At the End of the Road

This class has been really great and I have learned a lot through devising a piece of art with six other people. Personally, whenever I think about writing a play, I see it as a very daunting and overwhelming task. And with the addition of six other people, devising a play within a democratic framework can even seem more overwhelming. I loved that to create the realms we split up in groups and put the scenes on their feet. We then had two great ideas for every realm and we could compose from there. It’s also nice since some people are better at improv and thinking on their feet and some people are better writers. This process allowed both types to do their best work. Plus, both aspects of writing and improving together were a lot of fun!

I feel like our group really worked well as an ensemble. I know in one of my first posts I mentioned that I was nervous in working in a group, since usually in group projects it ends up one person doing a lot of the work and carrying the others. I did not feel like that at all with this group. I think we all shared an equal amount of respect for the project, for the community, and for each other. It makes me really excited thinking about how well we worked together creating this piece and how that strong ensemble feeling will carry over to the actual performance of the piece. I am proud to have been a part of this process!

Design Proposal

Budget: $3500

Forum

Since the play will take place in the Thrust Theater, I would like to see the space converted into a sports arena. I think this can be done with marking off the seating to illustrate two competing teams- “The Lard Ball Team” and the “Theater Students Team”. So, half the theater (sections A-C) can be assigned “The Lard Ball Team” and the other half (sections D-F) can be assigned the “Theater Students Team”. I think we should post signs on the walls of the section denoting which team they are sitting in support of. I like this idea since it is using the space to create a mood of competition and fandom. I also really liked Amy’s idea of painting the stage floor with chalk paint. I think the chalk can be used to denote time (how much time is left in a game), space (what are the boundaries), and score (keeping score of what is learned or who is winning). I also think it can be used to replace a lot of props in the actual show by being more creative and drawing them (further illustrating how theater students don’t need a lot of money since they use the resources they have). Also, I like the idea of doing a pre-show and/or half time show in the lobby of the theater. I think this will give audience members the feeling of a real sports game. Here are some ideas: For the pre-show we could have loud music playing, an announcer introducing the “players”, the players warming up, audience members playing cornhole, etc… I think the images of cornhole, introducing the players, and players warming up really helps set up the play. Also, another idea is to have an intermission where the half-time show is in the lobby and people can watch the show as they are going to the bathroom. This half-time show can include a dance routine, a band, a cheer, a song, or letting kids or audience members try and make a half-court shot.

Facsimiles

For facsimiles, I think it would be nice to decorate the lobby doors as the YUM Center with nearby buildings being represented (Actors, Humana). This could give the audience members a known reference before even entering the playing space. Also, I think familiar signage should be used in the play such as creating the show programs in imitation of the UofL sports teams programs. I think it would be nice, if possible, to put our picture, jersey number, height, position or sport of choice, even if its theater related. Also, I think the way we market the show should be reflective of the community and culture so that the YUM center and other iconic Louisville sports buildings (Bats stadium/ UofL football stadium) are reflected in the show poster. I think this will draw attention and interest.

Folk

I think the local culture can in one way be represented in our jerseys showing our Cardinal Pride with the jerseys being red and black. I think also the cheerleader’s uniforms and pom poms should be red and black. I think it would also be interesting if we could collect recent sports newspaper articles from UofL and make something from them. This way we are taking something from the local culture and using it in another innovative way. Maybe, we could make a backdrop with a collage from the newspapers. This way, we could create a backdrop that would include the community for a low cost.

Found

I think a lot of our sports props and gear will be found objects. For example, I have pom poms and at least one football. I am sure others in the group can bring/donate a ball or sports prop.

Fabrication

I think it would be nice to have something in the lobby where the audience could contribute before the show or during intermission. For example, having a chalkboard or dry erase board where they put their favorite team or a voting ballot where they could vote on which team they think will win in the play. I think both of these could involve the audience in the game.

