The Marquee

This final entry, presently being written on a ticking time bomb, will have to be short. Honestly, I can feel this computer holding its evil breath, waiting…just waiting to kick me off the Internet. Ten dollars says that when I try to post this blog, an error message will appear. And I will very calmly put my shoes back on and kick my foot through the monitor. Safety first. Wouldn’t want to do that barefoot!

So here it is, my final entry to you, my loveliest of readers…

 GOODBYE!

Loves,

 Hope you all brought in the New Year happily and are not still nursing hangovers. As for myself, there was no hangover, but I have been dealing with a major case of caffeine withdrawal. Silly me, I thought that was a myth! One of my New Year’s resolutions–okay, my only resolution–was to drink less soda (presently I’m at 4 cans a day–hey, it’s all diet!! This means that while my body will be riddled with carcinogenic aspartame, it will at least be thin). Anyway, the resolution lasted approximately one day before I started nursing my headaches with the sweet, sweet nectar of Diet Mountain Dew. It’s only January 2nd, and I’ve already failed at my one goal for the year.

  With the many months of 2007 (12, I do believe) looming in front of us, it’s time that I inform you that there will be a few changes made around WUT. You may know that I will be graduating soonly (if not, here’s your memo. Send graduation checks to: Lauren Zink, Wisconsin Union Theater, 800 Langdon St., Madison, WI 53706) which will leave my present office vacant, begging to be filled with a bright-eyed, bushy-tailed someone.

This means a few things:

1. My fellow coworkers will no longer be annoyed by the volume of my stereo or my way of unabashedly singing when I forget that other people are around.

2. Someone else will have to start picking on Bruce. It’s an easy role; I’m confident that someone will sneak right in there and take over command.

3. This blog will never be the same. Please hold while I wipe away these tears. I will now hold while you wipe away yours.

Welcome this person with open arms, and embrace every change that he or she will be making, including the major revamp that this blog will no doubt be undertaking.  Chat with him or her at our undeniably fabulous events, email him or her with your hellos. As for me, I’ll be here for a few more weeks, while Esty is on vacation in Costa Rica (myself, I’ve never been out of this country…which is why you should send your graduation checks in amounts large enough for me to partake in the wonders of the international world). I’ll probably post a few more times, but, for right now, this entry marks a revolution within the blog. I shall now celebrate it with words that have lifted the spirits of all Badger alumni at one point or another.

It’s astounding, time is fleeting
Madness takes its toll
But listen closely, not for very much longer
I’ve got to keep control

It’s just a jump to the left
And then a step to the right
With your hands on your hips
You bring your knees in tight
But it’s the pelvic thrust that really drives you insane,
Let’s do the Time Warp again!

*Let me start this entry by saying that nothing I write here reflects the opinions of the Wisconsin Union Theater as a whole, and while I may not always be impressed with the goings on here, this does not mean that we are anything less than quality. Bluntly, this means that I’m a bit of a bleeding heart liberal. I am not ashamed. (You can still go ahead and be conservative if that’s how you want to roll. That’s coo. I won’t stop you.)  Further, keep in mind that not everything that goes on here is part of the Wisconsin Union Theater season. We rent this venue out to student orgs, who fill it with whatever they deem appropriate.

The names in this entry have been changed to protect the guilty. *

This job has its perks; presently I’m chilling in the green room with the very talented, very British King’s Singers. Swoon. However, I should say that, while I often get to meet some great people, on occasion, I encounter some not so great ones. Now, let me reiterate, this means not so great by MY personal standards, not not so great by your standards or by the theater’s standards or by other members’ of this university standards.

So now that I’m done with all possible disclaimers, let me dive into the purpose of this blog entry: a speaker that used our facilities the other night, a conservative, gun-toting crazy man that I will affectionately call Det Tnegun.* I remember it like it was yesterday. I was typing at my computer, singing to Kelly Clarkson on the boombox when I hear a loud belch in the hallway. Enter Det.

“Hello, lady. CATCH!” says Det, as he pretends to throw a pair of deer antlers at me. Soon I am surrounded by a dozen stocky men wearing camouflage, all here to protect Det from “any hippies that might try to start insert explicative here.” (Little do they know that their camp has already been penetrated by the enemy. Mwah ha ha). They turn off my Kelly Clarkson. This just keeps getting worse. Det begins to talk, and it resembles painfully addictive reality television. You know, the kind that’s like a train wreck, but you can’t look away? Think Jessica Simpson on the Newlyweds, or any moment of TV with Anna Nicole Smith. Trimspa, baby!

