit. So it’s great that we set these goals back in January, and we’re, we’re gonna we’re doing
Phil Rickaby
now in terms of like setting up like, challenges for yourself. I want to talk about the Huns for a second. Sure. Maybe more than a second, because I think when you when we first sat down to talk about the Huns you referred to a couple days. Yeah. I mean, you were like, I’m there’s this magic trick that I have in this show. And I don’t know if it’s gonna work. Yeah. And that’s all you said, that’s all you said, was that there’s this magic trick. And the magic trick, I think we can now say was the fact that the people onstage were interacting with pre recorded voices that did not feel in the moment, like pre recorded voices. And I have to say that that particular trick to have the, to work with a stage manager or a sound person who’s going to be able to, to, to be a scene partner, for the actors on stage. That must have been something from the beginning that was like, difficult to, to arrange and to have happen. How do you find that? What was that? What’s that rehearsal process like? Well, to make that happen,
Michael Ross Albert
before, before we get to the rehearsal, I, I should say that about 20 pages into the play into the write the play, I did send a message around saying, I don’t actually know that we will be able to pull this off. And maybe I should, maybe we should lower our expectations for ourselves. But I think without any without any risk, there can be no reward and part part of the the challenge of stage or rather, challenge of pulling off this magic trick was incredibly satisfying, artistically. And watching the cast performed the play was like watching them walk a tightrope, because I think the audience could tell, like, if something goes wrong, it’s gonna go really wrong. And so, they’re there it really didn’t feel like like, a great I mean, it was it was a lot of pressure. Especially for our superhero of a stage manager on that shouldn’t Aiden Hammond but was you know, it really did feel like a like a great sleight of hand trick. And the rules. So the rehearsal process involve recording the voices from well, actors, before rehearsals even began we only gave each actor their own lines and very little context who Marie farci the director of a play I had maybe minutes ago with everyone individually and would direct and we would sort of like have a script handy. There are kind of movements in lay the characters respond to. And so, we could easily say okay, things are getting a bit tense in this movement. So the line you know, could you repeat that please like would this is a more tense moment can a heightened a bit, so we got the recordings from those actors and, and needed, needed them in Cue lab for the entire rehearsal run. So our sound designer was Angie truth, Hart, who edited the voices, I am pretty All of this must have happened before we met rehearsal. And in the room, Aidan, the stage manager would like in, in addition to notating, blocking, and doing all of the other things a stage manager does, hit the cue lab button and get into a groove with the actors and learn the moments where, where delaying by a moment could increase retention for and so like that was a it was a very essential part, the rehearsal process. And one that both Murray and myself had to learn before we went to Brighton, given the fact that a pandemic was, was still raging, especially in the Yeah, we and so we had to have a contingency plan and and learn how to learn how to call the show or how to run the sound through the show, which is not easy.
Phil Rickaby
Now, I mean, I mean, now as an audience member who saw the show and didn’t know what the magic trick was, there is that tension that you’re talking about the you mentioned, of the audience feeling like if something goes wrong, something’s gonna go really wrong, I think is an audience member. Because you know it sometimes when you’re watching a show, you have that like the same as watching watching a like an actual magic. So how did they do that? And I think a lot of audience members because I did went through the process of these people must be backstage. No, that’s not possible. They couldn’t possibly backstage, it was pre recorded. And then you then you sort of like are like, Oh, shit, this is like somebody is like, hitting basically play on a thing. And the stress sort of goes up as you like, subconsciously, not that it’s something you’re thinking about. But it’s something that is sort of like there in the back of your mind. Which is a fascinating thing to sit in, because you’re watching the play, and the play is tense, but there’s an added layer of tension to it. Which just sort of adds to the, to the the internal tension of the play.
Michael Ross Albert
Yes. And I think that there’s there are some, like horrifically comedic voice performances in that in that piece. And, you know, one of the one of the voices gets the biggest laugh every show in a way that’s like, quite unfair to the onstage actors. But without fail when when Tyrone savage and his British accent says, it’s everything. All right, it like, has always brought the house down. Right. And so yeah, I, I think that there is an appreciation of the technical wizardry that’s required. And those voices really serve a helpful function to creating tension play that is essentially three people sitting around a conference certainty. Yes. Yeah. And then that was and so that was the particular challenge for me in that piece was Can Can I make three people sitting around a table be 10 and dramatically compelling and, and I’m so glad that we stressed we had the opportunity to stress so many people out
Phil Rickaby
I think Doesn’t it didn’t doesn’t help. Doesn’t hurt that pretty much everybody has been in a conference room in a tense situation. So there’s like that that immediate like, oh shit, I know this situation.