Itemized list

Item	Price
Posterboard (for signs denoting teams)	I have posterboard I can donate
Markers	I have markers I can donate
Chalk Paint	$15
Chalk (2 boxes)	$8
Cornhole Boards	Easy to Make - $25 for 4 boards (2 teams)
Cornhole Bags	Easy to Make- $25 for 16 bags (2 teams)
Paying a Band Member	$250 (Includes rehearsals and performances)
Basketballs	Found- Members from cast find/donate
Soccer Ball	Found- Members from cast find/donate
Baseball	Found- Members from cast find/donate
Baseball Bat	Found- Members from cast find/donate
Baseball Glove	Found- Members from cast find/donate
Football	Found- Members from cast find/donate
Jerseys for Cast (7)	$200
Cheerleader Uniforms (3?)	$90 (for 3 people- top and skirt)
Poms (3 sets)	Found- Members from cast find/donate
Programs	(If had pictures/ created like sports by cast so only had to pay for printing) $200
Show Posters	Created by cast/ Only pay for printing $200
Chalkboard	Borrow from Theater
Newspapers	Found- Members from cast find/donate
Mascot Uniform	$40 (with prop- skull)
Referee Uniform	$20
Foam Fingers	$100 for 99 fingers
T shirt boomerang	Can be made easily $20 for 2
T shirts to give to audience members	$150 for 50 shirts plus printing logo
	Total: $1343

Final Thoughts

The audience for our read-through was smaller than I would have liked, but I’m glad we had the opportunity to get at least a little feedback. I think it did all of us some real good in the sense that it reminded us that we’re going to be creating something that people are going to watch and we really want them to enjoy. For me, that strong reminder that I was creating for an audience caused me to take a step back from my own contributions and find the strength to cut my own excesses. For example, I had included a speech in the “Support” realm that was a transcription of my own conversation with Jake Hassler. It was an idea that I had gotten “married” to, but wasn’t serving the script as a whole, and I finally found it in me to “divorce” myself from that idea.

I can’t wait to see how this project will continue to grow. I think our biggest challenge will be refining the script, and once we’ve gotten it to a happy place, our collective creativity will bring it to life in an exciting way. One thing in particular I want us to focus on is the “craft” element, as Dr. Vandenbroucke would term it. I would like to see the pace of the show become much faster and quite exciting, like plays in a sporting event, so that when we do slow it down with a longer speech, it’s really attention-grabbing, and is better able to drive a point home than, to paraphrase one of our audience members at the read-through, beating an idea over the audience’s head.

I had a playwriting professor once who, with every assignment, would ask the writer, “What’s your favourite line?” and them make them cut that line out. It was a harsh, but effective way of teaching us to step back from our own work and remain objective rather than loosing ourselves in what we perceived as the beauty of our own language and falling short of something we could be proud of in the long run. I’m not suggesting we do that with the script for the sports project, but it’s something I’d like us all to keep in mind as we enter this next step of the process - revising and refining. I hope we are all objective enough to ask ourselves, “Does this serve to accomplish the goal we as a group are striving to achieve, or am I indulging my own whims?”

I hope this is going to be something we can all be proud of. I think it will. Fingers crossed!

-Lauren

Interviews

The process of collecting interviews was a neat challenge, and admittedly, a little scary. The very first interview I collected was actually completely unplanned, and that may have been the best thing that could have possibly happened to get me over my interview jitters. I was out to dinner with my parents, when suddenly the topic turned to the sports they both played in high school. I whipped out my little voice recorder, and just let them talk. Every now and then, I’d probe for a little more information when I felt they weren’t quite dishing all the details, but for the most part, all I had to do was let them talk.         

As for my on-camera interviews, all but two of them were my students. For some reason, the two that were not my students, Jeremy Dugan and Jake Hassler, were the best of the lot, or so I consider them. Perhaps this is because Jeremy and Jake are familiars of mine, rather than my students, and so were more comfortable and open with me. Perhaps it’s as simple a thing as they’re more comfortable on camera. Whatever the reason, I feel like these two interviews have been especially valuable, at least from the ones I collected. However, that’s not to say my student interviews were useless. Each of them offered a perspective I hadn’t considered - for example, Clarence Jackson provided some serious insight into what it’s like to be a student athlete on scholarship, and Andrea Araujo taught me a little somethin’ somethin’ about soccer, a sport I know absolutely nothing about.

