I went home and did just what he said I'd do.

I now have three all-time favorite unforgettable best pieces of theater art and a second most timely for me as a person work.

Single-moment-in-time-stretching-away-into-the-distance performances, in chronological order of my seeing them:

1. My hero Mary Zimmerman's The Secret In The Wings (Seattle Rep). Simply, it was a bridge between two parts of my life and had everything my girl's heart could dream and everything my woman's soul could need.
   
2. Elevator Repair Service's 6+ hour word-for-word performance of F. Scott Fitzgerald's grim tragedy of undying love, The Great Gatsby: Gatz. Set in a banal office, there is silence, then chaos, then silence again and I was fully entranced for the entire length.
3. How Theater Failed America by Mike Daisey.
   

Most Heartbreaking Reflection Of My Life performances:

1. Rent by Jonathan Larson. I was 20, has just had my first psychiatric hospitalization, and was an acting student living in Manhattan.
2. How Theater Failed America by Mike Daisey.
   

Last night I saw Mike Daisey perform his newest show, How Theater Failed America. If you don't know about him you may still have heard or read him, as he is not only an actor, writer, and fat man who sits at a table, he is also a commentator for NPR and writes for several magazines. I had seen him previously in his break-out 21 Dog Years At Amazon.com ten years ago so I knew what to expect: a sweaty fat man sitting at a table that you cannot take your eyes off of. Talking. Just...talking. And drinking water.

The basic premise of the show is the imminent economic failure of regional theater, which is largely uninteresting to anyone outside of theater and a terrifying white elephant to anyone inside of it. It tells nothing new. Most art does not tell a new story.

However, it struck me, and I had, at the end, one of those tunnel vision moments at the end, where he is speaking only to me, looking only at me, as though hundreds of other people were not present and we were alone together in the dark. He had spoken about his suicide attempts and being saved by work, nothing but work. Art, starvation, nothing but ramen for months, but it gave him life. And then he said, Go. Go do this work. Be as luminous as I know you are, as you know you are, because this is not political commentary or a failing industry but the only thing that will give you life. Go, work, and Godspeed.

I have no money. I have ten dollars to live on until the 15th and I have 2/3 of a large container of plain non-fat yoghurt in my fridge, uncooked soba in my cupboard, two large containers of salt, and a jar of honey. No produce, no fruits or veggies or anything unless my wonderful big sister buys me apples and carrots tomorrow at the farmer's market. I barely work and don't know if I can manage more hours. But I can't, literally, live another day like this.

The part of my brain that understands money is fatally broken. Things appear, or they do not. This simply is and is not connected to any other function. (I am not this way when I run a business, however.) I do understand that I am dying, right now, and if do not do something right this very fucking moment that very soon it may be too late for me. I cannot wait, it is an imperative.

So. So I guess that I am going to quit Balagan. They are doing nothing that I want to do; they are the Boston Pops performing an over-produced Copeland and I am Jimi Hendrix. The current season is full of large, ensemble casts of solid, proven works with moderate production values and not enough rehearsal time lead by an already-bloated, squabbling administrative team that I could come back and save (I would be very good at that) but, since it already sent me to the hospital, I feel that would be inadvisable. I want to see a man hang upside down in leather and spikes playing Moliere by candlelight for nine people. I want to have five people in panda suits eat sushi in a five-star sushi restaurant. I want to produce Hamlet in Space and cast rock stars who wear body glitter. I want to make punk rock theater. I want to be happy, not broken-hearted; free, not bound; alive, not dead. I feel cheated and tired and I have only thiiiiiis much left to live for.

So. To work, then.