Operation Я.A.U.E.: On your mark . . .

James here.

Photo above:  The marquis above The Raue Center.  With the missing "E" on "Premiere" it now looks like we'll have a special visitor, the Premier of Chicago.

Resting on a day off from the theater in Crystal Lake, IL; the second stop on the westward advance of I am the Machine Gunner.  I arrived two days ago after shooting a television commercial in Spain and have been pushing through the fog of jet lag to get this show back on its feet.  Luckily Dutch, Jamie and Rebecca all arrived a couple of days before me to load the chamber and oil up the works for a smooth run in Chicagoland.

Rebecca and I spent most of today postering Crystal Lake and nearby Woodstock with flyers and postcards, trying to get the word out a bit more before we fire off this weekend.  We shook down more of the same types of joints we postered in Baltimore:  bars, coffee shops, tattoo parlours, etc.  With only two performances, its important we reach out to our audience any way we can.

Operation  Я.A.U.E. drops tomorrow and things look good.  The Raue Center has a beautiful space which we’ve converted a bit to meet our needs.  Instead of playing along the theater’s traditional proscenium, we’re bringing the audience up onto the stage, and by rotating the stage 90⁰, we’ve gotten the intimate black box space we need.

We’re on our mark, set, and ready to go.  Now we’re just waiting for the opening pistol shot to get this thing moving.

Out