Yesterday morning (a Saturday), I rose at 4 a.m. to stretch, put on some dark clothes, slicked my hair and drive across town to shoot a dawn scene for a student movie. I cruised through intermittent rain to get to our meeting point. The director met me and said the shoot was cancelled. The wood pile area we were going to use was under standing water, so we rescheduled the shoot for another weekend. The role I'm playing is Satan, and wouldn't you know it, God found a way to rain on my evil parade. I drove home listening to Johnny Cash. I put my head on the pillow around 5:30 a.m. and for some reason, one thought crossed my mind as I drifted off: 'The world is a stage.'

I woke up in the late morning and decided to do a little theatre penance. A group of folks are prepping to put on Shakespeare's Scottish Play at my theatre(I still have a hard time even writing the word Macbeth), and since my shoot was cancelled, I figured I should lend a hand to someone else's project. I figured I would run cable, haul gear, or hang lights. Just be a grunt for a few hours. Sure enough they had me up on a ladder stringing sound cable or hanging a bevy of lights. Different people (all younger than me) had different ways of announcing their authority and importance, and I did my best to keep my mouth shut and do some basic labor. A lot of effort goes into prepping a stage in the theatre, and really, those are some of the smallest stages in the world.

After four hours of free labor, I cut out to watch some basketball. Not just any basketball, but the NCAA Division I Men's Basketball Championship Tournament. That's a pretty big stage. Over twenty thousand people watching live and a few million on T.V. All to watch college guys run up and down the court. The winners would go on to the coveted Final Four. The losers would play no more, and everyone would stop talking about them. Sports is a fun stage to watch because there is a clearly a winner and a loser. Sometimes, people walk out of the theatre not knowing if anyone has won, and sometimes (like in the Scottish play) everybody loses. Plenty of people know when to cheer in sports, know the rules, know how to react to the action on the stage. Audience recognition & reaction helps so much.

Then, there's the political stage. My state legislature is in special session to pass a couple more bills. The governor called for it and promptly left to campaign for president. The state capital was abuzz with grumbling about this and that. State politics isn't a huge stage, but they get worked up just the same. On the national front, people are wondering about the attorney general. Why did he fire a bunch of attorneys? Was it politically motivated (ha ha ha)? Can he get fired? Congress and The White House are now in negotiations on how the stage will be set to talk about this. Closed doors? Under oath? Transcripts? There are a lot of way too stall if you really don't want to be under the gun on a big stage.

Last night, I went to see a play. The actor I was supposed to have the dawn shoot with was also in the opening weekend of a play (oh, those acting junkies!). The story was billed as five 32 year old characters figuring themselves out. Hey, I'm 32. Never will I connect with this play any better than this moment in my life, right? Well, not really. The play wasn't as much about being 32 as it was about five people who had made plenty of bad choices in their lives and now needed a change. They could have been any age. It could have been any stage.

What about the international stage? Wars, embargoes, posturing, tariffs, disease, trade, etc. I must admit that the world stage makes the least amount of sense to me. I don't understand why my country makes many of the choices it does. I understand other cultures & nations even less. I don't see the common goals. I'm not sure who the winners & losers are, except that no one wants to admit they are losing (especially when they are). The world is a big stage, and when you bomb on the big stage, you really bomb.

Last night, I went downtown to see my oldest theatre friend who was visiting town for the weekend. He has gotten married and still has his boyish looks. New York didn't work out for him, but an old theatre flame did. He moved to Ohio, and they got hitched three months ago. The stage can bring people together, and it can tear them apart.

I capped off the night by watching a band in a rock n' roll bar. Yes, there are stages all over the place. All times of the day and night. Some better than others. Some make more sense than others. Some stages we embrace, some we avoid. But big & small, there are plenty of stages for all.

Deep down, I know I would have traded all those stages on Saturday if I could have been Satan on the screen at dawn. Oh well, another day, another stage.

Chris Jungle has been naked on the stage.