The Experimental Theater Workshop of Detroit was a compost of hungry actors and actresses, and equally hungry writers who wrote, directed and produced their own one act plays. Most had a social message, it was the early 70's after all, the afterbirth age of the Sixties. Mike had formed the group on a vision. A cadre of talent combining creative energies to produce stage presentations that would point out the hypocrisy of the day. It was serious business..this theater thing of ours....but not without it's mishaps and creative pratfalls and on-stage slapstick sidetracks that rather than derail the theatrical train and thread, enhanced it instead.
The group consisted of four writers. Emmett Coin who went on to become a filmmaker in California; James Bogner who won numerous accolades and awards including Michigan's Black Poet of the year; Debbie Bodo who did go onto semi-fame as an actress and Mike Marino, director and founder of the ETW who did nothing more in life than write this piece about those days. Writing about the past is the fountain of youth to a writer. I digress.
The group was formed initially as a fund raiser for SHAR House which was a drug rehab center in Detroit to get the live in residents off methadone and kick the habit naturally. Mike wrote the script, 6 acts, 24 characters and did all the research with his trusted theatrical compadre, Emmett. One scene was set in a mental institution and to get the feel and flavor, Emmet and Mike contacted the administrator of Eloise, the name for the fading state mental facility in the western suburbs of Detroit. They explained the program and as they were getting a lot of publicity about the project it was well known and the go ahead was given.
It was a foreboding building. Wailing in the background...bars and dusty dirty windows adding to the anti-ambiance. It was the stuff nightmares are made of. Greeting, greetings, exchange handshakes and now ...reality time. Mike was taken to the ward area where they had a line of isolation cells...the door to one, number 8 if memory serves well, was opened, heavy steel, large bolts, Frankenstein s monsters lair...ah..but the best part..Mike had also asked to not only look at the cells, but to be placed in it and in a straight jacket and locked in for an undetermined amount of time that Emmet and the administrator would determine. Mike would have no knowledge of the length.
The jacket on..a dinner jacket suitable for a lunatic asylum worn by a deranged David Niven with a psychosis..then the cell door slammed shut. What 5 minutes? 20 minutes? Mike had no idea. When he went in it was 1 p.m. when finally he emerged it was 3 p.m. Panic rose like an errant erection while giving a book report and the tell tale heart was replaced by the tell tale bulge...the walls were closing in...isolated..dead silence...dark..strapped in a jacket...time ceased...suspended...alone ... adrift..with only thoughts. Gawd, hold on to these feelings..I must transpose them to paper...my actor must relay this fear and terror and project it to the back row....I mus direct the actor from memory..from indelible impression that has left it's mark, it's foot on my neck.
The last act was ready to be written..."From Darkness" had scheduled opening night two months hence..and it would be standing room only, would raise needed money for Shar House. The play also caught the eye of PBS television local affiliate and was taped and as a consequence, the tape was sent to New York and the play aired on Sterling Cable in New York City one of the first cable stations in the country.
The quirkiest moment that opening night was the fact that the main character was to grab an orange from a bowl on the television set and thrust it in her fathers face, all the while talking about "reality...as real as this orange" only as the prized line and moment approached on the theatrical horizon..Mike in the wings, noticed...the orange had not been set out..how the fuck can you talk about reality and use an invisible orange to give it form and shape? Fear loomed again..the actress..Debbie Bodo..grabbed the "invisible" orange as she had rehearsed with a real orange for weeks...she thrust the invisible artifact forward and gave her speech to her father with more feeling than could have been imagined..the cast was stunned...Mike was shocked..elated with her performance and if anyone criticized the scene for lack of orange..who cared...Debbie gave life to the scene..reality personified.
At the end of the performance an bows and meet and greet with the audience, the critic from the Dearborn paper came up to Mike and said.."That it was wonderful imagery...to use nothing and proclaim it something..I believed it! It was pure genius." Mike thanked him but also said..."It was Debbie's presentation that was pure genius. On my part it was merely an oversight, but glad you caught that artistic merit" From that point forward the orange was left off the stage and Debbie's performance only got stronger for each succeeding 12 presentations we gave.
