Thanks to the many, many factors driving up the cost of a gallon of gasoline (and that's about a dozen more blogs worth of topic there), it's getting harder and harder to be a "rennie" these days. For those that don't know, a rennie is someone who makes their living, or a good portion of their living, working the renaissance festival circuit. Now, obviously, this isn't the lifestyle designed for financial riches (few rennies are looking for that) and many rennies were just scraping by about 3 years ago. Then suddenly, the price of gas more then triples and it more and more difficult to get that renmobile (you know what I'm talking about, the station wagon/van that is loaded to the gills with personal stuff and is covered in Wiccan and anti-Bush bumper stickers) from one festival to the next.

I know I've talked to assorted performers/vendors/workers over the last year or so and they're all saying the same thing. They're doing less and less shows and only working the ones that are closer to their home bases (if they have them) because festivals don't/won't pay enough to make it profitable to work there. Those that do continue to work their old circuit tend to multi-task more and more. I've seen many a stage act working as vendor help or working a game booth to bring in some extra $$$ to get by.

What's this mean to me, you might ask? Well, in terms of entertainment (which I know best), it comes down to this: Most festivals will try to keep the entertainment budget down at it's current levels or lower, regardless of the cost of gas. If acts are having to charge more to cover travel expenses, the entertainment director at a show can either give them the extra money and hire less acts, or hire different acts that charge less because they're local or stay long-term. The Bilge Pumps are a bit different than a lot of other acts on the circuit because we all have full-time jobs during the week. We always commute to festivals and stay in hotels and whatnot. We can afford to absorb the extra fuel costs because the ren circuit isn't how we make our living, it's just an expensive hobby. However, some of the other acts out there are getting the squeeze from festivals both big and small because they just can't afford to work there at the price they're being offered. It's not the festival or the act's fault, that's just the way it is. That means you'll start seeing more "home grown" acts appearing on the circuit. That's the term I use for acts just starting up comprised of former workers/cast members that have worked at a certain festival and it's become their home faire and they want to break into the professional entertainment ranks. It happens all the time on the circuit, hell, it's how we got started, but it does mean the visiting patron won't be seeing their favorite acts perform as they'll have been replaced with a burgeoning act that hasn't gotten their shtick together yet. Anyone who watched the Bilge Pumps in our first couple of years knows exactly what I'm talking about.

In the meantime, here's hoping that things start to look up in the trickle-down from the big-business oil world as I wish anyone who wants to live the life of a gypsy, traveling around from festival to festival, the best of luck. It's a brave lifestyle choice that has gotten harder and harder recently. For those of you that go to the festivals and watch the shows and eat the food, feel free to tip your performer or waiter/waitress. In many cases your extra dollar here or there can make a big difference for someone trying to eke out a life. For fat cats like the Bilge Pumps, though, feel free to tip us, too, because we're greedy like that.

Because it's all for me blog. Me jolly jolly blog.
....Maroon

Notice that's fair without the "e". Don't know why, but I like the fact this festival doesn't use the olde English spelling of the word.

There's a reason why we tend to call this festival our "home fair". It's because of all the fans, friends, and family we have there. Norman was our first "ren faire" to perform at back in 2000 and we always have a blast coming back to the festival and performing in front of the multitude of crazed pumpers and pumpettes that grace our shows. I remember when the festival director first told us back in 2005 that she was going to move us to the back corner of the festival, my initial thought was "crap, now we're going to be lucky to get 15 people to a show", then she told me why she was doing it: to pull people back to that section of the grounds that had been dead since the move to Reaves Park from the Duck Pond. I felt better about it, but was still a bit unsure whether or not we'd be the draw she thought we would. Silly me. Our fans proved my fears to be unfounded as we continually fill the seats and more show after show in the years we've been at that stage. I know that many vendors around that area have told me of their appreciation that us and the chess match are back there, because the amount of people around their shops before and after the shows increases a ton.

