Houston - the professional year in review

Gigs

Express Theatre

Freedom Train
Children's Hilltop Theatre Festival

Main Street Theater

Pinkalicious
A Little House Christmas

Ohana Theatre Company

Awesome America

Voice-Over

IELTS Preparation Material

Highlight

Pinkalicious.  Such a blast.  Great cast vibes (I'm remembering the "Call Me Maybe" dance parties during intermission to cheer us up on bad days), fun and challenging material, fabulous company to work for (inc. clear chain of command and efficient use of time), rock-star status among children, not bad money.  A summer to remember.

Lowlight

I'm obsessive about theatre.  I find it hard to enjoy a show that I'm not throwing myself into full-time with almost impossible challenges to make me grow.  Which is a big reason why the small part in the once- or twice-a-week rehearsal situation of Awesome America was not a highlight for me this year.  But in line with the adage that there are no small parts, only small actors, I tried (not always successfully) to give my character a full backstory and be wholeheartedly present in every performance, which made it a lot more fun.

Auditions

A little (very little) statistical analysis of my auditions page...This year I auditioned for a video game, Theater Under the Stars, Masquerade Theatre, Main Street Theater, Texas Shakespeare Festival, industrial videos, Express Theatre, Unity Theatre, Ohana Theatre Company, Houston Grand Opera, a radio commercial, two TV commercials, the Houston Theatre Alliance, Classical Theatre Company, Ensemble Theatre, an animated web series, a live-action web series, Alley Theatre, a network TV show, Texas Repertory Theatre and Perseverance Theatre.  Thirty-five auditions all told, of which four got me the gig (11%), plus I got cast in two projects without auditioning, and I don't know how to factor that in.  This is compared to 35% in the second half of last year (with one casting without audition), so that explains why I'm feeling frustrated, but I'm going for (and occasionally getting) higher-level gigs than I was last year, so I guess I'm still on the slow rise.

Highlight

Auditioning for, and coming runner-up for, a role in Life Is a Dream at Main Street Theater.   Believing I will get the gig is an interesting mind trick to play before an audition. It helps me stand up for myself and go after what I want (like inviting myself to these auditions), be calm inside the audition room and listen and respond to the director, even when my interpretation of the show was totally different to his! Having that confident energy helps me believe in myself, and I think it also makes the audition panel believe in me too.  So this all led to me getting multiple callbacks, and feedback from the director after the auditions (totally unheard-of!) saying he thought I did a good job.  BUT the downside is that mentally the role is mine when I take that approach and so I crashed hard when it turned out not to be mine.  And it also means that I feel like I'm tilting at windmills a little bit.

Lowlight

The follow-up to Life Is a Dream was the next show that Main Street Theater was auditioning for, Henry V.  I was a bit rubbish.  Doesn't help that really the only role that suits me in that show involves speaking French, which I can't do.  So I read for a male character and found myself in a very blokey scene with three other men in which I really couldn't hold my own.  I think I was also a bit star-struck, because I was auditioning for, and reading with, a whole bunch of people whose work I absolutely idolise.  I was nervous and unfocused and threw out some of the technical stuff I'd been working on with the Shakespeare.  
I lost my "I'm gonna get this job" confidence after being rejected for a bunch of stuff I really wanted that week, including a head-spinningly fast and awful taping for a network TV show, and no less than three shows at Main Street Theater.  That week took a long time to get over.

Training

This year I took classes/trained in ballet, dialects, jazz, Meisner, running, screen acting, Shakespeare, singing, tap, how to prepare my tax return, and yoga.

Highlight

Meisner and Shakespeare classes at Kim Tobin Acting Studio.  Kim and her husband Philip are my new gods.  They have such a wealth of experience and are excellent at communicating it and meeting their students where they're at.  When either of them go off on a tangent (or one of Kim's rants) you get out your notebook or your laptop or your phone and freaking write it down and memorise it, coz it'll be gold.  I would probably move in with them if they let me.  Aside from training me in the technical aspects of what they do, they push me to amazing new levels of vulnerability in performance, which is exactly what I go there for.  As Philip said, "We begin to trust the unexpected as we progress.  And we like it."

Lowlight

Screen classes.  The classes themselves are excellent, and I love the people there, but it often feels like a fruitless labour because I get so few screen auditions and zero jobs.

Other Work

Hope Stone - teaching and blogging

Main Street Theater - substitute House Manager

Houston Grand Opera - lightwalker

So that's my year at work! The bulk of it has been children's theatre, which I continue to love, with some auditions taking me out there into the realm of the big boys.  I still feel very new in the Houston theatre scene, but I'm looking forward to next year, which will begin with my playing the fabulous Ms Frizzle in Main Street's touring production of The Magic School Bus.  Even better news than that is that I will be touring with some great friends, including Leslie, who just landed her first gig at Main Street!  May 22nd marks our two-year anniversary in Houston, which I had tied to some professional goals, so we'll see if they get met or not! Should be an interesting year!