The local station manager for the PBS station, Jerry Trainor was in the audience and wanted to meet these creative geniuses..or the guise they had created as such. After much talk it was agreed by Mike and Emmett to offer a free production of their one act plays as a fund raising item on the PBS auction. It sold for over $1,200 dollars and the cast and crew were set to perform for the idle rich in Bloomfield Hills on the circular garden patio at night with a who's who of Detroit celebrities, artists and corporate presidents and their trophy wives. What occurred that night was pure Marx brothers that combined marijuana with theater and Mikes urination scene got a standing ovation in the bargain.
Stage Fright Part Two
Red Squads and Back Stage Political Fall-Out
1971 – Detroit. The Sixties had come and gone, a hallucinogenic lightshow...colorful..tie-dyed peace and love gave birth to a sexual and political revolution. 1971 – the afterbirth of that revolution and the times had pulled a Jeykll and Hyde with the Woodstock Nation morphing into Altamont and the you did need a Weatherman to tell which way the violence was going to blow...the Black Panthers were now kidnapping judges and the White Panthers in Detroit were kicking out the jams and everybody was now a mother fucker.
Detroit as other urban enclaves had it's share of underground activity as remnants of the political Sixties. The factor of violence had now however been magnified and there was gun power in the air and pipe bombs were becoming a leftist fashion statement.
The Experimental Theater Workshop that I had formed along with other activists and artists in the Cass Corridor – Wayne State University neighborhoods of Detroit were already under scrutiny from the Detroit Police Department Red Squad merely because we were producing plays that dealt with drug addiction, human and civil rights, womens and gay rights, and the Holy Grail of Red Commies everywhere..peace in Vietnam.
Trinity Methodist Church in Detroit was a hotbed of leftist sympathy. They let the Young Communist hold their convention in the basement, the White Panthers would meet there when not in Ann Arbor, peace marches were organized there, and the Experimental Theater Workshop rehearsed there on it's stage for our various productions in theaters and activist rallies.
The Red Squad was a secret section of the Detroit Police Department..so secret in fact atht we all knew about them..boys in blue after boys and girls who are red. They would show up at our rehearsals at night when we held them three nights a week. One night my co-founder, Emmet was running late an ran in with a beaming smile on his face. He was as excited as farmboy at a cow-tipping championship.
“They're out there writing down licsence numbers!” he yelled and taking photos of the cars and people going into the building..my actors, set designers, etc. Then I saw the camera around Emmets neck..he did become a photographer and film maker of note later in the late 70's afterall.
We then..the whold cast and crew went outside in the dark..Emmett with camera and flash as our only “weapon” There they were..jotting down plat numbers in little books and photographing the cars when they looked up and saw us..commie pinko fags and dykes no doubt...Peace Queers! I went over to their parked cars across the street by the eempty lot and started writing their numbers down..and Emmet walked over and started snapping pictures of them taking our numbers down...and then it happened...somebody said something to piss the cops off..it could have been me..maybe..and shoving began and then the arrests. We were taken in for resisting arrest...and disorderly conduct.
Our lawyer, a good old fashioned ACLU type, Marco, was called and came down to the station which was a colorful assortment of street thugs and political wrong doers..at least in the eyes of he establishment..every try to explain Karl Marx to a gang banger? Good luck...we were fingerprinted...again...I should have just ahd copies of my prints made and passed them out like 8 X 10 glossy's as they've been taken so many times...
We got out of jail....it was late now..headed to White Castle and gut bombed ourselves into the wee smalls talking about the events of the night. It was a rush..every arrest was..and it gave us material for more plays...The Red Squad was eventually disbanded..the records however are still on file..locked away and forgotten no doubt in the basement at 1300 Beaubien Street.
The plays eventually got produced, we were interviewed about the arrests..eys we put our PR machine into gear and used every arrest for publicity...the shows were a sell-out...mainly because we didn't sell out..now I was targeted for Federal Court as I was too “public” and had some of the best ACLU and other civil rights lawyers in Detroit working on my case...political conviction like stage plays..in either case..the show must go on..and you must at all costs...kick out the jams mother fuckers...
