Monday, December 29, 2008
FEELING A BIT "LEAR-Y"
I have, in the past on this blog, made one or two comments to the fact that I am becoming, at least psychologically, a "coot."
This past weekend I've been feeling it physically, as well.
Last Friday, I did something really cootish: I tripped over my dog.
It wasn't Dweezil's fault; I knew he was sitting at my feet when I got up out of my chair but somehow, I mispositioned (is that a word? Well, you know what I mean) my feet and toppled right over the pooch. He didn't even move, but I landed squarely on my knees. The right knee took the bulk of my weight and I've been limping quite cootishly ever since. It still hurts but it's getting better.
The thing is, I KNOW people half my age are looking at me and thinking, "man, look at that old limping guy."
This is instead of what they usually think, which is nothing, since once you turn about 40 years old you become completely invisible to anybody younger than that.
Think about it. (This may just be a guy thing; ladies, please weigh in if I'm wrong.) You're walking through the mall, ogling the eye candy (i.e. late teens and twentysomethings). You can stare right at them, and they won't even look you in the eye. Hell, they don't even acknowledge that you're there at all. This is because you are invisible to them.
I take note of nearly everyone I pass in a shopping mall. Their faces say a lot. (Admittedly, other body parts say a lot too, especially in Phoenix, in the summer, when ladies throw caution to the winds and wear well-worn white halter tops or tube tops because the law says you have to wear something.
At least in my cootness I can still appreciate the female form. Regardless of what it looks like. Fat, skinny, tall, short, they're women. And I still like to look at them.
I once heard my 83-year old grandfather, shortly before he died, say to my dad: "Jerry, if I ever stop looking at women, bury me." Ol' Gramps was good to his word; while dying of Valley Fever in a hospital ICU, hooked up on breathing machines and unable to talk, he apparently spent several of his last moments writing dirty notes to his nurses. In other words, he lived life to the end.
So did Cliff White, who died on Friday at, coincidentally, age 83.
Most of you didn't know him. Cliff was a drama professor at Northern Arizona University from 1968 until he retired in 1992. He was so good at what he did, the University named its creative arts theatre after him a year later, and never really let him retire. I would constantly hear stories through the 90s that Cliff was "just filling in" for a teacher who'd left the employ of the university, or "just teaching a class to keep his hand in it," but anyone who knew him knew better. Drama was literally Cliff's life. After retiring, he and his wife, Doris, became the main proponents of community theatre in Flagstaff, and he continued to direct plays on and off pretty much up to the end.
Dr. White was the epitome of perfection in dramatics. As somebody once said of him, you don't have a building named after you at NAU by doing things half-way. To that end, working with, or being taught by, Cliff White could be very , very frustrating, infuriating and irritating, but you know what? You usually came away with something from it that you find yourself using in your daily life without even thinking about it.
I was a drama minor, so I didn't participate in, or even try out for, every show at NAU while I was there (my major saw to that), but Cliff cast me in three of the four shows I was in while at NAU. (The other show was directed by Doris -- no directorial slouch, either.) The first time I tried out for him, I was a freshman, kinda full of myself and he saw that, but told me, "keep trying out. I'm gonna use you one of these days. I'm just not sure where yet." True to his word, the very next show I tried out for, he gave me a very nice part.
I always got along with him, perhaps because I wasn't a drama major. For all the stories I have been reading from other folks who knew Cliff, for every fun story, there's one where he quite simply pissed somebody off to the point of near fisticuffs.
I met Janice trying out for a Cliff White show. She ended up being head of props for the production ("Paint Your Wagon").
Her favorite Cliff White story is one of frustration.
(Here's me, dressed as a miner in "Paint Your Wagon.")
"It's a play about miners," Jan said the other day, "so if you're a miner, you're going to need a shovel. But Dr. White didn't want just any shovels for the miners. He wanted PERIOD, 1848 shovels. Oh, and they had to be BRAND NEW, 1848-period shovels, because in the play, the miners are coming out of a store where they just bought the shovels.
" We went to, or called, every place in Flagstaff that might have sold shovels. I brought in many different perfectly good shovels that Dr. White refused to use. 'Too new. Not period.' 'That's better, but it's used! It has to be new!' I got so desperate I went to another drama professor and asked what I should do. 'Stick to your guns,' she said. 'Sometimes Dr. White forgets that we're in Flagstaff, Arizona and not on Broadway.' We eventually reached a compromise, but it took a long time to get there."
Cliff never stopped calling Janice "Props." Thing is, he probably left a mark on her, too. Since we're both now members of Romantasy Cabaret, a variety show with ever-changing skits, Jan has become one hell of a prop maker. There is a streetlight in our house at the moment for a skit we have yet to AUDITION. Jan built it. Agonized over the exact height for a week. That's Cliff White working in there.
