A Look Into The Mind Of Nicci Claspell...

As I'm sure you can guess, much has happened in the past few months. Chicago has been over for some time now, and was a really fantastic production. I can't say it went off without a hitch, but I'm confident in saying that everyone is really proud of what we put up. And it was filmed!! That is rarely allowed out here, so it's exciting that we'll be able to order dvds and see how good we actually were :)

In other un-career-related news, I've been single for a few months. It's a strange thing after being in a serious relationship for over 3 years, but I knew it was what had to happen. Very hard to do, but the right decision. In the time since, I've been focusing a lot on rebuilding relationships with friends and dedicating myself to my career. Which brings us back to the point of this blog...

I've been on several auditions, a few film/tv/commercial but mainly plays and musicals. I've actually been cast in and had to turn down/drop out of a few projects for various reasons. It's something I hate doing, but have found it necessary due to other developments! Which I'll get to right now.

The main reason I'm back here today is to talk about my most recent trip to New York. As you may have noticed in past blog entries, I try not to divulge too much information about projects I get excited about. Maybe it's superstition... considering the fact that I wear the exact same thing to a callback as I did to the initial audition, right down to socks and undies (yes they get washed first), I'd say it's probably superstition. Well, I've been doing the opposite lately and it seems to be working wonders. So get ready for the longest post ever, because I plan on giving more details than ever before!

I'll start by saying the main event here is the American Idiot first national tour. I attended an open call at the beginning of March, three months ago. I woke up later than I intended, and expected there to be a huge turnout for the call. Here's what I wrote in my planner while I was waiting for my turn to sing:

"This could have been the one, but this is not the one. Just because I couldn't get ready fast enough. I'm number 46 or 48, somewhere around there. I believe they've got Equity & EMC scheduled till at least 11:40, and the audition is supposed to go until 4:45, so hopefully it will go smoothly so I can sing. I like open calls. I like when they hold us in a big dance studio, it's great for observing people. They asked for the guys to bring a guitar to accompany themselves, so I'd say there's at least 3 guitars being played simultaneously at any given time. I like that this all doesn't make me nervous. It may have a few years ago, but I feel relaxed now. The only thing is, I wonder if it looks like I'm trying too hard, with my hair and my clothes. I brought a few different tops & shoes just in case, and I'm pretty sure I'll be changing. It's not like I don't have the time!"

And a little while later:

"This might be the one. They're actually ahead of schedule, by about 20 minutes. My appointment time is 3:20, so I may go shopping & be back by 2:30. Though I may not - knowing me, if I leave, I may not come back.

Even just a callback. For ensemble. Please! A shot is all I need."

So now you all see the flashes of desperation I get while auditioning. At least I can still be relaxed during it all.

Here's what happened... I had planned on singing a Paramore song that I didn't really know, and wasn't even sure I liked. I have Pat Benatar's "Heartbreaker" in my book as a backup, but I figured half of the girls there would be singing that. I did decide to leave and come back, and while I was in my car I was thinking of other songs I could possibly sing instead. When I got home I began searching for Melissa Etheridge sheet music, when it hit me. "Whats Up" by 4 Non Blondes. I'd never heard it on piano, and have only sung in a handful of times when it came on the radio or someone else sang it at karaoke, but I knew it was the song I had to sing. I found the sheet music online, printed it, and headed back over to the studio.

There was only a little bit of waiting until it was my time to sing, and the dance studio had cleared out considerably. I got into the room, went over the song with the pianist, and began to sing. I did have to start over once because I underestimated how much breath I would need to singe the first line, but once I got going again I don't think it could have gone much better. In fact, in the middle of the song where it starts to get loud and powerful, I'm pretty sure a silly grin crept up on my face because I realized it sounded even better than I thought it would! It sat perfectly in my voice and I belted the top notes with ease.

It takes me about 20 minutes to get home from this particular studio. I looked at my phone when I got home and saw that there was a voicemail - it was from the American Idiot people, requesting I come back the next day for a callback. I hustled to switch my shift at work and confirmed that I would be there. The following day, the main casting director was also in the room. I sang the same song, and was asked on the spot to come back in a few days to sing once again, and to dance. I was given music for the character Whatsername, one of the leads.

