1. What did you do in 2008 that you'd never done before? Went on an all expenses paid job interview.
2. Did you keep your new years' resolutions, and will you make more for next year? The constant struggle with lady nicotine.
3. Did anyone close to you give birth? I missed Julie and Mikes child by a matter of hours. Way to be a little late Anika!
4. Did anyone close to you die? Gilanna... although we had been out of touch for a while.
5. What countries did you visit? This was my first year spent ENTIRELY in the USA in a while.
6. What would you like to have in 2009 that you lacked in 2008? A semi-permanent place to live. I seem to move every few months.
7. What dates from 2008 will remain etched upon your memory, and why? November 4. It was surreal and fleeting… and totally worth it.
8. What was your biggest achievement of the year? Getting my Equity Card and a faculty position all in the same week.
9. What was your biggest failure? Staying in touch perhaps. Oh and dealing with men. I suck at that.
10. Did you suffer illness or injury? Got health insurance just in time to get a BAD cold, followed by strep. Merry Christmas!
11. What was the best thing you bought? FELIX ☺ Runner-up… my bed.
12. Whose behavior merited celebration? I’ve actually been rather disappointed in my friends behavior a lot this year. So I’ll pick Jane. Because she rarely lets me down.
13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed? Everyone who voted Yes on Proposition 8 in California, Proposition 2 in Florida, Proposition 102 in Arizona, and the Adoption Ban in Arkansas.
14. Where did most of your money go? Drinking my way out of Richmond and then moving to Missoula… which also involved drinking.
15. What did you get really, really, really excited about? Opening night of the Little Dog Laughed was pretty surreal for me.
16. What song will always remind you of 2008? “Bushel and a Peck”, specifically during the Entr’acte. Dance Jason and Mary-Page
17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
a) happier or sadder? happier
b) thinner or fatter? Fatter… my weight has been in such flux this year!
c) richer or poorer? Um… I have a very healthy income… but am still drowning in debt. Lets call it a draw.
18. What do you wish you'd done more of? Lovin’
19. What do you wish you'd done less of? Stressin’ about other folks
20. How will you be spending Christmas? South Bend, IN baby!
21. Did you fall in love in 2008? No
22. How many one-night stands? A lady never tells… okay like 5
23. What was your favorite TV program? Do you really have to ask? Battlestar Galactica!
24. Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate this time last year? Maybe. Hate is a strong word. Lots of disappointments though.
25. What was the best book you read? I finally got around to His Dark Materials this year.
26. What was your greatest musical discovery? I’m really loving In the Heights. It just works for me.
27. What did you want and get? Nearly everything but a boyfriend. Isn’t that strange? 2008 was sort of a banner year.
28. What did you want and not get? I don’t want to nitpick the good things this year.
29. What was your favorite film of this year? I haven’t seen enough movies this year to have a favorite. Movies require free-time on nights and weekends. Tropic Thunder was pretty fabulous though. I’m not going to lie.
30. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you? For my 26th birthday I had a champagne bash for the opening of Little Dog Laughed and got to meet Douglas Carter Beane who was such a sweetheart.
31.What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying? I would say someone to share the good stuff with… but I had so many wonderful people to share my highs and lows with that… who care if we were always wearing our clothes!
32. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2008? Richmond/Missoula transient
33. What kept you sane? Getting paid to do what I love.
33A. Who kept you sane? IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER Jane. Katie (if only be comparison dear). Jimmy. John H. Shelley. Diego. Mike. Julie. Glynn. Kat. Aaron. Erin. Wendy. Lisa Marie. Sal. Jere. Noreen.
34. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most? I’m sort of falling in love with the guy from Pushing Daisies. He might be my dream dude.
35. What political issue stirred you the most? My second-class citizen status
36. Who did you miss? Spring Semester. Janet. Summer. Jane. Fall Semester. EVERYONE
37. Who was the best new person you met? I’m not going to rank them. I met so many new folks. Working for Barksdale was a real blast though.
38. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2008: Things can work out.
39. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year:
Ive loved, Ive laughed and cried.
Ive had my fill; my share of losing.
And now, as tears subside,
I find it all so amusing.
To think I did all that;
And may I say - not in a shy way,
No, oh no not me,
I did it my way.
