Life Raft

Where is the help? That's what I've been wondering lately as I develop material for my one person show, Loveswell going up May 1st at the Hudson Theatre in LA. Rehearsing has been so much fun and at the same time really life affirming and a huge awareness builder of issues and how they are handled between my wife and I.

I feel as if we are on this life raft sometimes floating out and about in this ocean called life. Experiencing the world together; rowing our little boat here and there. And all is wonderful, that is until one of us skips the oar and falls out of the boat. It's as if the boat is drifting slowly away, you are trying to get back to it, treading water in the middle of the ocean, reaching desperately for the side of the life raft.

But your partner is upset that you've fallen out! And as you reach for her, she's taking the oar and hitting you on the head for falling out in the first place! Hitting me and hitting me until I'm pushed under the water drifting downward toward the bottom of the ocean. Where is the hand? Where is the help? Help me?! Help me when I've made a mistake, forgotten something at the grocery store, snored in the middle of the night, given too big a tip to a waiter, or past the exit to the movies. Why is it always, John, what are you doing?!

I don't know what it is about feeling as if she has to keep trying to get an answer for why the brain forgets things or skips a beat and makes a mistake. Maybe she's a scientist and like everyone else, she's just trying to figure out the billion dollar question that'll make us all more efficient or just more accepted by our spouces.

But I'm overwhelmed and it's easy to see why I forgot one thing at the grocery. I know you said it a million times, but I have a million things on my mind. So why doesn't she say, Oh, honey I understand, you are so busy, no worries, we'll just make it without the salsa. Instead, it's why, why, but why, no really why, how come, you had a list, did you cross it off, can I see the list, why, why, why?

Your hand, your hand is all I want to know that you love me no matter what. I thought of this recently in rehearsal, the life raft. I think we all need a hand back in, that's why we tell our stories. That's why I'm telling Loveswell, so we can stay in the boat enjoying the scenery of life.

Fun Developments for Loveswell

Have to blog about a great recent development for my one person show, Loveswell. In developing the material I tried out using surfing and the ocean as a backdrop, for metaphors, for my relationship. Loveswell is about relationship, but uses surfing and the ocean in a way that anyone can relate. And people really loved it, thus I had confidence in using it in the show.



This run starting May 1st at the Hudson Theatre here in LA, Loveswell will have the privilege of having famed surf artist, Meegan Feori, along for the ride. I had the instinct when I first saw her work on a site online. One of the first paintings I saw was Night Flyin Femlin and I was immediately taken.


All of Meegan's paintings share the ocean and surfing in a way that anyone can enjoy. It's not in the flashy maneuvers that surfing can easily take on, only appealing to surfers, but it's in her representations of the ocean as a playful place, of a connection place, of a meaningful place where we, as man or woman, share time bathing in the beauty of one of our most important natural worlds, the ocean.

As she says, “I am a bella niña bruja ocean-loving dreamer compelled to create what my heart and mind envision. While my work represents surfing, it is not exclusive to surfing. It transcends the act of surfing becoming a visual representation of human emotion and experience.”

After talking and meeting with Meegan recently at The Hudson Theatre on Santa Monica Blvd, in LA, she happily agreed to have a showing of her work coinciding with our Loveswell run. Then I had the idea to ask her to paint the set and use her own colors and interpretive talent to create the world where Loveswell will take place. And Meegan said yes.

So Loveswell is proud to bring Meegan aboard for what will be a wonderful and fun run of Loveswell, my one person show about a man fighting for his relationship through the ups and downs of marriage as seen through the eyes of a surfer.

Hope you can make it down to see both of these fabulous works. www.loveswell.com

Writing Loveswell

Hey John Fortson here. I'm back to blogging. Thought it would be fun as my One Person Show Loveswell is hitting the stage soon.

Someone asked me why I wrote Loveswell today. My one person show. It's not a new question but one that gets refined everytime I answer it.

I simply had to do it. I suppose like most writers, creators of things, these ideas come to you as if you were an antenna. Loveswell, sat in me for almost 10 years in another form, as another story. After a series of dead ends, I heard these bits and pieces of the story bumping around inside of me and finally had to listen. I've been very interested and challenged by the relationships in my life, with my relationship with even myself and so through my acting and my writing, Loveswell came to be.

The hilariously uplifting story of a man fighting for his relationship through the ups and downs of marriage as seen through the eyes of a surfer. It's a story about relationship, about grey areas of life, about all of us. Through telling our stories we all connect no matter how personal.

People said of Loveswell, "I felt as if I was at an intimate dinner party with you and found out things I never knew." I say to that I'm not embarrassed or ashamed to tell the things I feel insecure about because we all feel the same. We all have the same lives, just yours is in a different state and you go by a different name, but we are all the same.

I'm excited to share Loveswell again. It's been so fun to work with my director, Terrie Silverman again. To improv and dig deep to find the gold of stories lying beneath my skin. I look forward to Loveswell hitting the Hudson Theatre, here in Los Angeles, May 1st-June 7th.
Take care, John