This year was doubly special as we were making a return to the festival after taking last year off for the birth of my baby girl and the festival hiring the Jolly Rogers in our place. We were very happy to be back and according to our fans' reactions and welcome backs, they were happy to have us back, too. After missing last year and us no longer performing at Muskogee, it had been a long while for many of the OK fans to get their 'Pumps fix. Couple all this with the fact that we were recording a show to be placed on the new DVD (yes, again), and there was some excitement in the air this year for certain. With the word spreading before the start of the festival and all day Friday, we got a huge crowd on hand for the DVD show Saturday afternoon. At times, the sound guys said the crowd would overpower the mics shouting "MacIntyre" on "Old Dun Cow". Quite the experience, let me tell you. Big bilgy thanks go to our sound guys, Chris and John, and our videographers, John, Josh, Alyssa, Kathy, and to the Tod for the use of his camera.

When you add in the fact that I get to see my family and the whole band gets to see our "extended family" in the form of the Wingnut clan (one of whom was kidnapped by pirates from his school back in 2006), and Celia and Dana's clan (who were kind enough to treat us to a pirate picnic at their house on Friday), no amount of Oklahoma allergy attacks can make us stay away from Norman each April. Though we are still paying for this visit as Squeegy and I are still suffering the after-effects of the sickness. Oh well, you wanna have fun, you gotta pay the price, and the fun is definitely worth it.

Because it's all for me blog. Me jolly jolly blog.
....Maroon

I've been around the renaissance festival world long enough to witness many different types of ren faires, both the fun and the boring, the old and the new, the successful and the unsuccessful. I'm no expert, mind you. I'll leave that to our crew member Aloysius, who has been performing on the circuit for over 27 years, but I have seen a great deal of behind-the-scenes action vs end results for a festival and I think I might be able to share a bit of insight for those that are thinking of starting a new ren-faire or the like

The Bilge Pumps have performed at quite a few first-year festivals and we have watched almost all of them disappear as quickly as they have appeared. Only one or two are still around, the Louisiana Renaissance Festival is the best example, along with Scarlet's Mid-Winter Ren Fest. Pretty much all of the others are gone: The Newcastle Faire, King Arthur Fair, Red River Renaissance Festival, etc have all gone the way of the dodo. Some of them managed to hang on for a few years like Hawkwood, but they still went away in the end. What's the common denominator for these? Well, I can't say about all of them, but most of them came down to putting too much money into the grounds and entertainment, and not enough into advertising.

I know it sounds kind of perverse saying they spent too much on entertainment when that's what the Bilge Pumps are, but it's true in some cases. A new owner sees what the established places have done, TRF, Scarby, etc. and wants to make the festival match their "vision" in the first year. It's tough to pull in all the acts you want for the first year until you get a better idea of what the ticket sales are going to be because it's really easy to go in the hole on your budget. The Bilge Pumps have helped many festivals by lowering our asking price for a first-year show in the hopes that it will get off the ground and become repeat business, and new owners can try to get all of their acts to do the same, but you have to have a limit. Set up a budget and stick to it. Get the best acts you can get with the money you have allotted. You want to have the ooh-aah factor of good shows, but you can't pay too much for them. Have a cast as well, as they are usually volunteers looking for a place to play and encourage them to do little impromptu shows in the lanes to add the the ambiance.

Many of the festivals put way too much money into the festival grounds as well. Once again, to see their owners "vision" come to life. I've seen festivals throw away tens of thousands of dollars in equipment, materials, and man power building huge front gates, stages, and booths and they get zero return on it if no one comes to see it. In fact, as Norman shows each year (over 200,000 strong on a 3-day weekend), you don't have to have a built-up, permanent site to do well, you need fun acts and good vendors. A "tent faire" works just fine until an established attendance starts to come in. Once there is extra $$$, then the building up of the grounds can get rolling. You can always rent a fence to go around your festival site.

Good craft vendors are a must as well. I've always taken up the stance that entertainment pulls in patrons, and the vendors keep them there. If you have great acts and hardly any vendors, people will only be at the festival for an hour or two max and then they're gone, because there's nothing for them to browse through. Even if they're wanting to hang around see a certain show, they will likely think the 45 minute wait in 95 degree heat isn't worth it if they've seen all of the shops already. Good crafters are easy to find, but hard to convince. They, along with everyone on the circuit, have been burned by festivals promising them patrons and then cranking out 50 people/day. To convince a crafter to come to a first year faire, they need to know what you're planning on doing for advertising and they'll typically be looking for a decent vendor fee. $25-$50/day is about all you can get from some vendors if they don't know what the attendance will be. Food vendors, on the other hand, tend to come out of the woodwork, since they're the most likely to make money at a festival. You can charge them more, because they'll be making more. Remember, the more vendors you get, the bigger the festival looks and the more start-up money there is.

