Updates: Understudying, Casey Clapp's New Tree Guide, Bonsai Short Film

It's been awhile, do you blame me?

Let’s get one thing straight: I fucking love trees. That is not changing. Count on me for that. “But Tobin, how do I know this if you aren’t posting videos?” Gotta trust me on this one, k? But it has, indeed, been a while since a post—looks to be 187 days in fact. Quite a while, let’s catch up.

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Understudying for CTG’s Hamlet at the Mark Taper Forum

I’ve been lucky enough to be auditioning a lot (this is the primary goal, here, folks— just being real with you), and I booked an understudy role at the Center Theatre Group’s production of Hamlet at the Mark Taper Forum, starring the amazing Patrick Ball—who just wrapped an astonishing first season of the Pitt (please watch it, it’s breathtaking)—as Hamlet and adapted and directed by the legendary Robert O’Hara. I’ll be covering the incredible Danny Zuhlke, who plays Guildenstern, and the spectacular Jaime Lincoln Smith, who plays an incredibly juicy version of the First Player.

“But Tobin, will you get to perform and can I see you?” I’ll send out an edition of this newsletter to inform you all should that come to pass. It may be only an hour beforehand, but “thems the breaks,” as the bard says. You can subscribe to this newsletter at the link in the bio. Previews start May 28th, we open June 4th, and we run until July 6th, tickets here. Wait, no here.

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Casey Clapp, my dearly beloved tree, soul, and actual brother (by acclamation), has a tree ID book coming out that you should all pre-order

After years of trial and toil, my friend and co-host of Completely Arbortrary, Casey Clapp, finally has his tree ID book coming out on October 1st. You can all pre-order it here. (That’s the Amazon link because it matters for pre-orders, but it’s also available all the other places as well). Needless to say, I’m extremely proud of Casey and all of his insanely hard work to make this happen, and I’ve already ordered like 15.

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I’m working on a Feature Comedy Film called “Make Like a Tree”

As many of you know, I’ve long loved Christopher Guest and the films that he made in the 1990s and early 2000s which dove into niche worlds in order to give us grounded comedy from completely ungrounded characters. Movies like “Best in Show,” “Waiting for Guffman,” and “A Mighty Wind,” specifically, have informed my sense of what is entertaining and interesting in comedy, and, for the past three months, I’ve been working on creating one about the world of professional bonsai—a world that is rich with people who believe in it, who are unique and sometimes bizarre (I count myself among you all), and who dedicate a huge portion of their lives to the care of living art.

Mine is called “Make Like a Tree.” While the feature film will be a documentary-style rom-com about two sworn bonsai rivals developing an attraction to each other in the days leading up to the biggest competition in the cutthroat world of professional bonsai—and, no, I don’t worry about someone stealing this idea, because nobody could do it better than me, and also no one would want to do this, but, on the other hand, if they try, now you know where they stole their dumb idea from—I made a proof of concept, or “short”, if you will, over a few weekends in March with some very talented actors that gives a little bit of the taste of the world. You can watch it here. It’s about seven minutes long, and features myself, Reina Guthrie, Sarah Dooley, Jessica Kinsella, Christopher Ferro, Marika Engelhardt. Jessica Kinsella, Alan Trinca, Stephanie Carrie, Rory Kulz, and Amanda Stoffel helped out in other lovely creative capacities as well.

Ok, lovely to see you, talk soon,

Tobin