What’s in Carey Mack’s Pocket?: Magic
May 20th, 2007 by Carey Mack
I’ve always thought that the very, very, very funny film Waiting for Guffman totally mocks community theater. They put on their show in a gym, and the audience sits in folding chairs. They are not great actors, singers, or dancers. They lack self-awareness; in a word, they are horrible. The
Before I go any further, I need to say that I have always felt very self-conscious when I start to talk about my experience doing theater in high school. It feels like a parallel to “…and this one time? At band camp?” Or, even worse, that people will see me as I see the characters in Waiting for Guffman. But I’m all about showing up for my life and not apologizing. Plus, Tom Hanks gets just as effusive as me when he talks about his high school theater experiences. And Tom and I had eerily similar experiences: “[I] tried out for the plays, and got into them, and had more fun than I could possibly imagine. It was an incredible group of people, some of whom are still my friends. I got into this eclectic group that was kind of rootless and clique-less.”[1]
Wow, if that isn’t dripping with theology, I don’t know what is — we are, as humans, rootless and at the same time, I think it says something in the Revelation of John that in God’s world, there will be no more tears, or pain, or cliques, especially high school cliques. Can I hear an “Amen!?”
What got me thinking about all of this? Well, dear readers, I tell you — I found, in a pocket, a remnant of an experience that I had this past March. I jumped in at the last minute to run follow-spots for a community theater production of Gypsy, performed ably by the Saline Area Players (of the
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