Before They Were Night Vale: biscuits and wistfulness (Patreon)

Joseph usually picks the weather for Night Vale episodes. I don’t know music that well, so I trust his judgment. And in the first dozen or so episodes, I discovered a lot of great artists through his weather entries: Anais Mitchell, Dan Bern, Adam Green, The Tiny, Jason Webley, to name a few.

One of those fantastic musicians featured was Danny Schmidt, who’s song “This Too Shall Pass” was featured as the weather in episode 8. I bought Danny’s album (Parables & Primes) immediately upon hearing that song, and did not regret it at all. 

Another song from that album that really stood out to me was “Esmee by the River.” It’s so beautiful and wistful, about love and nostalgia. So I took that song and incorporated it into a Neo-Futurist play. I didn’t write any dialogue or even use the lyrics of the song to drive the narrative of the theater piece. I just thought about wistfulness and what wistfulness means to me. 

Biscuits. I get wistful about biscuits okay? They’re one of a small handful of positive memories I have of growing up in the South, and so that’s what I used in this play. But also, I like being funny. And sometimes kind of gross. 

As you’ll see in the stage directions-only script below, this play involved three people looking wistful. Then one fills their mouth with milk, another with all-purpose flour, and another with shortening (buttermilk, White Lily flour, and butter are better ingredients of course, but also we were on a tight budget here). 

Then the first two spit their ingredients into the third’s mouth as the music and lights fade. It always got a groaning laugh. It was fun. It was messy. It was a very good Neo-Futurist play. 

I hadn’t met Danny, of course, because in my mind, he was some famous musician who let us use one of his songs on our tiny little podcast. But then we started touring Night Vale. And then Joseph asked if Danny wanted to go out on the road with us, and Danny said yes. 

And we toured for months in 2014 with Danny Schmidt, regularly singing “Esmee by the River,” much to Danny’s confusion, as it wasn’t a song he regularly performed. We were too nervous to tell him why. To tell this perfectly nice man, who’s a perfectly excellent singer-songwriter, that we all once performed a play to his wistful, beautiful song wherein we spit food into each others’ mouths. 

Then one night (in Bismarck, North Dakota, at one of the only restaurants open late that would serve 10 people) we told him, and he looked even more confused. I was mortified. But he’s still friends with us. He still writes us and performs things with us. He even added Esmee by the River to his set list on our tour with him, just for us. 

Danny Schmidt is the best. 

###

biscuits and wistfulness
© Jeffrey Cranor, 2013

Music:  “Esmee By the River” by Danny Schmidt plays (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0MyPoy984jk)

Stage is dark. 3 Neos sitting on blocks in a triangle formation: #1 down-left, #2 down-right, #3 up-center 

4th Neo uses flashlight to bring up on each, according to timestamp. The light is a continuous up and down. So a 14-second window is 7 seconds slowly up and 7 seconds slowly down

Lights up on #1, Neo looking wistful – 0:00 - 0:14 

Lights up on #2, Neo looking wistful – 0:14 - :30

Lights up on #3, Neo looking wistful – 0:30 - 0:45

Lights up on #1, drinking milk – 0:45 - 1:04

Lights up on #2, eating fistfuls of flour from a bag – 1:04 - 1:19

Lights up on #3, eating giant spoonful of shortening – 1:19 - 1:30

In the dark, #1 & #2 move upstage, standing on either side of #3.

Lights up on #1 & #2 standing over 3, all up-center. 

After a beat, #3 leans back head and opens mouth. 

#1 & #2 spit their contents (milk and flour, respectively) into #3's mouth. – 1:35 to end. 

Slow fade lights and sound as #3 mixes all ingredients in their mouth. Everyone continues looking wistful.

CURTAIN