Update to the Mini-update

I went over to Toronto Cold Reads.  It was kind of odd, since very few actors turned up.  I heard that it was considerably fewer than usual.  I was actually recruited to play a couple of roles in a screenplay.  I wasn't expecting that, though there was one time I thought I would get press-ganged into reading at SFYS.  It does seem that it skews a bit older than SFYS, though that may just have been because the youngsters all stayed home (perhaps too glum to come out and play after Election Day).  It may also be harder to get people to come out every week, as opposed to once a month for SFYS.

I like the fact that it is a non-judgmental space, though I myself might be judgmental afterwards.  I only liked two of the four original pieces (one was actually pretty dreadful), and the translation was reasonable, but I have my doubts about submitting a translation of someone else's work to a series like this.  I basically felt far too many of the pieces had too many parts (especially the screenplay), though I suppose The Study Group will have too many characters as well and even some doubling (or there could be doubling, but I am starting to doubt the wisdom of that).  I really don't care for screenplays in these cold reading series (and I don't think they encouraged them at SFYS) because 1) they have too many parts and 2) there are far too many short scenes and jump cuts.  That is fine as far as it goes (on television), though honestly it has become a total cliche, and personally I'd like to see scenes develop a lot longer than television apparently allows.  Really the problem is when screenplay techniques migrate over to live theatre where they just don't work at all.

I might return, but probably only if my piece on the 7-Eleven is accepted.  Maybe I'll change my mind (after all, it is way closer to my house than the Storefront Theatre).  I did no networking at all tonight, and I generally am not any better at SFYS.  I guess I feel a bit of a fraud without having an actual project to promote, and I haven't decided how far to take any of these various pieces.  I guess I just need to push through and finish one or two and then decide what to do next.  On the way to and from the Social Capital bar and even while waiting for the evening's events to kick off, I managed to get another two pages of The Study Group done, so now I just need to integrate it back into the rest of the piece.  I'm trying to block out the rest of the piece, so I can tell just how long it really ought to be.  I'm starting to think 70 minutes might be the right length.  Anyway, if there is anything interesting on that front I will come back with another update.