Michael Ross Albert
Yeah, yeah, there’s a real dance of passive aggression. And we did like, I think I think it I don’t know how this happened but because the revival of the play happened after the pandemic, where, whereas beforehand, people that worked in offices relate pretty immediately to grim stances. Whereas, whereas people who have, who don’t need to regularly do conference calls or video messaging software could relate to the, you know, the grind rate of the peace, the millennial malaise whereas, after the after the pandemic, where we have all had to encounter crossbreeding zoom meetings, and even just hangouts with friends. I went to a tourist on Zoo. Like we we all really became fatigued and annoyed and, and I think it became I think it got cancer after Brexit, the real world.
Phil Rickaby
Yeah. Now, you mentioned going to Brighton Now, initially, you were supposed to go to Brighton in 2020, I believe. We sure were. And of course, things happened.
Michael Ross Albert
We received our Canada Council travel grant on April Fool’s 2020. Oh,
Phil Rickaby
that’s that’s devastatingly perfect.
Michael Ross Albert
Yeah, it was the first time I laughed in about three weeks. We found out and I actually, like collapsed on the floor lap. But we were very, very lucky to receive that fund. And to, to have been able to continue to defer it. So we were able to finally cross the pond. And it was, it was so wonderful it was for years. You know, just like not knowing what was going to happen with life, let alone with making theatre, to be able to go on an adventure to the other side of the ocean, to live in an Airbnb with people who have become close friends, like family, and do a show for strangers who laughed, and, and didn’t have to say nice things to us because they didn’t work. So it was it was really like one of the most memorable moments, experiences and something I’m cherished forever.
Phil Rickaby
I mean, I was I was going to ask about about, you know, the the audience reaction to the, to the show this Canadian show in England, but obviously it translated and people people got it. It
Michael Ross Albert
did and what was what’s funny is that the audience is it seems like the audiences were a bit quieter than we had been used to. And at the end of the show, were incredibly enthusiastic. Or, you know, would come up to us the bar or post about the show online. But there’s, but we were we were like, you know, you can laugh about you British people have, like they do comedy, don’t they? And I think there’s something there’s something so it made us kind of reflect on on the institution of British comedy, which is so Joe wonderfully. and unambiguously, Billy. And this, this play in a very Canadian way, is like a bit humble about it. laughs Maybe it’s like a lie. You know, we’re like, it feels like the laughs coming from something uncomfortably familiar, rather than something. outsize and slapstick and big. And so, Tyrone’s line still always got a really big laugh. Is everything all right? But we found it was we found it really became like a drama in hmm. And and perhaps it has something to do with the circumstances of the world at the time. We performed it for a second time, but did it did feel like, like quite an intense experience for the audience.