The interview process has proven itself as a really valuable form of research, and I’m so glad we have so much interview material at our disposal!

-Lauren

Design Proposal Part 2

Design Proposal - Part 2.

In my earlier design post, I focused on the costume design for Big Sweetie and Little Sweetie. Now that we’ve worked out some more detail with the script, I’d like to focus a little on the costume design for the seven of us in the class - the seven “scouts” in the show.

 (This might be a note for another time, but there are seven of us, we’ve created seven realms, we’ve talked about the seventh-inning, stretch - is there more we can do with the number 7? It seems like it should be important.)

With the design for Big and Little Sweetie in mind (that nostalgic, wholesome flavor which may or may not be masking the root of all kinds of evil....

Oh. Em. Gee. It just hit me that Big Sweety and Little Sweety shouldn’t be in pink... they should be in dollar-bill greens and coppers and nickels and golds. Money is what Big Sweety is all about, and maybe that would be a too-obvious costume choice... but I rather like it. Their buttons could be silver dollars, the piping on their pockets or Big Sweety’s elbow patches could be gold...)

Sorry. Back on track now. So, keeping with the nostalgic themes for the Sweeties, I’d like to see the seven of us in pieces of vintage sportswear, and each of us representing a different sport. I’m not sure it matters who represents which sport, though if I were to make the executive decision, I’d put everyone in the costume that made the least sense/made them look the most ridiculous.

 For example, what if Jake were dressed in a turn-of-the-century style bathing costume - the funny, multi-colored striped ones shaped like pajamas?

Perhaps, just for silliness’ sake, one of us is dressed as a jockey?

One of us could be in a Three-Stooges-esque golfing outfit, with the puffy pants and silly page-boy hat.

Someone could be in a 1960s bowling shirt and shoes.

I really want one of us to be in the short-shorts, knee-socks, and tank tops of the basketball uniforms of old. This person MUST wear sweatbands around his wrists and head.

Someone could be in the 40s-style leather football helmet and jersey, sans pads.

Someone, probably one of the girls, could be in a flapper-era tennis costume, with the pleated skirt and the cloche hat.

Someone could be in the striped, button-front style basbeball uniform circa Joe DiMaggio. (I would like this someone to be me, simply because I love baseball, but I’d be willing to trade if someone else were really passionate about it.)

As far as the color scheme, though our pieces may not match, I feel that color-wise, we should all be in the same palette. I want us to look like a Norman Rockwell painting when we’re onstage as a collective unit.  I envision us as sandlot kids - baseball field browns, whites, sky blues, sunshine yellows, dingy greys like play clothes that have been washed too many times, grass stains on knees, butts, and elbows, messy hair, scrapes on arms, legs, and faces - the idea behind the look being that we’re a rag tag, rowdy bunch of neighborhood kids - innocent, maybe a little naive, but tough and able to take on the bad guy.. Maybe one of us should have a black eye?

 -Lauren

Magic

In the draft of the script that currently stands (and will be read publically on Monday night, December 5, 2011, at 8pm in the Thrust Theatre for those who are interested!) there’s a quote that I have found particularly meaningful, and I think my cohorts have become rather attached to it, as well. It’s from a blog called “A Fan for All Seasons,” posted October 22, 2010. We’re using a cutting of it in the script, but for your reading pleasure, here’s the whole thing:

"To commit to a side is to be a fan; to be a fan is noble. Sports are an escape for us but also an anchor. We live through our athletes, we share their pain and their gain. Professional and Olympic sports are grown men or women getting paid (or getting sponsorships) to do what they love in

format where they are constantly tested against others who grew up being ‘The Best’. To witness someone struggle and fall, only to lift themselves back up and attain the sweet reward, that is why we watch, that is why it is compelling. It is real. It’s not a movie. It is us. That’s someone’s son, someone’s dad, someone’s brother. For the sports fan an image can stay with us like a loved one, like a memory of something beautiful that can never fully be replicated. In that moment you feel you’ve almost become that person’s family and you grieve and you hope and you celebrate as if nothing else mattered. Sport satisfies our need to hope, to feel there is something pure, like the image of arms hoisting the trophy, the winner kissing their sweetheart, the loser screaming into the grass, the goat weeping into two hands, or the veteran waving to the crowd as he exists his last game. In an era of text messages and pop-up ads, it’s good to FEEL something. In the end, we're all kids. It's not just about being in a packed stadium rocking the foundation with sound. It's about looking at an empty stadium and feeling hope."

