As I have stated before, I mostly use this website as a kind of portfolio of my creative projects. I have also been doing a kind of year-in-review report since 2012 (here's 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018 and 2019). This past year was challenging for many people, not just me, and for one overriding reason: Covid-19. Everything pretty much came to an abrupt halt in March of this year. Theatres closed. Travel stopped. Social distancing became a thing. Everything turned inward. There was a lot more consumption that production. So, with that in mind here’s the sparse artistic happenings that occurred for me in 2020...
I did not get an illustrious start to the year. In fact, I didn't really do much besides my day job for the first few virus-free months of 2020. My day job involves me teaching college students about theatre and cinema. These classes moved from on campus to an online format starting in mid-March. The online format continued throughout the fall semester.
Created a "digital theatre" piece for a local festival
Perhaps the most substantial project I did this past year was a "digital theatre" project for the 22nd Annual Festival of Independent Theatres. Originally, the FIT was planned for the summer. It traditionally happens in the July and August. It was, of course, cancelled this year as theatres shut down everywhere. I had pitched a project to the FIT back in early March through my theatre company Audacity Theatre Lab, so when it was announced they would instead do an online version of the FIT this year in the autumn, Audacity was on the list of previous applicants who were commissioned to participate. Since the traditional in-front-of-a-live-audience theatre project I had originally pitched wasn't going to work, I proposed devising a completely new work that would be tailor-made for streaming in an online video format. The result was Daylan Hillis in Space.
I pulled in my friend and sometime collaborator Jeff Hernandez to be my co-writer. Then I called up Jeff Swearingen, an actor and good friend who I've worked with a lot in the past. Over a few weeks, the script took shape and then Swearingen and I recorded the three-part monologue.
The blurb for the show went thus: Security guard Daylan Hillis feels underappreciated in his job at a top secret government facility. One night his otherwise boring shift is interrupted by an encounter with strange intruders and a chance to show what he is really capable of.
The piece played "on demand" from October 8 - 31 and seemed to be well-recieved. Good critical feedback as well. Only one review came out where it seemed that the reviewer was way off in the understanding the project.
Along with the project itself, we put together a few behind-the-scenes videos as well. Here's one.
If you wanna see the full project, head... HERE. It is 38 minutes of wonderful weirdness.
Did some world-building for a giant audio theatre piece
The other "big" project I was part of this year was through the college I work at. Since classes were to be conducted online this past fall, I collaborated with two fellow teachers to brainstorm and come up with a unique audio theatre project that the students could help devise and then record and submit from their homes. The other two teachers were full-time faculty while I was the only part-time adjunct involved. The project was called A Blast in Kranesville.
The project took several months and my contribution was mainly in the initial concept and world-building of the piece. I was inspired by the 2013 real-life explosion in West, Texas as well as the psychological effects that the lockdown was having on daily life from the current 2020 pandemic. I also initially wanted it to have a tone sort of like Welcome to Night Vale, though the tone took on a more sincere quality once the students started writing their own monologues.
The premise involved a fictional small town in rural Texas. An explosion happens at a mysterious long-closed factory at the edge of town, resulting in tremors and a weird green mist that seeps up from the ground. A shadowy government agency shows up and locks down the entire town for several weeks. The citizens of the town, sequestered in their own homes for this extent of time each are faced with their own frustrations, confusion and reflections.
Though I led five students through the process of creating and performing original character monologues, I am most proud of the wiki I created that provided background for the town of Kranesville. Read it... HERE.
If you are into projects performed by college students, you can listen to the actual project... HERE.
I currently have 104 subscribers (up 64 from last year). According to the analytics, in 2020 I had 13,532 views and racked up 1,061 total watch hours, so that was kind of great.
My friend Jaymes Gregory used his down time in lockdown this past year to start a delightful new podcast called Welcome to Jaymesville. It is part Pairie Home Campanion part 60 Minutes and part Welcome to Nightvale, all refracted through the slightly off mind of Jaymes Gregory. He featured me on episode 8.
I started a new series on the http://TheSoloPerformer.blogspot.com/ website called "Inspiring the Show." It is a look at how a cross-section of solo performers got the idea for and then went on to develop their shows. Here's David Mogolov on his show Eating My Garbage and Leslie Tsina on her show Lord of the Files. More in this series are coming in 2021.
When I created Daylan Hillis I was interviewed by Cristee Cook of Dallas Art Beat. It came out as a fun little piece.
Perhaps you would be interested in adding more excitement and romance, adventure and intrigue to your life. If that's the case, I don't know what to tell you. But I would suggest you subscribe to my newsletter. I mean, who knows? Life is full of surprises. I only send stuff out occassionally, but it is good stuff. Hit the button below...