Stage Fright - Part Three
The Urination Scene of Richard III
The Experimental (emphasis on the "mental") Theatre Workshop was an artistic lunatic asylum where we as it's unsedated inmates could, in addition to weaving literary baskets write, act, overact, over react, over achieve, under achieve and in the unholy process of our holy dimentia create miiature persona's for ourselves as actors, much as schizoids do, complete with dual voices in the head like Son of Sam's listening to some bellowing dog in the neighbor's backyard chained to the porch, promising a double your money back guarantee or a rain check for Thorazine filled pinatas. We were tattered clowns in a ragged road circus transforming ourselves into animated slapstick cartoons to amuse the crowd. We lacked the three rings a circus has, but, made up for it with stage left and stage right, and our case, politically at least, it was mostly stage "left"
After the curtain came down, and we took our bow on our successful fund raising performance runs on behalf of the drug rehab SHAR house, it was time for the Rustbelt Algonquin Table to be put to the literary litmus test. Four writers of the Apocalypse had to create and produce four seperate plays, each personal, each directed by the playwright. We also designed and constructed the sets andflats, ourselves, carpenters we were not, we would have lost all five fingers to a tablesaw and as the ultimate kick in the balls, we would also have lost our apprenticeships and kicked out of the guild and tossed off the docks into the harbor straight out of a scene in “On The Waterfront”, in our minds, to borrow a phrase from Terry Malloy..”Charlie, I coulda bin a contenda, instead of a bum” but, bums we were and as such we buggered on nonetheless. Our next theatrical series, was entitled "Self-Destruct" and we rehearesed with the fury of screaming nympho-mermaids trying to entice horny sailors to pop there Neptunian cherries in a watery grave deep in Davy Jones' Locker.
We gave four performances, all sold out of Self Destruct, and with reviews that would have made even Ed Wood happy! Let's face it..we were more Glen or Glenda than Hamlet in presentation, which made it all the more fun..at least for the troupe. We were approached by the local PBS TV station about perhaps donating a performance for their annual fundraiser auction. You know the kind that gave away tote bags for $500 dollars. I knew Jerry Trainor, the station manager, and had for years, so as friends I did what friends do..I committed the entire cast and crew to what would be our final curtain performance for a private donor that would end with accolades and urination!
We waited watching the PBS fundraiser to see what we would net asa contribution. Our "performance" went on the board and the bidding began. It was almost frightening to see the figures rise with the ringing of phones in the background as a backdrop. It was Quasimodo in the bell tower, hunched over the parapets laughing at the crowd celebrating the Festival of the Fools. Jugglers and pick pockets, dancing Gypsy girls in swirling skirts and fortune tellers with ample samples of amulets to protect or curse as the case may be.
Our adrenaline raced, our minds raced, it was a white water rapids ride on the Colorado after the spring snowmelt. Number fives to challenge kayaks from Norway and Vikings from Minnesota and Icelandic blondes with fur boots and red cherubic cheeks with sheep in tow to beat it off the island before the next eruption and disruption as a result of Vulcan, the pissed off god.
My co-founder partner Emmett and I were watching from his home on the Eastside of Detroit, drinking wine and smoking natures own. Finally the bidding stopped and we had netted $1,500 from a wealthy couple in Bloomfield Hills north of the city. Actualkly PBS netted it so they could afford more seasons of This Old House from Boston and various fare from the BBC.
We were ecstatic..on the phone..phone the cast...get ready for more rehearsal..get ready to perform one more time. We then received a phone call two days later from the winning bidders, a rather wealthy couple who had a national home building company. We agreed to meet privately at their home, and the site of the performance. Emmett and I felt like old south share cropping field hands being invited to the "big house" to meet Massa and Mistress, so we fortified ourselves with wine and weed once again and went to meet them on their turf..it was right out of Guess Who's Coming to Dinner?" It's Mike and Emmett..Glen and Glenda! Pull the strings, pull the strings!
