Time to play ball

A behind-the-scenes look at “Bang the Drum Slowly” and the acclaimed Steep Theatre Company

By Ross Kennerly

MISE EN SCÈNE

I’m leaning against an SUV in the parking lot behind Steep Theatre Company, a small, 41-seat, storefront black box at the corner of Sheffield Avenue and Sheridan Road, watching a group of New York Mammoths — the fictionalized version of the 1954 New York Yankees featured in Steep’s current and final production of the season, “Bang the Drum Slowly” — having a quick, pre-curtain call game of catch as the sun sets on the first humid day of the year. The rest of the ensemble, their faces divorced by the fading light into glowing and shaded halves, watch on, some of them smoking cigarettes, some of them spraying their hair into place, some of them adjusting their faux pregnant bellies.

“Let fly, let fly!” Warren Levon, one of the ballplayers, calls out.

Sam Dyer, another actor, enters the lot from the rear entrance to the theater — or “space,” as they all call it — with guitar in hand. His role called for him to learn the instrument to accompany himself in the play’s titular musical number. He pulls up an empty chair and begins to practice his strumming pattern, which he had to teach himself in only six weeks.

“Hey guys,” Michelle Tynski, the stage manager, announces, poking her head out from behind the back door. “House is open.”

“F--k, I am good,” Dyer blurts after she leaves, referring to his guitar playing.

“Can you play ‘Every Rose Has Its Thorn?’ ” Juan Castaneda, in costume as a translator, asks him in response.

“Yes,” he answers, delivering the line as emphatically as anything he would utter onstage. Then he breaks into the opening chords of the famous Poison tune.

At 10 minutes until call, Alex Gillmor, founding member of Steep and stay-at-home dad, rallies the ballplayers and other costumed characters around him in a circle to begin their pre-show warm-up, which, after a few unique, New York, aluminum, linoleum enunciation exercises, goes something like this:

“Sour face!” Gillmor shouts.

“Mmm!” the rest of the circle hums, their collective faces puckered.

“Scared face!”

“Agghh!” they scream, eyes and mouths wide.

“Smell a fart!”

“Ohhh…”

“Release a fart!”

“Ahhhh…”

Beat.

“Let a little shart out,” Gillmor laughs.

Steep has cause to be smiling: Last night’s performance was attended by several members of the prestigious Joseph Jefferson Awards (Jeff Awards) committee — who, along with most other critics, attend on opening night — and the cast was pleased to hear that the committee has already stamped the show “Jeff Recommended” after only one performance.

Now they can relax. A little.

COMPANY POLICY

“Part of the reason I was interested in starting the company was to work with people you’re comfortable with, and (have) an atmosphere where you feel like you could take risks. Part of that is having fun with each other,” says Peter Moore, the second of Steep’s founding fathers. “In ‘Catch 22’ (one of Steep’s 2005 productions), there was this one scene where one guy had to run offstage and open the door looking for his (character’s) girlfriend. Every time he went down there, someone was mooning him. God bless him, the kid kept it together pretty well.”

Moore’s position is that the loose environment contributes to their creativity and lets the actors experiment, which in turn contributes to their performances.

“And God forbid Gillmor’s standing behind you,” he warns. “You’re going to get a thumb up the ass.”

The backstage humor also lends contrast to the otherwise glum subject matter. “Bang the Drum Slowly,” originally adapted for the stage in 1992 by Steppenwolf Theatre alum Eric Simonson, is a “memory play” about Bruce Pearson, a big league catcher diagnosed with Hodgkin’s disease. The narrator, Henry “Author” Wiggen — played by Moore — is Pearson’s roommate and only confidant, as well as the best pitcher in the majors. Pearson convinces Author to keep his ailment from the rest of the Mammoths, who have a shot at the World Series, so he can play out the rest of the season.

The formula definitely seems to be working: In addition to their recent recommendation, Steep is also currently nominated for two Jeff Awards — Best Ensemble and Best Actress in a Principle Role — for their 2005 show “Book of Days.”

“It’s hard to say from the inside,” Moore says, “but I think people like to work with us.”

A HISTORY OF ADAPTING AND OVERCOMING

Steep performed its very first play, “Life During Wartime,” in March 2001, without having secured a space. In those days, they performed at Strawdog, Bailiwick Repertory and Chopin Theatre companies, among others, until they discovered their current location, a former food pantry for HIV patients. Even after being remodeled, the space is small. In the case of BTDS, which has a cast of 18 (enormous for a black box the size of Steep), most of the actors have to huddle in the dressing room, which, along with the parking lot, doubles as “backstage.”