Houston Day 559 - your afternoon Stanislavski

What Stanislavski & Meisner are teaching me about life

I'm in the middle of preparing a scene for class tonight with Kim Tobin.  I recently moved up into her advanced class and I'm a little out of my depth.  We'll save the psychoanalysis as to why that scares me so much for another day.
The scene I'm working on is quite a challenge (which is good - I think I feel like anything that's not a challenge is just bad writing, which is a whole other challenge in itself).  I've been struggling to articulate my character's objective so I reached for my Stanislavski book for some help.  Before I found any tips on articulating objectives, but I found this quote:

An actor must work all his life, cultivate his mind, train his talents systematically, develop his character; he may never despair and never relinquish this main purpose - to love his art with all his strength and love it unselfishly.

To be honest, I struggle with that last bit.  I just realised today how many harsh and bitter things about other actors I let slip out of my mouth.  That's also a personality trait of mine - I have managed "cut people off at the knees" as my mum says, to friends who aren't actors just as well as to people who are - but I think it's time to recalibrate the balance between honest and kind.  I am becoming ungenerous.  My selfish love of the theatre, as if it's some kind of finite resource I need to keep to myself, of course comes from my own insecurities.  But as I'm learning in Kim's Meisner work, things are just a whole bunch better when you take your eyes off yourself and get invested in what someone else is doing.

You must leave all of that alone and put your energy into one thing, doing the work.  (Larry Silverberg - The Sanford Meisner Approach.)

Not only in this circle, but also in life.  (Gayla Miller - see Lessons in Theater and Life on the Hope Stone blog.)

Houston Day 542 - Obligatory Thanksgiving Post

Random Thoughts on the Thanksgiving Day Parade:

• The Rockettes: the missing link between the Ziegfeld Follies and cheerleading.
• NYC parade: spectators in coats and gloves and scarves and warm hats.  Houston parade: people in jeans and t-shirts.
• There were two Australians in the parade! Anthony Warlow (playing Daddy Warbucks on Broadway right now): you have my undying love and admiration forever.  You are what is good about musical theatre.  Cody Simpson: you're alright too.  Your blond, surfer-derived image reminds me of home.
• I love a good celebration, but I sometimes think that celebrations are less special when this country is so goddamn affluent.  And so over-the-top! Fake snow to end the parade?Weird.  It's a far cry from saving up for a special feast because that's the only decent meal you've eaten all year.  I still sit so uncomfortably with that and I am still figuring out what to do about my feeling that we just have far too much money.  Anyway, I'm looking forward to moving into my Simplify Challenge tomorrow. 
• I think I just saw a character who looks like a weird Santa-Jesus-Pilgrim hybrid.

Thinks I'm Thankful For (Random Sample):

• My family and going home for Christmas! Four weeks, y'all!
• My adopted family, the Nickerbekahs, with whom we are eating Thanksgiving dinner.
• That Lucas and I come up with fun hybrid names for couples.

P.S. : The National Dog Show on TV after the parade.  Hilarious.

Houston Day 541 - The Player's Sonnet

I have been reading tons of Shakespeare recently to prepare for some upcoming auditions, to the point where I'm beginning to think in iambic pentameter.  The following is my attempt at writing in Shakespearean style (and continuing to process what the hell it is I do).  I began it when I was having a working/drinking/reading lunch at Onion Creek Cafe and finished it tonight with John Denver on the sound system and Lucas baking pumpkin pie in the kitchen.  Happy Thanksgiving all, and especially to my Houston community of artists.

The Player’s Sonnet

The same way I can look at that cursed table,

And see not just a panel of blank faces

But my true love, or hate; so I am able

To see them in a made-up world of spaces.

I play to them my piece, to achieve my aim,

And in that same way I will play my life.

I will traverse the highs and lows of fame,

(And somehow manage still to be a wife).

Just as I fancy, I will land each role

Then play it, then let it go; but what will stay

Is my integrity, my joy, my soul,

My willingness to play another day.

This piece is hard and sometimes unforgiving;

But I am a player; so I play my living.

Houston Day 538 - Your Silence Is Rich

Sunday Scribblings: Silence

This is inspired by the Sunday Scribblings blog and by some conversations I had with my cast members between shows yesterday.

I sense rather than see the longing in your eyes.  Your voice has just a shadow of sadness.  (Will all this striving be in vain?) I recognise it because it is in me, too.

And yet you hold your tongue and your dignity.  Your silence is rich.  We are masters of self-possession and fake-it-til-you-make-it (will we ever make it?), and from somewhere you find the strength to witness your own disappointments.  You are your own counsellor.  There is an easiness in your posture.  You have learned to wait, with enough love and money to continue, and the unrequited hope still gently bleeding through.

Teach me how to find your silence.  Because the drive won't go away.  And the questions are insistent.

(What if the story of my life just disappears in the noise?)

Houston Day 536 - more insomniac blogging

It's 4am and I am awake (not for the rest of the day, I hope) so here's a little update on life in Houston.