Like I said, Cliff White was a perfectionist. Apparently right down to when it came to stuff like shoveling snow off his driveway. "Why let some kid do it?" I'm sure he was thinking. " I'll do it, and I'll know it's done to my satisfaction."
Shoveling the driveway was the last thing Cliff did. He had a heart attack, living life right to the end.
------
The most interesting part I ever got from Cliff White was a small part as a guard in NAU's production of "King Lear" in 1978. The technical name of this part is "Second Servant." In the scene, The Earl of Cornwall has just gouged out the eyes of the Earl of Gloucester. (Read the play.) After Cornwall and Lear's treacherous daughter Regan run out of the room, I and "Third Servant" (First servant was killed in the same scene about two minutes ago), take pity on the blinded man and try to figure out what to do with/for him:
Second Servant: I'll never care what wickedness I do,
If this man come to good.
Third Servant: If she live long,
And in the end meet the old course of death,
Women will all turn monsters.
Second Servant: Let's follow the old earl, and get the Bedlam
To lead him where he would: his roguish madness
Allows itself to any thing.
Third Servant: Go thou: I'll fetch some flax and whites of eggs
To apply to his bleeding face. Now, heaven help him!
"The Bedlam" is a character named Edgar, who's actually quite sane but forced to pretend he's a nutcase. (Read the play.)
Now, here's why I remember this little jaunt. Later on in the play, Gloucester is in fact led to the white cliffs of Dover and reunited with Edgar, who is actually his son and not crazy, as I mentioned. HOWEVER, in the NAU version of this play, when Gloucester is finally delivered to Edgar at Dover, Second and Third Servant (me and the other guy) are NOT the two guys delivering Gloucester to his son!
This was because Cliff wanted to be sure that everybody who got into the show got to say something. So two other guys who hadn't had a line yet got their lines to say.
The four of us used to joke about this. We created a whole subtext: Servant Three and I headed off to Dover with the blind guy, but it was cold and rainy, and with all the pubs in the area, we all went inside and had a couple of pints. Too drunk to continue, we bribed two other guys in the pub to take Gloucester there.
That makes sense, right?
------
Does anybody out there have a floor-standing easel I can borrow? I really need it...
TT
I have, in the past on this blog, made one or two comments to the fact that I am becoming, at least psychologically, a "coot."
This past weekend I've been feeling it physically, as well.
Last Friday, I did something really cootish: I tripped over my dog.
It wasn't Dweezil's fault; I knew he was sitting at my feet when I got up out of my chair but somehow, I mispositioned (is that a word? Well, you know what I mean) my feet and toppled right over the pooch. He didn't even move, but I landed squarely on my knees. The right knee took the bulk of my weight and I've been limping quite cootishly ever since. It still hurts but it's getting better.
The thing is, I KNOW people half my age are looking at me and thinking, "man, look at that old limping guy."
This is instead of what they usually think, which is nothing, since once you turn about 40 years old you become completely invisible to anybody younger than that.
Think about it. (This may just be a guy thing; ladies, please weigh in if I'm wrong.) You're walking through the mall, ogling the eye candy (i.e. late teens and twentysomethings). You can stare right at them, and they won't even look you in the eye. Hell, they don't even acknowledge that you're there at all. This is because you are invisible to them.
I take note of nearly everyone I pass in a shopping mall. Their faces say a lot. (Admittedly, other body parts say a lot too, especially in Phoenix, in the summer, when ladies throw caution to the winds and wear well-worn white halter tops or tube tops because the law says you have to wear something.
At least in my cootness I can still appreciate the female form. Regardless of what it looks like. Fat, skinny, tall, short, they're women. And I still like to look at them.
I once heard my 83-year old grandfather, shortly before he died, say to my dad: "Jerry, if I ever stop looking at women, bury me." Ol' Gramps was good to his word; while dying of Valley Fever in a hospital ICU, hooked up on breathing machines and unable to talk, he apparently spent several of his last moments writing dirty notes to his nurses. In other words, he lived life to the end.
So did Cliff White, who died on Friday at, coincidentally, age 83.
Most of you didn't know him. Cliff was a drama professor at Northern Arizona University from 1968 until he retired in 1992. He was so good at what he did, the University named its creative arts theatre after him a year later, and never really let him retire. I would constantly hear stories through the 90s that Cliff was "just filling in" for a teacher who'd left the employ of the university, or "just teaching a class to keep his hand in it," but anyone who knew him knew better. Drama was literally Cliff's life. After retiring, he and his wife, Doris, became the main proponents of community theatre in Flagstaff, and he continued to direct plays on and off pretty much up to the end.