The day of that third callback was an exciting one! I sang in the morning - my audition song, plus one of the two songs from the show they had given me, it was put on tape this time - then I had an audition for a film, then went back for a dance call for American Idiot. It's days like those they make you feel like a real like actor, pounding the pavement. Dance calls usually make me just a little nervous because although I can dance, I wouldn't consider myself a "dancer". Luckily, this dance call mainly involved running back and forth and throwing ourselves around. Though a little painful, it was easy as pie. I was among the 6 or so girls that were asked to stay and learn a second, shorter combination. That, too, was pretty easy to pick up.

About a week later I received an email from casting, saying they thought I did really well at the callback. They wouldn't know what the "next steps" would be until May, but to let them know if there was anything that would make me unavailable to them.

Fast forward to 4 weeks ago (wow, was it a month ago already??), I got an email saying that more callbacks would be held in New York and they would like me to attend if I was able. Well, there is NO way that I was not going to be available!! Luckily, I had already requested the weekend in question off because of a friend's potential birthday weekend in Vegas. As fate would have it, that excursion was cancelled so I didn't have to miss out on any big celebration, and I didn't have to get any shifts covered at work because that was the week that one of our new girls was supposed to start, so she just got those shifts. Everything fit right into place.

I want to take a moment to thank my wonderful parents for providing funds for me to fly to New York and comfortably spend what turned into a week there. A big thanks to my sister as well for hanging out with me and letting me stay with her. Cecil, Anne, and Sarah Claspell, you are the best people in the world :)

I took a redeye on friday night and arrived around 11:00 on Saturday morning. Sarah met me at the subway station and we headed to her beautiful place in West Harlem to drop off my stuff. That night we attended the third annual Improm, which is an improv prom. People involved in comedy all throughout NY dress up to the nines, and couples get to do a 5-10 minute improv set together. Which meant that, as each others dates, Sarah and I got to perform together for pretty much the first time ever. I was nervous about it, having only completed the first level of UCB's improv classes (ooh! I'll have to talk about that later!) but it was fun and we got some laughs. After that, she and I went on to kill it at karaoke downstairs, and impress people with how much we are alike.

The only important thing that happened on Sunday is that Sarah and I got lobster rolls from Luke's Lobster. It was honestly one of the most amazing foods I've ever had. We also went to Williamsburg and saw the most hipster flea market I've ever seen. As I said, Sunday was all about the lobster rolls.

Monday was Memorial Day and we attended "The Company Picnic", another event involving many people in the comedy community. There was also a guac-off which we participated in, and our blue cheese guacamole was a hit. I don't think anyone officially voted, but if they had I'd like to believe we would have won.

And now for the main events, what you've all been waiting for, the callbacks! Tuesday morning at 10:30 was my appointment time. I got up early to do my hair exactly as I had for the initial audition and dress in the exact same clothes. As luck would have it, Sarah works directly across the street from the studios where the callbacks were being held, so she escorted me all the way there! I had some extra time so I decided to find out why everyone from the East coast loves Dunkin Donuts so much. Yeah, they know how to make a donut.

Once inside the studio, I had a little time to wait around and talk to the other people there. I saw a few familiar faces from the Los Angeles auditions. Once again, not nervous. Pretty relaxed. I got into the room not too long after my appointment time and sang the same two songs I had been given three months prior. We were asked to prepare one of five poems, but to my knowledge they didn't actually have anyone do them. When I was done singing, the casting director walked with me out of the room, and asked me to come back later to audition for another project they're doing. When I went to his office to pick up the sides, an associate/assistant told me that they're reviving On A Clear Day You Can See Forever on Broadway, and it's going to be starring Harry Connick Jr. I had a few hours to kill so I bought a new dress that would be more appropriate for this particular role - a 1940's Jazz singer. I'm positive it would have taken away a little if I had shown up in the American Idiot attire. I ended up reading/singing for the casting associate/assistant that I had gotten the sides from, and it felt very good. He actually looked through my book after I sang and asked me to do another song, one of my favorites to sing - "Life of the Party" from The Wild Party. I love singing that song because I feel I can really let go and just have fun. He said considering the amount of time I had to work with the material from the script, I did a great job.

I was called to come the next day to sing and dance for American Idiot again. This time the director, Michael Mayer, was in the room. This was very exciting because he was the original director for Spring awakening, and he's also directing On A Clear Day. That seemed to go well, and once I was done singing, I was given music to look over for a different character. The casting director talked with me again and asked how long I would be in town, and I told him I had a flight early the next morning. He told me to look into how much it would be to change my flight to a later time/date so I could be seen once more for AmId in the morning, and On A Clear Day in the afternoon. If need be, they could help out with the cost. I immediately got on the phone with the airline and got a quote. I also called my manager to tell her the good news.