Speaking of advertising, and you can't speak of it enough. If people don't know your festival is there and what it'll have, then they won't come, you won't make any money, and your festival is toast before it's even been buttered. Set aside a big chunk of money on the ads, because that's where the majority of the festival budget needs to go.

Of course, all this being said, you can follow your plan exactly and things can still bite you in the butt, like what happened to me and mine during Wild Western Days when we had a successful run all set up with tons of pre-order ticket sales and good advertising, a lot of good craft vendors, food vendors, and a killer list of entertainment... and what happens? We get hit with a weekend with wind chills about 20 below zero, snow, and a 1/4 inch of ice covering the ground and streets. That will kill the best of them, I don't care how organized ya are.

All in all, there is no magic formula to running a successful show, but you've got to make sure to have a plan, have some start-up money, and have a lot of luck. Sometimes the stars do align.

Because it's all for me blog. Me jolly jolly blog.
....Maroon

OK, I know this topic isn't really Bilge Pumps-related (per se), but I felt kind of frivolous today and wanted to share my thoughts on what I think are the on-screen fights in moviedom. Without any further ado, here's the list, in no particular order:

Eric Bana (Hector) vs. Brad Pitt (Achilles) - "Troy" - I really like the fact that they use spears for much of the fight which you don't see much in movies. Also, the styles of Hector and Achilles are markedly different with Achilles fighting like a god would fight.

Jason Statham vs. Bad Guys in oil slick - "The Transporter" - I still smile and laugh when he straps on the bike pedals to his feet and starts to do some damage. It's clever and... well... slick.

Roddy Piper (Nada) vs. Keith David (Frank) - "They Live" - Personally, my favorite of the bunch. Maybe the longest street brawl in movie history. I can watch it over and over.

Viggo Mortenson (Aragorn) vs. Lawrence Makoare (Lurtz) - "Fellowship of the Ring" - Just a flat-out nasty bitch of a sword fight. Short, sweet, and brutal.

Ziyi Zhang (Jen Yu) vs. Michelle Yeoh (Yu Shu Lien) in the temple - "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" - Two of the best female martial artists going at it with a variety or weapons in a very gritty fight. Definitely a contrast to the ballet-like fights in the rest of the movie.

Jackie Chan (Thomas) vs. Benny Urquidez (Thug) - "Wheels on Meals" - A young Jackie against Benny the Jet in a helluva long, nasty, and flashy fight. What I find interesting is that you don't really see any of Jackie's trademark silliness in this fight. It's just a straight up duke-em-out.

Cary Elweys (Dread Pirate Roberts) vs. Mandy Patinkin (Indigo Montoya) - "The Princess Bride" - Great swordfighting and comedy throughout the sequence. One of the things that makes it great is the name-dropping of the great fight masters while the duel is going on.

Uma Thurman (The Bride) vs. the Crazy 88's - "Kill Bill, Vol. 1" - Showdown at the House of Blue Leaves. This is the perfect example of good, old-fashioned, over the top chop-socky goodness. Fountains of blood coupled with good choreography.

Liam Neeson (Qui-Gon Jinn) & Ewan McGregor (Obi-Wan Kenobi) vs. Ray Park (Darth Maul) - "The Phantom Menace" - The fight scene that made jedi, sith lords, and light sabers dangerous. All 3 actors synched it up and got it right. Shame that Darth Maul had to bite it at the end. He would have made the rest of the prequels very interesting if he was still there.

Ewan McGregor (Obi-Wan Kenobi) vs. Hayden Christiansen (Darth Vader) - "Revenge of the Sith" - Can't have one without the other. These two dudes went all out in the big mother climax fight of the series. The fight I'd been wanting to see since the early 80's. They didn't disappoint.

Sylvester Stallone (Rocky Balboa) vs. Dolph Lundgren (Ivan Drago) - "Rocky IV" - It's uplifting and fun in the Rocky tradition. You can't help but root for both guys at the end. Heart, guts, and muscle on display along with a liberal dose of smashed faces. Stallone and Dolph were in their element.