Dr. White was the epitome of perfection in dramatics. As somebody once said of him, you don't have a building named after you at NAU by doing things half-way. To that end, working with, or being taught by, Cliff White could be very , very frustrating, infuriating and irritating, but you know what? You usually came away with something from it that you find yourself using in your daily life without even thinking about it.
I was a drama minor, so I didn't participate in, or even try out for, every show at NAU while I was there (my major saw to that), but Cliff cast me in three of the four shows I was in while at NAU. (The other show was directed by Doris -- no directorial slouch, either.) The first time I tried out for him, I was a freshman, kinda full of myself and he saw that, but told me, "keep trying out. I'm gonna use you one of these days. I'm just not sure where yet." True to his word, the very next show I tried out for, he gave me a very nice part.
I always got along with him, perhaps because I wasn't a drama major. For all the stories I have been reading from other folks who knew Cliff, for every fun story, there's one where he quite simply pissed somebody off to the point of near fisticuffs.
I met Janice trying out for a Cliff White show. She ended up being head of props for the production ("Paint Your Wagon").
Her favorite Cliff White story is one of frustration.
(Here's me, dressed as a miner in "Paint Your Wagon.")
"It's a play about miners," Jan said the other day, "so if you're a miner, you're going to need a shovel. But Dr. White didn't want just any shovels for the miners. He wanted PERIOD, 1848 shovels. Oh, and they had to be BRAND NEW, 1848-period shovels, because in the play, the miners are coming out of a store where they just bought the shovels.
" We went to, or called, every place in Flagstaff that might have sold shovels. I brought in many different perfectly good shovels that Dr. White refused to use. 'Too new. Not period.' 'That's better, but it's used! It has to be new!' I got so desperate I went to another drama professor and asked what I should do. 'Stick to your guns,' she said. 'Sometimes Dr. White forgets that we're in Flagstaff, Arizona and not on Broadway.' We eventually reached a compromise, but it took a long time to get there."
Cliff never stopped calling Janice "Props." Thing is, he probably left a mark on her, too. Since we're both now members of Romantasy Cabaret, a variety show with ever-changing skits, Jan has become one hell of a prop maker. There is a streetlight in our house at the moment for a skit we have yet to AUDITION. Jan built it. Agonized over the exact height for a week. That's Cliff White working in there.
Like I said, Cliff White was a perfectionist. Apparently right down to when it came to stuff like shoveling snow off his driveway. "Why let some kid do it?" I'm sure he was thinking. " I'll do it, and I'll know it's done to my satisfaction."
Shoveling the driveway was the last thing Cliff did. He had a heart attack, living life right to the end.
------
The most interesting part I ever got from Cliff White was a small part as a guard in NAU's production of "King Lear" in 1978. The technical name of this part is "Second Servant." In the scene, The Earl of Cornwall has just gouged out the eyes of the Earl of Gloucester. (Read the play.) After Cornwall and Lear's treacherous daughter Regan run out of the room, I and "Third Servant" (First servant was killed in the same scene about two minutes ago), take pity on the blinded man and try to figure out what to do with/for him:
Second Servant: I'll never care what wickedness I do,
If this man come to good.
Third Servant: If she live long,
And in the end meet the old course of death,
Women will all turn monsters.
Second Servant: Let's follow the old earl, and get the Bedlam
To lead him where he would: his roguish madness
Allows itself to any thing.
Third Servant: Go thou: I'll fetch some flax and whites of eggs
To apply to his bleeding face. Now, heaven help him!
"The Bedlam" is a character named Edgar, who's actually quite sane but forced to pretend he's a nutcase. (Read the play.)
Now, here's why I remember this little jaunt. Later on in the play, Gloucester is in fact led to the white cliffs of Dover and reunited with Edgar, who is actually his son and not crazy, as I mentioned. HOWEVER, in the NAU version of this play, when Gloucester is finally delivered to Edgar at Dover, Second and Third Servant (me and the other guy) are NOT the two guys delivering Gloucester to his son!
This was because Cliff wanted to be sure that everybody who got into the show got to say something. So two other guys who hadn't had a line yet got their lines to say.
The four of us used to joke about this. We created a whole subtext: Servant Three and I headed off to Dover with the blind guy, but it was cold and rainy, and with all the pubs in the area, we all went inside and had a couple of pints. Too drunk to continue, we bribed two other guys in the pub to take Gloucester there.
That makes sense, right?
------
Does anybody out there have a floor-standing easel I can borrow? I really need it...
TT
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