Long overdue updates!

It's ironic that the busier you are, the more there is to blog about, but the less time/energy you typically have to blog. It's an obnoxious conundrum :)

In a nutshell: the 2-minute version.
* Oklahoma closed, rather successfully, as the top-grossing mainstage show the Little Theater has had, I think, in its history. That means better-funded shows for the future! I still have people making comments about the production. It was an incredible experience and I'm so glad I got to do it!!

* I was asked to be the head of the makeup department at a special fx company, called Ethereal Fx. Projects are really picking up, and there's some fun stuff planned. We recently acquired 6 mannequins that I have full liberty to give makeovers, and I'm doing stage crew for a December ballet. It's really nice, because we've been trying to get our foot in the door with these guys, and even though I'm working stage crew, I talked with the Director directly (haha...) and offered to help them with makeup. Her eyes lit up and I had to stop myself from doing a triumphant fist pump :)

* I'll be doing another show! I auditioned for a locally-written piece about the 60's. It's called My Generation and will be performed as a fundraiser. Half of the cast from Oklahoma will also be in My Generation, and I am ridiculously excited to be with some of my favorite people again. I was never a big fan of tye-dye and psychedelic music and whatnot, but it'll be a really good learning experience about some of the themes from the 60's (like what the political landscape was like, the effects of racism, etc.) I don't know what character I am yet, (or music or dance part or whatnot), I think I'll find out on Thursday. I'm hoping to snag a copy of the script this Wednesday night.

*Congrats to Jamie Miller, my sister-in-law, who just had a baby girl! Her name is Anna Miller, and because it sounds so close to Ann Miller, the famous super-speedy tap dancer, Eric and I celebrated the day by watching On the Town. Good times and a super adorable baby :)

*Eric and I visited Vine Street in Paso Robles, where we walked the light-lined homes and saw the fun little local sights. They close off the street, decorate stuff, and have tables of free cider, hot chocolate, popcorn, cookies, etc. with music groups, dancers, and a few famous Christmas characters. My all-time favorite was a reincarnation of Scrooge, this cute little man who dressed up like the famous Humbug and spent 3 hours Bah-humbugging the crowd of probably 500 people clustered around his house. He'd make grouchy comments about people's clothes, yell at them that Christmas doesn't exist, then dart inside his house to the second story porch and continue yelling at people. The crowd (and especially the children) all boo-ed him back, hissing and yelling their own insults, and it was the most hilarious thing I've ever seen. I'll have to post a short video I took... it was just delightful :). There was also a guy dressed up as the Grinch, but he wasn't nearly as entertaining.
The other cool thing was that I got to pet a live wolf! They were a pair of rescued and mostly-domesticated wolves, but they were huge and simply beautiful. Highlight of my night :)

More to come... off to make dinner!

Breaking News in Theater-ness

This news broke out last week, but since not everyone's heard about it, I'll break it here too.

Just after the first rehearsal for Oklahoma ended, the director asked if he could speak with me. Out in the hall, he told me he was considering asking me to dance the part of Dream Laurey. (In part of Oklahoma, the lead girl Laurey has a dream about the two guys who are vying for her attention, which later turns into a nightmare. It's a fairly well-known dance piece and is usually pretty ballet-heavy.)

He wanted to make sure it was okay with me, because some of the nightmare scenes/lifts can be a little rough, and he wanted to make sure I didn't get hurt. I had to laugh on the inside as I remembered all the random dangerous things I had lived through in the past decade-- being swung like a pendulum on a pickaxe, hurling razor-edged hubcaps through the air, ducking under real ropes being lassoed in the air, death drops in lifts... and then everything I'd done in jujitsu (martial arts) beyond that (arm bars, pain holds, distance landing, sparring, full-body throws....)

I assured Zach that I was totally fine with rough lifts (and even looking forward to it) and that I would be delighted to dance the dream sequence. 

