Tiny Alice

I wrote the article

Because it seemed important

That the people at the theater

Knew how serious I was

The place had become a cult

I mean, we used to tease about that

But by 2009

That’s really what we were dealing with

We were doing Tiny Alice

I was just—

I wasn’t an actress

I used to be in marketing

But I always felt like I was prevented

From moving ahead

Because I wouldn’t drink the Kool-Aid

And say we were the best thing to happen to theater

Since the cavemen reenacted the story of making fire

And I got asked to write this article

For this local magazine

Just a puff piece

On the rules of marketing in the current economy

Even though the rules of marketing in any economy

Are exactly the same

Push, push, push

And I was going to write something straight-ahead

Very matter-of-fact and simple

And then I said ‘Forget it.  I’m writing the truth’

I said ‘We need to be more critical

We need to be harder on ourselves

We need to raise our expectations

We need to stop saying we’re so great’

I stopped short of saying ‘Because we’re not’

But I still got called into the whipping room

When the article came out

And everybody acted as if I had said that

As if I’d come right out and said the real truth

Which is—

We were in bad shape

Artistically, anyway

The ironic thing is

At that time

We were doing Tiny Alice

And it was great!

I loved it!

And so everybody was pointing to it

Saying—

‘See?!?  See?!?  They still have it!’

What we had was an anomaly

Every so often we’d put on a decent show

And people would herald our comeback

Say—‘There!  That proves it!  We’re fine.’

We were not fine

We hadn’t been fine

In a very, very long time

I was suspended

Just for a week

With pay even

But going back…

I just felt like the air

Had been let out of me

From that point on, I just sort of kept my mouth shut

I sat in this place

Of great artistic vision

And expression

Keeping all my opinions

To myself