by Rob Callahan
When I’m not writing about shows here, I’m in them elsewhere. Usually with this little troupe I’m in. We call ourselves the Rockstar Storytellers.
I only bring this up as it is the central focus of this week’s blog. We were all over the place this weekend. In fact, it’s starting to feel like we’ve got a thumb in every pie. Take “Wits,” for instance. One of our ranks writes that stuff. Take the Seldom Scene fund raiser at Kieran’s on Friday. Two of us were there. The Rockstar Storytellers & Friends show out in Wisconsin on Saturday delivered on its advertised promises. And, finally, the bi-monthly Rockstar Storytellers show at the Bryant Lake Bowl was Sunday.
I can’t say much about “Wits” this time around. I couldn’t go because I was across the river at a benefit. Officially billed as the Seldom Scene Benefit Party of Awesomeness, the new theater group’s event took over Kieran’s Titanic Lounge stage for a night of music, mirth and mimery. I got up and read my favorite new story (which you’ll find in this year’s MinnSpec anthology, if you were wondering) and phillip andrew bennett low took the mic to recall an epic failure in human relations or two. So that covered the Rockstars’ presence. After that, mime Kirsten Stevens did a bit of that trapped-in-a-box mimes are generally reputed to do before she closed with some pretty cool iPad-centered miming, and Mayda hit the stage and generally dazzled everyone, like she does. After the show, Mayda asked me if I’d kindly get to work on a spoken word recording, so that she can play me in the background from time to time. It’s only fair, I suppose, since I play her in the background of my readings from time to time myself.
I was also absent from the Wisconsin gig, but my partner-pre-mime phillip andrew bennett low made it. After our Friday show and prior to his Saturday departure, he and I got a chance to talk briefly about his impending adventure across the cheddar curtain. Then it was time for the Sunday night show at Bryant Lake Bowl. Allegra Lingo, Ben San Del, Amy Salloway, Joseph Scrimshaw and I all spent some time regaling the audience with bits about finishing up a given chapter in life and moving on to the next. Except for Scrimshaw. He talked about the finality of it all, by which I mean the zombie apocalypse of course. Joseph Scrimshaw brought the house down with his observations over humanity’s ongoing obsession with zombie apocalypses, and he did it in a pair of red sneakers. I think Garrison Keillor is starting a thing.
After that show, it was time to retire to the dining room and take part in some good, old-fashioned comradery. We knew we were in the place to be because Scott Seekins showed up, followed by a bunch of random dancing people on the sidewalk outside.
The obligatory Scott Seekins picture, which all Minneapolitans are required to take when he sits down at the table next to theirs.
If you listen closely, you’ll hear phillip andrew bennett low in the background offering to pay someone to go outside and dry hump the flash mob. Phillip andrew bennett low somehow managed to be involved in juvenile sex conversations all weekend, and I managed to be there when he did. I’m maintaining that these two things are entirely coincidental.
