Auditions were recently held at Roy Arias studios in the city for the role of “Colin” to perform  with  writer, Lauren Robert who will be playing the role of “Deanne“.

The response to the Breakdown posting was enormous, and from that original response 15 extremely talented actors were asked to come in and read.

Rehearsals for the June 1st performance begin this coming week.

Musical accompaniment to Don’t Kiss Me in the scene will be provided by brilliant jazz guitar great, Ed Cherry formerly of Dizzy Gillespie’s Band. Lauren and Ed have shared the stage in the past as headliners for the Sedona-Jazz On the Rocks Music Festival and the Cotton Club.

See details for The ARTC 2009 Spring Reading Series Announcement

For Reservations call 212-560-2377 or email: rsvpartc@gmail.com

Music and Lyrics: Lauren Robert and Slats Klug

As Performed by: Lauren Robert and Tim Warmen

Now You’ve Done It

Music and Lyrics: Lauren Robert and Timothy Warmen

As Performed by: Lauren Robert and Timothy Warmen

Opening ensemble: Opening the Pandora’s Box of life

Waiting For The Click

Music and Lyrics: Lauren Robert

As Performed by: Paul Oakley Stovall

In the face of a brutal beating hope springs eternal.

Anywhere Can Be Home

Music and Lyrics: Lauren Robert

As Performed by: Aaron Berk

Living on the street, Frankie tries to make the best of it.

All I Can Do

Music and Lyrics: Lauren Robert and Timothy Warmen

As Performed by: Lauren Robert and Timothy Warmen

Deanne and Colin struggle to come to terms with their feelings for each other and their haunted pasts.

Bein’ Somebody

Music and Lyrics: Lauren Robert

As Performed by: Paul Oakley Stovall

Carmel lectures Frankie about survival in this crazy world.

Don’t Kiss Me

Music and Lyrics: Lauren Robert

As Performed by: Lauren Robert

Deanne struggles with Colin’s advances of ‘true’ intimacy.

Risky Business

Music and Lyrics: Lauren Robert

As Performed by: Lauren Robert, Paul Oakley Stovall, Danny Dolan

Deanne, Carmel and Frankie look at the risky business of love.

I Need To Rest

Music and Lyrics: Lauren Robert

As Performed by: Lauren Robert and Timothy Warmen

.22 Caliber Mouth

Music: Timothy Warmen, Dan Dolan and Lauren Robert

Lyrics: Timothy Warmen and Lauren Robert

Arrangement: Dan Dolan

This title song which is still in the development stage embodies a harder rock-n-roll drive than other songs in the show to encompass the wavering of Colin’s world as he is exposed and those emotions that send him over the edge.

]]> http://www.22calibermouth.com/archives/a-work-in-progress/feed 0 http://www.22calibermouth.com/archives/the-setting-lower-east-side http://www.22calibermouth.com/archives/the-setting-lower-east-side#comments Sat, 04 Oct 2008 21:09:35 +0000 Tony http://www.22calibermouth.com/?p=280 Tony DiOrio’s atmospheric, evocative photographs are offered as inspiration to producers, directors and set designers. The beauty of .22 CALIBER MOUTH is that it is a tale told and sung by five characters only. An unusually low number for a musical production with this degree of dynamism. The entire story takes place within the parameters of a small part of New York. The Lower East Side. The flavors of a bar, a park bench, single apartments and a hospital bed, are not difficult to replicate in any literal way.

These photos depict the world of 70s New York in which the play takes place. The flavors, the darkness. the sexy graffiti –strewn milieu where everything was quite a bit more out of control.

The possibilities in terms of lighting, staging, and sound design are endless.

I don’t believe there is any age limit on searching for or finding answers for a way to make some bearable peace with our stay on this earth.

I am not a cheerful spirit. I am young and old. I am emotionally hobbled and I am far far wiser than my years. As are the five flailing characters of my play. Yes, though people experience me as fun, funny and loving (at times) my view of life is that it can be the cruelest teaching device, beyond brilliant in its hellish challenges. I believe the elusive spirits of fun and love show up whenever the hell they want despite our prompts or beseeching and likewise do the demons.

That  is why Tim Warmen’s contributions to this project have been such a blessing to me. He understands everything, but his beliefs are intact.

We met when he was called back to play the role of Colin in the Ohio Theater workshop. His audition was stunning and he had the sensibilities to back it up. His passion for my work translated into brilliant suggestions and advice. His questions brought  needed light and depth to many scenes and many songs. “Where is the humor between these two? Where is her tenderness? Isn’t it really family they all yearn for?” Like many collaborators, our fights were renown, but we believe in each other.

As many writers will tell you, this play wrote itself. I was the conduit, yes. I have always been an actor and singer and it is from this perspective that I began to write. .22 Caliber Mouth is my most recent play with music and the one that cut closest to the bone.

The lead character, Deanne chose an innocuous day, without any dramatic explosions (for a change) as the right time to begin to express her difficult story to me. Though we have certain similarities, this play is not about me. It did not happen to me quite this way. I believe that most cogent, intelligent self-examining females will understand certain aspects of Deanne and her sister Ronnie. Though they are quite different, each shares traits that resonate in all of us who have hungered for love.  

In my life, like so many, I have gone to the greatest self–sacrificing lengths to avoid the existential, to outrun the dark menace of loneliness that loiters just outside the apartment door after “he” leaves. God Bless those who have embraced solitude with poise and brave pursuit, in silent self-commune, in a ballet of thought, deed and grace, of life with vitality undeterred by broken heart.

I, on the other hand, battered by betrayal, the sting and stun of a fresh divorce, acute bouts of lovesickness and so many walks on the wild side that I should be dead… well, I’m scarred for life. What scars I didn’t get from this world I inherited through the zeitgeist of both the blood and the word.

So I write from this place, this conundrum. I do have hope and a passionate desire for love and a longing for life to come out right. Perhaps this is why these characters chose me. 

I love them.

Because they try so hard.

Lauren