            Reading over this again, even having read it fifty times already, it gives me a strange sort of clean feeling, like the calm before the storm. It’s the same feeling I get before I walk onstage opening night, or before I enter the cemetery at a funeral. It’s a feeling of anticipation and readiness and a certain amount of confidence that I know I have the strength to do what has to be done. It’s funny to me that words from some strangers blog about sports could give me that feeling. I wonder if it does the same thing for other people?

            I also wonder if theatre can do this for people - if an image from a show can stay with a person “like a loved one.” When we, as spectators, look at an empty stage, what do we feel? Do we hold the actors onstage dear to our hearts? Do we rejoice in their triumph and despair in their downfall - or, are we smug in their defeat, complacent when they do well? Does an empty stage fill a modern audience with anxiety and dread?

            Certainly, it’s different for everyone. Speaking for myself, an empty stage is, and for my entire life has been, something magical. I remember walking onto the stage at the Grand Ole Opry a few years ago, the stage at the New Amsterdam in New York City, and Ford’s Theatre in Washington, D.C. I remember working my way through the mysterious underbelly of the Drury Lane theater in London. I remember the first time I set foot onto my high school’s stage, my elementary school’s oversized platform, my church’s altar... every time, everywhere, it’s been that same magical feeling - that sense of the calm before the storm. It’s like a sixth sense comes alive and reacts to an unseen current of energy in the air.

            Does everyone get to experience that feeling? Does everyone have that little touch of magic in their lives - that feeling that anything is possible? I hope so. I can’t imagine how dull my life would be without it.

-Lauren

A Little Psychology for Ya

Hello, there!

MUCH earlier in the semester, we all created research presentations on different aspects of the sports world - economics, social class, rivalries, etc. My presentation was on the psychology of the sports fan. We seem to be coming back to some of these topics fairly readily in the script, and so I thought it would be a good idea to explain a little more just what we’re talking about.

Let’s start with some science words. (Have you had your coffee yet? Good!)

There’s a certain aspect of neurology associated with fandom (not just of sports, but of anything, really) involving something called the mesolimbic system - which, basically, functions as a link between the opiodergic system and the dopaminergic systerm.

The opiodergic system controls our enjoyment of external stimuli. (Notice the root is similar to the word opiate, opium, etc?) When you really like something, it’s because these little things called opiods are finding lots of opiod receptors in your brain and latching on, creating a pleasant chemical reaction.

The dopaminergic system governs our want-to function. We receive a certain stimuli (like the smell of fresh cookies) which we’ve learned to associate with another stimuli ( the taste of fresh cookies) and, therefore, we are drawn toward that stimuli (or, pushed away, if the association was unpleasant.) This is the part of the brain that make Pavlovian conditioning (remember the dogs and the bell?) possible.

Combined, these two systems make up the mesolimbic system, which evolved to drive us toward things like food and sex, but other stuff sometimes gets caught up by it. When someone is a REALLY big fan of something, it’s because their opiodergic (liking) response is spilling over and causing a big reaction in their dopaminergic (wanting) center.

Another funny little brain function that contributes to fandom is something called a mirror neuron. A mirror neuron is partly responsible for our ability to sympathize with others, because it gives us the ability to put ourselves in someone else’s shoes. Have you ever read a book and imagined yourself as the main character? You can thank your mirror neurons for that. Have you ever caught yourself behaving like that character in real life (maybe pretending your pencil is a magic wand, or quoting a line of dialogue in the context of your everyday speech?) You can thank your mirror neurons for that. A sports fan’s mirror neurons allow that fan to put him/herself in the place of their favourite athlete, sometimes so much so that they feel wins, losses, and good and bad plays as keenly as if they were actually a part of the game!