This particular day got up to about 90 degrees, and had about 64% humidity. It also happened to be the day of the dance call. I changed into my dance attire, complete with leg warmers and a fishnet shrug thing, but once we started dancing these things were quickly removed. Though there was air conditioning in the room, there was only so much it could do with probably 30-something people running around and slamming ourselves into the ground. We also learned another combination that involved capoera and other defensive moves. There was not a single dry body to be seen. Once again, I was asked along with a few other girls to stay and do the same girly combination we were taught in Los Angeles.

As I was leaving the room, I spoke with the casting director and told him the price of the cheapest ticket we found. He said it wasn't a problem, they would reimburse me for it. The whole thing. What? These things happen?? It's a strange and wonderful feeling when you're liked and wanted to the point that a casting company will shell out hundreds of dollars just to keep you in town for one more day. Even now, I'm still trying to wrap my head around it.

A few hours later I sang once again, this time with just the pianist and musical director, the music for the other character I was given earlier. I was told to forget about the other music and come back the following morning at 11 to sing this new stuff, for the character Extraordinary Girl.

And I did. The toughest part about this whole experience was not being warmed up enough. Unfortunately I couldn't belt some of the notes I normally would have been able to, but luckily I think I was still able to mix them very well. I get the impression that the creative team liked me a lot, and there's nothing more you can really ask for than that.

I had a couple hours to kill before my On A Clear Day audition, so I tracked down the Luke's Lobster truck and got another lobster roll. It was absolute heaven.

I returned to the studios, changed into my more appropriate dress, and sang/read for the Clear Day creative team. Michael Mayor seemed to be impressed that I could transition from punk rock AmId to smooth jazzy Clear Day, and said it's been a good day. It certainly was. A good week, actually.

I slept on and off from around 8pm until 3am, packing and facebooking intermittently. I caught a cab at 4am for a 6:55 flight from LaGuardia. Arrived in LA around noon, went home to drop off my stuff, and went straight to work.

There are several things I glossed over, this entry being long enough already. I got to meet up with some of my friends from my Alabama RENT cast, the lovely Meagan Elizabeth Lewis, Stephanie Mosley, and Lauren Bowling. Tuesday after the first auditions I got to see Sarah perform in 2 improv shows at UCB which were absolutely incredible. I also finally treated myself to 4 meatball sliders from The Meatball Shop, one of my very favorite places to eat in the world, as a celebratory last meal in NY.

I heard from my manager this morning that I seemed too young for On A Clear Day You Can See Forever, which I was half expecting but I'm so happy just that I was brought in for it in the first place. She also said we should hear about American Idiot by the end of the week, which is exciting and nerve wracking. I'd rather it just be a surprise, but now you know exactly how long you have to send good vibes my way. I really do feel great about the whole experience and have a good feeling about it. I'll be sure to update here when I get word!

(to view pictures to go along with all of these words, check out my album on facebook!)

Ok Fine, Here I Am

(Yeah, that's me there in the middle)

I really have no idea how Evan has blogged every.single.day. for the past I don't know how many years. Like they say... it's not hard to remember, it's just so easy to forget.

I can assure you that there are many valid reasons for my absence! Valid and time consuming and exciting reasons! First of all, I got called back for Roxy and Ensemble in Chicago, and was cast as Liz! She's the one that says "Pop" in Cell Block Tango. I surprised myself in the dancing portion of the audition! Though I was sorry for about a week and a half afterword, because my muscles obviously weren't used to moving like that. We've been in rehearsal for a few weeks now, and as long as I stretch and warm up beforehand, it's really not so bad. My recovery time has been just a day or two after each dance rehearsal, and pretty soon I'm sure I'll be just fine! We open in about 3 1/2 weeks, and there are only 4 performances - March 9, 16, and 23 at 7:30, as well as a 2:00 matinee on the 23rd. These are all Wednesdays, and considering it's a 40 minute drive from LA without traffic, I understand if you can't make it. But if you can, then great! It's exciting to be working with all new people on this show, and I think we're all going to put something together that's very enjoyable.