He looked quite happy. He explained his reasons for asking me-- that I was so comfortable with doing the lifts at auditions, that I looked a lot like the lead Laurey anyway [we even have the exact same haircut], that I was smaller [being short finally came in handy!] and thus easier to lift, and that I had done such a good job at BS-ing the ballet in auditions that I looked like a ballerina anyway. I thanked my lucky stars for having been on Paul Winkelman's ballroom team. I learned so much there, especially about lifts, holding your weight, and trusting your partner. Hallelujah!

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A couple days later, at the end of a different rehearsal, we were all idly waiting for the next rehearsal segment to start, and Zach said, "Hey, MJ, c'mere. I want to try out a lift."  (I've started going by "MJ" here in California-- it's sooo marvelous! Everyone remembers my name so much better, and I don't get confused with other people. Try taking a nickname sometime when you hit a new setting, it's thoroughly refreshing.)

Zach is an awesome dancer himself, so along with directing, he'll also be choreographing the show. He had me jump into an overhead lift, and I can't tell you what a thrill it was to be doing lifts again. I haven't done them for performance since..... man.... since Stadium of Fire in.... 2007?  Long time-- and it felt so good!  Zach informed me that it would be the ending lift that "Jud" would carry me off with. It's gonna be cool. Apparently, we're going to be using a lot of the same lifts that Agnes deMille used in the original Oklahoma, and he's planning some really awesome ones.  Now all we've gotta do is find a guy who can dance the part for Dream Curly......

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Knowing that I'll be doing some intense dance work has really helped me focus on exercise more. I realize I do things better when I have a purpose behind them, so I've started swimming to increase my breath support (for singing), aerobic exercise (for endurance, in dancing & singing), flexibility and splits for the lifts, and weight training (also for the lifts). I do a little bit every day, or while I'm reading or watching a movie. I feel great, and have a lot more energy than before. It's wonderful how something so seemingly benign can inspire to do more.

I was reading over the other blog I posted about theater, and realized something. I had been secretly hoping for the part of Laurey-- and in an unusual way, I kind of did get it. I'm dancing Laurey. Funny how things don't always turn out like we think they should, but they still turn out.

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Oh! I totally forgot! During the last rehearsal, I acquired the parts of Kate and Ellen (the stage is very small, so they're keeping the cast likewise small, combining roles and being creative). That being done, I now have some bit parts in singing and some lines. I wasn't expecting that, so that's been really cool  :D

"Contented Sigh" post Demystified

So, in the "Contented Sigh" post, I alluded to a bunch of happy things that'd happened, but didn't explain them, so I will now.

New toy: 
After lots of thought, careful research, and a fortuitous promo, I decided to invest in an airbrush kit. As a makeup artist, I work with all sorts of different materials, and because I've already trained in airbrush, I figured it was a good time to expand my arsenal. Plus, airbrushing is fabulous for photography, which I am working mostly in, and has a list of pro's that compete with traditional makeup's con's.

I got my kit from Dinair, a great company that was one of the original founding/inventing groups of airbrush. The kit consists of an itty bitty compressor that is amazingly powerful, all the equipment attachments, the airgun, 8 foundation shades, glamor makeup stencils (not like tatto-art stencils, n'case you were wonderin' :) ), and some other stuff. It just so happened that Dinair had a promo to get a free set of blush colors when you buy a certain kind of kit---- the kit I was planning on getting anyway. So, with good timing and a lot of giddiness, I ordered my kit and got $50 worth of free makeup. WIN.

I've been practicing on myself, and did a trial run on my photographer last week, so I'll see if I can post those pictures if they get put up somewhere.  It's been delightfully fun to experiment.  I'll probably start offering it as part of my portrait-business stuff here soon. Stay tuned :)



Bucket List:
I owe an enormous thanks to Katie for this one. When she came to visit, I idly asked her one day what kinds of questions she asked strangers-- how she had so many things to talk about with the random human being she'd sat next to maybe five minutes before. One of the topics she mentioned was people's Bucket List (you know, that list of things you want to do before you kick the bucket.)