            Finally, I’d like to talk a little about testosterone. You’re probably familiar with this as the “male” hormone, which contributes to things like aggression, sex drive, and the growth of body hair. You’d be correct, but don’t forget that, just like estrogen, testosterone is present in both sexes. It may seem like a no-brainer that people watching a sporting event experience elevated levels of testosterone... but it may surprise you that this surge follows the same pattern as male animals in the wild fighting over a potential mate. That’s right - watching sports makes you horny (IF you’re a fan.) The more you identify with a team, the hornier their success with make you. In fact, studies have shown that the level of arousal experienced by an avid fan watching their team win was comparable to that same fan being shown erotic images!

That’s all for now - catch you on the flip side.

-Lauren

Design Statement #1

I’m double dipping a little with this blog post and going back to the idea of what our villain should look like. Each of us has been asked to create a design statement for the show, and for mine, I’d like to focus on the honchos and minions of Big Sweetie’s Super Fried Sugar Burgers with extra Lard Balls (tm).

A design professor of mine used to have us start any design project by thinking about the element in question in terms of the five senses (sight, sound, touch, smell, and taste.) In terms of the Big Sweetie company, I think it would...

Look like a lot of fun! A Big Sweetie associate always has a smile on their face (even if that smile is slightly evocative of the cat who got the canary...) and each Big Sweetie store is flashy and bold, to catch your attention as you pass it on the highway.

Sound like the music of an ice cream truck, or carnival music... on the surface, it seems innocent and wholesome enough, but after a while becomes sinister and creepy.

Feel greasy. I made myself a couple of grilled cheese sandwiches over the break, and when I was done I noticed that my face, which had been bent over the stove, felt like it hadn’t been washed in days. My hands felt this way, too. Big Sweetie’s would feel like the inside of a bag of microwave popcorn... gross, but not so much that it stops you from reaching for more.

Smell delicious... for a while. When you first walk in the store, you would smell things like fresh baked breads and pies, savory meats and sweet, sugary drinks. After a while, however, that sweet smell would take on a sickly quality... like a baby’s spit-up. From spending all day in this environment, a Big Sweetie’s associate would reek of that too-sweet-sick smell.

Taste delicious... the Big Sweetie’s Super Fried Sugar Burger is just the right balance of sugary sweetness and savory meatiness. After a while, however, the thought of taking even one more bite is sickening.

The five-senses work through helps me come up with images true to the world of the play and the world of the character. The representatives of Big Sweetie’s, then, whether present on stage or represented in commercials, should have the innocent, clean-cut look of a 1950s soda jerk - paper triangle hat, pink striped shirt, bow tie and a white apron. The evil “tell” would be evident in the makeup design - the hair should be greasy and dirty under the hat, the skin an unhealthy yellow-green color, perhaps even acne-like patches of rotting skin on the face, and sunken, dull, corpse-like eyes. The Boss’s costume design could incorporate some of those same wholesome 1950s-style elements, just bumped up the social ladder: keeping the pink striped shirt and bowtie, but put on a suit jacket instead of an apron. The makeup design would be essentially the same, but I would like to see the eyes of the Boss even more drastically sunken and hollow, rimmed in reds, with puffy purple-green bags underneath. I also am fond of the image of the Boss smoking a cigar or a pipe, but in keeping with that faux-innocence, it could be a bubblegum cigar or a bubble pipe.

- Lauren

Bad Guys

In our most recent session, the Tuesday before Turkey Day break, the question was raised about how we should represent the “bad guys” in our story - The Big Sweetie’s Deep Fried Sugar Burgers with extra Lard Balls (tm.) I’ve been letting this idea bounce around in my head over this holiday weekend - a good one for thinking about junk food, at that!

