Saturday, July 16, 2011

PARKING LOT PLAYERS (Video)

John Cullum brags about the madness, the fun, the adventure he and Emily had, when they were working on a play to perform on weekends, in a parking lot.

It was, and still is, one of their most favorite ventures--"One Fine Morning In the Middle of the Night." Emily wrote it, using a pseudonym, and John directed it.

They used the courtyard of a nine-story hotel, a rundown, "bums" hotel on Bleecker street, and transformed it into a theater. The play was a hit, but the day it opened, the newspapers in New York City went on strike.

To finance the play, they "passed the hat," but couldn't keep "One Fine Morning" open, without running out of money.

Could they, should they produce it again? It's fun to speculate.

3 comments:

Carola said...

I want to hear the rest of the story. I hope you continue with this theme next week. I remember the poem well and can recite it to this day.

Linda Phillips said...

Did you mean Edward Albee?

Part of what I love about you Em is your inventiveness and your tenacity! You are my sister Libran!

Peggy Gaffney said...

Please do continue the story next week. My father used to recite the poem at least once a week when we were children. It was one of our favorites. He had a bit at the end about 'if you don't believe these lies', asking the blind man across the street who saw it all, but I can't remember how that part goes. What I can remember doesn't rhyme or scan, so there was more.