Some time later, out of sheer curiosity, I asked Eric what was on his bucket list. It was just something I'd never really thought to ask before, and Katie's questions had made me interested.
Eric replied that he'd always wanted to ride a horse on the central coast of California. Turns out he had never ridden a horse, and has been wanting to for a long time. I was surprised, and a bit delighted, because one of the things I'd always wanted to do was to take a horse into a gallop or a canter. (Most places with horse-tours won't let you do anything above a walk, or go anywhere besides the trail, so you spend a good hour sitting like a lump on this animal that has his nose glued to the horse's rear in front of him.)
I proposed celebrating our anniversary by going horseback riding on the central coast (convenient, eh?), and Eric really liked the idea. We found a company that lets you have free reign (haha... get it? Reign? ....meh, never mind....)  with your horse, and you can take it anywhere at any speed along the beach.

BEST THING we have ever done! I cannot describe the feeling of finally being able to be so free... the word 'bliss' is about as close as I can come. We took a trail through some sand dunes for a good half hour before arriving at the beach, and the moment I was able to take Indy (my horse) into a gallop, my eyes closed, breath came in of its own accord, and some sort of nirvana engulfed that stretch of beach.

We paid a rather hefty price for it-- not financially (it was actually quite affordable!), but with our muscles, sore backs, sore butts, and a distinct inability to bend over without groaning. It was kind of laughable, and while it lasted for me for 4 or 5 days, it was SOO worth it. We're looking into doing it again. If we could afford lessons, we'd both be interested in learning to ride better... but all in good time.

SO COOL.

New Calling!

I got a phone message last night asking both me and Eric to meet at the Bishop's office this morning. I was rather thinking they'd officially make us the 15 & 16-year-old's Sunday School teacher, since he said it would only take 5 minutes. But lo and behold.... I am now the 2nd counselor in the Young Women's Presidency!

I couldn't have been more delighted, and the bishopric and YW's kept telling me how delighted they were that I would be in. I've been dying to work with the youth, and haven't gotten to for so long (because of college wards), that this was an awesome surprise.

YAYY!!!!

I'll be working with the Beehives specifically. (I would also love to work with the Laurels, and some of the older kids, but this is pretty dang close. And I get to keep accompanying Eric to the teens' Sunday School class :) )  There are only 2 Beehives in our ward, and a 3rd verging on inactive, but it works for me. They're both super cute and very smart.

Woo!

Theater Update

WOOOO!!!

First rehearsal with the whole cast tonight for Oklahoma-- it's going to be so good! We burned through the music very quickly, and the cast sounds wonderful. Everyone picks up fast, and the music director is talented and very funny. The other cast members are personable, and I can tell some of them will be very close friends.

AND..... the director asked me to dance for Dream Laurie!

For anyone who hasn't seen the musical, there's a part where she has a dream about the two guys competing for her, and the dream ballet has a ton of lifts and really cool stuff. Zach said I had rocked the audition so well, and looked like a real ballet dancer enough (even though I was bs-ing the ballet off of a week-long stint at BYU before I dropped the class) that he wanted to put me in rather than finding an outside dancer. Woohoo!

Accordingly, I will now be singing up for an actual ballet class :D

I'm stoked!

Results of the Monkey Poll

"Have you ever owned a monkey?"

Yes, currently do.	0 (0%)
Of course, I have a house full of them.	0 (0%)
Sortof, I monkey-sit on the weekends for friends.	0 (0%)
No. I find their large nostrils offensive.	0 (0%)
I am a monkey.	1 (100%)

Votes so far: 1

It appears most people do not have sufficient experience with monkeys to have a sustained opinion about them. Congratulations to the one monkey who reads this blog ;)

Love you all!

