KevinSix.com

and you thought you had a bad Monday at work...

 

It Works! It Really, Really Works!

Last time I posted here, I asked for a miracle and got one.  The same day!

The dog owner from upstairs came over to talk and became a neighbor.  It must not have been easy because of all the trouble I've caused.  I commend the neighbor and look forward to a nice living arrangement.

The landlord, however, still needs to learn how to read a calendar, join the human race and gain about 50 I.Q. points.  This will take a miracle but I'm used to them by now.

People I rely upon to to their jobs need to do their jobs.

Drivers need to look beyond their hood ornaments.

More love in politics (hey, miracles can happen, right?)

Broadway producers need to choose my play.  It made the stack (bonafide miracle!) now it needs to get the "Smash" treatment.

And I need to give everyone a break.  I am going to try this just for today.

I'll let you know how that miracle shapes up.

Here's a ton of gratitude for the miracle that happened (that I didn't expect), for the miracles that brought me to this point and for future miracles.  In gratitude, I promise to take care of the last miracle on my own.  Thanks!

The OccupyThisDollar Video

OccupyThisDollar.com The OcupyThisDolar Video Goes Viral "Occupying places is getting more dangerous by the minute and politicians still only care about money. The only safe way to protest is to Occupy dollars and send them to politicians." -Kevin Six FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE OTD Headquarters, San Diego, CA (December 2, 2011) The OccupyThisDollar campaign is going viral, videographically. The OccupyThisDollar Video was posted on OccupyThisDollar.com early this morning and is ready to be viewed, shared, distributed and, basically, go Bubonic (except that it will not kill anyone). The OccupyThisDollar Video, shot and edited by actress, blogger and professional photographer Kymri Wilt, features OccupyThisDollar.com founder Kevin Six (ostensibly) printing labels, attaching them to US Currency and mailing them to politicians. The labels have a simple message: Occupy this dollar Please listen to all the people Not just those who can afford it Thanks Watch the video, share it, then interview Kevin Six. You owe it to your readers. OccupyThisDollar Video OccupyThisDollar.com Links OccupyThisDollar Video OcupyThisDollar.com OccupyThisDollar Media Page Occupy This Dollar Labels California Representatives Labels Contact Kevin Six at the e-mail address below or by calling 619-818-1131. [email protected] • Kevin Six

 

This cat hates ballet.

What can I say.  Everyone is a critic.  Even my cat.

 

My Other Blog

Using a blog to promore another blog.  Boggeriffic! 

My wife and I often lie in bed laughing and wonder who would believe the things we come up in the privacy of our home and begroom.  Do you really want to know?  If so, folow our blog:

http://olson-six.blogspot.com/

Olson Six

The ongoing adventures of Kevin and Jennie Olson Six.

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Heads Must Roll!

Ladies and Gentlemen, The San Diego Chargers:

It turns out I was wrong.  The Chargers are not an elite team that has had a bad run.  They are a bunch of Lonesome Losers that have been masquerading as an elite team for a season and a haf.

And there is plenty of blame to go around:

The offensive line, the defensive line, the secondary and, sadly the quarterback are all to blame.

So too are those who coach them, the general manager who micro manages them and the idiot who owns them.

I have been a fan since Air Coryel days and it took me thirty two years to figure out that we didn't win a Super Bowl then and we won't win a Super Bowl now. We are Lonesome Losers, beaten by the Queen of Hearts every time.

It is time for the San Diego Chargers to trade Dean Spanos who knows less about football than any owner in the history of professional sports.  Someone must break the spell thad A. J. Smith has cast on the Spoanos Family -- a spell that has them thinking that Smith can pick talent.

No. The only thing A. J. Smith can do is trade away talent. Junior Seau got his ring elsewhere, ditto Rodney Harrison, Drew Brees and I'd go on but I have already cried enough tears over this team.

I have cried gold and blue until year thirty two.  Today I quit giving a flying facisimile of funk about the San Diego Chargers, the mistakes, the lack of depth, the egos and the departures. 

I GIVE UP!

San Diego Chargers, I break with thee, I break with thee, I break with thee.  The dog poop for your shoes will arrive shortly.

I hate you and every thing you stand for.  I wasted the best years of my life.  I will never get any of it back.  Next year, I will follow whomever wins the Super Bowl this year.

Except the Patriots. I hate the Patriots.  And the Packers.  And..

Oh, hell!

The Wake Surfing Film of the Century

I don't need to say more.

But I will.

This film was an honor and a triumph to make. it took blood, swet, tears and a whole lotta love to produce.  Many thanks to my beloved wife, Jennie, the crew and the people of Scandia Minnesota who had a festival just for me, which they call Taco Days -- and which I call Kevin Six Presents Taco Days but that's a film to be released at a later date. 

Tonight, we bring you the wake surfing film of the century.  A little film I like to call:

The Wake Surfing Film of the Century

 

Cast:

Kevin Six..........................Kevin Six

Jennie Olson Six.................Jennie Olson Six

Sherri Mann......................Sherri Mann

Shawn Klancke...................Shawn Klancke

Katrina Nord......................Katrina Nord

Kiki Mann.........................A midget who looks just like her (no child labor laws broken)

Rusty and Tinkerbell............Themselves

 

Crew

Director, producer, writer and all around cool guy.........Kevin Six

Camera....................Kevin Six, Jennie Olson Six, Katrina Nord

Boat Drivers..............................Shawn Klancke, Sherri Mann

Water Safety.........................Shawn Klancke and Sherri Mann

Stunt coordinator.............................................Kevin Six

Executive Producer........................................Chuck Mann

Special Thanks to: The lovely people of Scandia Minnesota, the Embrace Adrenaline Trapeze Club, the Marine on St. Croix water patrol who totally pulled us over, MasterCraft Boats, GoPro cameras, Shane Foss who surfs very well but not on video and Kali Mann who... Kali, where were you?