Another thing that has been keeping my busy is getting ready for pilot season. First and foremost I finally got some new of my new headshots printed, though I think I'm going to be in the market for some more soon. 'Tis the nature of the biz. I also had an audition a few couple weeks ago for an exciting new pilot, produced by Brian Grazer. My manager referred me to an acting coach another client of hers goes to, Stan Kirsch, so I had a session with him a few days before the audition. It was really great - I may try out a few other coaches, but I really liked him. I liked that I walked out of there so much more confident about my performance. I also just put another audition on tape to send to Telsey & Co. They cast all the big Broadway musicals, and they're also casting a new pilot about Broadway musicals! This one is being produced by Spielberg. Huge. My manager and I agree they're probably going to go the route of some big b'way star for the role, but it's fantastic to be able to put my face in front of these people.

I mentioned last time that I had a meeting with another commercial agent. This is an agency I've heard about since moving to Los Angeles, just like my theatrical agency, so I was very excited for the opportunity. The meeting went well, and a few weeks later I was asked to come in again to meet with the agent's partner. Now, in my experience thus far, meetings have been about 15-20 minutes. Somehow this one ended up being about an hour, and I left having no idea how it went. I mean, we talked about RENT. Cause eeeevveryyyyyyythiiiing iiiisssss reeeeennnnnt! Apparently in my life, it is. Anyway - I guess it worked this time because I now have a commercial agent! I am insanely excited, I've wanted this for years. Now all I have to do is get a commercial so I can pay to take improv classes and get new headshots so I can get booked for commercials.... it's an endless cycle.

On top of all this, I'm now the manager at my work. Seems we've had an almost steady flow of receptionists getting hired and then soon getting other opportunities elsewhere for at least the past 6 months, and our previous manager decided it was time to move on. So on top of my extra managerial duties, I'm training several girls and my boss is consulting me on who to hire. None of this is bad. I'm so lucky that this job is as flexible as it is, my boss is great, and my co-workers are great.

And another thing, I like to finish my taxes as soon as possible and I had a lot of info to gather this year. I've been a busy bee.

So to everyone not immediately around me (roommates, Evan, co-workers), it probably seems like I've disappeared. If I'm not at rehearsal or work or an audition, I'm researching things that have to do with rehearsal or work or auditions. I can't remember the last time I've been so involved in my own life, and I love it. The next step is to try and reincorporate other people into it, but for now I'm enthusiastic about the possibilities I'm creating.

Third Time Is Maybe Not The Charm

A dream come true twice over is plenty. I keep joking to people that I'll be doing RENT for the rest of my life, but as fun as that would be I'd miss many other opportunities. This will be my first pilot season with my manager and agent working for me, which hopefully will yield lots and lots of auditions and - with any luck - a job or two! My manager is also setting up a meeting with another commercial agent and that is going to be good, I just know it.

Wow... so in typical Nicci fashion of late, I had let myself dwell on RENT. The callback was on a Saturday, and we were told that they'd probably be finishing casting by the end of the weekend. When a few friends told me they got calls and were offered roles on Monday, I still held out hope that maybe there was more to be done. Christmas came and went and I still let myself think about it. I even sent the production office an email letting them know how much fun I had at the callback, and that I'd love to be a part of the show in any capacity.

The hardest thing was not knowing if I should be expecting something or not. Sure, no one in this industry is going to give everyone that didn't make the cut a courtesy call. But they had been posting most everything online up to that point so the fact that I never saw a final cast list made me think that maybe they were still in the process. I finally got word from two of my friends that were cast in the show that an email was sent out to the cast. My immediate reaction was to be a little sad. A) It's RENT! and B) I'd love to work with those friends again, I know they're going to be fantastic.

And then... a wave of relief came over me. I'd let a lot of anxiety build up by not letting this particular audition go, and as soon as I know I wasn't waiting for anything anymore I felt like a normal person again. Yet another example of why actors have to forget about the audition as soon as they leave the room. You can cause yourself a lot of frustration otherwise! I am very excited to see my beautiful friends in this show. Ben, my Angel from both RENTs I did, is again one of the Angels, and My darling friend Josie is a Maureen. They're going to be spectacular :)

I had an audition for a reading of a new musical today at the Pasadena Playhouse that I feel good about. Any audition where get to sing Pat Benatar and use a Russian accent is bound to be a fun one. The people behind the camera seemed to like what I did and laughed in all the right places. And now, though I feel good about it, I've let it go. If it happens it happens.

