Open Thread 18 November 2009

Mortimer the Indian from the prop box and the onstage stage manager.  In this production the stage managar danced.pl

Comments

[greg0]

Wanted to point out the Christmas Revels performances to folks in the DC area. The Revels are a national organization with different performances in 9 US locations. This year in DC, costumes and music from the Italian Renaissance will be featured.
http://www.revelsdc.org/
It's a lot of fun!

[Maureen Lang]

You both truly missed your 2nd careers there, dear brother. I've seen several productions of "The Fantasticks" over the years- surely wish I'd been in the audience for that particular one. Any photos of the famous somersault around?

[Patrick Lang]

Maureen

This was a good one. Marguerite choreographed various parts including her own. This was in a big theater owned by USIA in Izmir, Turkey. It must have been 1971. I just happened to find the picture. No. No pictures of Mortimer's amazing falls. No wonder my back hurts. pl

[Cieran]

Colonel:

Well, you always said that you were part Native American.

Now we know which part!

[Patrick Lang]

Cieran

That's why I thought it funny when the drama teacher in the Izmir American High School asked me to play the part.

I was a second thought although I was committed to produce a play that year. It was Marguerite they really wanted because she was so talented for the dance. pl

[Jackie]

Col.,
Please let us know how the NYU Conference goes on Friday.

[alnval]

Col. Lang:

Wow! 1971? Turkey?

Hoş geldiniz efendim

This was the only Turkish phrase I ever learned when I was a Field Assessment Officer for Peace Corps at Occidental College. A team of us worked several summers in the early seventies gathering psychological selection data on the prospective Volunteers who underwent their initial language, cultural and teacher training at Occidental before finishing their training in country. In the mid seventies Peace Corps took the universities and colleges out of the training arena by centralizing initial training in Puerto Rico. I don’t know how they’re doing it now.

As I recall the prospective Volunteers were being trained to teach English as a second language in schools throughout Turkey including Izmir. They interacted constantly with Volunteers who had been successful in Turkey and with Turkish nationals. We summarized the psychological data for the Field Selection Officer who appeared at the end of the training program and who made the final selection based on our data as well as on information provided by the instructors in the content courses.

Assessment was sometimes difficult as serving in Peace Corps was an acceptable alternative to service in Vietnam. Peace Corps approach to selection was “select-in” not “select-out.” They wanted people who wanted in for ‘positive’ reasons and not because joining Peace Corps was an opportunity to avoid service elsewhere. As none of us were good at mind reading, we did the best we could with whatever data we could put together that made sense.

There was also an under current of concern among the staff who had served in Turkey as to whether this crop of trainees contained people who had been placed there for intelligence reasons by other government agencies. We were assured that this was not a problem but that didn’t make it go away.

All in all it was a stimulating and rewarding experience. Everyone felt that we were doing something important for the country and the world.

Occidental College, by the way, is a small liberal arts college in the Eagle Rock area of Los Angeles perhaps best known for Jack Kemp and Terry Gilliam and for occasional appearances in Jonathan Kellerman police procedurals.

[SubKommander Dred]

Pat:
That performance didn't happen to place in Arlington, at the TJ Theater, did it? When I was a young lad in the 70's, I often volunteered for sound and light duty for a number of productions, and I do remember working spotlight on a performance of "The Fantasticks." Is it possible our paths could have passed before?

[William R. Cumming]

Tis the season almost to be jolly. I do understand that almost 50% of June college and University grads are still unemployed. I know, Scrouge (sic). And the Canadians are headed to almost 70% vaccinated for seasonal and swine flu with no shortages and no problems of willingness to be vaccinated. Is the President vaccinated yet? His family? The Congress? The military? They all seem to travel a lot around the holidays. Hoping those Thanksgiving family & friends reunions are not viral pools!

[N. M. Salamon]

Colonel and all others:

Please peruse:
http://www.postcarbon.org/new-site-files/Reports/Searching_for_a_Miracle_web10nov09.pdf

A rather long analysis of possible alternative energy sources based on Energy input versus Energy gained.

Were this manifaceted analysis correct, its implication for the USA among others is to stop wasting energy and scarce resources on wars and get on with heavy duty investment into alternate energy -- though it is almost certain that there is not sufficient capital top save the present standard of living.

Learn and enjoy!

[Charles I]

Soldier, writer, teacher thespian - truly a Renaissance man!

Clifford, if by chance you breeze through here, I must thank you for your book Dark Crusade. Tremendously informative, a wonderful historical and philosophical survey that was very very readable for such a treatise. I really like your writing and am grateful for the prodigious amount of reference and analysis you share here. Feels like auditing one of your courses for free.

Thanks again.

[Arun]

Afghanistan is mostly a loose federation of villages or valleys (plus some urban centers). Any stabilization of Afghanistan should respect that structure.

Mahatma Gandhi had had a vision of India as a confederation of villages and had spelled out how it would work. Of course, it turned out India was more amenable to a central authority than Gandhi thought. But perhaps those ideas can be dusted off for how to organize Afghanistan.

[Patrick Lang]

Jackie

Karen greenberg tells me that the center will have transcripts and a video link available after Thanksgiving. I will post those then. It was an interesting meeting populated by all the usual "suspects" and a few new ones. pl

[Brett J]

haha-enjoyed the picture, Pat. Though it takes some folk time to learn, you seem to swimmingly take yourself seriously in character as well.

[Patrick Lang]

BrettJ

Translation? pl