Phil Rickaby
Audiences are weird, and you know, every audience is different. And you know, you go to a place and you’re not sure what an audience is going to go into be like, years ago, when I was working with Keystone theatre, we were doing plays in the cellar silent film. Because the actors on stage, we’re not talking. A lot of times audiences had this involuntary response that it took them a long time to figure out oh, I’m allowed to laugh. And so they would, they would be really quiet at first. And then after somebody laughed, they would, they would suddenly realise, oh, yes, I can, I can make noise. And it’s interesting to watch an audience make that discovery. And then, you know, when you take a play, say to England, and it’s sort of like when people come come here, or people go to a different place and the accent, they have a dialect, maybe the audience is quiet because they’re like, I need to concentrate because this is an unfamiliar dialect to me, or something like that. You never know what it’s going to be but you know, as long as at the end they they react in the way that you want them to that’s that that’s awesome. Did you feel like it was that that it was maybe the dialect or was it just the fact that maybe it was just pandemic II
Speaker 2
I you know, I wish I could tell you what, or put my finger on it. We I’m not sure that this is this had anything to do with it, but we we did begin the show with a land acknowledgement that I don’t think no colonisers, the OG colonisers are used to hearing and it was an pence. So there was a part of me that wondered that Perhaps? Perhaps that was a bit baffling or they began scratching their heads before the play start. But it’s not to say that they weren’t involved. I could we were in a, like a very, like a reasonably sized house and had reasonably sized audiences. And I, yeah, I’m not I’m not sure it’s not to say that they, like didn’t. I’m not saying it didn’t go well. The response was really good. But it was, but it was a little perplexing to everyone that we would be doing. Doing this show that here in Toronto would get big enthusiastic laughs throughout. There is a moment in the play, where I think the tension has ramped up to to a boiling point, and is diffused moment momentarily by and once that tension breaks, they there, they were a bit more willing to vocalise. But at that point, the play takes a turn towards more serious thematic content. So the laughter is not necessarily you by the time they, they realise they could laugh. They, it wasn’t time for them to laugh anymore. It was but it was very it was a fun it was. It’s, you know, like you said audiences are weird. And what I’m so grateful for is that People who had no reason to see this bunch of Canadians took time out of their day to, to get stressed out. And were so, so kind and welcoming, and told their friends to see it. We, we had these wonderful actors came to see it, and later did a post announcement about our play. In the most like beautiful and fancy terms. We had people, young people, this is my way, maybe my favourite, sorry, but they like, we’re coming in from London to do Grinch stuff and went back, London, which is about an hour and a half away. And then came back to see the show again the next day. And we were like, just completely floored that that the response was so so genuine and so kind.
Phil Rickaby
Yeah, yeah. It, you know, audiences, every time we go to a place, you have to sort of adjust your expectations, you know, new audience, you know, you have to try to figure out how is this audience going to react? And it’s one of the things that that actors, performers, playwrights have to be ready for and how to be flexible with. But you can always tell when an audience is into it. Like they might not be vocalising? Yes, but the energy in the room tells you that they’re there with you. And that’s always one of the great things about about about doing theatre and to have people come back and like do all this. So that’s obviously the show was was really well received.
As far as like,
Were you familiar with the Brighton fringe at all before you went? Or was it just like?
Speaker 2
Well, we had three years. Right, sorry. But no, we, we, oh, I guess it was only to pardon me? No, it wasn’t a fringe that was on our or my radar. Hat. But at the end of 2019 festival, here in Toronto, we receive an invitation to take the show and began like a real research campaign of looking at what available venues were what, how their festival runs, and the scope and size of it and, and box office expectations and attendance expectations. So I think we did I having the luxury of time with that was was very useful. And we
Speaker 2
think we picked really well, in terms of like, where we were staying, and where the show was presented and how it was marketed. I’m sure if we were to do it again, there were things we would do differently. But like it’s a it’s a really fun town, first of all, it’s it’s probably, I think, is one of the most progressive cities in the UK and Ireland. And so there’s a real like party vibe, as much as there can be in Britain. But people come for their for their bachelorette parties, whatever you call them over there. And there’s and this like there’s very dramatic scenery and like a great midway. And really just like excellent food, vegan options, all of the things a bunch of North American millennials.
Phil Rickaby
That’s perfect. That’s perfect.
Speaker 2
I think we realised how North American we are. Especially being the the energy and efficiency that’s required for the Toronto fringe, we really like, brought that with us. And, and realise very quickly that there is a much more lackadaisical right towards the creation of art. Now, in that, I don’t know if that particular festival or we’re in the UK, but we were like, We it didn’t take us very long to realise we’re, we’re at a 12 and put about a date. Yeah.
Phil Rickaby
But that’s one of those things that if you’re, if you’re travelling to Fringe Festivals, if you’re going to more than one Fringe Festival, each one like each one is different. And you don’t know like, you’ll go to one is this a flyering town in the only way to find out is to try to flyer unless somebody has told you in advance. And then you might be like, well, we don’t need these flyers anymore. But you know, there’s all kinds of like, differences and so every place is different. And to find out that you’re running it, I don’t know, I wonder if they if they were like, these North Americans are really quite intense. They were okay, yep, they sure were.
But it was it was a great experience. You guys, you guys had a you know, you got to you got to stay together. And you did I think one day trip into London and, and had a great Yeah. Sounds like Yeah,
Speaker 2
yeah, we really had a blast. Yeah, it was a very memorable experience. Even the difficult parts. Yeah, like trying to leave the UK during the week of the Queen’s Jubilee, which you’ve never done before. I guess he won’t get a chance to you now.
