The Actor's Theatre of Louisville advertises its Premiere Pass as "4 admissions for $100 dollars: any play, any time. any theater." If you go to their ordering page for packages here, you'll see they expand on this, saying: "Four admissions for $100 - use in any combination to any Festival play. Call (502)584-1205
(Not available online)."

We went to the box office and bought a Premiere Pass several weeks ago, as noted here. When I asked the box office attendant if we needed to call in advance and notify anybody he said no, when I asked if this was any play, any show, any theater he confirmed that it was. No advance arrangements necessary.

It turns out this is a L - I - E. That's right: a big fat honking ugly irresponsible irritating lie.

Yesterday, we drove up to Louisville again, had an early dinner at El Mundo (yum) and went down to redeem our Premiere Pass ticket stubs for tickets to AT THE VANISHING POINT, the play we'd most been looking forward to, about the history of an old neighborhood in Louisville called Butchertown. As it's being produced in a warehouse in Butchertown which isn't a theater and probably never will be again, this particular production is a once in a lifetime event. (I'm not saying the play won't be produced again, mind, just that this production is obviously special.)

We were rudely -- both of us, by two different box office attendants, and I'm talking EXTREME rudeness -- informed that the performances of said play were sold out and therefore our Premiere Pass tickets were useless. These clerks were fine examples of a particularly obnoxious variety of the species Self-Appointed Overly Important Jack-Ass. (It is not my fault if you haven't been on a date or cracked a smile in 8 years because you can't stop rereading Proust long enough to emerge during daylight.)

I've worked in the service industry. Hey, it sucks. But it's your job and you don't treat your patrons poorly. It's not good business. They paid their money and you treat them nice. You are accomodating. You are gracious. (If the patrons commit patron sins all bets are off: we didn't.)

Instead we got the argument that our passes only worked when tickets were available. Excuse me, but isn't it their job to make sure the passes work all the time as advertised? There is no fine print here. Not on the tickets, which clearly reflect the advertising slogan, not on the website, not any place I can locate, and yet we're supposed to believe there is some rule that applies because these peon asshole gatekeepers tell us there is?

Of course, we were told we might be able to get in on empty seat passes for today's shows. No thanks. Instead someone's supervisor is going to get an irate letter, cc'd to the Better Business Bureau and the Attorney General's office, and we will receive a refund for half the price of the Premiere Pass -- at a minimum. I find it extremely disappointing to discover this kind of behavior and attitude (and apparently false advertising) from Actor's Theatre, an organization I've always held in high esteem despite the fact that if you make one little purchase from them they call you every night and harass you to donate money to them. (Oh, I can't wait for those calls now.)

The thing that bugs me most: the play's run ends today. There's no time for this to really be righted, and, as a result, we don't get to see a show we'd really been looking forward to. I'm still working on a post about Eugene Meatyard's photography, which I'd hoped to talk about in discussing AT THE VANISHING POINT (as I understand it was a partial inspiration for the play, despite the fact Meatyard was a Lexingtonian).

So, buyer beware when dealing with ATL. Enough said.

Just had to get that off my chest. The whole thing made me want to retreat into a nice, unexclusive showing of Hellboy, where the box office attendants only care if you can pay at all. It was too late though, so we just came home... And saw all our neighbors dressed up in their costumed finery on their way to the annual Beaux Arts Ball (which we really will make it to someday).

I imagine they all have massive headaches about now.

Some things I've been meaning to post links to that have been collecting dust:

The highly addictive adventures of "Cat and Girl", via David Moles. Hours of procrastination free for the taking!

Over at CHUD a list of 100 movies that deserve more love, via Weird Writer. I'm not down with all of these, haven't seen quite a few of them, but there's some good stuff on the list.

And...

Poetry daily has an amazing poem today, "The Mythological Cod" by Alice Friman. An excerpt:

Enough of that.
Did you know Cod have
white livers and a vibrating
bone inside the head that
lays down like rings in a tree,
layers to remember? The books say
if you make Cod's head chowder,
better cut away the lips
or put a penny in the pot
for luck, there being other ways
to speak.
Once upon a time,
before a place to stand stood
on the face of the deep, the sea,
wrapped in its great sheets
of water, rolled over on its back
and had a dream. And the earth
heaved with it, the sky purpling
with blushing. And all the gods
pacing in their dressing rooms
stopped to polish up their lines.
You know this dream —
how the sea in its soggy sleep
rose, streaming with wet,
knocking the four winds off
their pegs to whizz and bang
against the walls of heaven.
And how Death sank to his knees
and shook in the confines
of his silhouette, for under
the racing eyelids of the sea
swelling as if to break and
singing in the hammock of its aching,
Death saw the dream of the turning wheel.
And hurtling from the teeming depths,
an arc of liquid fire — the Cod.

And Christopher updated his journal and put up pretty pictures.

I believe that's it. Nothing more to see here.

worm: "Exes," Buck 65

today's fave post: Justine weighs in on illusions about writing and the recent Jane Austen Doe-catalyzed discussions

namecheck: Sean "Great Blurb King" Stewart