Seventeenth Wednesday
Seventeenth Wednesday was another piece that started out as an acting class
monolog. While I couldn't escape thinking about my own father -- nor did I want to --
Daddy is based much more closely on my grandfather, Fred Schmidt, who was a gruff
and weathered old navy guy (see him below on the right as a young man with a navy
buddy). His jobs in the Navy were first a cook and then a driver. He parlayed these
early experiences into many excellent beef roasts at Sunday meals and a driving gig
for Hamilton County, Ohio. His county job appeared, to my young eyes, to consist
mainly of shuttlling alcoholic derelicts back and forth between highway labor jobs and
their county-provided flophouses. And he handled an occasional eviction for the
Welfare Department. These were not altogether happy times.
The piece was originally a monolog for Tommy, who reminisced about his recently
deceased father. Daddy got added at the suggestion of Francis Gercke, my acting
teacher. It seemed to make sense to keep it a one-actor piece. I had fun with details
like the bologna smoothie, which struck me as just the sort of nutty thing that would
happen when you were trying to cope with an ancient and dying person. A brilliant
actor named Terry Scheidt played both parts in the Fritz production. The direction by
Duane Daniels and Robert May was flawless.
To the play.
Seventeenth Wednesday was another piece that started out as an acting class
monolog. While I couldn't escape thinking about my own father -- nor did I want to --
Daddy is based much more closely on my grandfather, Fred Schmidt, who was a gruff
and weathered old navy guy (see him below on the right as a young man with a navy
buddy). His jobs in the Navy were first a cook and then a driver. He parlayed these
early experiences into many excellent beef roasts at Sunday meals and a driving gig
for Hamilton County, Ohio. His county job appeared, to my young eyes, to consist
mainly of shuttlling alcoholic derelicts back and forth between highway labor jobs and
their county-provided flophouses. And he handled an occasional eviction for the
Welfare Department. These were not altogether happy times.
The piece was originally a monolog for Tommy, who reminisced about his recently
deceased father. Daddy got added at the suggestion of Francis Gercke, my acting
teacher. It seemed to make sense to keep it a one-actor piece. I had fun with details
like the bologna smoothie, which struck me as just the sort of nutty thing that would
happen when you were trying to cope with an ancient and dying person. A brilliant
actor named Terry Scheidt played both parts in the Fritz production. The direction by
Duane Daniels and Robert May was flawless.
To the play.
