A View From The Other Side

Another guest blogger this week! Blake L. Pfeil, playing Giuseppe Zangara in ASSASSINS, has agreed to spill his guts for us. Read and enjoy! - Nik

Hey, Blake here. We’re thru the first weekend of performances…to sold-out houses each night, mind you. Huh. I should have prepared the talented Mr. Walker, our tour-de-force Balladeer, for my guest blog spot a little better.. I have a few things I need to get off my chest, so please, if you need a glass of water, I suggest you get it now. You won’t want to get up.

I’m 20. I consider myself the baby of Company One’s cast of ASSASSINS...the youngin, the newborn, Sam Byck’s “bubula.” So imagine, for just a second, the what I might feel each time I am onstage with my fellow actors, each of whom (in some sense or another) has taught me a few things about this craft. I can go to school all I want, and I can study the mysteries of acting as much as I damn please, provided I schlep out a $40,000 check each year. But this is something much more exciting.

I’ve slowly developed more this summer (alongside truly gifted professionals) than any year of schooling will ever be able to give me. My mother knows: I’m a hands-on person. I can’t sit in a classroom filled with people and pretend to listen...instead I can watch Ed Hoopman as Czolgosz try to break a bottle every night and always get something else out of it. I can attempt to pry David DaCosta's Booth off Jon Popp's Oswald every night and always learn something different. I can sit and cry each night because Nathanael's Hinckley and McCaela's Fromme feel unworthy of somebody’s love. You can’t imagine what it does for a budding actor to listen to Mason Sand drive two entirely difficult Byck monologues home every night, swearing left and right, giving an audience something to think about…and I mean REALLY think about.

I’m trying to explain just how much these people have educated me in an artistic environment that I LOVE. It’s no mistake that I learn something different from Penny Hansen’s screams as Billy Moore for a Bubbalo Bill every night…or from the murderous rage that engulfs Liz Rimar's Sarah Jane Moore when Billy needs that goddamn Bubbalo Bill. See…when you can watch and listen to something like that night after night, it affects you.

I was talking to Jeff Mahoney, Mr. Looking-on-the-Bright-Side gonna-win-an-award-for-playing-a-real-Guiteau, about this feeling of elation that I get each night watching and listening to this group of extraordinary actors. Elaine Stritch said it best: “If somebody doesn’t have any talent, get off the stage! You’re wasting my time. But if they GOT it – and I’m talking about Mama Rose kind of talent: you either got it or you had it – I am so uplifted by talent. I can’t stop crying, applauding…screaming.” I am get this night after night after night. These people got it, and I am so thankful they do, because I am reaping so many benefits.

I’m 20. I should not be allowed onstage night after night with a company of such gifted actors. I’m learning. I’m dreaming. Somehow, by the sheer grace of God, I’m surrounded by this experience. This Wednesday can’t come soon enough.

Please come bear witness. If not for me, the 20 year-old (or, the Italian with a severe stomach problem and murderous hatred towards the government), then do it for my fellow cast members. You won’t believe your eyes. Your ears. Your head.

Heart? Oh, yes.

-Blake