Good-bye Millie, Hello Gobs of Friends!

I went to most of my son's last performance of "Thoroughly Modern Millie" tonight. I saw most of it because I did go to one hour of rehearsal for ACC. (And it was nice to have that boundary of getting there on time and leaving on time. Thanks to director and stage manager!)

And Caden's show--such a good performance! A good closing night.

But how fun was it to see so many pals at the performance! Friends from theater! Friends from MMHS marching band! Friends I've done shows with and friends I taught at Spanish Fork Youth Theater.

I felt like I was among this whole group of people who at one time or another was part of my family.

So awesome!

Keep playing! And playing!

The sad scene--Nathan, you are here

Most of my posts are happy, silly, excited, and yes, a few are complaining.

This one is really about sadness. And fear.

I will cry during the typing of this blog.

I am rehearsing the scene in ACC where the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come shows Scrooge that, because of Scrooge's selfishness and cruelty, Tiny Tim dies. I will be talking about my son, Tiny Tim Cratchit's death.

My own son died. Nathan Kelly. Almost three years ago. How can I talk about Tiny Tim's death and not wail for the death of my own son? In the scene, my husband, Bob Cratchit, is also supposed to sob. I'm not sure about the young man who's cast as Bob. Not sure he has the capacity as an actor to cry. But my husband will be playing Bob for one performance. Though Nathan isn't Craig's natural son, Craig has felt Nathan's loss, too. How can Craig and I get through this scene?

Acting is living for me. I take my experiences from my life and put them into my characters onstage. I wish this wasn't a scene I could pull such agonizing pain into it. Nathan's death haunts me. It always will. And he, too, died from others' selfishness, including my own.

I have some time to memorize the lines. I have some time to put this into perspective. But I know Mrs. Cratchit's pain.

I am going to ask God to please ask Nathan to be with us during our performances. Whatever Nathan is doing in heaven, for those nights, I need him with me.

Keep playing. And loving. And healing.

Gingko Biloba, here I come!

This will be a short blog. Why?

We were told on Tuesday that ACC is no longer going to be a reader's theater. I saw this coming. All the costume changes and moving around set pieces. I saw it, but didn't want to believe it.

Oh, don't get me wrong. The show will be a ton more awesome. If, that is, I can remember my friggin' lines. So I am memorizing, and Caden is going to record them for me so I can listen to them on my Ipod.

How I will get through the scene when The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come shows Tiny Tim as already dead I d not know. If I were holding a book, I think I could do it without completely breaking down. Now? Answer: Xanax.

Oh, and I was kinda whiny at the rehearsal when they told us this, and my fellow cast members are serious champs and offered to help me. Love them!

So here I go, memorizing.

Keep Playing! (and remembering!)

Swimming in Molasses--OR--Am I Just Too Pushy?

I have never felt like I needed to be The Boss. I can follow as well as lead.
I think.

See, I'm involved in several projects. One, the zombie movie that was rescheduled, is a project that I now have much more responsibility. I am the producer! And the director of the show thinks highly of me. I think highly of him. I've offered my help and he has gratefully and graciously accepted and welcomed it. The Zombie Movie will Rock!

But the show I'm in now, ACC, well, I stepped in last Thursday at the first music rehearsal because it was basically a train wreck. Please understand, I am not a musical genius. I can sing. I've had some training. I know how to work with other people to get them excited and working as a group. I didn't want to completely walk over the music director of the show last Thursday night. But the show was in peril of drowning and I gave it my best shot of Jennifer Style CPR.

I have fretted that I was just too pushy. I wasn't that worried about the music director. She has been sadly put into a job she can't do. Period. But I worried horribly that the show's director would be mad that #1 I pretty much took over (the director wasn't there), and #2 that when I told her it was a train wreck, she'd think I was a complaining diva loser.

Fortunately, I spoke with the director tonight and she was grateful for my feedback.
<Wiping forehead>
Phew!

Keep Playing!

Me as Singing Diva

I might be a diva about singing. It's not that I think I shouldn't sing loudly. I want to. It's fun. But last night at music rehearsal, I sang and sang and sang so loudly because nobody else knew what they were doing. I could have been perceived as a diva. I know! And I find them so abhorrent!

I've never considered myself very knowledgeable about singing--I've picked up some ideas here and there. And I find myself zombie singing all the time (especially in church), in that I don't enunciate at times, I take breaths when I shouldn't.

I am now thinking, when dealing with singers who don't know what they're doing, if I were the music director, I'd give them a few tips, give them the notes, give them where I want them to breathe and call it good. We have less than 2 1/2 weeks til performance and nobody knows nuthin'. Yipes.

Am I this controlling? Or is it that I want to help and just like to support others?

