Travisty

‘Don Juan’ shares some entries from a diary he found half-burned in his fireplace.

Monday

Today, my director asked me about my thoughts on the production. Director is quite a strong word for what he really is — to direct would presume the capacity for thought. I think ‘therapy pet’ would perhaps be more apt. Perhaps this could be a more fruitful avenue to go down than directing plays that, quite frankly, he doesn’t understand. Like most people, I find him amusing, in a tragic sort of way why else would I keep him around except as amusement? In any case, he knows he can’t fire me either I’d be acting for him, reviewing him — or both! But if I had my way, I’d be director, producer, and tech; as well as play all twenty-five parts. Although no one would fund that, which I wear as a badge of achievement.

Later in the day, I do a stint at the hospital radio — means I can share my witty insights and excellent diction to a largely captive (and often unconscious) audience. Apparently prognoses have nosedived since my time on air; oh well.

Tuesday

I wake up and decide to speak in a strong American accent today, for no reason other than to confound my friends into thinking I’ve had a stroke. My director, who has spent rather a lot of money on a dialect coach, is currently bearing an expression beyond words. He simply doesn’t value my creative input. I quit, have lunch, and rejoin the production. I may exhaust others, but I never bore myself.

I begin my afternoon by fluffing my hair to make it look like I’ve covered my head in jam and rolled around on a barbershop floor. After a couple of hours — when I have got it just right — I receive a call from the editors of Varsity. I have been asked to review a production tonight, all expenses paid. Naturally, I know the entire cast, and find them to be hypocritical, dreadful and two-faced — but of course, I will put on pleasantries when I naturally get invited backstage.

I now have to think about what to wear. I have a penchant for obscenely long scarves, but given that the diameter of my neck is approximately commensurate to the width of my shoulders, I find such sartorial choices do me no favours. It remains remarkable to me that my incredibly slender figure can support such an enormous head. I settle for something comfortable — my normal look, which I have titled ‘Homunculus in Burberry’. After all, I am the first man to perform himself in drag. I don’t plan on buying flowers for the cast — I simply give the gift of my presence. For lunch, I look intently at a bowl of wax fruit (not the fruit, just the bowl) until I feel nourished.

As I arrive at the theatre, the number of gays per square inch is frankly alarming (of course, I’m not gay, I’m homosexual; the two things are quite different). I worry for a moment that they could actually be better than I am, but I plug my ears with my fingers until the feeling passes. After three minutes, I can’t face any more, and go out for a smoke, leaving across the stage and through the backstage. Naturally, I’m only smoking ironically, and so won’t suffer any of the negative health effects. I put out the cigarette on the ADC stage door, thus causing it to burn to the ground for the fourth consecutive time. Such is the cost of bad art — good riddance.

Wednesday

Upon waking up, I pen down a brief ten-thousand-word critique of the last night’s travisty [sic], triangulating the influence of Brecht on the history of cauliflowers, my revolutionary thoughts on cigarette smoking as a cure for hiccups, and seventeen stanzas about my fondness for Mongolian ululatory jazz and the medieval use of the semicolon in the idiom of Baudelaire. I took special precaution not to mention the production once; after all, what else is a review for if not for writing about oneself? I despised the production. I would have, quite frankly, rather have spent an evening staring at a picture of a decomposing turd. A must-watch. Five stars.

After having a preposterously small cup of coffee, I read over my handiwork. I begin to criticise my criticism so fervently that I get a nosebleed, until everything cancels each other out and I’m left with a blank piece of paper which I submit to Varsity. I can begin to imagine the plight of Wilde — it truly is a horrible condition to be this brilliant without anyone to fully appreciate my terrifying genius. Although I suppose that’s what friends are for — trying to grasp the full extent of my brilliance, like a bisson frisse listening to Penderecki. I spend the afternoon at the local Oxfam, where I am working as a mannequin, which entails wearing exactly what I’m wearing and standing still for quite a while.

Thursday

This morning, I said something terribly droll — to rapturous applause from my compadres. That’s the real reason why I have friends — just to have people to dictate all the brilliant witticisms I drop. That way, when I turn 25 (or when I start needing to shave, whichever comes first) I can assemble and publish a book of my pithiest witticisms for the benefit and education of the public. It will be so obscure that, as soon as someone reads it, it will go out of print.

Everything I say and do has never been done before; why do something sensible when you could do something original? Last time I used the same word twice, I took a vow of silence that lasted almost three minutes. After I have exhausted every word in the English language, I will move on through Portuguese and ancient Akkadian. 

I had lunch seven times today — which consisted of looking intently at the same crumb of gruyere with seven different groups of people whose names I can’t remember (though they all know me, naturally). I quadruple-book myself with afternoon obligations but cancel all of them by telling each of them that I’m really with someone else and instead spend three hours shooting moody black and white self-portraits for my upcoming play (which I am also planning to act entirely in black and white).

Friday

Tonight is the opening night of my performance. All is going smoothly, until by Act IV, I am struck by a terrific vision — what if Macbeth doesn’t have to die? Blessed by the muses, I, contrary to everything I had agreed with the director in two months of intense rehearsals, refuse to die onstage, and instead stay on, reciting a monologue I had penned two minutes prior to the show. The curtains close early, presumably as it was impossible to better my artistic coup de grace (saying anything in a foreign language gives the illusion of erudition, mi amore). By the puzzled looks of the audience and the smouldering expression of the director, I am indubitably due for great acclaim — perhaps due for singling out in my own review, to be published tomorrow, which I will entitle ‘Performance of the Century’.