I become frozen in my seat, careful not to make any sudden movements, as one of the men has just made the comment that they should all take their guns out of their pockets to pose for a photo. Sweet mother of insanity! I then begin to wonder why these men think it’s cool for them to not hold back a single one of their bodily noises in the presence of a “lady” or this Det guy that TCAFC* thought was worth their money.

I’m not sure if I’m allowed to repeat any of Det’s next words. First of all, none of them should have ever been said to begin with, much less relayed via this blog to you, the innocent public. What I can say is that I was remotely impressed with his ability to slam homosexuals, Koreans and vegetarians in one disturbing swoop of a statement.

But the week after this trauma, I get to meet a group of 6 men with British accents, so I guess life has a way of working itself out.  

Recently our very favorite Operations Manager, Mr. Bruce Ehlinger, left our beloved WUT and ventured all the way to sunny California for the League of Historic American Theatres’ Conference. I would hardly believe it myself, except for the fact that pictures have surfaced.

As you may have heard, the Student Union Initiative passed, and if it doesn’t get overturned in the appeals process, we will be undergoing some much-needed major renovations here at the Wisconsin Union Theater. The League of Historic American Theatres conference provided us with the insight as to how to approach renovating our unique historical theater and, better yet, kept Bruce in another state for a few days.

While Bruce being absent from the office for a week is payment enough, he doubled our perks by bringing back 85 stacks of conference notes, which I have been privileged enough to scan through with hopes of discovering informational gems that I may in turn pass on to you. Oh, life as an intern!  

More of the support for many theaters comes from contributions rather than through ticket sales. What could this factoid mean for all of the potential donors out there? Well, let me tell you what you’ve won!  It could mean your name on a board, or, equally as cool, a sweet-shaped floor tile. It could mean a coffee mug or a T-shirt or a private peek at our space during construction…the possibilities are as endless as these stacks of conference notes!  While the construction drags on, we want you to know that we are still in existence, spiritually and physically. Of course, physically, we’ll be in more of a state of disarray than backstage is on a show night.

Now the actual process of renovating this theater will probably be as unpredictable as…well, backstage on a show night. If these walls could talk, they’d tell you great stories about Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy and Itzhak Perlman and Louis Armstrong.  It’s not what the walls have to say that worries us so much as what we will find behind these chatty room dividers: asbestos, pipe configurations crazier than anything found in a Dr. Seuss book,  possibly even the approximately 2.4 million pens that keep disappearing from my desk.

So I guess the moral of the story is that we’re now relying on Bruce to provide all the answers. We’re doomed.

I recently had the opportunity to chat with Michelle Koffel during “On Wisconsin,” her show on WSUM, the student radio station (after which she asked me if I wanted to be her regular co-host, a question that still blows my mind, mostly when I’m on the air every Monday from 4-5 and can’t think of a single question that would fit into whatever interview we’re currently conducting…). Myself and the rest of the guests that day (a few representatives from the Madison World Music Festival Committee and the World Peace Day Celebration) were asked the question, “Can music stop war?”

Huh. There’s no denying that the folk movement during Vietnam marked a powerful period in musical history, but did it help stop the war? I don’t have an answer to that question (just an English major, remember?). And for that matter, did that “Proud to be an American” song released after 911 make any of us genuinely feel more patriotic? Can the right lyrics in a song change the outcome of an election? Stop hunger? Keep your landlord from overcharging? (Hmm….let’s imagine this, shall we? “Gee, Lauren, I never saw it that way before. Thanks to that beautiful song, I’ve come to realize the error in my ways. You live here for free now.” Mmmmm, lovely). Exactly what is the quantifiable impact of music on society, if any?

Natacha Atlas works with Amnesty International to stop violence against women. Eddie Palmieri received an award from Yale for his work on building communities through music. Vusi Mahlasela, one of our Acoustic Africa performers, has been nicknamed The Voice for his powerful anti-Apartheid lyrics. (Says Dave Matthews on Vusi: “It’s people like Vusi that give me hope that culture and civilization will survive.”)

The point of this little entry isn’t to come to any conclusion, just to throw these questions out there. Maybe it’s the open discourse for which music helps open the door that can change the world. What do you think?

I can’t quite decide which of these ridiculous (and completely anonymous) people were my least favorite this weekend, so I’m gonna go ahead, make a list, and let you pick one for yourself.