Five minutes into the performance, James Allen, or “Jamie,” bursts out the back door into the lot, half in and half out of a suit, adjusting his tie in the SUV’s windshield, for the first of his many wardrobe changes. Every actor in BTDS changes clothes at least once, and due to the already oversized cast, several of the actors embody multiple roles, in some cases up to three. Also, and this is my favorite part, the Steep Theatre lobby ingeniously doubles as “house left.” This means that, unbeknownst to the audience, the actors’ movements are choreographed around the audience seating, into the breezeway and outside the theatre. This also means that Jamie has to walk all the way around the building from the parking lot to enter from house left.

Incidentally, directly next door to Steep is a Country & Western bar, Wrigleyville North. Moore describes it as being “one of those bars that is more full at 11:00 in the morning than 11:00 at night,” which he attributes to the Sheffield House, a transient hotel a block south that supplies a generous portion of its clientele. Sometimes, about halfway through Steep’s performances, country music begins to bleed through the theater walls, which in the past has caused the occasional complaint.

“It is what it is,” Moore says of the difficulties, “Seems like every very small storefront theatre has some sort of quirk, whether it’s the El running over it or a band next door. Something.”

Steep’s unique location, though, has accounted for some humorous anecdotes from those actors who, like Jamie, had to circle the bar in transit from backstage to house left.

“In ‘Incident at Vichy,’ ” Moore says, referring to one of Steep’s past plays, “Peter Esposito (another BTDS cast member) played this character called ‘Old Jew.’ And didn’t really say anything, just had this long Hasidic Jewish beard. Every night he had to walk around (there), and people in the bar would just start whoopin’ and hollerin’, and one time he went by some woman flashed him. He got in the dressing room, and he was like, ‘She really had small breasts… I think it was a dude.’ It was a transvestite flashing.”

Another time, during “The Job,” Moore played an ex-con who fools a rabbi into believing that he is a man of the cloth. During one scene, Moore, dressed in full clerical garb (with collar), and his co-star, wearing a Hasidic beard, kippah and tallit, came booking around the bar from the parking lot. From the other direction, a bewildered elderly couple rounded the corner and bumped into what appeared to be… a priest and rabbi walking out of a bar.

NON-PROFIT THEATRE 101

So what does it take to get a show like “Bang the Drum Slowly” up and running? First, don’t pay your actors. Fundraising events — like the upcoming Board Night on June 9 at Trace — help cover costs, but most of their revenue comes through the front door.

Second, plays are submitted, read, and democratically voted on as an ensemble. Steep then plans out three or four shows for the season, which typically runs from September to June. BTDS is the last show for the 2005-’06 season; Cubs fans should be happy to learn that its placement is not by coincidence.

“We thought, (let’s) open up the show in May or June, right in the middle of baseball season, two blocks from the stadium,” Moore admits. “(It will) kind of be a cool event, kind of play into (the show).”

Productions rely heavily on volunteers to get off the ground, not to mention a slew of multitalented cast members, most of whom direct and assist with the technical aspects of the production as well as act. One of these players is Tony Adams. In addition to his principle responsibility as director which, appropriately enough, he compares to being a baseball manager, Adams designed the set, arranged the sound and created the costumes along with fellow designer Adam Dodds.

“If only you could have seen the madness that was the costume design for this show,” Adams says between bites of a sandwich before the performance. “I had to find clothes for 20 people, and (Dodds) had to make 14 period baseball uniforms. And a pattern did not exist for them.”

Set design can also be a challenge.

“We did one show that a guy in the company wrote and directed, and there was a scene where a dead cow had to fall from the sky,” Adams remembers. “And it worked in the show! It just really forces you to be creative, because there’s really no other option.”

Once the director and design staff are in place, the next step is to start casting, which isn’t exactly a walk in the park. “You have to do an incredible amount of research before you even get the actors,” explains Jennifer Leavitt Adams, Tony Adams’ wife, who acted as voice coach for Dyer. “There are different (variables) that you look at in a script, like rhythm, like sociological impact.”

The director generally rehearses the cast up until opening night, then transfers control of the play over to the stage manager for the duration of its run. (Adams is here tonight because one of the principle actors is away at his daughter’s wedding, and understudies have taken on several of the roles.)

That’s it. Sounds easy, right?

“We’ve been real fortunate,” Moore says. “We’ve got some great people, and we try to make it a fun experience. We don’t take ourselves too seriously, we work hard and we play hard afterwards.”

Julia Siple, a company member, sums it up even more.

“If you really want to get a sense of the theater company,” she says, a few minutes before I make my leave halfway through the second act, “you should stay after and have a couple drinks. I think tonight they’re playing Beer Dice.”

I don’t know what that is, but it sure sounds like fun.

Bang the Drum Slowly runs May 25-July 1, Thursday – Saturday at 8 p.m. General admission is $15. The June 9th “Board Night” performance includes a $5 donation and a meet-and-greet with the cast at Trace after the show. Call (312) 458-0722 for reservations.

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