No Disrespect

April 4th, 2008Blog0 comments

Article here from 2005 quoting Dell’s then-CEO: [The iPod] is a “fad”, a “one product wonder.” [Via Daring Fireball.]

Moral of the story: Never diss the competition. Doing so automatically shuts off your brain to what the competition may be doing successfully. The competition should always be studied carefully, and its successful techniques should be absorbed and improved upon. And then you should say that you actually invented it first.

I’m putting together new blurb pages on Year Zero and Build, my new plays.

Year Zero is about young Cambodian Americans in Long Beach. I try to be authentic when it comes to cultural details, but — and this is a controversial choice for me — the needs of storytelling sometimes trump authenticity.

For instance there’s this Cambodian folk tale that I wanted to use in the play. I decided to simplify it for the needs of the story. In my version, a king travels to a foreign land, learns magic to help his people (grow crops, make rain, etc.), and on the way back runs out of food. He decides to use his magic to transform into a tiger so he can catch some food. And after he does so, he likes life as a tiger so much that he forgets to transform back. Indeed, he forgets that he was ever human.

The story is a mirror of a particular character in the play, and one of its themes is reincarnation. So I felt that modifying the folk tale was permissible.

In the original folk tale it’s the king’s whole traveling party (queen, court advisers, etc.) that transforms into a single tiger. The court advisers become the legs, the queen becomes the body or something, and the king turns into the head.

And I just put it together: Did the ancient Cambodians fucking invent VOLTRON?!

In addition:

Flight of the Conchords: The full 15-song album, studio recorded and remastered. Arriving April 22nd. So excited!

Monologues

April 2nd, 2008Blog0 comments

I just got home tonight as it started to rain. I went to UCLA’s Powell Library, lifted it up and turned it upside down and shook it until everything Spalding Gray related fell out.

I get totally addicted to a certain author and find myself sucked into reading everything they’ve ever written. The last time this happened was with Vonnegut a couple of months ago. It’s kind of a powerful, creepy thing — like meeting a new friend you can’t get enough of.

In Addition: Deep-Fried Hamburgers.

Swimming

April 1st, 2008Blog2 comments

I got Monster in a Box through Netflix because I was curious about Spalding Gray’s monologues. I wanted to check out his technique for storytelling.

I loved it, so I got Swimming to Cambodia next. I loved that, so I Googled to see what he’s up to now.

It turns out that he committed suicide in 2004.

I had read this back in 2004 but hadn’t made the connection. Now I’m sad and frustrated.

Man, is this some epic storytelling. How does he do it?

There’s definitely a rhythm to his performance. Building, explosion, quieting down, building again, explosion, quieting down. Also, he twists and turns, surprises you. Sets you up for one thing but does something else, like Daniel Johnston.

The lesson to take from this for me is this: A law of the universe is that time moves in one direction. Forward. And one of the most powerful aspects of storytelling is the juxtaposition of images, ideas, sounds from one moment to the next. One moment: “I’m going to Grandma’s house.” Cut to: Body floating in a river. There is power in the incredible leap from one moment to the next. The listener/viewer/reader’s mind boggles as it tries to figure out what the fuck just happened.

It’s mindbottling, I tells ya!

So sad that Spalding Gray is no longer with us. All there is to do is to read/view everything he’s ever done.

IN ADDITION: The best sports article I’ve read in a long while: Chasing Jose by Pat Jordan.