Arts Marketing

I just read an article about a Theatre Communication Group conference on arts marketing and it raised all kinds of emotions.  In the article,  someone commented that playwrights were complaining that marketers don't know how to market their plays.  And marketing directors were complaining that playwrights don't know enough about marketing to tell them what to do.

Having been both a marketing director and a playwright, I think I have as true a perspective on the problem as anyone.  Both parties are right.  In my experience, arts organizations choose products without consulting the marketing department and then complain when sales figures are low.

As one friend in the business once said, "When a play sells well, it's an artistic success and when it doesn't sell well, it's a marketing failure."

Artists and arts managers should remember that in the for profit world, the product originates in the marketing department.  Marketers decide what people want and then help create a product to sell to these people.  Arts organizations don't often ask their audiences what they want, unless we're talking about Broadway - and there's a reason that ticket prices are high on Broadway: people want to see the shows.

Arts organizations are encouraged to take risks and expand their audiences' horizons by presenting work that is new, that challenges the status quo and makes people feel and think.  That is good art. The problem with good art is that people don't like it as much as good artistic product. The fact about nonprofit theatre audiences is that they don't know nearly as much about theatre as the people running them.  This is not a bad thing.

I worked at a theatre in San DIego that got a huge grant to study audience demographics in the service of expanding audiences and especially minority audiences.  It is no secret that the majority of theatre goers at that time were older, well-educated, well-to-to white people.  This years-long study supported African American plays, Latino plays and traditional plays and tried to integrate audiences to all of them.  The results were interesting. 

Generally, Latinos supported Latino plays; African Americans supported African American plays and Whites went to everything.  So the audience, after the years-long study, turned out to be predominantly an older, whiter, well educated and well-to-do audience but one, we learned, who appreciated more types of plays than we thought. 

The same crowd that marketing directors at theatres have been marketing to for years.  With limited budgets for marketing (something I have never understood), marketing directors have to market to this demographic primarily.

I am not advocating for marketing directors to dictate to playwrights.  People engaged in this activity are on TV and in film and playwrights (and theatres and audiences) want something different.  I am advocating for marketing directors and artistic directors to communicate. 

Remember, artistic people, that the marketing department manages the only people who interact with customers who like and dislike the product.  Remember, marketing people, that artists have to develop seasons of thoughtful, thought-provoking and powerful art.

Of course, all you really have to do, playwrights, is look at what the large and medium theatres are doing to see what they want and what they want is brand new but proven thought-provoking art.  The fact that playwrights are even in theatres in the first place is a miracle.  The fact that they are complaining about this miracle is heart-breaking.

My goal is to wright a Tony Award winning play and, during my acceptance speech say, "To the people who chose plays: know that there are still a number of plays with my name on them in your stacks of unread plays.  The cost of doing these plays just went up.  Also know this: in support of the play writing community, I will submit the rest of my plays under pseudonyms so you will have to read them all to find mine.  During that process I know you will find other voices as good as, or better than, mine.  Thank you."

Too bitter?

A Win is a win!

Congratulations Casey Nicholaw!  I did one show with him in Junior Theatre ("How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying") and he's the real deal.  San Diego City Beat asks if his victory was a hollow one based on the voting rules change at the Tony's.  But he's a Tony Award Winning Director/Choreographer and I don't know anyone more deserving.  Congrats Casey!

Now if only I could get him to read my musical about the female Elvis impersonator...

V-Day

Valentine's Day is my favorite holiday.  Probably because it's one of the few times it's OK for prople to say "I Love You".  The V-Day movement chose this time of year to tell the world about a something that continues to hold the human race back from love.

Violence and especially violence against women.

And that's why The Vagina Monologues are performed in February all over the world.  The celebration/lesson by Eve Ensler starts off not-so innocently enough, with women talking about their vaginas -- it'a a celebration of that which is the gateway to creation of the most profound kind.

Then you go to intermission and, when you get back, you see what some people have to go through just because they own one of these amazing things.  There is a price for owning a little bit of the power to create.

And, over the years, there have been reasponses to the Vagina Monologues.  A man by the name of Derek Dujardin had such a response to the show that he wrote The MENding Monologues to show the women of the world that men are listening.

He wanted to make it funny and keep the pieces light but sometimes, it didn't work out so well.  There is just so much to think and feel about the concept of violence towards women.

So I joined the cast and we are invited to write our own pieces in response to the Vagina Monologues.  And it's been powerful.

Not a laugh riot; not always fun; not a great way to think and feel.  But it's a way to show hope.  That there are men who won't buy into cheap shots at women, won't accept the status quo; and who stand up for the right of women to be safe.

And there's a third production that takes Derek Dujardin's work one step further.  A Memory, A Monologue, A Rant and a Prayer is a response from famous writers and performers.  This response to the Vagina Monologues, the movement and the fact that there is violence in the world was put together by Eve Ensler and features some of the best writers working today.

And, like the two shows that preceded it, it contains things that are monstrous and beautiful.  Well-written, passionately performed and containing a valuable message.  This is why I am involved this year and why I am inviting every one I know with children to come to this event.

To these people, I say:vsee one of these performances for your children.

It is one evening out of your life.  It will take you on a rollercoaster ride of emotions.  It will show you that the world is not neat and tidy, that people are capable of perpetrating horror; and that other people have not taken the news silently.  It is a way to see the darkness and the hope in the world.  Something you should not have to tell your kids about but exists.

Something that I believe in.  So please come and see what the world is.  Know that you won't be the same after seeing it but you will be informed.  Know that there is hope and you and your chuldren represent that hope and know that the money is distributed to the onranizations where it can do the most dood.

Thank you and love,

Kevin