Friday, December 19, 2008
Monday, August 11, 2008
One for the road...
This entry was written Sunday, August 10 after a swishy night at the delightful "Club Dacus". All sappiness has been preserved. Enjoy!
No one who knows me would call me an overtly “emotional person”. I tend to enjoy momentous occasions in my life from a detached perspective. I expected my final performance of Guys and Dolls at the Barksdale to be a similar experience, regardless of the fact that it would be my last performance as a “Local-Richmond-Actor.” This was not to be.
During the final scene of the show when my character “Damon Runyon” officiates the wedding of Nathan and Adelaide the irascible Scott Wichmann threw me a curve ball. Normally he would stride up to the altar with his blushing bride (the lovely Rachel Abrams) with his usually charming grin, delaying Nathan’s participation the nuptials as long as is humanly possible. This time, Scotty approached me with a bittersweet half smile. He went through the usual routine of deflecting the first “I do” to Adelaide before taking a vow for the team. All was going as planned, although it felt a bit rushed. There seemed to be a few extra bars of music to fill.
After I had pronounced them husband and wife one last time, I started making my way stage-right for the final tableau, when Scott stopped me and grabbed my hand, giving it a firm shake before sending me on my way. Tears welled in my eyes as I proceeded to close the show.
Those who have seen Guys and Dolls will know that my role was somewhat of a cameo that helped move along transitions with some funny gags; but not to Scott didn’t let it end that way. All summer he regaled us in the dressing room with legendary stories of sports, theatre, popular culture, politics, etc, and each shared a common theme; community and teamwork. In that moment, all of the stories made sense. His simple gesture of a handshake was the perfect “good game” to the end of a great run for me. Not just in Guys and Dolls but in the city of Richmond.
I came to Richmond from the great state of Indiana not knowing what to expect. I had obtained a coveted place in Janet Rodgers’s Voice and Speech graduate program at VCU and for the first time I was living a full days drive from my dearest friends and family back home. At VCU I found a community of artists that shaped me in ways I could not have imagined. However my chosen course of study did not lend itself to the limelight. As a vocal coach, most of my work was done on a personal level forging individual relationships with actors during rehearsal rather than integrating fully into the community of a production.
Then in my second year I was drafted into a production of This is Our Youth at Richard Bland College. While the process was trying to say the least, the individual work I did with my acting partner was a revelation; I wanted back on the stage. That spring I attended the VCU cattle-call auditions and was cast in Clay Chapman’s volume of smoke. Clay and Isaac Butler’s process was truly phenomenal. I had worked with many guest artists at VCU and none had been able to facilitate the communal experience of creating theatre so effortlessly as these two men.
Their support gave me the balls to venture out into the greater Richmond theatre community. Volume of smoke led to Visiting Mr. Green, which led to The Little Dog Laughed, and Guys and Dolls. During each of these productions I encountered a directors, designers, actors, crew, and patrons who were kind, creative, professional, and most of all, just plain fun to be around. Sure each production had its moments of strain, but the eventual healing process always seemed to strengthen the work. “Why do we fall Master Bruce?”
Batman references aside, as I write this, I have less than ten hours left in my beloved Richmond. A city that I once thought of as scary, sweaty, and a bit rude, got under my skin. It became my home and carved its essence into my heart. The friends and colleagues I have made at VCU, the University of Richmond, the Richmond Triangle Players, and Barksdale/Theatre IV will always be a part of me, as I continue to develop my art and pedagogy at the University of Montana.
So thank you Richmond. You haven’t heard the last of me. Good game.
No one who knows me would call me an overtly “emotional person”. I tend to enjoy momentous occasions in my life from a detached perspective. I expected my final performance of Guys and Dolls at the Barksdale to be a similar experience, regardless of the fact that it would be my last performance as a “Local-Richmond-Actor.” This was not to be.
During the final scene of the show when my character “Damon Runyon” officiates the wedding of Nathan and Adelaide the irascible Scott Wichmann threw me a curve ball. Normally he would stride up to the altar with his blushing bride (the lovely Rachel Abrams) with his usually charming grin, delaying Nathan’s participation the nuptials as long as is humanly possible. This time, Scotty approached me with a bittersweet half smile. He went through the usual routine of deflecting the first “I do” to Adelaide before taking a vow for the team. All was going as planned, although it felt a bit rushed. There seemed to be a few extra bars of music to fill.