1. A gentleman (haha, gentleman. I use that word loosely, apparently) furiously yells at Claire about the volume of the music in our theater. “IT’S TOO LOUD!!” Claire goes backstage and has the sound people turn the music down (see, we are here to serve you). He then proceeds to leave and place an angry voicemail on our administrative assistant’s phone. He also decides we must not have gotten his point and sends a vicious email to my boss, Esty. My absolute favorite part of this story? He was wearing earplugs.

2. During Les Yeux Noirs (Gypsy/Klezmer), a man complains to our supervisor that someone behind him is talking during the performance. (I love this one. There’s approximately 1100 people in this theater, dancing, clapping, laughing, generally enjoying themselves–at this very free, very fun music festival, and this dude is upset that some person behind him is talking. Wait. It gets better). This dude then says, “You know, there was a Nazi rally here a couple of weeks ago. This would be the kind of event that they’d like to break up.” Uh, hold the phone. If someone is bothering you during a performance, it is totally cool for you to come and get one of us. We will absolutely deal with it. However, first of all, this doesn’t seem like the kind of event where you should be complaining about audience members talking. Second of all, when the heck was it decided that talking during a Hebrew band makes you a NAZI??

3. The Whirling Dervishes drew in more people than the theater could hold, transforming us door staff into a new category of superiority that I will dub “The Enforcers.” During the performance, I went upstairs and tried to clear people that were sitting in the aisles (fire code and all). As I’m clearing people, some random woman has the balls to motion fervently at me to sit down. In a small moment of victory against my timid, Cow Town mentality, I put one hand on my hip and use the other to wave my badge at her. Yeah. Respect my authority.

4. Same show. In fact, most of these people were at Whirling Dervishes…Fellow WUT staffer Blaire clears the aisle on the main floor. A woman sitting on the stairs flashes her all access MWMF badge at Blaire and then says, “I’m writing an article on this performance. I have to be able to see.” That’s really special. Do you see the 1,300 seats in this theater? Funny thing about them–they all give you a view of the stage! Magic!! (Blaire is like my hero, actually. During this fiasco, she was talking about how much she enjoys taking food away from people and was the first to volunteer to not let people in once we had reached capacity).

5. Between shows, we (attempt to) clear out all of the patrons from the theater so that we may get a better count of audience members in order to make sure we don’t go over capacity (that darn fire code again!). Admittance back into the theater is only available through the front lobby (let me just take the time to say that this situation was a pain in the butt for WUT staffers as well as patrons). Unless you are this one woman: I am guarding the side doors as the theater empties, ushering patrons to enter in the front door so that we may count them. “Excuse me, miss, but could you please enter through the front? We’re not permitting people to enter through these doors,” says me, POLITELY. “I’m sorry,” says exceptionally rude chick and breezes past me into the theater.

6. Another Whirling Dervishes lady, who I have innocently dubbed “Balcony Expletive that starts with B” (we all know how much I love to alliterate). Prior to the WDs, there was another event going on upstairs on the theater deck; therefore, the balcony was roped off until the main floor filled, so the event upstairs had fair warning. Enter BB. “Excuse me, why isn’t the balcony open?” she asks. Blaire and I offer explanation. “”Who can open the balcony?” she asks. Insert explanation here again. “No, you don’t understand. Who has the decision-making power to open the balcony??” she says. Uh, yeah. We do, and you’re not getting in there until we let you (only phrased more diplomatically).  “That’s really, really rude. We have been waiting specifically so we could go up into the balcony. This theater is going to fill. There’s a line. Open the balcony.”

7. Really, this is a continuation of 6. Several of the MWMF coordinators approach us and say that they’ve received multiple complaints that the balcony isn’t open yet. Random MWMF volunteer opens the balcony, not knowing the situation. People storm up there. Shana, supervisor, runs upstairs, and Blaire and I hear her scream, “THE BALCONY IS NOT OPEN UNTIL I SAY IT IS OPEN!” and people file, defeated, back down the stairs. Patience is a virtue, people.

Moral of the story? Don’t be a dick. I won’t yell at you, but Blaire or Shana will!

Me? I’ll just blog about it!

Hey, reader! Did you enjoy Madison World Music Festival? What a great event that is! It’s really special that we at WUT and all of our fabulous co-sponsors created a place where we can expose you to different cultures to help foster an environment of understanding. Woo.

