Disney Photo 1992©

Reid Belstock came to the Disney Entertainment Arts program fresh out of Ringling Brothers Clown College. Before that he had cut his teeth performing juggling shows on Pearl Street in Boulder, Colorado.  I saw that Reid had raw talent when we first met, but he was clearly a diamond in the rough with a hard edge

Reid wanted to juggle fire in his act, which alarmed Disney’s management.  I remember standing in the parking lot outside our rehearsal hall surrounded by a half-dozen men and women with clipboards.  Disney’s thought was that outside was the safest place to witness Reid’s fire juggling.  The first thing Reid did was light a double headed devil stick on fire and kick it across the asphalt yelling, “Back to the Future!”  The gasoline soaked devil stick rolled across the parking lot leaving behind two flaming tracks, before coming to rest under the gas tank of a parked car.  I instantly heard the click of a half-dozen ballpoint pens, as the Disney brass began scribbling on their clipboards.

I was a teacher, director, and mentor all rolled into one.  To soften Reid’s hardened streetwise edge I gave him a pair of horn-rimmed eyeglasses with the lenses popped out.  At first Reid resisted my attempt to develop a more sympathetic comic character.  With coaxing he put on those glasses and transformed before my eyes. Reid named his new character, Tommy Loon, and for the rest of that summer he had me, and the audiences at Disney in stitches.

Disney Photo 1992©

Afterwards the comic glasses became Reid’s signature, and he built his career on the character he developed at Disney, under my direction.  Twenty-years later Reid contacted me, and asked if I would direct him in a new show called, SMIRK, that he was developing with his partner, Warren Hammond.

But that’s another story…

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In 1992, I was selected as show director of theater for the Disney Entertainment Arts Festival in Florida. Mark Sieve of Puke and Snot recommended me for the position. It was a pet project of CEO Michael Eisner, and a dream gig for me.

This post will be the first in a series about my directing career. Disney was not my first public-show as a director, but it does mark a clear beginning. There is my life before Disney, and my life afterwards.

You can see by this picture that I was a very young. During my time at Disney, Rosie and I were also performing on the national Renaissance circuit. I lived in Orlando, while Rosie and Liza lived in our trailer at a string of Renaissance Festivals across the country.  I would work Monday through Friday at Disney, and perform weekends with Rosie on-the-road. I racked up a lot of miles with Delta Airlines that year.

Disney 1992®

This official portrait of my cast was taken on a weekend so I’m not in the photo, but if you look close you can see that my spirit is present.

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I miss our stage mates…

If you are what you eat, then I hope playing a giant chicken pointing out the tragic consequences of your choice for lunch, provides a unique experience for the audience.

I believe the fool travels the crossroads between tragedy and comedy.

Being a chicken is a hell of a gig.

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StarTribune photo:

A week ago today the great artist Tony Caponi died. I had the opportunity to meet Tony for the first time when I was the opening act of the 2015 Season at the Caponi Art Park’s Summer Performance Series.

After a 40-year career of teaching art Tony spent the next 30-years of his life sculpting a 60-acre masterpiece. Every stone in his park was laid with his own hands. I performed in what he called his, Theater in the Woods. It is a circular stage at the bottom of a natural amphitheater large enough to fit a thousand, but intimate enough for a few hundred-audience members to enjoy an evening of performance art under a canopy of trees.

Even though my time with him was brief, his impact on me was tremendous. I felt like I was somehow participating in his larger artistic vision, when he witnessed me performing in his magical 60-acre work of art.

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Photo by Marc Norberg:

Pictured here is the full cast of THE VAUDEVILLIAN. I wrote the play in collaboration with Kevin Kling for the 100^th Anniversary of The Southern Theater. The vision was to recreate the first vaudeville show that played the Southern Theater in 1910. When I read the grand opening playbill there was a tap dancer with a band, I immediately thought of Scott Crosby and The Medicine Show. Next on the bill was a two-person juggling team with a WC Fields’ style trick pool table. Arsene Dupin is the only performer I know who can match WC Field’s attitude on stage, plus we had already worked up a juggling act together, so the choice was hauntingly obvious. Finally, the spookiest discovery was that the only woman on the bill was an eccentric musician named Rose.  Who do you suppose could play that role?

Standing here on stage are well over one hundred years of show business experience. I remember being backstage before each show.  Arsene would be busy preparing all the magic apparatus, while Rosie sat with Scott and the band telling jokes. Rosie has always been able to hold her own in our male dominated business.  As I watched her, I imagined the ghosts of the original cast circling around Rosie telling her jokes, and laughing.

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Photo by Marc Norberg:

This is another photo from THE VAUDEVILLIAN. I’m trying here to juggle a bucket in the pattern as Arsene throws everything within his reach at me.

I loved performing this routine.

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Photo by Marc Norberg:

This is the opening of Arsene and my act together. We first put together a two person-juggling show after Rosie and my daughter Liza was born.  I had a blast performing with him around town while Rosie was a new mother.

In 2010 I invited Arsene to perform in The Vaudevillian for the Southern Theater’s 100-year anniversary, after I discovered that on the 1910 grand opening bill was a two-person juggling team that hauntingly reminded me of our old act.

It was a delight to perform with Arsene again.

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Photo by Marc Norberg:

This is a scene from The Vaudevillian at the Southern Theater here in Minneapolis. I wrote the play in collaboration of Kevin Kling back in 2010 to celebrate the Southern’s 100-year anniversary.

The show was based on the original vaudeville show that played the night that the Southern Theater opened its doors in 1910. When I looked at the original line-up the only woman on the bill was named Rose. The play was about the spirits of these original cast members returning to the stage 100-years later.

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