            I don’t own a television, so needless to say I watch a LOT of TV when I’m home at my parents’ house, and I’ve been paying attention to food and candy commercials recently. I’ve notices a few common threads:

            Primary Colors. The color scheme in almost all the food and candy commercials I’ve seen over the break use your basic 8 Crayola colors. They’re bright, happy, warm, and inviting.

            Childhood. It’s a no-brainer that holiday candy commercials would feature children, considering Moms and Dads are getting ready for Saint Nick to fill up stockings with melt-y gooey goodness in just a few weeks - but even restaurant commercials either directly depict or make references to childhood. Consider, if you will, the Burger King commercial where the dude is ashamed to eat a Whopper because of his really tiny hands. Where is he talking to his buddy? A playground! I suppose this makes sense. When we were children, we were constantly encouraged to eat. At my house, a clean plate was rewarded with all sorts of wonderful things - dessert, a trip to the movies, the doll I’d been begging for, and on and on. As adults, we’re encouraged to WATCH WHAT WE EAT!!! Count carbs and calories, diet, exercise, worry about what certain foods will to to our cholesterol and acid reflux - there’s no reward in eating as an adult. Maybe that’s why these commercials are always triggering that memory of mom telling us to clean our plates - they want to remind us of what it flt like when eating anything at all was rewarded.

            Slogans. True, every company these days has a slogan or a jingle... but I would bet good money that the most memorable ones have something to do with food. For one thing, they’re super short - two or three words, tops. The words themselves are short, and upwardly inflected. Not to mention, these slogans get reinforced with FOOD - the thought of food while watching TV, or actual food in the store.

            Deals - Again, many companies advertise deals and specials... I’m thinking specifically of “value meal” commercials. It’s like there’s a competition to see who can stuff the most fatty food into the public for the least amount of money.

Keeping that in mind, what should our “bad guy” look like? Someone mentioned the McDonald’s Hamburglar character, another suggested a corporate fat cat... things to think about. 

-Lauren

Warm Fuzzies

Hello, all! Sorry that I’ve been MIA, but I’m back!

Working on this script has been a wonderful experience. Honestly, when we were first getting started, I had a few reservations about what it would be like to work together on a piece like this. I’ve done a bit of playwriting before, but I’ve never collaborated on a script. Ever. I was nervous about my own ability to give and take on ideas and dialogue - would I become too married to my own work that I couldn’t allow the others to give input? Would my vision for the project become so strong in my head that I’d get a playwright’s version of tunnel vision? Of course, once I realized I was susceptible to this problem, I was worried my cohorts would be, as well. Yikes!

Thankfully, and knocking on cosmic wood, here, that hasn’t happened yet. We haven’t fought about ideas yet, or what should and shouldn’t go in the script. As it turns out, we’re making a really great team! I always look forwarded to devising with these folks. I get the sense that we’re pretty much on the same page regarding what we want to see happen, and lemme tell ya, that’s rare. Think about it: How often have you been put into a group of five for a project for English or Biology, and by the end of one week, you were ready to kill your partners? Or, perhaps, you were like me in school - once the other kids found out that you actually cared about your grades, AND you were smart, you got stuck doing all the work! I’m just so thankful that’s not happening. Shout out of love to my classmates!!

-Lauren

What's Funny?

Ever since we decided on our targeted communities, I’ve been thinking about our target audience. Who should enjoy this play the most? Obviously we want everyone who sees this to love it, but there are definitely people we should focus on. Theater and sports are pretty broad categories, but I want people associated with those areas to experience this play on higher level than other audience members. Even though I generally frown on this, I feel like this is the sort of thing where we can include a bunch of inside jokes that our communities will immediately understand. I think one of the Cornerstone readings discusses this too, but since we are righting this play about, for and through these community members, I feel like it’s only natural that they enjoy this even more than the general public.

At this point, most of the script is completed and we have a good idea of what we’re doing. But as we refine and edit our play, I want us to plug in some more references for sports and theatre people. We already have some: “We can’t split up; this isn’t a Solo Command Performance,” the acting warm-ups, Bradyman, etc. But I feel like we can do a lot more. A lot of ideas have come up in our improv sessions and we really just need to sit down and work them in.

