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It’s all good in the ‘Hood

  • Shows

061816The night before Father’s Day, the fellas—Ty Fance, Stan Sellers and I—reprised (or revamped or resurrected) a new version of our play The Father ‘Hood. It might’ve been our best (and different) version yet!

This rendition was less theatrical and had fewer “special effects” (I mean, c’mon, for our first showing, we had coffee orders over the PA and a voiceover intro by Dennis Haysbert! Nice to be connected, Ty!)  As always, we benefited from Tony Robinson’s involvement first as a director, then a consultant.

This Father ‘Hood was more fluid in concept, more “story” and less “stand-up” than the original. And while this truth-telling/story form had the same roots in appreciation of our Dads, there was a little extra wonderment (and exasperation) of being Dads. The audience laughed, commiserated, hurt, and go figure…enjoyed.

This is/was not my comfort zone, in fact, parts of this type of acting/story-telling is downright painful. I’m sure glad I got to reach deeper with the encouragement of these guys, and the backing of the supportive team and audience.

Been a long way from the Alta Dena “Back Stage” premier where I went sprinting down the street two minutes before show time to get rid of this energy inside me that was blowing up. (I get anxious but rarely that anxious—almost nervous.)  The guys still laugh at the thought of me in my dress clothes and shoes, (Costume #1) sprinting away from the venue opening night. They may have wondered if I would return.

This last one (version and pre-show) was calmer, and I kept my pacing confined to the back of the Story Salon…
Special thanks to Beverly Minkins for her intro of our premise, and hosting abilities, she runs a great story venue, and we were happy to be there, and have both performance and audience turn out so well.