notes & things | 5/6/26
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| The set of HERE BE SIRENS |
Another chilly spring week that feels like it should be warmer than it is, but then again, Chicago is always woefully unpredictable. I feel like the last week and part of this week have fallen down the rabbit hole. I have been working on INSTRUMENTS OF DARKNESS, the Macbeth witches play, in daily writing exploits and have hit the close of Act I, so am heading into the more challenging stretches. I did manage to get the print and e-versions of two other plays under wraps and posted to Patreon for subscribers. It's a great way to get to see a little bit more writing than just poems or blogs. The third will also be available once I have it cleaned up a bit. I haven't begin promoting or sending the plays out for performance opportunities, but for now, am just focusing on the writing parts and getting them into a form interested readers can find.
It's fitting that last night, we took in a performance from Chicago Fringe Opera of "Here Be Sirens." This not only helped give me some ideas on staging and multi-vocal poems and performances, but was right up my alley subject-wise. Not only was it a revisit of the plot of GRANATA, which was about Persephone and the sirens, but the title echoed the working title for the Calypso series of poems/collages I will be working on this summer, HERE BE MONSTERS. It was also in what is becoming one of my favorite neighborhood black box storefront theater venues (we saw both The Seagull and The Three Musketeers there.) I am not that familiar with opera in general, no do I speak the requisite Italian, but enough was in English with the music and vocalizations to fill in holes (and subtitles projected above when needed.) This week, we also have tickets for CHICAGO at the Auditorium which is always fun. After the opera performance, we figured the night was young and took in a movie, Hokum, which was delightfully gothic and actually had a few good jump scares and a haunted hotel vibe.
It is hard to believe we are moving into the second week of May. Toward the end of the month, we are planning on spending a couple hotel stays in Wisconsin and Michigan for wedding gigs that J is doing (while I loaf about the hotel room for a couple days and maybe, just maybe, maybe, some exploring in the off hours.)
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