Read Online Dancing Barefoot by Wil Wheaton - Free Book Online Page A

to tell you all how excited I am to be standing here tonight. I have
     brought with me some of the most talented writers and performers I know, and we hope to
     present you with a show you’ll never forget. We are Mind Meld , and our
     show is called, Assimilate This !”
    There is wild applause, and the lights dim. I walk offstage, trading places with Kristen
     and Tracy who are to begin the first scene.
    The lights come up, and the show begins.
    It goes incredibly well. We are all funny, and we never miss a beat in any of our
     sketches.
    Jim is a natural. He never misses a cue. A few times, he even anticipates when an
     improvised bit needs to end and blacks it out like he’s been doing it for years.
    We are extremely lucky to have him doing our lights. If we take this show on the
     road, we’ll take him with us , we decide.
    All our sketches kill [ 4 ] except one, and that’s a great batting average for us.
    We only have one real problem, and the audience never knows about it: With about 20
     minutes remaining in the show, Maz and I both have to pee worse than we’ve ever had to pee in
     our lives! Normally, this wouldn’t be a problem. All theaters have a bathroom backstage, but
     we’re in a ballroom, behind pipe and drape, and there’s no way to run off to the real bathroom
     without distracting the entire audience.
    We have little choice but to do the pee-pee dance for the rest of the show, even when
     we’re on stage for sketches. I seriously consider using an empty bottle of Crystal Geyser, but
     think better of it.
    Months of planning, hair pulling, and agonizing have resulted in 90 incredible minutes,
     and the show is over. When we do shows at ACME, there is always a touch of sadness on closing
     night. That feeling currently mixes with the opening night excitement that we’re also feeling.
     I can’t believe it’s over.
    When the lights go down on the final sketch, the crowd roars, whistles, stomps their feet.
     They demand more, but we don’t have anything else to give them. We have left it all on the
     stage.
    I walk out to thank the audience for coming, and introduce the cast.
    As I step out from behind the curtain, the most amazing and unexpected thing happens –
     they leap to their feet. They scream. They applaud. They whistle. They howl. I stand there,
     dumbfounded, and struggle to keep myself together. The validation I feel from this crowd is
     overwhelming, and my eyes fill with tears.
    It’s hard for me to share with anyone how much shit I’ve gotten over the last 15 years
     because of Star Trek . The lousy treatment at the hands of WILLIAM FUCKING
     SHATNER is nothing compared to some of the things Trekkies have done to
     me. They’ve insulted me. They’ve called me names. They’ve hated me without knowing why. It was
     risky for me to put up this show . . . if it had tanked, I would never have been able to show
     my face at a Star Trek convention again.
    I’ve been working so goddamn hard for so goddamn long to get people to just give me a
     chance – to let me challenge their expectations of me, and hopefully change their minds about
     me. Getting this huge, genuine, passionate, heart-felt standing ovation, from this group of
     people, is simply magical. I will cherish it for the rest of my life.
    My only regret is that I forgot to thank Jim, our sound and lighting technician.
    So, Jim, if you’re reading, here is what I would have said:
    â€œThis show did not come together overnight and it didn’t come together easily. We all
     worked very hard to make it happen and the whole thing could have been easily ruined by a bad
     tech guy. Fortunately, we had the most amazing tech guy ever. Jim [here is where I’d point to
     the side of the stage and call you up] has never lit a sketch show before and he didn’t miss a
     beat tonight. If you enjoyed the show, Jim deserves your applause as much as any of