Post-show partum

Ugh. I'm so drained. In so many ways. I got to the theater at 4:30. We started our dress rehearsal at 5. Maxx (lighting tech) and Edna (sound tech) both assured us that they were ready for a full run through with no stops. Afterall, they have had the script for three weeks and should know all their cues. We didn't even get through the first half of the piece because Edna and Maxx did not know their cues or lighting/sound levels AT all. At 6:15, when I finished warming up and went to change, my workshop director was still going over the cues. 15 minutes before the show I was running up and down stairs of the Phoenix theater to finish warming up. I ran all the way to the 8th floor of the building and did vocal warm-ups. There was a moment right before I went downstairs when I asked my mom (she passed when I was 17) for her help and guidance. I don't know if these kinds of things work but I guess I also just missed her and knew she would be proud of what I've done. I know it wasn't my best performance and it took me about 20 minutes to warm into the piece, plus I forgot lines here and there but I got a standing ovation! Everyone was so gracious. When the lights came up people just say in their seats and didn't move for 10 minutes. I debated whether or not to do a talkback but decided against it because I figured I would be too vulnerable to take feedback my first time performing. Maybe I should have? We struck the set and a group of us went out to dinner at a local Italian place. I asked my best friend Jessica to join us and she said she would meet us there. She showed up as everyone was leaving. I stayed over at Jan's. We drank whiskey until 4am and I broke down crying. She said that was normal given all my hard work and build-up for so long and that she wouldn't be surprised if I did that for awhile. The next day I went out to brunch with my workshop director. We were both exhausted. I could barely even talk about the show except to say that I was really disappointed with the lack of support I received from my best friend, Jessica. She wanted to "talk" with me about the show. I sensed that there was going to be some criticism from her in some way  I texted Jessica and told her that I needed a break from her for awhile.

Showtime distraction

Ok, there are 60 rsvps. My sister is flying in from DC.
We found a lighting designer who met with us on Wednesday to do the cues. He was very professional and we were in and out of the theater in 3 hours.
I have been rehearsing my blocking cues in the theater for an hour three days this past week.
And now I've finally reached the big day!!
 I woke up so nervous this morning that I literally passed out from anxiety. I woke up from a 3 hour nap and there was still 4 hours until call. So I went over to Jan and Alex's house for some distraction. Alex and I found some pink streamers and took turns wrapping each other up like mummies. Then we "un-mummied" each other and left a ratty pink shredded mess that I made Alex clean up. I just helped Jan load up the car with wine. And now I'm headed off to dress rehearsal and (aaaaaah!) the birth of my piece. I can't believe I'm finally here. Just hours away. I've worked my ass. Hours and hours and hours boil down to 70 minutes. I do have to remember, though, this is only the first time. So I will do my very best AND know that there will be plenty more performances in the future. The next time you'll hear from me, It will be post-show!

Lighting guy is out

Gregg bailed. He stayed at the theater after we finished our disastrous first rehearsal to continue rehanging the lights and he accidentally left a cord dangling. The tech manager called to inform me about this and told me that I needed to rehang the cord asap if I still wanted to perform my show. I was in band rehearsal when she called so I left a message with my workshop director and asked her if she could contact and tell Gregg to go down to the theater and move the cord. He was irritated, but agreed. However, when he got down to the theater there was a class going on and they would not let him in. He called my workshop director at 11pm to tell her that he had tried but that no one told him there was a class going on. He said that due to our lack of professionalism, he could no longer move forward with the project. My workshop director drove into the city from Nicasio at 12am to restring the cord. She got home at 3am. I can't deal with this. Now we have to find another lighting designer and arrange an extra time to do sound and lighting. I am to the point where I feel like crying about the production aspect of this piece. It's difficult to wear all three hats: actress, writer, director.
 At LEAST I finally succeeded at my piece after performing it so flatly at the tech rehearsal. My workshop director and I met all day monday whereby I totally failed at performing it two times in a row. My workshop director was literally catatonic by the end of that rehearsal. She kept telling me that I needed to work on singing and resonating the words and I got very confused and frustrated.
Then tuesday, I nailed it. The piece came out of me effortlessly, naturally, and I remembered all my blocking. I also did really well at performance space on Friday. Thank god! The "actress" part of me can rest easy until the dress rehearsal.
The writer part of me is still making last minute changes -- taking out parts, rearranging other parts. MWD agrees with the edits. I think she's exhausted. I don't blame her. This whole self-production thing is a bitch. Plus she's not getting paid. Yet...
I really do hope that money will come through soon. I will focus on fundraising after the show.   

