Moving Things Around Just Doesn’t Pay What it Used To
While the writer’s strike has ground all of Hollywood to a halt and rendered all televisions blank and featureless save reruns of Good Times, another, perhaps less glamorous strike is plaguing the Big Apple some three thousand miles and several levels of national interest away. Brace yourselves:
They’re striked. It’s stricken.
There are no more people in New York City willing to move objects from point A to point B, haul flats from point B to point C, or preset the Grinch’s Mazzila-mazoo. Need that prop moved from that table to that other table, Mr. Director? TOO BAD. There is literally no one who is willing to do this for money.
And judging from the fact that there are currently only eight shows still running on Broadway, they’ve basically got the theatres by the balls. After all, they are one of the industry’s most powerful unions. You know how most unions are called “Local Seven Hundred Eighty-Three?” The stagehands’ union is called Local One.
That’s right; they are the FIRST UNION, the one union to rule them all. Remove their dental plan at the risk of plunging us all into an era of darkness and orc-warfare.
As the strike wears on, we must face a grim possibility: doing things outside. Conan and The Daily Show are on hiatus, and Wicked and The Lion King promise no salvation. And honestly, how long can you read internet blogs before your eyes eat themselves?
In the interest of pre-eminently alleviating such an epidemic of ocular auto-consumption, here are three fun things you can do outside with your whole family:
November 15th, 2007 at 4:14 pm
Was that some sort of weird, backhanded compliment? I’ll assume I’m reading it correctly and say “You’re welcome.”
Maybe the stagehands and the writers should just swap jobs. It might be a nice change of pace to see all our favorite sitcoms chock-full of stagehand-centric jokes. Plus the thought of watching writers attempt ANY sort of manual labor is funny in and of itself.
November 15th, 2007 at 4:18 pm
I had to struggle while writing this not to make a stagehand “striking” pun.
November 15th, 2007 at 4:25 pm
Wow, I honestly didn’t think you could “nerd up” a post that was presumed to be at full nerd capacity by being exclusively about Broadway, and then you went and threw in a Lord of the Rings reference.
I’ll never doubt you again, Sir.
November 15th, 2007 at 4:30 pm
Is it better or worse that when I read “orcs” I immediately thought of Warcraft?
November 15th, 2007 at 4:50 pm
Worse, but only if you haven’t upgraded your War Mill to a Tauren Totem.
November 16th, 2007 at 7:54 am
That guy on the far right looks like Matt from Heroes; am I right?