The Matchmaker

It wouldn’t be funny if I thought it could get any worse. – Oh, wait, I don’t have health insurance either. How did I end up here? What the hell? I put in my time. I moved from doing shows for free at tiny venues to getting paid at midsize companies to getting my Equity card to performing in regional theaters to doing a few independent movies to working off-Broadway, a ridiculously improbable ride for a college drop-out. But even though I have paid my dues, and I work, I’ve never known where my next job is going to come from. Now, what the fuck am I going to do? I’ve already quit smoking. I started jogging. I eat right. I seek out old pros and follow their advice. I read, study, travel, and I started writing. I go see plays, concerts and movies. I strike up conversations with strangers. Shit, sometimes I even hang out with playwrights – anything to help get a job. I don’t own anything of value and have convinced myself that I am just keeping things lean and mean, no extra baggage to keep me from taking a job that, by the way, even at Equity rates generally doesn’t pay for shit. Is this the actor’s life? My god. Isn’t there any other way?

Fast forward a few weeks. I have just left an audition where the playwright had a coughing fit during one of my dramatic pauses and was forced to leave the room. Mid-audition. Enough, I say. Enough. Something has to change. Then, while looking at the audition notices on MinnesotaPlaylist, I came across a poll on the household income of the readership. Did you see this? Wow. Naturally there is a healthy segment of the readership who don’t make shit, but there are some rich motherfuckers who read this thing. Some rich motherfuckers who like theater. . . Then it hit me. What if I could sell myself to one of these people in exchange for their patronage? What if I could get one of these Richies to put up the money for one of my pet projects? How could that happen? The answer was staring me in the face. To survive, we often think that smaller is better. Our balls shrink when it gets cold outside. The less you put out there, the less gets chopped off. What if this time we think bigger. Bolder. Something like …

 

FOR SALE: thirtysomething actor.

Semi-attractive white male actor seeking arts lover.

Will provide out of body experiences for money. Flexible.

Me: 5’9” 140 lbs hazel eyes You: rich

 

WANTED: thirtysomething actor.

Arts lover seeking unemployed actor for light work around the house.

And that special feeling.

Me: powerful You: flexible

Di Vinci. Shakespeare. Michelangelo. All have benefited from this system of the wealthy directly supporting the individual artist. I say we help make Minneapolis a model for a new age. Putting on a show is not enough. We need to pay our actors, designers, directors, and writers. And the Richies have a legacy to uphold, a legacy of not just artistic excellence but of an attempt to pay the people who do excellent work something resembling a living wage. The money is out there. The survey says so. You just need to give up your pride to get it. I have considered the old answers—selling cocaine and/or marrying well—and have decided instead to harness the power of the Internet. I demand that MinnesotaPlaylist share their resources. You want us to read your articles and your audition notices? We need the Richies. I demand that MinnesotaPlaylist add a new feature to their online classifieds. They need to unveil a Patronage System for the 21st Century. You, Poorie, do you absolutely need to see The Tempest set in outer space with chimps? That’s so cool. Itching to produce a play for people who think exactly like you do about genocide and how we all still need to think that genocide is bad? Awesome. Dying to stage all 9 seasons of St. Elsewhere at the BLB? Burning to do a staged reading of The Seagull on a Monday night with Equity actors? Fuckin’ A. I will get you your very own patron! For a small fee, I will bring together You, the poor actor making less than 20,000 per year, and You – whoever it is that said you made over 100,000 per year. Everybody wins. The rich no longer have to worry about who will whip their gardener while they discover the new Lyn/Lake, and the poor will no longer have to perform unnatural acts in the basement of the Theater Garage. As an added bonus, due to increased traffic and ad revenue, the good folks at MinnesotaPlaylist will also no longer have to perform unnatural acts in the basement of the Theater Garage. “What about you, Pimp? What do you get out of this?” you might be asking. Well, the satisfaction of helping my community to thrive. “OK,” you reply, “But what will you actually be doing?” None of your fucking business. It’s complicated. Is it prostitution? Who cares? Find yourself a patron and have it, Orangutan Tempest Man. As for myself, I‘ll be fine. I have made it this far by giving up or losing everything of value in my life. I intend to continue to do so in the future. And, I am going to finally develop the show that has been bubbling in my brain for a long time: “Pawlenty! The Musical! ” Because with a little help from one special rich person, I can have this town. I just need to take it.❦