Asking for Trouble 2012: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles on VHS

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There are many, many reasons to love Youngblood’s ASKING FOR TROUBLE, which opens tonight at EST at 7pm, but for me it comes down to the actors.

Man, these actors.

I’ve been working with three big talents – Merissa Czyz, Bob Jaffe, and Jay Patterson – and you should definitely come see them rock out my show, “Flannel and Lace,” as part of Series A tonight at 7pm, Thursday at 8:30pm and Saturday at 3pm. Stick around tonight for Series B at 8:30pm. In fact, see it all. It’s gonna be great.

But I’m posting on Youngblog for the second time in almost as many days (sorry) to comment on the role one of those actors has played in my development as an artist and human and why this has made my first A4T experience extra special.

My childhood was defined by VHS. I was part of the first wave of kids to have easy access to cheap on-demand video entertainment. It arrived in the form of boxy tapes you could rewind and rewatch to your heart’s content. And when I was a kid there was no VHS I watched more than the 1990 action blockbuster Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. I crushed that cassette.

Fast-forward to the A4T pick party a few weeks ago. I sat down after drawing the names of my actors and immediately began the necessary Google stalk. The instant I saw Jay Patterson's headshot I knew who he was, even before IMDB confirmed it.

Jay starred in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. 

He played Charles Pennington, the father of a troubled teenager who flees home to join archvillain Shredder’s dreaded ninja street gang, the Foot Clan. 

I have watched this man act more times than I'd care to admit. I have forced my brother to play him in backyard remakes of the movie while I played Shredder. To Jay this may have been just another gig. To us, this was the art that mattered, the art that taught us how to tell stories.

So I wrote a short where Jay plays an eight-year-old boy, Bob plays his older brother, and Merissa plays their mother. The three of them tell a story. For all the years my brother and I spent playing Jay, now Jay is playing us. 

And he is a fantastic actor – funny and scary and heartbreaking – as are Bob and Merissa. I could not be happier to be working with them and director Matt Dickson. If our play were a VHS, I’d order a pizza with anchovies and watch that sucker on repeat. Come out to EST this week and see for yourself.

We Got What We Asked For

In the end, who knows how many were there. How many beers were drunk, how many moves were busted. Who knows what props were misplaced, what lines reimagined. What laughs were got, what tears, what gasps. What songs were danced to, what cheers went up. When we staggered out of Ensemble Studio Theatre at 2am, at 3am, at 4, 5, 6am, did we see stars above us? Or were those just tears, reflecting the light of true happiness?

Yeah it was all of those things.

One of the appeals of Asking for Trouble is that although all start in the same place (on the 6th floor of EST, suddenly realizing we have no idea how to pronounce anybody's name ever) we end up in wildly different places. This year's plays were set in bars, on cruise ships, in apartments, on rooftops, in the ocean, in minor league baseball stadiums, on strange communes, and more. Our characters were creepy, funny, old, young, sweet, romantic, edible, high, squids, pilots, klutzes, and French. And yet--and yet!--there were convergences. The collective unconscious of Asking for Trouble, the river of panic that we all drew from drew forth:

- Two plays that featured body-swapping of a sort
- Two plays that featured headlamps
- Two plays requiring ridiculous mascot costumes
- Two plays with dance numbers
- 2 Carols
- 2 Sashas
- And lots and lots of partial male nudity

Asking for Trouble 2011 was a blast. Thank you, so much, to everyone who made it possible and to everyone who showed up and supported. See you next year.

Asking For Trouble Starts Tonight! Also More Videos!

When I say trouble you say asking trouble
ASKING
trouble
ASKING
trouble but how's it going? You ask? Well:



Huh, okay, well, hopefully you guys have some provisions on hand. Right? Do you guys have any provisions?



Wow, that's terrifying. I'm just wondering though if Graeme had to drink himself out of his office, is there anyone around who can recommend this strange and mysterious alcoholic beverage?



Well, I'm sold. (Thanks again to Darcy and Chris for putting those videos together.)

It begins tonight! Wednesday October 5th! And it continues the next day, and the next, and the next! Asking for Trouble! All that beer! Get yourself over to the furthest west 52nd street that ever were (cf. this classic Mike Lew post for more on the subject). Go on, now. Go one and have some good times with some incredibly sleep deprived writers, actors, and directors. Incredibly.

Asking For Trouble: No, We Actually Picked These Things Out Of Hats

We actually, seriously did, we had hats, we had four hats. Four. Hats. And we picked things out of them. Things.



(Trailer cut by our very own Chris Sullivan and Darcy Fowler. Well done, guys.)

Asking for Trouble. Seriously. Tickets/information. See you there.

Asking For Trouble 2011: How Trouble Is Asked For

What's that sound? That sort of, that...it's a little bit like crying, a little bit like laughing, a little bit like screaming, a little bit like the sound of twenty-five plays being written and produced in two weeks. Oh, that sound, yes, of course. Why, that could only be

Asking For Trouble!

Every year, the we of Youngblood draw actors, a director, and a point of inspiration from a hat. Several hats, actually, but that's not the point. The point is that everything is random, and fast, and excellent. We draw those actors, and that director, and those points of inspiration--this year we drew both a title for our play and a song--and then we run off to our hovels and bathtubs and blanket forts and we write. We write like hell. You ever seen the playoffs? It's like the playoffs. Any playoffs. Except without eliminations. It's just like playoffs in that we all get sweaty and passionate and every game counts every word counts.

You see?

After the writing comes the rehearsing, and the rehearsing. We rehearse wherever we can. Perhaps you will recall how earlier I said "twenty-five plays," I was not joking. Twenty-five plays are being rehearsed right now. As I type, and as you read this, that is happening. We rehearse in theaters, in rehearsal spaces, in hallways, in offices, in bathrooms, on the backs of flatbed trucks. Anywhere. Everywhere. Then, just as things are picking up steam, suddenly everyone realizes that every single play has, at minimum, one completely ridiculous prop or costume piece, like, a working waterfall, or, a fighter jet, or, an exact replica of a 19th-century Prussian Army uniform, or, an entirely authentic genie that grants actual wishes.

This is about the point that the actors and directors start to get the crazy murdery looks in their eyes, start to ask the playwrights questions like "what were you thinking" and "dear god, what were you thinking" and "I hate you?" And the playwrights smile Cheshire smiles and say the only permissible response: "I was thinking of trouble."

In less than a week, Asking For Trouble will be on its feet and ready for you, and I think you should be there. I think you should absolutely be there. Because the real beauty of Asking For Trouble is all the little gems that are created out of all this chaos. The chaos emeralds, you might say. With very little time to second-guess and absolutely no time to get soft, the twenty-five plays and twenty-five directors and ninety-five actors draw from deep within themselves some amazing, courageous, hilarious, and poignant theater.

Details are below. I hope you'll join us.

Asking For Trouble 2011 will be performed in 4 series.

• A single series ticket is $12, click here to pick a single series.
  
• 2 series for $20, click here
• 3 series for $30, click here
• 4 series for $36, click here

Performance Schedule:

Wednesday, October 5th
Series A - 7pm
Series B - 9pm

Thursday, October 6th
Series C - 7pm
Series D - 9pm

Friday, October 7th
Series B - 7pm
Series C - 9pm
Series A - 11pm

Saturday, October 8th
Series D - 3pm
Series A - 5pm
Series B - 7pm
Series C - 9pm
Series D - 11pm

All performances will be at Ensemble Studio Theatre, 549 West 52nd Street, 2nd Floor (between 10th & 11th Aves).

RSVP on Facebook! Also, tweet @ESTnyc using #AskingForTrouble and tell us what you think of the shows!