i wrote/acted in an impromptu play last night. at the guadalupe theater.
cruz ortiz, juan ramos, and adriana garcia went to an ice house. they each drew something on a napkin. then, i joined marisela barrera, lisa anaya, and adriana to adapt these ice house ideas into a fifteen minute play. we wrote it in 90 minutes. 3 scenes. it needed more work, of course, but was fun. we got some good evaluations (and some mediocre ones). the first scene was titled "his chorizo is after everything." it involved true-ish stories from each of the women. in each, i played the role of the schmuck. the second was a myspace-based blind date, which ends after only 7 seconds. the last scene is four friends on their way to an ice house, stuffed into a honda hatchback. i have a history monolog:
cruz ortiz, juan ramos, and adriana garcia went to an ice house. they each drew something on a napkin. then, i joined marisela barrera, lisa anaya, and adriana to adapt these ice house ideas into a fifteen minute play. we wrote it in 90 minutes. 3 scenes. it needed more work, of course, but was fun. we got some good evaluations (and some mediocre ones). the first scene was titled "his chorizo is after everything." it involved true-ish stories from each of the women. in each, i played the role of the schmuck. the second was a myspace-based blind date, which ends after only 7 seconds. the last scene is four friends on their way to an ice house, stuffed into a honda hatchback. i have a history monolog:
- A hundred fifty years ago, san anto was HOT. Not like today, no, no. because today there’s always air conditioning to look forward to. Ahh. It’s late june, you’re walking through HEB, and you got goose-bumps. But in 1856, by june, nobody could remember what a goosebump was. you were just hot.
- But there was ice. Like Vaqueros, Texans lassoed glaciers in Greenland, dragged ‘em to Galveston, and blocks as big as your house were brought on trains to warehouses in each city. San Antonians lined up at the nearest “ice house” to buy their very own chunk of sub-zero ecstacy. sometimes, they just hung out beside that massive block of ice, to bask in radiating coolness.
- Fast forward fifty years. Ice was now made in factories, shipped to multiplying ice houses throughout the city. San Antonio had German immigrants, who weren’t great architects, but knew a thing or two about BEER. Ice house owners bought that beer, added tables, chairs, and groceries. Ice houses sold to Tejanos, Anglos, and Blacks. See, Jim Crow segregation never caught on at some ice houses – our racist lawmak-ers didn’t know whether to classify it as a “place of revelry” or not. If all you really wanted was to drink, you went to a cantina. But if you preferred to socialize, the ice house was for you. This was the place to gossip, laugh, and pick up chicks.
- Prohibition pushed cantina-goers into unventilated speakeasys. But with the summer heat at 100 degrees, people still came to ice houses, which survived by selling Cherco-Cola and Coca-Cola – which had co-caine until 1929, which is, in my opinion, at least as dangerous as beer. Anyway, if you knew the pass-word, the best ice houses offered top-quality pilsner and lager, smuggled in from Mexico’s finest breweries.
- During the Depression, alcoholism at an all-time high, they gave up on the prohibition idea. Moonshiners went out of business, while ice houses thrived. In the end, not even air conditioning could kill the ice house. Because nobody goes to walgreens to hear chisme. and nobody goes to Piknik to watch the spurs game. names and owners change, but Bexarenos still gather to relax, hear music, gossip, laugh, and pick up chicks. An ice-cold chela in one hand, an ice-cold chula in the other. !Viva la ice house!
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