I wrote for the student newspaper when I was an undergrad at MIT. I joined because I thought it was a travesty for a school newspaper not to report on all of the arts events that the good student body was generating. I joined the newspaper for my senior year in order to rectify this situation. In my tenure, I covered a wide variety of MIT events:
Musical Theater Guild
Jesus Christ Superstar
Company
The Apple Tree
Guys and Dolls
West Side Story
Dramashop
The Winter's Tale
Six Characters in Search of an Author
Shakespeare Company
Romeo and Juliet
Gilbert & Sullivan Players
Pirates of Penzance
Chorallaries
Better Late Than Never
Concert in Bad Taste
Next Act
Kiss Me Kate
One Victor H. was a member of both the Chorallaries (an a capella vocal group) as well as Next Act (a musical show put on by one of the dorms). I didn't know Victor when we were both undergrads, but we ended up being in the same class in grad school at Berkeley and became good friends. It was in retrospective conversations that we discovered we had, in fact, interacted at MIT. He knew me well because I'd given him questionable reviews on two occasions. For the Next Act show, I recorded that although Victor had a nice singing voice, he was a horrible actor: he had the same vapid grin frozen on his face no matter emotion he was trying to portray. The "vapid grin" line apparently became a common jibe for his friends and acquaintances. Some even took a stack of newspapers, cut out a bunch of copies of the offending paragraph, and pasted them onto his dorm door in the shape of a smiley face with, of course, a vapid grin.
The funniest overlap, though, regards my review of the Bad Taste concert by Victor's beloved Chorallaries. The Bad Taste concert is an MIT tradition, held at midnight one day in March, where the stated goal is to be as offensive as possible. My review of the 1993 concert was that the singing was rather mediocre, though I thought the overall performance was quite funny. Apparently this hurt the feelings of the esteemed vocal group.
In 1994, I was serving as the editor of the Arts section. When the time for Bad Taste came around again, the Chorallaries sent Victor to go deal with The Tech. He came into the office and was pointed in my direction when he asked where the Arts editor was. He asked me in the traditional way that he would appreciate it if The Tech would review Bad Taste, promising the usual skip-to-the-front-of-the-line privileges. I assured him that we would send a reviewer. Then Victor tried to push his luck. He said that his group didn't really like last year's reviewer, thinking that the reviewer's comments were not very insightful. I pondered for a bemused moment whether I should reveal myself, but I held myself to a simple "okay."
Victor, however, noticed my slight hitch. The wheels started turning in his own head, and he did not like what they came up with. "You wrote last year's review, didn't you?"
"Yes," I replied. "Yes, I did."
Victor hesitated for a moment longer, wondering if he should say anything more. Eventually he decided that he had dug his hole deep enough and he sheepishly turned around to leave.
It would make a better story if I vengefully returned to excoriate the group more severely than the year before, but I refrained. I sent another reporter and left Victor feeling good about himself again.
It was quite funny when we realized later on in graduate school that we shared this connection. "That was YOU?!?" we each cried.
Musical Theater Guild
Jesus Christ Superstar
Company
The Apple Tree
Guys and Dolls
West Side Story
Dramashop
The Winter's Tale
Six Characters in Search of an Author
Shakespeare Company
Romeo and Juliet
Gilbert & Sullivan Players
Pirates of Penzance
Chorallaries
Better Late Than Never
Concert in Bad Taste
Next Act
Kiss Me Kate
One Victor H. was a member of both the Chorallaries (an a capella vocal group) as well as Next Act (a musical show put on by one of the dorms). I didn't know Victor when we were both undergrads, but we ended up being in the same class in grad school at Berkeley and became good friends. It was in retrospective conversations that we discovered we had, in fact, interacted at MIT. He knew me well because I'd given him questionable reviews on two occasions. For the Next Act show, I recorded that although Victor had a nice singing voice, he was a horrible actor: he had the same vapid grin frozen on his face no matter emotion he was trying to portray. The "vapid grin" line apparently became a common jibe for his friends and acquaintances. Some even took a stack of newspapers, cut out a bunch of copies of the offending paragraph, and pasted them onto his dorm door in the shape of a smiley face with, of course, a vapid grin.
The funniest overlap, though, regards my review of the Bad Taste concert by Victor's beloved Chorallaries. The Bad Taste concert is an MIT tradition, held at midnight one day in March, where the stated goal is to be as offensive as possible. My review of the 1993 concert was that the singing was rather mediocre, though I thought the overall performance was quite funny. Apparently this hurt the feelings of the esteemed vocal group.
In 1994, I was serving as the editor of the Arts section. When the time for Bad Taste came around again, the Chorallaries sent Victor to go deal with The Tech. He came into the office and was pointed in my direction when he asked where the Arts editor was. He asked me in the traditional way that he would appreciate it if The Tech would review Bad Taste, promising the usual skip-to-the-front-of-the-line privileges. I assured him that we would send a reviewer. Then Victor tried to push his luck. He said that his group didn't really like last year's reviewer, thinking that the reviewer's comments were not very insightful. I pondered for a bemused moment whether I should reveal myself, but I held myself to a simple "okay."
Victor, however, noticed my slight hitch. The wheels started turning in his own head, and he did not like what they came up with. "You wrote last year's review, didn't you?"
"Yes," I replied. "Yes, I did."
Victor hesitated for a moment longer, wondering if he should say anything more. Eventually he decided that he had dug his hole deep enough and he sheepishly turned around to leave.
It would make a better story if I vengefully returned to excoriate the group more severely than the year before, but I refrained. I sent another reporter and left Victor feeling good about himself again.
It was quite funny when we realized later on in graduate school that we shared this connection. "That was YOU?!?" we each cried.
Ah, Bad Taste 1993. Adrian and I remember it well; it was our first date!
ReplyDeleteMenage a Troi: "I sense... sexual deprivation."
MIT Barbie: "Math class is *easy*!"
Benjamin Sisko character: "My wife was killed by multiple Borgasms."
I had forgotten that was your first date! Too funny. Hard to believe that was 15 years ago, now.
ReplyDeleteYoicks! I'd forgotten that that particular Bad Taste contained so many of the most memorable lines. And I'm pretty sure Jake sang "Cab Driver in New York". But no "Arise Ye Dead of MIT" (thanks, Tophe) or, erm, "Rub My Duckie"...
ReplyDelete