The Rock (Beck) vs. Ernie Reyes (Manito) - "The Rundown" - Personally, I had a good time watching the Rock get his ass kicked for much of this fight. Perversely, I also enjoyed watching him kick ass. Strange. Combine trash talking in Spanish with acrobatic martial arts and you've got a winner.

Val Kilmer (Nick Rivers) vs. Christopher Villiers (Nigel) - "Top Secret!" - I mean, seriously... how do you top an underwater bar fight? This one's been a favorite of mine since before I had favorites.

Mel Gibson (Riggs) & Danny Glover (Murtaugh) vs. Jet Li (Wah Sing Ku) - "Lethal Weapon 4" - The fact that Riggs/Murtaugh show their age and limitations vs a master like Jet Li and can still believably beat him in a fight shows great choreography, acting, and fighting from this trio.

Wesley Snipes (Blade) vs. Luke Goss (Nomak) - "Blade II" - Two super strong dudes doing superhuman things while doing superhuman damage to each other. No amount of concrete shattered by someone's head can be enough. This clip doesn't show the whole fight, but it's all I could find on Youtube.

Uma Thurman (The Bride) vs Darryl Hannah (Elle Driver) - "Kill Bill Vol. 2" - After all of the high-flying fantastical fighting in Kill Bill 1, this fight gets right back down to basic gritty dirty fighting. No quarter given when these two bad-ass chicks go to town on each other. Show's you why you don't sword fight in a trailer.

John Lone (Kinjo) vs Yoshiro Harada (Takeda) - "The Hunted" - Couldn't find a clip anywhere of this fight, but trust me, it's bad ass. The quintessential ninja vs Samurai fight that ends the way you think it would end. Don't confuse this movie "The Hunted" with the other movie with the same name and a good fight...

Tommy Lee Jones (Bonham) vs Benicio del Toro (Hallam) - "The Hunted" - Intense fight that shows you just how deadly a knife fight can be. No fancy moves or high-flying acrobatics. The first one to make a mistake, dies.

Tobey MaGuire (Spider-Man) vs Alfred Molina (Dr. Octopus) - "Spider-Man 2" - This is how a superhero fight should look. Incredible action with lots at stake and a fast pace. There's hardly any let up and the bad guy acts like a bad guy by playing on the hero's morality as a weakness.

Jackie Chan (Wong Fei-hung) vs Ken Lo (John) - "Legend of the Drunken Master" - Jackie taking on his own real-life bodyguard. I like the contrast in linear vs circular styles as well as the Buster Keaton physical comedy that Jackie puts in his moves.

Stephen Chow (Sing) vs Siu-Lung Leung (Beast) and the Axe Gang - "Kung Fu Hustle" - This movie is crammed full of awesome and funny fights, but there's nothing like a good finale. Makes me want to start every fight with a good toe smash.

And just to show there's a pirate in me...

Gina Davis (Morgan) & crew vs Frank Langella (Dog Brown) & crew - "Cutthroat Island" - There were better individual fights in the POTC movies (not to mention they were better movies), but nothing beats the power and pageantry of this ship to ship fight between the two pirate crews.

Well, that's about it. There a ton of other great movie fights out there, but these are my personal faves. Lemme know what you think. Maybe I missed some.

Because it's all for me blog. Me jolly jolly blog.
....Maroon

Well, after getting peppered with questions at our weekend at Scarlet's Mid-Winter Renaissance Festival, I determined which blog subject I should post about next. Even after a year and a half away, the rumors refuse to cease as to why we're no longer performing at the Castle of Muskogee and the Oklahoma Renaissance Festival. Well, let me finally set the record straight, for those who are wondering, on the multitude of reasons.

First, the back history... the Bilge Pumps began performing at the ORF back in 2000 and some of us had been there even longer as members of the cast in 1997 and as members of the Scottish Caledonian Gamers for the next couple of years. The owner of the festival, Jeff, remembered me from the characters I played back then and told me when I pitched the idea of the Bilge Pumps to him in the winter of 2000 that my street performances back then were a big reason he wanted to hire us, sight-unseen.

