Up and Down and Memorizing Sucks

I had hoped with the blog that I could keep everything separate. This blog would be about this (like about a certain play or something), while that blog was about simply this one thing.

Today that's not really working out. See, I had a really cool thing happen--a really amazing thing really. But I need to start earlier. As I travel around reviewing plays, I've gotten to know people. Some have become friends. (And some not, but I won't go there today.) One friend, Jeff, works for a theater company in Salt Lake City--the Off Broadway Theater (OBT). Jeff and I have hit it off and remained in contact. He blessed me by attending "Hairspray" and telling me he liked it.

Without going into details (that are altogether fascinating and what I consider a miracle but I'm too tired to type out right now) Jeff got me an audition for the OBT for their Christmas show. I know it sounds weird, but they're doing a show with a Sesame Street--Mr. Rogers--Suessical theme. I went to the assistant director's house today and auditioned because the call backs for the show are tomorrow. I will be busy with opening night for "Impossible Mystery."

Long story short--the audition was super fun! Wendy liked me, said I have "good diction" (preening--really?) I asked, "So you don't think I sound like a Poindexter?" She said no. Yeah! She said she felt a real connection with me. She said, "If you don't get cast in this show, keep auditioning, and when I do my own shows (she also directs) I'll let you know. I want you in my show."

Okay, wow.

I drove home intermittently crying--feeling blessed.

Then I went to dress rehearsal for "Impossible Mystery." I forgot half my lines, and I don't have too many. Everything felt all flustered, disorganized. I was dazzled by the show and forgot all the timing, the storyline (as this is how I remember things: this comes first, then this, then this). I was completely screwed up.

I came home and wanted to cry, but this time from humiliation. Wendy, the assistant director, asked me if I was good at memorizing. I was honest. I told her I was okay.

I need to do something, learn something, so I can memorize better. This feels like a phobia or something. I want to do this--live theater--so I have to figure out a way to do it well.

Keep Playing! (and for me tonight--I will keep praying.)

Impossible Mystery--2--The Japanese scene

I play Oba San, the deaf Japanese grandma in this scene. For those of you who don't know it, Oba San means Grandma in Japanese.

Most of the players in this scene couldn't come. I might have been irritated with this, but I got to step in and do other parts and they are fun ones. I met two of the people I'll be in the scene with--Nelson, who plays Master Sato, and Dane, who is 'The Mastermind/Client." They are both good actors and nice men.

I discovered I have a Japanese accent that isn't half bad. I get to do some fun physical stuff. I get to wear an amazingly cool costume. And I don't have many lines to memorize. All good.

My worries? There are lots of special effects in this scene and I'm super hoping they go well. We have very little final rehearsal time and I'm hoping these plans pan out. It won't affect me, but it will make the scene suck. And I'm in that scene, so it may be embarrassing.

I like the director, who also wrote the show. She used to kind of intimidate me as she's somewhat unreadable. But I found a lot I liked about her and decided that I hoped she found some things in me she liked, too. She cast me, and gave me some excellent suggestions about the scene last night, so I am feeling excited and peaceful at the same time. These are good things to feel.

Sorry for the shortness of the blog, dear readers. I just don't have much more to say about last night's rehearsal!

Keep playing!

First Readthrough of The Impossible Mystery

Years ago, I was given the remarkable opportunity to work with the Grande Dame of Spanish  Fork Children's Theater--Anna Murdock. I volunteered as a parent helper while Spanish Fork Youth Theater put on "Narnia". For several seasons, I was able to actually work for Anna, for pay, as one of her drama teachers. My son was in each of her shows, and during one summer show, even my husband was hired to teach 80 kids how to act.

Anna retired, so my gig as a teacher was over. But we've remained friends, and she has watched over my son's progress in shows as if she were his own grandma. She gave him his first part (a Dwarf in Narnia) and has encouraged Caden's persistence and talent in drama. I owe a lot to Anna.

Her daughter Cami wrote a fun murder mystery a few years ago and I directed one scene of it--the Mansion scene, set in England, in which a bunch of silly society ladies twitter and gossip and giggle (and then the murder is eventually solved. There's more to it than this, of course.) I directed the Mansion scene with teenagers as the gossips. And now I am one! I'm Lady Chattaway.

We had our first read through tonight in Anna's wonderland backyard. Some of the cast I know, some I don't. I admit, some of the people in the show are folks I, ahem, have had issues with. This should be really interesting.

Which brings me to the topic that keeps swirling around in my blogs--the politics of theater. There is apparently no smaller world than the arena of local community theater. Because Anna has been doing this for 40+ years, she knows everyone. And because she is the nicest, kindest, most guileless person in the world, she sees everyone for how she wants to see them. She sees me this way, too. As a perfect person.

I admit--I'm freaked out. Okay, I am. I'm humbled that Anna thinks so well of me. But I admit it freely, I have burned bridge, at least really torched them badly. Those bridges are now appearing in this show with the ushering in of certain cast members who I've--um--been unhappy with and said so. Or, in the case of one woman, I reviewed the show she was in and I was honest about it. (And that is the subject of a whole other blog sometime soon). I will need to somehow pull these bridges from the ashes and reconstruct them.

Lesson for the day--be as nice as you can to everyone in your small theater world, even those people who you think aren't good teachers in a youth drama program. Someday you may be in a show with them.

Here's me, signing off. But to all of you, keep playing!

Little Women Audition

I was having a hard time letting go of the magical time I had in Hairspray, so I thought I'd just go to another audition and be able to do it all over again. (This in and of itself was really stupid, I was soon to find out.)

I went to audition for "Little Women" at Orem's Scera Theater. Orem is about a 30-minute drive away on a ridiculously bizarre slash of freeway that seems to be perpetually torn up with construction. Hence, mistake #2 in this plan.

The Scera is a beautiful facility--a cozy indoor stage, two fine movie screens, an art gallery. It's posh. All around the first floor are couches and yummy chairs--it looks like the fancy lobby of a fancy hotel. For the "Little Women" audition, sitting on each of these couches and chairs were teenage girls--tall ones, short ones, fat ones, skinny. Most of them had impossibly long, shiny hair, slightly curled under at the ends. It was like I'd entered into an audition for a Pantene commercial.

Many of these possible Megs, Beths, and Amys seemed to know one another. With much squealing and hugging, these ladies sat close together on the comfy couches, arms entwined and eyes like daggers. Oh yes, these girls were all the best of mates, but once I heard them speak, it was clear what was really going on.

"Oh, what was YOUR last part? I had the lead in blah blah blah." "Oh, you were only in the ensemble? Well," (small knowing shake of the head) "I bet you did a great job."

 And on and on. It was like watching a nest of vipers wearing shiny wigs fight over the last piece of roadkill.

I went into the audition, which is always a little daunting. I handed the accompianist my sheet music ("I Don't Know How to Love Him" from Jesus Christ Superstar), and stood in the middle of what looked like the dance studio portion of the Scera. Mirrors to my back, director, music director, assistant director at the table in front of me. The deciders faced me as I sang.I wanted to sing "I Get a Kick Out of You" from "Anything Goes". Or anything by George Gershwin. I do better with the torch singer ballads. But, I sang and apparently did okay, because I got a call back.

I did, of course, mention I was the daughter of Bozo the Clown. Maybe that's why they called me back. I mean, what says Little Women more than a clown's daughter, right?

More about the call back on my next blog.

So, for now--keep playing!