After I had pronounced them husband and wife one last time, I started making my way stage-right for the final tableau, when Scott stopped me and grabbed my hand, giving it a firm shake before sending me on my way. Tears welled in my eyes as I proceeded to close the show.
Those who have seen Guys and Dolls will know that my role was somewhat of a cameo that helped move along transitions with some funny gags; but not to Scott didn’t let it end that way. All summer he regaled us in the dressing room with legendary stories of sports, theatre, popular culture, politics, etc, and each shared a common theme; community and teamwork. In that moment, all of the stories made sense. His simple gesture of a handshake was the perfect “good game” to the end of a great run for me. Not just in Guys and Dolls but in the city of Richmond.
I came to Richmond from the great state of Indiana not knowing what to expect. I had obtained a coveted place in Janet Rodgers’s Voice and Speech graduate program at VCU and for the first time I was living a full days drive from my dearest friends and family back home. At VCU I found a community of artists that shaped me in ways I could not have imagined. However my chosen course of study did not lend itself to the limelight. As a vocal coach, most of my work was done on a personal level forging individual relationships with actors during rehearsal rather than integrating fully into the community of a production.
Then in my second year I was drafted into a production of This is Our Youth at Richard Bland College. While the process was trying to say the least, the individual work I did with my acting partner was a revelation; I wanted back on the stage. That spring I attended the VCU cattle-call auditions and was cast in Clay Chapman’s volume of smoke. Clay and Isaac Butler’s process was truly phenomenal. I had worked with many guest artists at VCU and none had been able to facilitate the communal experience of creating theatre so effortlessly as these two men.
Their support gave me the balls to venture out into the greater Richmond theatre community. Volume of smoke led to Visiting Mr. Green, which led to The Little Dog Laughed, and Guys and Dolls. During each of these productions I encountered a directors, designers, actors, crew, and patrons who were kind, creative, professional, and most of all, just plain fun to be around. Sure each production had its moments of strain, but the eventual healing process always seemed to strengthen the work. “Why do we fall Master Bruce?”
Batman references aside, as I write this, I have less than ten hours left in my beloved Richmond. A city that I once thought of as scary, sweaty, and a bit rude, got under my skin. It became my home and carved its essence into my heart. The friends and colleagues I have made at VCU, the University of Richmond, the Richmond Triangle Players, and Barksdale/Theatre IV will always be a part of me, as I continue to develop my art and pedagogy at the University of Montana.
So thank you Richmond. You haven’t heard the last of me. Good game.
Tuesday, August 5, 2008
Another try at this...
For most of my time in Richmond, Virginia I spent a good amount of time keeping a functioning Livejournal on the website of the same name. However over the past 8 months the winds of change have blown me in all sorts of unpredictable directions that I could never have imagined. Wonderful roles in fabulous plays, union memberships, teaching oppurtunities, and of course the biggest of them all... the looming moving to Missoula, Montana (Go Big Griz!). And in all the hub bub, my Livejournal faded into obscurity. Lonely, un-touched, and maybe... just a little sad.
So, since I will pretty much start my life anew out west under the craggy slopes of the Rocky Mountains, I mark my departure from Richmond with the inaugeration of a new blog. New beginnings, new mindless ramblings!
Who woulda thunk that a young man from South Bend, Indiana who could barely get himself cast as a tree in high school theatre productions would someday end up an Acting Professor at a major university where all the radio and television call letters begin with the letter "K".
So as I depart Richmond, my home for the last three years, I leave you, the reading public, with this blog. I don't really know what it will become... but here we go!
So, since I will pretty much start my life anew out west under the craggy slopes of the Rocky Mountains, I mark my departure from Richmond with the inaugeration of a new blog. New beginnings, new mindless ramblings!
Who woulda thunk that a young man from South Bend, Indiana who could barely get himself cast as a tree in high school theatre productions would someday end up an Acting Professor at a major university where all the radio and television call letters begin with the letter "K".
So as I depart Richmond, my home for the last three years, I leave you, the reading public, with this blog. I don't really know what it will become... but here we go!
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