Life lessons, my friends. Life lessons.

Keep Playing! (And keep pondering...)

Second rehearsal of ACC (A Christmas Carol) and Nov 2011 SFCT Board meeting

I liked that we were getting things started with blocking tonight. Unfortunately, it seemed I was the only one in the scene. My Cratchit husband is far too busy goofing off, making jokes, and then not doing his lines. My 'kids' are not very experienced and though the director basically said, Go, my kids didn't. They stood there until I ushered them around. I guess I really am their mother.

I got another part--a Cockney one, for the several nights that one of the actresses can't be there. Yeah for me, but crap. We should have a full cast for each performance.

Mont and the girl who won't be there seem to be flirting. Ugh.

I like the project, though in this show, around Mont, I--I, the funny witty person, have become the prim nerd that says things that are completely lame. It is the only way I seem to be able to keep myself from telling him to shut his stupid mouth and stop acting like an idiot. Well, actually start acting and stop being an idiot.

The Spanish Fork Community Theater meeting was really interesting. I so don't feel like I fit in, but seem to actually have some kind of acceptance. Good!

Two things I found interesting:
1. Adam said Eliza Doolittle does not have to be Audrey Hepburn's twin (meaning she doesn't have to be thin) and can be older. Older? Hmm. I'm older. And not thin.
2. It's between a ball and a garden party for fundraising. Garden party sounds much easier. Have some entertainment, throw the kids some crumpets and send them home.

Keep Playing!

Halloween Bargains

I bought hair and body spray for $.50 a can. I have pink, red, green, purple, silver, gold, white, and more maybe but can't remember what colors. I have several make up kits.

I love after the holiday sales now.

Costume stuff is expanding!


Keep Playing!

First Readthrough of A Christmas Carol--random musings

~I like things to be fair, though they hardly ever are.
It may be that I'm not as funny as I thought. Or maybe I just like things to go smoothly. Maybe I'm more polite than I thought. See, I think it's remarkably rude for people to talk over someone else when they are reading through their lines in the first read through of a script.

~Mr. Scrooge is a Republican.

~I think it's hilarious that I play two wives and one husband is my own husband and one husband is young enough to be a very young son of mine. Cougars in Dickens? Yes!

~Mrs. Cratchit would have a lower voice than Mrs. Fezziwig. Mrs. Cratchit aka Mother has worked hard her whole life, has lived in a place that probably has dubious flues on the chimneys, making smoke in the room from October to June. Talk about a smoker's cough! Mrs. Fezziwig is silly and loving. Her voice will be higher, and more cultured.

~If you know you can't make it to rehearsals and performances, you shouldn't audition.

~I need to learn how to sew well.

~It's clark, not clerk.

~Sometimes seating charts are necessary for adults. To keep the distruptive ones separate.

~It is invaluable to have a good friend in the same room with you.

Keep playing!

Santa and the Missus

My husband, the heretofore high school English teacher/Renaissance Man, now actor, has decided to be Santa this holiday. So far:

• He has secured the suit, just needs a belt
• Has the beard growing on his face--I bought the white stuff to spray on his beard so he will be a whiter, brighter Santa
• Has me to advertise
• Has me to be the younger, slightly Trophy Wife to Santa

What alien abducted my husband and left this semi-hammed up dude?

Keep playing!

The new play--a surprise blessing!

I went to an audition for a reader's theater production of A Christmas Carol on Thursday. As usual, fewer men than women. Some friends were there, who I was happy to see except as an actress. This was a theater I wanted to work for before but scheduling conflicts prevented me from auditioning for their debut production.
Theater: Springville's Little Brown Theater--very cozy (read--small) black box theater. I LOVE IT.
So, the audition--lots of talent in the females. The men--the young man I'd seen in The Importance of Being Earnest and he was good. The other man showed up in a puffy black wig that had a long braid down the back. Reminded me of when I used to be in Indian Maidens and we all wore black yarn wigs. He had a cowboy hat on this wig and those aviator type sunglasses. I thought he looked like a rather lame terrorist. When he read, he talked like a cowboy. Instead of a clipped British accent, as he read the lines he said things like, "We are goin' to the circus." I don't say this to be mean. I say this for what happened next.
I went home and told my husband, a high school English teacher, that it would be great if he read. The show needs help. My husband, needless to say, has never heretofore expressed any desire to perform. But this is Dickens we're talking about, and he's been reading in front of a bunch of teenagers for 33 years. What does he have to be afraid of? If he can face that every school day, a reader's theater is nuthin'.
Long story short--he came, he read, he got cast! I am as stunned as you are. He is playing Mr. Fezziwig to my Mrs. Fezziwig (we kiss! how cute is that?) and another smaller male part. I also play Mrs. Cratchit. We are already thinking of character development. What kind of hairstyles did they wear in the Victorian Era? Will Craig need to trim or shave off his beard? How will I do my hair?
THIS. IS. AMAZING. I have been dancing sillily all weekend.
Our son, an amazing actor, was not cast--too young to be Young Scrooge and too old to be a Cratchit kid. Caden will sing in the choir, do tech (which he yearns to do), and perhaps play the guitar and the French horn. I admire him that he is completely okay without having a speaking part. He said, grinning, "I don't always have to have the lead."
THIS. IS. AMAZING.
Merry Christmas to us!
I have reserved everything I can get my hands on that deals with A Christmas Carol--the library's copy of the novel, the novel on CD to download, several versions of it on film.
The heck with Thanksgiving. 
God bless us, everyone!
Keep playing! (And keep the faith that miracles like this with me will happen to you!)