 Fantastic. Now that that’s over, let me tell you what Madison World Music Festival was like for me…

Let me start by saying that I’m really not confrontational. In fact, I am the exact opposite of confrontational. If you ask me to do something, I’ll probably do it. If you verbally abuse me, I will stand there and cry. If the construction on my apartment was supposed to last one week and instead lasts three, so my roommate and I are forced to sleep on the living room couch admist all of the stuff that we cannot put in our unfinished bedrooms, I will not call the tenant resource center and file a complaint. Blame it on growing up in Cow Town, USA.

That’s why on Thursday when I came to work 4-6 and was asked to pull inserts out of the Isthmus for two straight hours, and then was asked to stick around until midnight because MWMF was moved from the terrace to the theater because of crappy weather, and we had no door staff, I said yes. No fuss, no fighting. (If you saw my creit card bill this month, you’d know that I need the money. And that really cute pair of shoes. Ooh).

Now, dearest reader and potential theater patron, please understand that every member of WUT staff has sacraficed our dinner to make your theater experience more enjoyable. Please understand that we, to please you, our darling, have skipped the 5 hours we had planned to spend at the library preparing for our Italian composition, and, thus will probably receive a lower grade. Please, love, understand that we are canceling yet another date with our boyfriends that we have not seen all week so that we can be here to serve you. Please understand that we have spent 10 hours every day of this weekend dedicated to you. Please, honey, understand that we are spending 8 hours on our feet, breakless, hungry, dirty with 217 layers of newspaper ink on our fingers, to make the events that we scheduled and planned for but have no time to actually see run smoothly. Got it? Okay, great. Now, please understand that if you, sweetheart, decide to yell at us or be rude to us in any way, we reserve the right to make a snap decision to set you or this venue on fire.*

* Disclaimer: If, by some freak coincidence, this theater (or you, I suppose), is set on fire any time in the future, I promise I didn’t do it. This whole setting things on fire line was a joke and not an admittance to harboring intense feelings of resentment towards this theater (or you, I suppose) or even a hidden tendency toward pyromania. I don’t even own a lighter.

This past week I have had the duty—no, the privilege of sitting at three (THREE) information tables for the Wisconsin Union Theater. Believe me, I could give my little fifteen second speech in my sleep (and probably did at the MU Bash; an info table from
9 PM until midnight?? Whose idea was that anyway? Alas, I’m not as young as I used to be).

Well, since I’ve captivated you already, loveliest reader o’mine, without having to give you a free food coupon (it was my bait at the info tables…and what a sweet, sweet bait it was), let me give you the rundown on the WUT committee. Consider it payment for the hours and hours of entertainment I have given you for free!

Who we are: a group of seriously dedicated students that love this “comfortably funky” (thank you, Susan Kepecs from the Isthmus) theater and firmly believe in what WUT offers the students and community alike

What we do: help program the season events, sell CDs at the shows, set up info tables (freaking obviously), promote the spectacular performances here

What’s new with us: STREET TEAM! It is my delightful duty to lead our latest WUT wonder, the street team. We’re a subcommittee that’s in charge of your basic flyering and chalking marketing techniques, plus substantially cooler shiz, like setting up outside events to promote awareness of shows. Not sure what that means? Think this summer’s showing of “The Life Aquatic”  on the terrace plus ticket giveaway before Seu Jorge.

How often we meet: once a week, with occasional extra volunteering

What you get out of the deal: resumé building (ha ha), free food, tickets to shows, opportunities to score free CDs, possibly meeting the artists and the chance to hang out with really cool kids

How to join: Come to our kick-off! September 19^th, 6:30 PM, Frederic March Play Circle. Get free cookies and milk, and, a major bonus, a free ticket to that night’s Natacha Atlas performance (Arabic/African electronic dance hybrid worthy of Bond. James Bond). Email lbkatzman@wisc.edu to get signed up, or just come and check us out!

If you are a new student, you’re probably wondering how the heck to navigate the Humanities building (I’m a senior, and that bastard building still confuses me), why you have to spend $540 a semester on books that you will most likely never open (I can’t help you there. I still call home and complain every time I buy books), and how, on a campus of this size, you’re ever going to find your niche. ‘T’won’t be easy, my dear child; you’ll probably have to kiss a lot of frogs before you find your princely place here. Truth be told, I didn’t find my niche until halfway through junior year! But, to be completely trite and quote that book that every last one of us got for high school graduation, “Oh! The places you’ll go!”

