I was extremely stoked to get an audition call today, for a production of Pygmalion in Walnut Creek. The bottom line: I have to pull a Cockney dialect out of my ass by Thursday morning. Oh Christ on a cracker. Anyone who knows me knows that dialects are probably my biggest Achilles' heel as an actor. I mauled Australian something fierce in a show in college, and when I was asked to do a Latino street patois for a production of The Comedy of Errors, I failed so miserably that the director accommodated me by changing it to a heavy Jewish accent. So now it's Cockney time. 'allo, guv'nor. I tried busting Cockney out today on my family, and it sounded like a Kennedy having an aneurysm. Thank God my acting teacher is kind enough to lend me some of his dialect materials; I'll also be hitting the library tomorrow to find some dialect cassettes. Pray for me, or if you have any good resources, let me know.

Well, I wasn't bullshittin' you guys, I did go to Vegas for the weekend. It was a surreal thing - and that's saying something when a thing is surreal in a locale even Dali could not have conceived - to see TVs in the casinos tuned to both the NCAA basketball tournament and the war news on CNN and Fox News. Regardless, it was a fine time to let off steam after nearly 3 months of occupied weekends. I got into town Saturday evening and hooked up with Mark. It was uneventful for the average citizen - gamble, gamble, gamble, eat, gamble, eat, gamble, sleep, gamble. A couple of noteworthy rememberances from the trip:

In a place like Vegas, if you don't have at least one cabbie anecdote, you've had an unfulfilled trip. After a late night of losing money downtown, topped off by the Golden Gate's timeless 99-cent shrimp cocktail, Mark and I caught a ride from a gregarious hack. He told us about the turncoat at Camp Pennsylvania who grenaded his own fellow soldiers, then got progressively animated talking about some of the anti-war protestors who've been on the Strip, and then let loose with enough invective to fill 10 human gall bladders recounting the one fare he had who made the mistake of calling him "Saddam." "I told him, 'Get the fuck out of my cab!' Cocksucking bastard! I'm not an Arab! I was in the U.S. Air Force 16 years! Cocksucking bastard!" Typing this out, there's something lost in the translation, but this guy was on fire, but not in a homicidal way - more like a bemused-cabbie-who-takes-no-shit way. I swear, he must have said "cocksucking bastard" about 10 times in the span of half a minute. Mark and I were nigh well convulsing with laughter.

The other hilarious anecdote: We came out of The Venetian and got into the long-ass taxi line. Over the PA was a guy with a beautiful tenor voice singing some of the old Dean Martinesque songs from the '40s and '50s - "Inamorata," "Arrivaderci Roma," etc. Except in the middle of the singing, you'd hear the guy going, "How many? Step right up. Have a great night." We both realized the fellow in the gondolier outfit facilitating the cab line had a headset mic and was singing while he was ushering folks into cabs. And the guy could sing. Mark turned to me and said, "Now I know what I want to do with my life." Too fuckin' cool.

And now, just a couple of Crusty Uncle Lou's Vegas Tips:

If you want to eat at a good buffet, try the one in the Aladdin, especially if you like Middle Eastern food. It had great tandoori chicken, pilaf, samosas, curried garbanzos, hummus, tabbouleh, dolmades, baba ghanouj. Damn tasty.

And if you play blackjack in Vegas, stay away from the tables that say "Blackjack pays 6 to 5." Even if it's a single-deck game, even if it's at a low limit. If blackjack regularly pays 3 to 2, extrapolate that and the normal payout would be 7 to 5. It's a rip-off, folks. I swear, we saw those 6 to 5 blackjack tables filled with rubes who couldn't do basic math. Unbelievable.

How'd I do? I lost about $300, but it's entertainment dough. I never bet more than I can comfortably afford to lose. And besides, I know I don't have the temperament or stomach to tolerate losing scads of money.

Last week I had two theatre auditions and one voiceover audition. I couldn't believe I had such a block and staying away from auditions. You can't fail if you don't try, I guess. What the hell. The new issue of Callboard comes out this week, probably. I'll see what's out there I'd like to try out for. In the meantime, I'll try to relax. Maybe.

The protests that shut down downtown S.F. today got, er, a little dada. People puked and shat in front of the Federal Building. Nice to see the anti-war umbrella is big enough to cover bulimics, incontinents, and other chemically imbalanced performance artists.