I was in a slight panic at first. I didn't want to blow it, only for the sake of Jerry Trainor and the reputation of PBS, so the wine and weed had caught up with both of us and once inside our fears were allayed..turns out the couple was already three sheets in the wino wind and dead drunk! At last..common ground and a common slurred language.
By the end of the pow-wow we had the particulars and had set the date for the performance. We also found out that in attendance would be a who's who of Detroit arts and industry from the head of AMC to the theater director of the Detroit Institute of Arts and everyone in between. An industrial-cultural Gyro with meat and spice to please and entice the picky palates of suburbanites venturing into an ethnic restaurant with now concept of Oompah, Flaming cheese or goat meat. Give a godammned Greek a kitchen..and magic happens. Nobody cooks like a Greek.
The performance was to be the round, or rather semi-round, semi-circle to be held on the rather large patio on the back yard surrounded by lush gardens of gardenia's, roses, and more flora than an Indonesian rain forest. The chairs would be set out on the lawn, our lighting and scaffolding behind the chairs, and our dressing room, or the "green room" was to be the garage just to the left of the backyard patio. The only thing at the meeting I remember saying, was "Of course you'll remove the Rolls Royce!" Emmett reminds of that line to this day..after all..it was only a Mercedes and not a Rolls! Paupers!
We rehearsed for another two weeks...then opening night...we had nothing to hit but the heights! It's Showtime at the Apollo! Greasepaint and sweat, mixing in the garage with motor oil and old exhaust. Suicide perfume me thinks it's called, or should be. Close the doors, run the engine and sign a final lullabye, bye, bye.
The actors were in fine shape, parts memorized, characters "method" absorbed and the writers were all in their literary cups drunk with what they perceived as success. Getting to play "the garden" as we referred to it. It ain't the Palace or the Palladium either, but, to aspiring artisans aswe were it was at least the Catskills! We were gonna play in the shadow and footsteps of Sheckey Greene, Henny Youngman, Lenny Bruce and Marty Feldman...Marty Feldman? Old bug eyes not to be confused with Old Blue Eyes. We knew were not Sinatra and this was not the Sands Hotel and Casino in Vegas. We weren't even Monte Rock III although one of our actors Dave, a Wayne State drama student pulled off a good Monte routine that we were never sure was just a routine. Didn't matter, the kid could act up a storm and in retrospect could have wowed us all and tickle our fancy with a flamboyant feather boa, as long as it wasn't constricting.
Emmett and I had arrived early in the day on opening night to give our regards to our own private Broadway. We had scaffolding to set-up along with lights, check the garage dressing room situation, and in general get the lay of the land, which in this case would be the couples 24 year old daughter that Emmett and Mike had their eyes on from the earlier meeting and had already mapped out nefarious plans to beat each other to the punch. Beautiful and Rich! A bum actor's dream come true!
It was late afternoon, four-ish and the program was to start at 5:30 with hor'deovrve's and enough booze to launch the Queen Mary. Dinner would follow after social hour at 6:30 with outdoor seating and lobster and wine flowing like a rush of underground lava. That was for the guests. The starving artists were lucky to get burgers and Coke after Mike made arrangements with the oversized cook in the kitchen just off of the garage door that led as a secret passage between starvation and carnivorous rescue. I lied and told her I was African-American but just passing!
I was running around making sure everything was going according to plan...so far so good...the garage was massive, the Mercedes was moved out and the actors turned it into a "green room" that would be the envy of any Sears-Roebuck store, for in addition to actors, make-up and costumes, hung an assortment of garden tools, saws, other implements known and unknown so it was a Garage Louvre celebrating manual labor..a Diego River fresco in three dimensions with the added flair of the faint scent of motor oil, gasoline from the gas powered lawnmower, and a faint hint of mown lawn that was sticking to the blades of the mighty Toro placed in the corner of the garage, a sentinel standing guard over all the other implements ready to cut down the intruder or interloper who dared to intrude and lope. There was a gas powered chain saw hanging from a hook on the wall near the window on the west of the garage and it too was more than a tool...it had a soul..Mike could feel it..one wrong move on the daughter and he'd be cut down in the prime of his youth..chainsawed and massacred, cut into little pieces no more recognizable than human mulch.
