Algorithms for the Masses by Julian M Bucknall

I’m in a show at the moment at the Fine Arts Center here in Colorado Springs (as it happens, tonight is opening night). We’re doing Crazy For You, a modern musical that marries up lots of great Gershwin tunes with a light 30s style plot. And tap dancing. Lots of tap dancing. Man, am I glad I’m not in those numbers: I get exhausted just watching.

Anyway, I play a British character (type-casting?) called Eugene Fodor who’s on a trip through the American West with his sister writing a guide book (no, nothing to do with the real Eugene Fodor or the Fodor’s guides, it’s just a joke). At a point in the second act I propose that the assembled company could learn a thing or two from Englishmen: to keep a stiff upper lip. And the company then slips into another wild tap number called Stiff Upper Lip, in which I’ll admit I do participate (probably muttering under my breath ‘step-ball-change’, ‘step-ball-change’). I am not, in any sense of the words, a gifted dancer.

Moving right along...

Last night I discovered that our set designer, Tom Hansen, is a cartoonist. As a present to each actor on preview night, he’d done a cartoon of them. Here’s mine, showing me giving my line with Tom’s recurring kid character listening in.

I’m so going to use that drawing of me. Maybe for the DevExpress newsletters?

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