It’s been a ridiculously long time since I’ve taken a tour of good ole UW, but I still remember the suspiciously friendly tour guides attempting to ease our fears of being friendless, alone and spiritually lost in a new place. In their efforts to lull us high schoolers into submission (okay, maybe that’s paranoia; perhaps it was more like trying to instill a calm and trusting dependence in us so the University would later be able to raise our tuition over and over and OVER, and our learned compliance would tell us to just shut up and write the check already), these guides told us of the plethora of student organizations that we could join in order to fit into the campus community (and build a resumé. Prepare to instinctively recite that phrase whenever anyone asks you why you’re doing something you hate. “Oh, you know, it’s great for building my resumé”).  

Anyway, enough whining about the bureaucratic process that is college. On that fateful campus tour day, our courageous leaders told us that we would never have to worry about finding a group of students with similar interests, that our campus had so many diverse RSOs (that’s registered student organizations for the frosh out there), there was even a pineapple appreciation group. The cynical senior in me realizes that this silly RSO is probably just a Chadbourne interest group with 3 members, but at the time, my parents and I thought this was a remarkably novel and reassuring idea. Surely if a pineapple appreciation group existed, a small town girl like myself would have no problems adjusting to this 933 acre campus and, subsequently, the new life journey on which I was about to embark. (Pineapples are the universal symbol of hospitality, after all).  “With banner flip-flapping, once more you’ll ride high! Ready for anything under the sky!”

Well, kids, it’s four years later, and I can tell you that it’s a load of crap. Mostly. You are going to stumble. You’re going to hate some of your classes, wonder why the professor thinks he has the right to regulate your attendance, and, after the 217^th time of her staying up until
4 AM to chat on AIM, seriously consider punching your roommate squarely in the face. And you’re probably going to realize that the pineapple appreciate group isn’t your cup of tea…er, juice. “I’m sorry to say so, but, sadly, it’s true, and hang-ups can happen to you.”

But between all the struggling, and, often because of it, you’re going to learn and grow and explore here, and, ultimately, find out more about yourself than you ever realized existed. Maybe you don’t ever join an RSO, or you’ll wait until junior year to pick a major, or perhaps you even drop out and try your hand at a completely different path. Such is life. Embrace it.  

Oh, and one more thing. “Your mountain is waiting. So…get on your way!”

I feel as though it is my duty to inform you of the damage that the theater sustained. However, this is tricky business—how do I do it without exposing any personal bias or sob stories about how the solution to this problem is money? (I already DID an entry on WUFIP, darn it!)  Further, I’m not even going to pretend to know the structural complexities of this establishment. (How many times do I have to tell you that I’m just an English major??!) Therefore, Ralph Russo, Cultural Arts Director extraordinaire and the paramount voice of the theater, has prepared an official statement for you…which would normally be fine by me, except for the fact that his official statement is boring, as all official statements are. Therefore, I have “Laurenized” it for you, free of charge!

“Heavy rains and a burst chilled water pipe caused flooding in the lobby and backstage areas of the theater. (Our sh*t got wet). Significant damage was done to the wood veneer coverings in the lobby area, and they will need to be repaired or replaced at significant cost.  (Whose idea was wood veneer anyway?? I mean, seriously. But I digress. They’ve become all wrinkly and discolored, which are dangerously unsexy traits for wood to have). The wood floor in the scene shop area is heavy damaged and will also need to be replaced.  (I hear the hottest new thing in flooring is cork. Maybe we should try that. It is impervious to water, after all.)

The carpet throughout the theater lobby will have to be replaced sooner than expected since it has been damaged and discolored by the veneer glue dripping on it. (We’re not talking interior design here, folks—although I wish we were. What a project!! We don’t have the luxury of saying we must replace the carpeting because it’s shag or something equally disgusting. Things could be worse. ) The flooding was due in large part to old ineffective drains located on the outer theater balcony and to the busting of chilled water lines located under Park St. right next to the Union Theater. (Not our fault!) 

It’s also likely the doors leading out to the second floor balcony will need replacement, as thresholds for these doors have been damaged over the years by slow leaks. (They’ve been dying a slow and painful death, kinda like the career of Tony Danza. A smack in the head to whoever thought giving him a talk show was a brilliant idea).

Perhaps the most severe damage occurred in the Theater’s basement where the
Union’s Art Collection is stored and the Union Computer Support staff is located. Also the Union’s Game’s room has been damaged.  (Who cares about them anyway?? No, just kidding–don’t send me letters.)  Currently all of these areas have tested high for mold spores.  (An undiscovered market for the Claritin salespeople??) As of today, these areas are still evacuated. (I can’t think of anything witty to put here. I guess that means it’s time for me leave). “