Guests were beginning to arrive, luxury car after luxury car, not like that 1970 something Dodge Dart I drove pathetically forcing it to perform what for it was an unnatural act such as turning over and starting and getting me from Point A to Point B and not falling apart at Point A- I as most of the crew, not actors, were dressed simply enough in faded jeans and t-shirts. Not the billboard message shirts of today with John Lennon on the front, or Pink Ribbons to save a breast...which makes me think...men have colon cancer but never is there a "day" or a ribbon for it...but on the other hand, it is the colon we're talking about so the ribbon would be a ghastly color you wouldn't want on a bumper sticker next to you're faded Vote for Romney! No..these were bonafide plain white Marlon Brando as Stanley Kowalski affairs...you know..a fucking t-shirt with nothing to say, yet by being "silent" it said it all.
I was standing outside of the garage with Emmett smoking a joint while the actors were inside getting dressed for the performance. The guests were pulling up and parking on the street except for one very naughty looking Brit sports car that pulled into the circular drive and stopped by the t-shirted twosome. I quickly swallowed the roach that was at on time a full grown joint, now reduced to a smoldering cinder...a meteorite that had raced through space at one time the size of Alaska, now reduced to Rhode Island.
A gentlemen exits the drivers side, James Bondish, only older, not good looking, a bit of a pot belly and receding hairline..so how the hell did he score the young blond in the passenger seat that probably gave him head at 70 MPH on the Lodge Expressway or was it intercourse at the interchange? He'll never tell. We knew the answer...his wallet and bank account were obviously larger than his "mucho macho member" and a healthy stock portfolio will get you laid and a blow job any day.
I being a gentleman myself, dashed to open her door, she had legs that shot out from the car, long and powerful, they could have propelled a rocket to the moon and her boosters would still be ready to orbit all nightlong. The driver noticing my chivalrous moment in time mistakenly took myself and Emmett as the hired help and tossed the keys to Emmett with a deep voiced to impress the chick "Boy be careful when you park it, it's expensive." More penis extender talk. My machine is bigger than your machine kind of locker room swat the towel crapola.
We pointed the way to the backyard "amphitheater" where cocktails were being served and watched Legs and the Portfolio Man disappear into the crowd. Gone. Swallowed up whole. Champagne in hand (get her drunk enough you might bag her later buddy!) It was at that moment in time, the portal of opportunity opened wide and called to punk in both of us. The car was talking to us..not a voice in the head, but a metal mental moment..."Drive Me, go ahead, you have the keys, he's showing off his trophy fuck for the night, ride me hard, slam me into gear, burn my rubber, squeal my tires, run my tank to empty if you like!" That was it...of all the gin joints and garages in the world, she had to walk into mine..deal.
Emmett had the keys and tossed them to me as I have had some prior experience with other peoples cars that were not my own. Ignition, liftoff..we drove into the street quietly, not letting the engine rip loose yet. Emmett made a hurried dash to tell the actors we'd be right back but not telling them from where. It could have been Mars for all they knew, or better yet, Venus with vagina's and virgins for all the men aboard the ship, along with a cask of rum and salted goat meat.
We made the trip to Woodward Ave, the notorious Friday/Saturday Night drag strip of the Motor City. We put the radio onto WABX and fed our head as the engine roared off from the stoplights. We passed two young girls in a Ford and slowed just a bit to let them know we were interested. They Were!!! In the car that is...put the two of us in a Falcon and a blind girl wouldn't fondle us in braille...it was time to head back..back to the opening performance and the Encore Urination Scene that wowed the crowd.
Oh yeah, we forgot to change the station back to it's original dial position at biz talk WWJ..the guy would get in the car after an evening of arts and urination and instead of the stock report or the Tigers game and Ernie Harwell...he would be greeted with the sounds probably of Frank Zappa and the King Biscuit Flower Hour!!
It was time...show time