The Magical Maple Mountain Marching Band Tour--Fall 2011

I am leaving my usual blogging about my own performing experience and describe my latest adventure--going to St. George with my son's marching band for band tour.
Maple Mountain has an amazing band. I speak from experience that they practice for hours and hours and hours. I speak from experience when I say that there are many aspects to being in marching band, from learning the music, learning how to do that stuff they do (I don't know the terms to use), to having a particular way of wearing a uniform, etc etc etc. Really, I mean that et cetera times infinity.

I admit, I feel somewhat lost that I haven't been more a part of this process as the rehearsing was happening, though I've been working in the MMHS band's Booster Club's Scone booth. (Yum!) And I did go to one of the performances @ BYU. But rarely have I been on the sidelines so much when Caden has been involved in a performance of any kind. I've been backstage mom, drama teacher, and fellow actor when he has been in plays. I made friends with his former junior high band teacher (we let him and his family come ride our horses) so felt like I was 'in', at least a little.

This time, I was amazed at how the band ran itself (meaning, without my help). Everyone knew what they were supposed to do. They packed up the trailer with all the instruments in step with one another. This 'item' (instrument) goes here and so and so is supposed to put that there. They hung out with their sections in a way that it almost felt like they were all one person instead of individual players. There was a synergy that pretty much blew me away.

I have never been involved in any activity except like, you know, being in a family, that spends as much time together as this band spends with one another. I'm sure this is why it felt like they were all in sync. They operate like one huge machine. I am going on and on, I know. But seriously, it was pretty awesome.

The performance in St. George was almost anti-climactic, to be honest. I'd seen the performance before, and except for the lump in my throat watching my kid perform, all gussied up in his uniform, it was pretty much the same thing. But the performance the kids did later in the day for the residents of a senior citizens home was so touching, so powerful, so tremendous, there's really no way to convey in words what the experience was like.
I hadn't really figured it out, but this was the very last performance that Maple Mountain Marching Band would perform "A Day of Infamy", their program for the year. Maybe that's why I couldn't keep the tears back during this time watching the show. I bawled and this is not a good thing. When I start to cry, it isn't easy to stop it. I did stop, but it was a little sketchy for a while.

The other activities we did on tour, going through Cove Fort on a tour (a special place for our family because my husband's ancestors established it), playing laser tag (MY FIRST TIME!), miniature golfing in a rather odd dark golf course that had black light painting all over, were enjoyable and contributed to the whole of the excursion. It's all one, and it was all fun. (Except riding on the school bus. I will continue to push for more funding for education. Those buses are TORTURE.)


I made friends with the other chaperones and hope we get to do many activities together. They must be cool people--they have some awesome kids! And a special thanks to the parents that invited us to drive home with them in the far comfier truck that pulled the trailer. That whole ride was a joy, for the comfort and the awesome company!


The one downer that happened was so minor, it's stupid, but it kind of rocked me. The second night on the tour we weren't able to get the room assigned to us and there was some speculation on just how did the deadbolt get bolted from the inside. But we got a room in the motel's other facility across the street. I admit it, when we moved over there, I cried. I felt like I was part of the group anymore and it rattled me. It upset me. I'm a baby sometimes.

Okay, there was one more thing. I didn't really interact with the kids and never really learned the names of most of them. I've added a few on Facebook, so I know them. But I had imagined all this fun stuff, playing Nertz, laughing (teenagers usually like me...), hanging out. It didn't happen. It was weird for me.

I came home from the tour so exhausted--it is hard for me to do mornings. But I did them! I was up and happy the whole time. Up meaning awake and also, upbeat and positive. I am the latter usually only after 10 AM. So this was a victory for me.

When I came home, I felt mostly gratitude, way more than I felt the tiredness.
I am so looking forward to spring band tour with Concert Band. And to being on tour again with marching band next fall.
Band tour was magical.

Keep playing!