There are also a couple exciting auditions coming up, the first of which being Chicago. I submit myself for the role of Roxie (Velma has already been cast), and got a message from one of the casting people saying that we had a lot of mutual friends, and she was actually planning on finding me on facebook and asking that I come in for the audition. That could be a good sign! If my last dance audition is any indicator, I think I'll do fine tomorrow. I'm not a dancer, but I can dance. And if my body doesn't want to listen to me tomorrow, they're also casting The Last 5 Years which requires no dancing. A different song choice and I think I may have a fighting chance for that too.

Aannnnddddd lastly - I have another meeting with a commercial agent next week. I am so so thrilled. This could be the one, folks.

Happy Almost New Year!

A few years ago, Evan was inspired by the Day Zero project to create a 101/1001 list. That is, a list of 101 things to accomplish in 1001 days, or a little under 3 years. I've decided to create one for the upcoming year... one of my goals is to actually finish thinking of 101 things to do! But another one is to blog more. Since it's only a day away from being 2011, I'll start off with a little treat I threw together last night. Enjoy!


Clips from the rehearsals for RENT in Rancho Cucamonga

A big thanks to Ms. Erika Jenko for sending me the clips! I'm no pro at cutting videos, but I wanted to whip something together to let you all know I'm still alive. I'll leave my reel to the pros.

Happy new year everyone, with any luck you'll be hearing from me much more on this site!


*I just found out that the Day Zero Project is down or has been removed. This is unfortunate since I had about 60 goals saved on there. Booo, back to the drawing board.*

Too Much Talk About Music

I just got home from the Dangerous Beauty auditions and man do I feel relieved. I got all the info on this audition two weeks ago and have had that much time to think about it. On the one had, it can be nice to have that much more time to prepare, especially when they ask for 2 minutes of music, plus reading some lines. But on the other hand, that's a good amount of time to start to stress out about an audition.

Not to mention that I didn't really have any ballads or up-tempo songs that I was comfortable with or that would go over well at this audition. The one song I normally sing for auditions is kind of a power ballad, even a torch song, therefore NOT a regular ballad or up-tempo. This left me with a few choices: Take the last part of the song more briskly and pretend it's an up-tempo; sing the beginning of the song like a ballad; sing something from Chess (even though I'm not sure it's appropriate for what they're asking); or find brand new songs. So what did I choose? Well, I didn't. I prepared all of those choices.

I found one song from my AMDA days that I never sang but someone else in my class did - "Stranger To The Rain" from Children of Eden. This is a little faster than my go-to song so I took it from the bridge straight on to the end. It was more like a 1:30 but it was a good cut. Into my audition binder I also threw "Heaven Help My Heart" from Chess. That's actually not a bad ballad, I think I'll keep it in there as a just-in-case song. I put "Nobody's Side" from Chess in there too, knowing it was a definite no but at least I could sing the whole thing without forgetting anything if I ever need to. The fourth song I put in the binder was my good ole' go-to, "A New World" from Jekyll and Hyde.

Over the past week I worked on all of these things. I even dug out my keyboard and set up camp on my bed, music strewn allover my room and midi versions of each song queued up on my laptop. After reacquainting myself with all of the songs, the hardest part was to choose which songs to sing. I obviously couldn't sing "A New World" for both my ballad and up-tempo. I decided I'd definitely be doing "Stranger To The Rain", but even when I was getting ready this morning I couldn't decide on a second song.

I even decided to stray from my regular musical-theatre-audition-dress, so everything about this audition was a bit foreign to me. I did feel much better when the casting director came out to get me and told me she'd been hearing great things about me. And when I stepped into the room I got a compliment on my dress. Hooray! I went to the pianist and told him I'd start with the up-tempo, and he told me that they'd so far been doing only one song. Hooray again! I got up there and sang, and felt better than any practice run I'd done up until then. They liked the song, and then we moved onto the sides. I read through with the casting director once, was given a not by the director, and then read it again. They liked how I took the adjustment and the choices I made, and that was that!

When I left I felt confident and that's really the most important thing. I think I have a shot at it, and if not this then at least the CD has finally seen me and what I can do. Cross your fingers for me!

I Am Alive And Well

As I'm sure you've noticed, it's been about a month and a half since I last posted an entry. I haven't been trying to avoid blogging by any means - in fact there have been several times I've wanted to blog because some cool things have been happening, but I just haven't done it.