But, that also brings up the point that we don’t want there to be so many inside jokes that anyone on the outside is lost and confused. There’s definitely a distinct balance, but I feel like a lot of the sports-themed references could reach more people than the theatre ones. Maybe we can get community members involved in picking these inside jokes, helping us know what seems funny to them in what situation? They might even be able to generate some ideas of their own that we can work in.

Design Proposal

1. Forum

I’ve thought a lot about making the stage floor look like the “stage” of some sporting event. There are a lot to choose from: basketball, football, soccer, baseball, tennis, track and field, etc, but I don’t want necessarily to single out one sport over the other. That is why I propose our floor be a combination sports floors. Like a basketball court that has a double border (like tennis); it should also have lines running horizontally like in football, and those lines should be delineated by yards. I’d also like to see the three-point semicircle turned into the rectangle that is around the goal in soccer. If we could find a way to turn the half-court circle into the boundaries of shot-put, that would be great too. In terms of a backdrop, I think we are all agreed that we need to have a giant chalk board, but I would love it if it were the skyline of Louisville. Or maybe a “skyline” of the University of Louisville? Either way, I’d also like steps leading up to a platform where the scout can draw the door, it opens, the scout enters, it closes, and the scout escapes down stairs behind the chalk board backdrop.
Budget: 30fl oz of Rustoleum Specialty Chalk Board Paint: $11.90 from Sears

I figured we would need 3-5 cans.

For painting lines on the “field” we can find very cheap white paint at The Home Depot - $12.97 for a gallon of tintable white paint.

I’m not sure about how much lumber costs.

2. Facsimilies

I’d love for each realm to use UofL signage and icons pertaining to the particular sport(s) being played. For example, maybe the Sex, Pleasure, Fun realm could take place at Papa John’s Cardinal Stadium (and have all the signage, slogans, jumbo-trons, fonts, etc., associated with it) since this is where Tom Brady, the football superhero shows up. I’d also love to see a slide show of mascots when the mascot tells his/her origin story. Most if not all of the audience member will recognize these images of previous incarnations of our mascot, and should relate to them.

3. Folk

In terms of reflecting local culture, I think it is important to remind the audience about Louisville with things like, “keep Louisville weird,” The Kentucky Derby (and its associated events, e.g. Thunder Over Louisville, The Great Balloon Glow/Race, The Pegasus Parade, etc), Lebowski Fest, Kentucky Shakes (which would be über-easy to incorporate), the Pride Festvities, St. James Court Art Show, The Louisville Slugger Museum, ear-X-tacy, etc… I’m not exactly sure how to incorporate any of these just yet. It will require some class discussion and collaboration. This may be a part of the facsimilies, or it could be as easy as adding the names of some of these events to the clothing we wear.

4. Found

I would love, love, love it if we could ask our interviewees for their own sports memorabilia (i.e. jerseys, gloves, hats, cleats, bats, balls, etc) and frame them. Then we can hang them on the walls of the thrust as if they were the sports heroes of the hall of fame, or of those athletes hanging on the walls of arenas. Maybe we could get a hold of their trophies (including real trophies for accomplishments, and mental trophies like leg braces, splints, etc).

5. Fabrication

I’m not sure if we can actually get those people of the sports community to make some of our props, costumes, or set decorations, but if we could, that would be awesome. Perhaps we could invite them to help build the set, as long as Charles would be okay with that? Or maybe spend an afternoon/evening helping us paint?

6. Costumes

I think that our costumes need to be as realistic as possible. Yes, this play is a fantasy, but it needs to be real. I’m thinking jerseys, uniforms, and then everyday street clothes. I don’t think it would be too hard to find this stuff cheap, as well as creating it cheap. Also, in order to keep things inexpensive, we could just use small props to create the illusion of characters. We need cheerleaders? Dress them in black, slap a “letterman’s jacket insignia” across their chest, and give them pom-poms. Boom. Cheerleaders. Same thing for coaches or even referees, unless we want the mascot to be the only ref. Just give them a whistle, a clipboard, and a hat.