We performed there for the first two years for little money and a handful of shows a day. To supplement what we did on stage, Jeff wanted us to do some street theater as well, which we did. Starting in about 2003, though, our popularity had gotten to the point where he wanted us to do more shows during the day, including the infamous "kids show" that took place just before the knighting ceremony. As we did more shows on stage, we did less street theater because we had to recover our energy between shows, get food, schlep our equipment to the next stage, etc. As this happened, Jeff became less and less enamored with us. You see, Jeff likes street theater and seems to be a firm believer that being interacted with in the lanes is about the only reason that people go to renaissance festivals at all. He once told one of the Bilge Pumps that he would prefer not to have stage acts at all. A slap in the face. That's kind of an indication of his attitude towards us. Contradictingly, he realized we were popular with the patrons and kept us around regardless. However, he continued all the while to wheedle at us, trying and make us perform for less money or do more shows for the same money. Another slap in the face.

'Course, that's not much different than a lot of festival owners do, so that's not why we're not back. One of the biggest reasons is this: As many of you Okies remember, we did the Dragon Attack Stunt Show in Muskogee in 2004. In preparation for that show, myself and my hard working stunt show crew, which included almost all of the Bilge Pumps, built the Castleton Harbor ship stage from the ground up in a span covering over 22 weekends of driving back and forth to Muskogee from Dallas/Ft. Worth. One day, at morning meeting during the run of the festival, Jeff congratulated his on-site builders for building that stage. Not one mention of the fact the Stunt Show crew did 95% of the work. None. Another slap in the face. To be fair, we didn't do everything, his crew did dig out the pit with a backhoe at the beginning of construction and then a little bit of painting at the end. Still, a slap in the face. We also had some water stunts we were planning on performing during the show and wanted to keep the water at the stage as clean as possible so we wouldn't be falling into slop all the time. Jeff, however decided it was cheaper to fill the pit with runoff water from the parking lot, including all the oil and filth. That's what we had to fall into each day. Another slap in the face.

Then, after we put on the show to huge crowds during the 2004 season, filling the seating area way beyond capacity and overflowing audiences into the street (much to the delight of the nearby vendors that were extremely happy to have such a large crowd draw in that section of the festival, Jeff insulted us by offering us a contract worth less than 1/2 or what we'd made before. Obviously, we turned his generous offer down. I was later told that it should have been obvious that we were getting as much as we did in 2004 to cover the stage construction (which in our eyes was a labor of love because we wanted to do the show right). Hell, if we were going to charge him for the labor of building that stage, he would still be paying. Now, before anyone thinks we were breaking the bank in 2004, the Stunt Show (with more than 20 members in its production) barely made more than the Bilge Pumps and pulled in as much audience as the joust during our afternoon shows. In fact, we were up there in Muskogee the following winter, knee deep in cold mud and rain while building the stage up for the 2005 show, when he brought us his insulting contract offer. Another slap in the face.

Because of this ugly situation, we kicked around the idea of the Bilge Pumps not even returning in 2005, but we did it anyway because we knew we have a lot of fans there and didn't want to disappoint them. Things kind of coasted in 2005, mainly because we rarely saw Jeff at all and worked through Karen, his second in command. However, after my wife and I suffered the tragedy of a miscarriage at the Castle the 3rd weekend in 2006, I decided I'd had enough of dealing with a place that was only serving to make me and mine miserable and told the guys I wouldn't be back... ever. They did a tremendous job of covering without me (for the first time, I might add) on the last weekend of the festival that year but they ultimately decided that it wasn't worth the headache of dealing with the politics of the festival to come back and perform, either. To add a nice, final slap in the face, Jeff tried to not pay us for the last weekend since I wasn't there and the entire band wasn't present. This, despite the fact that there were 4 or 5 Bilge Pumps on stage all all times. Come to think of it, that's more of a kick to the groin than a slap in the face.

So there ya go. Most of the rumors I've heard are not true. We left of our own accord. We weren't fired because we were too dirty, or too expensive, or no longer popular with the fans. It was a combination of many different factors leading to our decision, but we still believe it was the right one. We're sad that we're not going to be performing for many of our NE Oklahoma fans, but we're not sad that we don't have to deal with the constant disdain from the ownership. Now, with all these negatives being said, let me say that we really enjoyed working with the other performers and cast members of the festival. Not to mention Karen, the Manager there, who was really supportive and helpful during our time there. I guarantee you, she has the toughest job in the faire. And most of all, our fans in the area who kept us coming back year after year. We hope to see all of you at the OU Medieval Fair in Norman.

Because it's all for me blog. Me jolly jolly blog.
....Maroon