It was recently brought to my attention that some things I say here can be taken as me being narcissistic. I was worried about that when I started the blog. No one whats to toot their own horn too much for fear of others becoming annoyed with the sound. But here's what it comes down to: This is a blog about me. It's an easy way to give family and friends an update on what's happening on my professional journey, as well as some personal and social life stuff, on their own time. If anyone gets tired of reading about me, they can choose not to visit the blog.

On that note, I think it's time for an update!

So where did we leave off... Chess is long over now. We had a brilliant last weekend, and we followed our closing night 1.1 with another potluck. The cast and crew was full of so many wonderful people, there was no way we wouldn't have a good time. I don't think I wrote about this before, but a friend of one of the producers came to see the show and enjoyed it so much that he invited the whole cast to the Magic Castle! I've been wanting to go there for years and years - it's part hotel, part restaurant and venue for magicians to perform. You have to either be a member or invited and accompanied by a member to get in. Luckily, the producers friend is a member (he's a magician) and was our host for the evening. Not only did we get a private magic show from him - that I got to help out with - but there were several floors with lots of rooms and shows happening in them all night long. We were there for about 5 hours. I think that may have also had something to do with the ghost piano player that we had a sing-along with.

I also had the immense pleasure of singing a song with my chess co-star, Blake Ewing, in his one man show at Vitello's in studio city shortly after the show closed. We sang "Someday", a song what was cut from The Hunchback of Notre Dame. It's a beautiful and moving song, that as far as we know it's only carnation that can be seen is in German on youtube. So unfortunate. His show was packed and went off without a hitch.

That audition I mentioned last time went pretty well. I would have been nice to have been a little more familiar with the sides, but I did the best I could with the time I had and it was in no way a bad audition. And a good thing too because I haven't had an audition since. It's the beginning of pilot season, which means almost all efforts are going toward reviewing and choosing which pilots will go ahead, which in turn means there's not much that's casting just yet. Sure there's projects here and there, but it's not going to get back into full swing until after the new year starts.

So that means now is the time to prepare for the actors portion of pilot season! I finally had that meeting with the commercial agency on Wednesday. I feel like I'm getting better at these things, it only took me an hour to figure out what to wear! I got there with about 10 minutes to spare. The receptionist handed me a folder with four "commercials" in it, and told me to pick one to read to the agent. I spent a couple minutes with that, and then the agent come out to meet me. He was very friendly and easy to talk to, and I got a good feeling about the whole thing. It seemed like everyone there enjoys what they do and actually work for their clients. We chatted a little bit, I read the commercial a few times, and that was that. He said he's be in contact with my manager in a few days.

When I got to work I was greeted with an email from my manager. Unfortunately, it looks like there's a conflict with another client of theirs, most likely meaning they already have someone that's my type. So that's a no-go. Of course my initial reaction was that I was bummed, I've really been looking forward to this. But then I though you know, I guess I can't get them all on the first try. I've been very lucky and signed with the first manager and theatrical agency that I've met with. That really doesn't happen all the time, so I'm excited to take more meetings when we get them. Plus, I'm now 25 and that means I'm legally allowed to do beer and alcohol commercials. I don't know how much that will work to my advantage, but I'd like to imagine that it will very much :)

I'm also lucky that I do, in fact, have an audition next week. It's for a new musical, Dangerous Beauty, based on a 1998 film that was based on a non-fictional book. The casting director for Reprise is bringing me in. That's pretty exciting, because she hasn't even met me yet so either her relationship with my manager is very strong, or Jason Alexander's recommendation weighs pretty heavily. Or Both! The show is going to be in Pasadena which I love because it's so close, and the pay would be pretty darn good too. I'm in the process of choosing some songs. I need two, one uptempo and one ballad, that are 32 bars each. That's a bit of a challenge because nearly every musical theater audition I go to requests 16 bars or less of one song, so I'll be singing 4x as much as I'm used to! It will be good though. I just know it.

Things Are Good

I should have written last weekend. My plan was to sit down and blog as soon as I got home on Saturday night after the show, but for some reason or another, I didn't.

