The Calm before 2010

It's two days after Christmas and I find myself looking ahead to a week where I have absolutely nothing planned. The day job has given me the entire week off. The theatre is quiet this week. I'm really not sure what to do with myself. Well that's not entirely true, I have a few things I want to get done, get started, finish up, but no big plans. I'm imagining that by this time next Sunday I'll be a bit stir crazy.

Christmas was good. I stayed in LA (a tradition I began last year and hope to continue for several more years to come). We had 10-15 people drop by our place for Christmas dinner and a few games. It was a fantastic night and truly the way I wanted to spend the holiday. I love my real family, it's just they live in colder parts of the country and I realized a few years ago that I get crabby when I visit them in the winter months, so rather than inflict that upon myself and them I am quite content to stay here and celebrate with my Los Angeles family.

I'm looking forward to 2010 for a variety of reasons. Theatre Unleashed will be jumping into a busy third season. I've picked the shows I'll be stage managing and am looking forward to them. I think I've managed to avoid doing two back to back, something I did this season and am really trying to avoid in the future. Personally I have a project up my sleeve. Something that isn't ready to be rolled out quite yet, but I'm hoping will be ready by the end of January. It's something that I hope will allow me a little bit more financial freedom as well as be something that is entirely mine. I'm excited about so many things. It's a good feeling to look ahead and know good things are coming :)

The End of a Journey

Holiday Hangover closed last night. For me it was the end of a journey, a new experience (well nearly new anyway). I don't regret it at all. It was fun to experience life from the other side of things. I am usually so caught up in my own world of lighting and sound cues and making sure a production runs smoothly that I don't get to lose myself in the story telling side of it.

I will now happily return to the light and sound booth for the last few events of 2009. It is truly where I'm happiest and where I can best make a contribution to Theatre Unleashed. I never had aspirations of being on stage, never studied, never really thought to much about it. It's not something I want to do often or that I'm very good at, but it was fun to play for a little while.

Thank you to Andrew, for pushing me to try it. Thanks to Phil and Lauren for being fantastic people to act with and for putting up with a non-actor in their scene and to the rest of the cast, Josh G., Josh M, Sylvia, Kim, Benito, Pamela and Matt for a great run.

Two More Nights

Opening weekend has passed and we are down to our last two performances of Holiday Hangover. Friends keep asking me if I'm having fun. -- Yes, of course I'm having fun, but it's still not really where I'm the happiest. I've returned to the booth for a couple of our late night shows (Die Gruppe in GBLT and Tales of An Unsettled City: Exodus) and that is truly where I belong. I have no regrets, I'm glad I did it. Do I love it as much as my actor friends? No, absolutely not, but that's alright. For most of the them the thought of working a light and sound board is terrifying or boring so I think that makes us even! We all have things we love, for me it's not acting, it's the technical side.

So if you haven't yet, come see Holiday Hangover. Tonight and tomorrow night may be your last chance to see me on stage with the lights on for a very long time. If you don't come for me, come to see the rest of the amazing cast I'm thrilled to be performing with, they truly are some of the most talented people I know.

Maybe...

Maybe, just maybe I do like this whole acting thing. Don't get too excited I don't like it enough to leave my place in the booth, but I did have a lot of fun tonight and am really starting to look forward to our opening night tomorrow. Everything kind of fell into place today. I can see now from the actor's point of view how sometimes it really does seem like the miracle of live theatre will never happen. When I walked in to the theatre tonight we still had a lot to finish. It was significantly farther along than when I left the night before thanks to several hard working TU peeps who stayed into the wee hours of the night working. But there was still quite a bit to do tonight. We started over an hour later than we intended and only had one audience member, but it went well and we are absolutely ready for tomorrow night.

I'm having a bit of a hard time drawing the line between being an actor and being the production manager. At one point in the couple hours before we started the show, Andrew, the director, looked at me as I was helping him hang, cable and focus the last couple lights and said "You don't have to do this, you're an actor." Without even thinking I replied, "No, I'm a production manager." Where else would I be, I can't just sit there and watch other people work on technical things. I find myself worrying about things during the show and have to remind myself to let it go, to enjoy the experience of being on the stage and not in a room above it. I've learned a lot from it. I am a firm believer that every actor should at least once in their acting life stage manage a show, now I'm starting to believe that every stage manager should at least once in their tech career act on a stage. Will I ever return to it -- I can't say yet, for now I'll enjoy the opportunity, the people, and the magic of being part of the performance!