Happy Birthday to me!

Yesterday, was my birthday. I'm not a nostalgic person when it comes to dates, in fact, I only remember two that concern me. The day I was born, Feb. 14, 1969 and the day I was born again, August, 4 1994.

August 4, 1994 was the premiere of my first play: Scenes From My Love Life. For better or for worse, my life changed that night. If you're interested in the details around that event you can click here and listen to me discuss it while I was driving to Palm Springs last year.

http://www.ronnielarsen.com/audio/RLAudio%20Scenes%20From%20My%20Love%20Life%20etc..mp3


Anyway, I never wanted to be a playwright, it wasn't my dream growing up. But while in SF I wrote a little play about my sex life and it got rave reviews and made a litle money and because of that experience I continued writing plays exclusively for the next 10 years.

Not all plays work on opening night, in fact, most of the time most don't, but on that night, in that theater, with the cast and that script, things worked and my life as a playwright began.

I often wonder what I would have done had the played failed miserably. Would I have written more plays? I certainly wouldn't have met some of the people that positively impacted my future projects. So for me, everything changed on that night. And every year I always think about August 4th, 1994 and the actors and my producer and the theater and my friend who came to rehearsals and promised me that they play would would work. It's the only date, besides my birthday that I ever remember. And it's the only cast I ever worked with that I feel completely nostalgic about.

Scenes From My Love Life
Original Cast
Theater Rhino, Studio

ISAAC......Bixby Elliott
CHRIS......Christian Canterbury
STEVE......Mitch Ellis
RICHARD....Patrick O'Connor
MIKE.......Drue Macintosh
BILL.......Eric Womack
LARRY......Michael Cronin
ALLEN......Frank Willey
GENE.......Neal Shorstein


Producer: Caryn Horwitz
Supportive Friend: Barry Horwitz

The play never worked as well as it did that first month in that theater with that cast in San Francisco on August 4th, 1994 and I never enjoyed working in the theater as much as I did for that one month with those people in that 54 seat theater.

Click to read more about the play.