Our rehearsal on Wednesday night went very well. I got to meet the two new people and see the rest of my lovely cast again. I'm not sure if the AC was broken or wasn't on, or it was just too hot for it to even help, but we didn't do costumes because it was nearly sweltering. I appreciate when a director makes sure that there is no marking during a put in rehearsal with new people, especially with it is both their first and last with the whole cast before going up in front of a whole audience. I know if I was being thrown into a mix that was already established I would feel much more comfortable if the whole cast was putting as much into it as I was. So that's just what we did! After humming the tunes a few times a week for almost three weeks, it felt really good to let it all out once again. Everyone sounded better than ever too!

We had a good sized audience for out re-opening on Thursday, with several reviewers in the audience. Since then, we've had some more fantastic reviews pop up. We got a "WOW" from Steven Stanley at stagescenela.com, Kevin Taft showed his love of the show and our performance on frontiersweb, LA Weekly gave us a nice shout out, and today when I picked up a copy of Backstage, I saw my name printed in it for the first time. That, for me, is huge! They chose it as one of their "Critic's Pick" selections and really couldn't say enough wonderful things about it. I know I wasn't the only one who wished they had seen what we'd done at the rehearsal on Wednesday instead, but obviously we still had enough spark to impress.

This may sound weird, but I feel like there's only so many times you can say "thank you" before you start getting a little freaked out. Is it just me? It's not like I don't mean it every time I say it, that I'm not thankful that people appreciate something I'm a part of... I guess I'm just not used to all of it! The more "thank you"'s I say, the more I kind of want to go to my room and snuggle up with a sudoku book or some other logic puzzle. On my more introspective days, I'd rather play with logic puzzles or watch terrible reality television about fat people than interact with real live people. Sad, and probably wrong, but true.

Anyway.... My roommate Tom and his friend, plus my friends Quiggs and Sebastion saw the show on Friday and it seemed like they really liked it! *Back to the thank you's for a second, it's much easier to say it more to people I know that people I don't know. So there's that* I was so happy they came, and that they could take advantage of the discount tickets (we're now sold out of those for this weekend). After the show nearly everyone from the cast and crew headed over to The Other Side again for even more singing and good times.

Saturday's performance was a weird one. Perhaps it was from the extra singing the night before, but my voice was a little scratchy. Also, I've been looking at what audience members say about the show on goldstar.com, and one person commented that "the actress playing Florence could have varied her expression more, she wore a mostly pained one throughout". With all of the positive things people have said I shouldn't have let that get to me, but nevertheless it was on my mind. In my second song, I have to hold out a D for about 5 bars at the end. Before this show, I probably would have laughed at the though of belting a D for any length of time. Needless to say, even though I've done it many times now, I still take a huge breath and mentally cross my fingers every night before it happens. This particular night was not my best go at it. Probably my worst.

If you'll remember, during the first part of the run my manager wasn't able to get in to see the show because the website had some sort of glitch and oversold seats, so we had to give priority to they paying patrons. Luckily the problem was fixed and she got in just fine on Saturday night. So here I was, starting out my show on a not so great note (literally) on the night that my manager was in the audience. And on top of that... no one clapped. Not a single smack of the hands after that off note. This happens sometimes, you'll just have a dead audience that sees "in concert" and doesn't know how to treat it. Now that I think about it, I'm not sure they clapped after the first song, but that's happened before because the second pretty much is just the second part of the first. But this, complete lack of applause after the most terrifying note I've ever sang, really threw me for a loop.

Much to my relief, when I got backstage I saw I had a text message from my manager from just after the show started, saying she was stuck in traffic. I let myself believe that it meant she hadn't witnessed that weird weird moment, and I kicked myself back into gear. I feel like I had a couple other not-so-great notes, but only a few, and I felt that I had more control as the show progressed. The cast took a few press photos before we were able to go out and greet people. Unfortunately the casting director that was supposed to come with my manager wasn't able to make it, but she said she was very proud of me and she liked it a lot. She actually saw the original production in London, and she was pleasantly surprised by this production. Even with all the strange stuff that happened in that particular show, I'm also proud of what I got to show her. It's the first time she's ever seen me perform live, and she was impressed! That's all I could have asked for.

While writing all this, I got word from her that I have an audition for an episodic tomorrow morning, and we also have a meeting with a commercial agent in a little over a month. I've been hoping to get a commercial agent because, do you have any idea how much money you can make for a national commercial? A lot. So I'm happy very happy and excited about this meeting.

That's all the updating I can handle for now, hopefully I'll feel up to it again in just a few days!!