Tech rehearsal sucked!

It couldn't have gone worse. Gregg, (lighting design) rolled in and immediately took charge. He has a very alpha male energy that was quite abrasive compared to the bubble that mwd and I have been in. His energy was great for certain things -- he quickly rearranged the audience in a much more intimate fashion, he helped stage the piece, and he got right to work on re-hanging the light board. Then it was time for a run-through. Mwd told me to warm up beforehand but that was really difficult to do because I was busy blocking out the stage and fielding questions. Mwd seemed a bit overwhelmed by Gregg's energy as well and sort of just defaulted to his commands. This bothered me a bit because I felt like her job as workshop director was to take control of the lighting design and tech and let me focus on performing my piece. That did not happen. Gregg interrupted my run-through every like, 20 minutes with his opinions about blocking, props, writing changes, lighting overrides. I kept feeling smaller and smaller onstage and I started getting pissed that mwd wasn't saying anything. By the end of the run-through I was delivering my lines in an angry and forced way. Edna (sound design), couldn't make it until the last hour of the rehearsal so mwd had to help her with sound cues but she forgot a soundboard attachment so we couldn't get sound over the loudspeaker. That was a fail as well. I ended up pouting all the way home and I never expressed my frustrations to mwd. I just turned them inward and starting doubting about going through with the piece.
I emailed Amanda about the rehearsal disaster and she said, "Congratulations! That means your dress rehearsal will be a success!"

Bigger chunks at Berkeley performance space; sound design

I'm now performing 20 minute chunks of my piece at the Berkeley performance space. Mwd emailed me feedback saying that my last performance was really strong and that she could feel my sass, coolness and vulnerability. Thank god for mwd. I really hope that I can start to pay her soon; she deserves it. The memorization is still not all the way there. I still find myself going into my head to try and recall a line which takes me out of the story. Amanda says that I should be running the piece from memory in it's entirety as much as possible from this point on. That feels like a tall order. At least the blocking is done for now. We took the last three days to do a rough sound and lighting design of the piece. I have supermario music stuck in my head! I sent off the piece with cues to Gregg (lighting design) and Edna (sound design) for our upcoming dress rehearsal. I'm relieved that I decided to stop all work except teaching. I need all the time I can get.

7 glorious days of memorizing all day every day; sound design

Mid-winter break. All of my private lesson clients were fine with the break in music lessons. I did lose one nannying family. Understandable. This entire week I have been doing nothing but memorizing all effing day. I'm about 75% done. I am getting nautious memorizing in my apartment so I've been going on walks, going to Baker beach, Ocean Beach, Golden Gate park to memorize in nature. I found this cool memorizing tool online, you put all the material you want to work on into this conversion application and what you get is the first letter of every word you are trying to memorize. This approach has helped me get the initial skeleton of each section down and then I return to looking at the text and going from there. But oh my god is there nothing worse than memorizing. I guess actors and actresses just get used to it and their technique grows stronger the more roles they have.

I met with the sound designer, Edna and we went over my sound ideas for my piece. I'm going to use supermario music. I asked her to compile all the supermario music she can find and burn me a disc so Mwd and I can start creating the soundtrack for the piece.

Jan and John; coordinating tech rehearsals

Alex's mom, Jan, has just generously offered to donate wine for the pre-show gathering! Awesomeness. Also, my ex-boyfriend John, has offered to house manage and use his carpentry skills to build me a door; my main prop. More awesomeness. I set up the tech rehearsals. The only problem is that my light tech can no longer do the show so I have to find someone else. The search is out...my girl Vanessa may know someone. Mwd has started doing another performance space on Wednesdays which is in the same space as Fridays. You can come and practice your material that you are going to do for Fridays. I hope that I can make it to some of them. I am getting to a point where I just can't juggle all of my work and feel like I am having enough time to adequately prep for the workshop as well. Today I wrote all of my nannying and private lesson clients and asked them if it would be ok for me to take a break for the next six weeks. I really need the time in order to pull this off! It's gonna seriously hurt my budget since I am financing this piece myself. I may need to borrow some money, UGH. Hate. doing. this.