The Day Before

Yesterday was supposed to have been a full dress rehearsal. Didn't happen. Instead we got a four hour-long tech run. In itself, that's fine, but it only pissed us off because it was the result of problems that could've been solved earlier on, except for the gross incompetence of the producers.

What was mind-blowing was the meeting after. The "director", let's call him E, decided based on the recommendation of his partner - let's call him W - to put back a scene in which a character reveals he's been in drag all this while.

Now W is a businessman who's in this purely for profit. His "creative" contributions thus far (and I use the term very, very loosely - as loose as a 60 year-old gonorrhea-infected whore working the slums of Bangladesh) include sitting in the audience and singing along to every fucking song. W has not a single fucking clue what entertainment is about, and probably thinks Jack Neo's variety show is the epitome of humor.

I objected, based on the grounds that it was (a) nothing but a cheap joke, and (b) incredibly offensive. I'm not a prude. I think that the word "whore" is incredibly funny, and anything with "fuck" in it is automatically made funnier. Drag queens can be funny, but it's wrong to make fun of them just for being who they are. Unlike Christians, who can be made fun of just for breathing.

I make light of this now, but I was really angry last night when I said it. Everyone remained silent, because they knew it was a losing battle. It didn't matter, I wasn't fighting a battle, I was just letting them know how offensive they were being. Now that I think about it, I doubt they even know what the word means.

Now I'm getting to the best part. W got up and made a little speech. Basically he said he didn't go to musicals for the drama or the story, he went for the music and the singing and the dancing. Oh, and also to laugh, apparently. The dramatic scenes were too long and "draggy".

What a huge fucking insult.

If you wanted a concert you should've just produced a concert in the first place. How much time did we work on the actors? How much time and effort did they put into trying to find some motivation - any motivation at all - for the ridiculous lines which your partner wrote? And here you are, dismissing everything. If you want, just cut out all the acting bits. You'll be left with just the stuff you like anyway.

The very fact that he was allowed to say this to two writers was mind-blowing. We were trying so fucking hard to restrain ourselves from getting up and bashing his face to a bloody pulp.

Anything for a laugh, no matter how cheap it is. It's a sad world when I find myself stooping to a target demographic of four year-olds. Actually you don't even have to try with them, they laugh at anything. Anything fucking thing at all. I mean, look at babies. A bubble can generate mass hilarity.

When the music director spoke, I calmed down. He has an incredibly soothing voice. I still wanted to kill E and W, just not so violently. Maybe by slow poisoning or bloodletting.

When I got home, I didn't want to head upstairs that quickly. I needed a cigarette so badly, but I didn't have a light. I wandered around the neighborhood for a while, but didn't spot anyone. It was, after all, 1.30am. Finally I managed to bum a light off an Indian truck driver. He didn't seem to speak a word of English, but among smokers, certain signs are universal. He was so nice, he even gave me a spare lighter. While this wasn't enough to completely restore my faith in humanity, it certainly helped.

I've decided. Today shall be my last day. It's opening night, and if they make it tonight, everything else shouldn't be a problem. I was going to stay the weekend, but fuck it. It's just not worth it. Might as well get on with my editing, which I've neglected for the past few days. At least I'm getting paid extra for that.