Phil Rickaby
I know. But one was probably you. So I take it you don’t recommend doing so?
Speaker 2
It was a low point of Yeah, but it was, it’s truly something I’ll never forget.
Phil Rickaby
Yeah, yeah. Now just sort of in as we sort of just start to come to a close here interesting factoid is that this summer will be the fifth time that a play of yours is produced at the Toronto fringe. That is correct. And that’s a pretty good record. That’s pretty good record in the in the Toronto fringe, how do you feel about about that, about that sort of milestone?
Speaker 2
I, it’s a bit off because it it’s not. It makes me feel old, if I’m perfectly honest. And but, but, you know, Grinch has been a really significant part of my artistic career and the formation of my attitudes about art. And, and so I’m, I’m, I’m really glad that I have an opportunity to continue to experiment with something new in this setting, I think fringe gives infringe invite risk taking. And I, I, you know, you never know which piece is going to land or, or strike a chord with audience members. But range gives you the opportunity to, to, to what to fail, really, to like, without without the pressure of catering to a commercial audience. You can take big swings and try stuff on for size. And I each play that I’ve done in the Toronto fringe and in other fringes have all been really like significant. Like test for myself for their good indicators of where I was at as a person and as a writer at the time of writing and So I’m, I’m really grateful that I, I have the chance to articulate the strangeness of how it feels to be alive right now, in a way that I probably wouldn’t have had it not been for the opportunity for form of play in the Grinch. So I’m really thrilled, I’m scared. You know, it’s, it’s a very vulnerable tivity showcasing something that written the public, and and there is a risk that it might not be any good. I, I truly thought. I mean, I didn’t know what to think about the Huns, or anywhere before an audience got into the room. And that’s like, it’s, it’s terrifying that they might, they might run for the exits. And so that fear is a really good motivator. And it means that it requires everyone to work in a in a way that is Fruitful And Joyful. As if the friend is not fun. It’s not worth doing. And so, I, I feel so fortunate that I get to have fun with this creative team. The plays being directed by Jill Harper, who is a director I wanted to work with for years. And she very graciously sat down with me in the winter, where I, I, I didn’t do a good job at articulating what the play would be apple, and dead. Yeah, let’s do it. Let’s make something weird. Oh, I appreciate that. Everyone. Everyone dives in everyone. Everyone is embracing the spirit of risk taking that’s involved with a show in the Fringe Festival. And I’m glad I got to do it for a fifth time. How lucky? Like Absolutely. Yeah.
Phil Rickaby
Yeah. It I mean, I know that you’ve you’ve had this experience, and I have when you’re presenting something new. And there’s a moment, you know, early on or something if it’s a comedy or something, you’re waiting for a reaction. You’re like, if this if I get this reaction, I know that it’s funny. We think it’s funny from rehearsal, but the audience will tell us, and there’s almost like a subconscious holding of the breath until like, you get that reaction. And then you can sort of be like, okay, that moment passed. That was the litmus test. The audience likes it. We’re good to go.
Speaker 2
Well, and some performances. The audience will laugh, and some they won’t. Yeah, yeah, some are late at night, when the audience has had a couple before the show. And some are in the middle of the day. Like, there’s there’s something really I mean, there’s something ephemeral about, but inherently about theatre, but because of the, the scheduling that’s all over the place, really invite variety in the in the house, and lay will be different. And that’s so cool.
Phil Rickaby
Yeah, yeah, it’s a great, it’s a great lesson about about theatre in general that like that, like a real concrete reminder that then these words with these actors with that audience will never happen again. And this reaction is unique to this moment. And it’s sort of like a, you go in and you let it happen. And hopefully everybody has fun. Amen. Well, Michael, I’m really looking forward to as always, I’m always excited to see a new show that you that you’ve written, so I’m really looking forward to good old days in Toronto French.
Michael Ross Albert
Thank you so much, Phil, and Thanks for Thanks for talking to me.
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 podcast, you can also leave a review those reviews and ratings help new people find the show. If you want to keep up with what’s going on With Stageworthy end 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 stageworthypod. And you can find the website with the complete archive of all episodes at stageworthy.ca. If you want to find me, you can find me on Twitter and Instagram at PhilRickaby. And as I mentioned, my website is philrickaby.com See you next week for another episode of Stageworthy
