You know it’s time to throw in the towel when your life, either as a whole or in specific areas, starts to reflect a Gilbert & Sullivan operetta too closely. Specifically, when it reflects the darker/tragic operettas and/or characters. These pieces of entertainment are supposed to be farcical - far removed from real life. A mockery of theatrical vehicles. One of the downfalls of the medium is that too often, the shows deal with caricatures, not real people. Not real life. And, yes, my life is just that. A modern day G&S tragedy. G-d forbid, my life be trapped in The Mikado, or HMS Pinafore, where all is well with the world at the end. No. I’ve become Poor Peg, but in real life, where no Murgatroyd can return from the dead, and the second act is pure fantasy. Phoebe, without Wilfred. Jack Point, sans the fun and laughter. And I don’t even know why.
Indeed, I have a song to sing, O… and for worse reason than dear Jack Point. That jester, at least, lost out to a noble lord.
There is a fine line for us performing artists between life and reality. I think anyone who has ever taken theater seriously has found themselves, at one point or another, becoming a character they are portraying offstage. Whether it be by picking up their mannerisms, quoting them in real life, or finding yourself falling for a co-cast member because your characters have fallen for one another, it happens. But, at some point, you snap out of it. Rehearsals end, and you return to your normally schedule broadcast. The blurred line between reality and theater fades along with the last curtain call.
But how sick and twisted is it when you realize that you have somehow become a character from an operetta that you haven’t played for years? That there is no contextual reason for you to have a parallel path, other than sheer, dumb luck?
Cheerily carols the lark, indeed. Mad, I, yes, very, but why? It’s actually no mystery. I keep playing the role of Mad Margaret, only I’ve never done it onstage fully. I am Mad Margaret. Only without the relief Jack gets at the end of Yeomen. I’m stuck in replay.
And, yes, I fear that as this recurring typecasting in the Ruddigore of life, I will eventually be left chasing after insects, pulling my skirt over my head, and becoming, more and more, the town joke.
This violet yearns to be a rose. But she can’t grow the thorns. She can’t transplant herself. She’s never appealing enough. She’s never delicate enough. She is too tender. She’s never
But she’s stupidly stubborn, and keeps growing back. She gets weeded, but doesn’t know any better. All she knows how to do is fight through, year after year. She finds the strength to grow from nothing constantly, just to be stepped on throughout the next season. She’s not long enough, not extraordinary enough, not fragrant enough, not special enough to be included, to be taken in, to be desired. She’s barely noticed. She gets mowed. And yet she keeps coming back. Because she’s too stupid to stop. And she keeps this asinine hope alive that some time, it will change. But it never does. She’s genetically flawed.
But alas, the cruel awaking…
I wish I’d never done G&S. I wish I’d never been cast as a mezzo. I wish I’d never studied Yeomen. I wish I’d never learned how to sing. I wish I’d never learned how to act. I wish I’d never known any better.
Ignorance would be blissful. I wish I were never born to be aware. To know what was being missed out on. To robotically just go through motions instead of feeling anything. To not give a damn.
What was the Tin Man thinking?