Me? I'm going to Vegas.

A number of people have navigated here as a result of searches on Alex Bennett, a radio DJ who's been on the air in S.F. and N.Y. since seemingly time immemorial. He had just gotten back on the air after a year-plus absence, and I had his show time jotted down in my "Currently Ingesting" sidebar. Well, after all of a month and a half, he's gone again, which is a total bummer. No word from the estimable Mr. Bennett on why Clear Channel pulled the plug on him so soon. He's been a semi-regular poster to ba.broadcast on Usenet, and though he's posted about other matters since his last day on the air Friday, he hasn't directly addressed the whats and wherefores of the matter. (I suspect contractual minutiae is keeping him silent for now.) He was the only local program on the station, amongst a gaggle of tired neocon screamers and one actual interesting jock from L.A., Phil Hendrie. And now in his morning slot they're piping in a couple of guys from Sacramento. It makes no sense, other than perhaps a bottom-line sense to pipe in everything from other Clear Channel talent. Radio fucking blows, and Alex Bennett deserved better than 6 weeks and out the door. Perhaps he's enjoying Mai Tais on the beach with the other local media talent currently in exile, Terilyn Joe. (For the occasional person who emails me asking of her whereabouts, according to Spencer Christian, the KGO weatherman, she's enjoying her time off, still getting paid by NBC.)

The last performances of Tomfoolery were today. So it goes. It was an eminently fun month-long run. Houses were mixed, but I think part of that was that it was the company's first production in S.F. The people who were there seemed to enjoy themselves a great deal, which is heartening. I've gotten positive feedback from my friends and family who attended. I worked with really talented, funny, generous people, on material that was enjoyable in every way. I was blessed.

Yesterday I auditioned for Shakespeare at Stinson, a summer festival in West Marin which I worked with back in '95. It doesn't look like I'll get called back, but it was worth it just for the ride into and out of Stinson Beach for the audition. Blustery rains had left by then, leaving a pristine, slightly cloudy day in such a beautiful locale. Taking the last part of the drive, negotiating the several hairpin turns, all the while seeing the coast and endless stretch of ocean, Primus pumping on the stereo, I knew I had had a great day even if I'd crash and burn on my monologue (which I didn't, I don't think).

No auditions in my immediate future, though I'll scour Callboard magazine again to see if I missed anything. I'll be sending follow-up notes to the folks who saw me at Theatre Bay Area's general auditions this week. I hope that I can improve in the self-promotion department, the "biz" in the showbiz. Watch out, Brand Lou is coming. Be afraid.

In the meantime, I'll be considering some mini-vacations in the near future. I've got almost 4 weeks of time off accrued. (That's what happens when you're in two plays in the last 6 months and can't go anywhere.) Maybe Phoenix before baseball spring training ends, maybe Ashland, Oregon for the Shakespeare festival, maybe L.A., maybe Seattle, maybe Vancouver, maybe elsewhere. A week-long vacation will be coming up next month. Gina and I will either go to New York City or New Orleans, a short while after her 30th birthday. The last long vacation I took was a working vacation to Seattle in the summer of '01 - a week and a half shooting a film Moxie co-wrote and co-produced. It's time to luxuriate.

A moment of silence, please.

Presenting the return of spongeworthiness.

It's been a hell of a long day, so to make it brief:

Tomfoolery went pretty damn well this weekend. The family came to see it on Saturday, and they brought along approximately 30 of their friends and friends of friends. So a third of the house was there to see me. Zoinks. They all seemed to enjoy the show, or at least were extremely polite. Sunday night's show was attended by a few choice members of the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, whom we dragged on stage at the encore to sing "The Vatican Rag." Next weekend, we switch interchangeable parts of the two casts. I'm looking forward to playing with the quite talented members of the other cast.

The TBA general audition went great, as far as I could tell. I got up, did my two monologues, got laughs from the auditors, and had a minimum of detrimental nervous energy. Now we'll see if I get any calls out of it.

Lysistrata is going tomorrow night, like it or not, then it goes into the history books. On Sunday, we got to play in the performance space - a circus school - and had quite a fun time. With all the above happening, I was on the loose in S.F. for 14 hours on Sunday. Like I said before, dog tired but damn thrilled.