L-R: Karen Konzen, Travis Webb, John McCurnin, Trent McCool, Brandi Pullin, Wescott Youngsen.

 

	KAREN KONZEN (Nadine)
TRENT McCOOL (Horndog)
	JOHN McCURNIN (Plato)
BRANDI PULLIN (Cutiepie)
	TRAVIS WEBB (Phyllis)
WESCOTT YOUNGSEN (Cheese)

From THE TUSCALOOSA NEWS, May 28, 2000, Page 1E

When Alan David Perkins got his first computer, he was living in New York City. The University of Alabama graduate -- a former Million Dollar Band member -- delved into the teeming life around him, which probably kept him from falling into the online world.

But he's done his research, according to Charles Prosser, who is directing Perkins' play "Nobody Knows I'm a Dog," about people who live more fully online than IRL (in real life), for Theatre Tuscaloosa's Second Stage.

"There were about two years where I cocooned every weekend," Prosser said. "Friday to Monday I was at the computer.

"I am a computer geek, and I know every one of these people," he said of the six characters in "NKIAD." "I could have written this thing myself."

Billed as "a.net.play," Perkins' work is about a diverse group of people -- a middle-aged housewife, a 16-year-old geek genius, a man pretending to be a woman, a youngish woman insecure about her appearance, a man embittered by past relationships and a genial goof -- who meet in a singles newsgroup on the Internet. They avoid dealing with issues by playing roles online.

Although it could hardly be more timely, the play evolved from years spent in theater.

"When you're in New York, and you're new, what do you do? You go to a lot of theater," Perkins said in a phone interview from his Big Apple office.

He began writing, studying at the HB Studios school, then co-founded a company, Developmental Stages. the student company put on numerous plays, and Perkins wrote "a ton of scripts." He later worked with another fledgling group, Theatre on a Limb.

"It was creatively a good time, good juices flowing, good actors just hungry for some stuff," he said. "You'd be surprised how you can really keep it going when people are wanting you to do it."

"NKIAD" evolved from a bare bones idea about bulletin board services, a precursor to chat rooms. The working title was "BBS."

While working on a musical about computer hackers, Perkins began researching the life of the nerd. He stumbled across a cartoon from the New Yorker, with a canine logged online, captioned "Nobody knows you're a dog."

"That one little hook got me going: everything wraps around that," Perkins said.

He created characters as amalgams of people he met online, and studied plays such as "Love Letters," where the actors read written communications, but don't physically interact.

After rewrites, he entered it and others in competitions.

"I will submit to any competition," he said. "You never know. I've won like 16 or 17 awards, and that's how I did it, by sending out a lot of submissions."

The Queens Playwright Festival picked up "NKIAD," which led to various local and regional productions. An independent film company has expressed interest. Although Perkins doesn't think of it as his best work, he recognizes why it's caught on.

"It's quirky enough that it works," he said. "Then there's the combination of the theme and the approach. It's very theatrically stylized, yet very easy to produce."

Productions have been as simple as actors sitting in a line, tapping on music stands to simulate the sounds of typing, up through full-blown productions with actors using networked computers.

The Second Stage production will fall somewhere in the middle. The stage will show all six characters at desks or workstations, some with laptops and others with full-sized computers. The actors will type with an ear to rhythm, but not necessarily hitting note for note, letter for letter.

"The slap of the return key signals the next actor to go," Prosser said.

Although most of the time characters are sitting and staring at a screen, or typing and talking, Prosser insists it's not static.

"The actors' biggest challenge has been 'How do you act from the waist up?'" he said. "It's like monologues to their monitor."

As if that weren't challenge enough, Prosser is also directing younger actors. Second Stage tends to focus on the work of newer playwrights, with outlets for young actors and directors.

Prosser is no newcomer. As a performer, he's graced Theatre Tuscaloosa shows for years, shining especially in musicals such as "Cabaret" and "The Secret Garden."

"NKIAD" will be his first directing job for Second Stage, but he's helmed dozens as a schoolteacher here and at Thomasville.

"The cast will tell you I've slipped a couple of times, 'Now students,'" Prosser laughed.

Although young, they're not inexperienced. Some are relatively new to town, like Brandi Pullen (playing Cutiepie), who's had small roles in Theatre Tuscaloosa's "Man of La Mancha" and "Dracula," while others have worked at their respective schools.

Wescott Youngson (playing Cheese) has played feature roles recently in "Man of La Mancha" and Shelton State's production of "Damn Yankees."

Filling the other roles are Travis Webb (Phyllis), Trent McCool (Horndog), Karen Konzen (Nadine) and Josh McCurnin (Plato).

Nadine is a newcomer to the 'Net, and her questions to help clarify terms and ideas, so there's no reason to fear getting lost in "NKIAD"'s jargon.

"Although a big part of what makes it interesting is the modern technology and what's going on with the Internet, it's more about the characters, the words, how they interact," Prosser said.

Perkins hasn't been back to Tuscaloosa much since graduation in the late '80s, but will fly down this week.

He and Prosser have exchanged e-mails, and he's confident the director gets it. Although he makes himself available, Perkins leaves it up to the director to call the shots.