A Little House Christmas

...is super-fun.  We've been open for about a week now.  The schedule is (disappointingly?) light so far, with usually only one show a day.  Again, I could sing the praises of Main Street all day - how instead of just making do when the sound design computer crashed during tech, someone popped out during lunch and just bought a new one; how when one of the actors had a previous contract with another company for one of our performance days understudies were prepared well in advance; and the fabulous costume designs of Macy Perrone.  I love working for a company that says that anything less is not good enough.  In an ideal world every company would work like that, but that's not been my experience so far!

A Little House Christmas cast members: me, Lauren, Natalie,
Chioke, Curtis and Scott

The cast is large (ten) and fun, and we seem to be going out for lunch together most days.  And there's that lovely feeling of being in a Jane Austen novel when you're dressing for a period show - the women's dressing room is all petticoats and lace and corsets (well, a corset).

Hope Stone

Our teen theater class has entered phase two of this year's plan - the Simplify Challenge.  Inspired by this year's performance theme of "Simplify" every student and Leslie and I are giving ourselves the challenge to simplify our lives in some defined way for a defined period of time.  Last night most of the kids gave their commitments to their challenges.  We've got water-drinking, some restrictions on internet usage, a few variations on the theme of minding your own business, dog-walking, a few variations on meditation and intentional living, cleaning and organising stuff, being grateful, being positive, getting on top of schoolwork, and a couple of people trying to keep calm in their relationships (man, I remember being a teenager - that was hard).  My challenge is to do yoga/meditate every morning, and to eat breakfast sitting down in a calm environment with no multitasking.

The Hope Stone blog continues to be a fun extra activity in my life, and I'm also beginning to think about pursuing other blogging opportunities as well.  The new Hope website will be up soon, which will see me blogging with more regularity.

TMJ Syndrome

It was when I realised that I was avoiding eating because it hurt to open my mouth more than about a finger-width that I decided to do something about it.  My chiropractor has beaten me up and wrangled my jaw a couple of times in the last few days and I'm going back again after the weekend.  Other Little House cast members have been comparing their experiences of TMJ with mine, and I didn't think that mine was associated with any stress, as theirs was.  But then the chiro said it was phenomenal amounts of neck and shoulder tension that were putting my jaw out, along with some pretty regular teeth-grinding, and asked me what I was stressed about.  Then I got home and Lucas grabbed me by the shoulders, looked me in the eyes and asked me what I was stressed about, and I realised that maybe I am worried about a few things.  Then the next day with my jaw loosened up by the chiro I realised that a tense jaw is my defense mechanism and I spent the whole day painfully aware of how I wanted to grind my teeth and clench my jaw and just generally tense up all the freaking time.

So I'm feeling pretty vulnerable (the chiro took away my defense!) and bruised (her assistant beats me up pretty good during those massages) and worried...she took away my coping mechanism! Another yoga cleanse is in order, I feel - I think I'm going to start that the day after Thanksgiving, along with my Simplify Challenge.  More boring food and meditation and other slightly odd but awesome ayurvedic practices.

Awesome Friends

Ashley and Lindsay looking adorable

Speaking of Thanksgiving, this year we are spending it at Nick's aunt and uncle's place with Nick and Bekah.  They continue to be very dear friends to us, although this week is tech week for Bekah so we won't really see her til that's over!  I also love teaching and doing life with Leslie (wish her a happy birthday!), and my regular walk-and-talks with Ashley, and hanging out at Ashley and Lindsay's apartment.

And an Awesome Husband

Leslie commented last night that it's an awesome marriage when he can look me in the eye and ask me what I'm stressed about and make me realise it.  I am so grateful for Lucas! His field trip a couple of months ago made me realise just how much I need him around.

He continues to love his job, which is ramping up again for another lease sale early next year, and he's totally gotten me hooked on playing Magic, and he also was very excited that the new Halo is out.  Although he's finished it already - I think that's an anticlimax but apparently it's not.

Houston Day 531 - Lucas' birthday!

Lucas' Birthday

...was yesterday, and he turned the ripe old age of thirty-one.  In the tradition of his family, where they got to celebrate their birthdays in both the Australian and American time zones when they were kids, we went out for dinner Friday night, his "Australian birthday".  It was to a fancy restaurant we'd never been to before in the Heights called Glass Wall.  Roasted brie, delicious meat, lovely dessert wines.

The day itself involved breakfast at Yale St, Lucas seeing our first public show of A Little House Christmas, and a pub crawl on White Oak, organised by the inimitable Josh Ulla`, who works with Lucas and who seems like nothing so much as a youth group leader on steroids.

I also gave Lucas tickets to go and see the Texans play the Colts in December.  Yes, I am a good wife.  And we have good friends who are going with us to see them play as well! Lucas' fanship of the Texans is just one of the many symptoms of his sudden-onset (about a month after we got here) and hilarious passionate Texan patriotism.  Another is his belief that he is the reincarnated spirit of the James Buchanan who fought and died at the Alamo.