Marie

August Happenings-- Theater-ness

So, if the last post sounded mildly cryptic, that's because: 1. I wanted it to be, so I could write about the fun stuff in more entertaining detail, and 2. It was late and I while I wanted to put something up, I didn't want to write out said details at that moment. So here are the entertaining tidbits :)

Oy, where to start!

Theater Awesomeness:
So. Marie arrives in California. Marie is bored. She emails a local theater to volunteer, having heard that it's one of the longest running community theaters and runs good shows. Three or four weeks go by, and still no answer. Marie figures that they either didn't like her email, or didn't want volunteers, and gives up the idea of hearing back. Sometime around the next day, an email pops up in her inbox. Theater manager wants to meet. Marie goes to the theater, and instantaneous friendships, adventure, and delight are born.

The manager I met with was Jessi, an adorable girl who is simultaneously friendly, organized, direct, kind, a goofball, and awesome. We clicked instantly and she is an amazing manager, plus a bucket of fun. She showed me around the theater, said she could definitely use some volunteer help, and it was only a matter of deciding where to put that help to use, since there are a ton of productions going on. She broke off in the middle of talking about theater, and said she had permission to ask if I would also be interested in working at a Haunted Maze she manages in October. When she found out I knew airbrush makeup, she was absolutely delighted and informed me they had a paying position as head artist.  Then I was delighted!

A few minutes later, one of the production directors walked in to take care of some business, and so we were introduced. Jessi and I had already discussed how the schedule of the Haunted Maze would definitely overlap with two of the Little Theater productions, so when the director amiably invited me to audition for his show, I thanked him but knew in the back of my head that there was little chance of me even being on stage crew, much less acting in it. But he was cool, and people at the theater were SUPER super nice and friendly. I even met a guy who had been working at the theater since before I was born, an ex-hippie named John who is the dearest little man. He emanates a feeling of care and good-naturedness, and it was so cute to listen to him later as he ran a Light Hang. (For any of you non-theater peoples, a light hang is when the crew adjusts the big overhead lights so they're in the right spots for the next show. It's pretty technical and can take a long time.)

The next week, I got a phone call sometime in the afternoon from Jessi. She told me that there had been some situational changes at the Haunted Maze, and after trying to work out the problems for a long time, she was quitting. She described the circumstances and told me that I was still free to make my own choice to accept the Head Makeup position. She also said the reason she was calling me (before the boss even knew she was quitting, haha) was so I could still audition for the show I was invited to, since she knew I was eager to get back on stage. I was quite touched by the fact that she would go out of her way so much for me. I thought over the circumstances and decided it would be better for me not to take the job. (Not that it was a bad situation or anything, I had just worked with difficult artistic personalities before and wasn't keen on repeating the experience.)
Accordingly, I realized that meant I would be auditioning that night.... and that I needed music, a dance skirt, and to be warmed up, confident and ready to go.

Haha.

Some of you might know about my horrendous auditioning experience in high school, and if you do, you know that auditions still make me nervous. I am gradually getting more comfortable, but I really have to prep to calm myself down and tell myself it's okay if I screw up or don't get in.

After several mishaps with acquiring suitable sheet music and finding a printer that worked, I sang all that day, hoping my voice wasn't too rusty, and scurried about taking care of business. I finally found the church they were holding the auditions at, and was relieved to find that the director was awesome and the other girls were friendly and chill. Even though the dance audition was heavily ballet-style, somehow the week-long class I had taken at BYU was enough for me to look like I knew what I was doing as a ballerina.

Singing isn't my strong point, but the vocal audition was at least passable. My voice cracked during the most dramatic part of the song, and while I was cringing inside, I was proud of myself for pushing through it and not looking awkward. When the director asked me to sing it again, but with a Belt style, I figured, "What the heck", and belted my little voice out. Still not perfect, but I felt good for following through with directions without excuses.

Auditions finished, the director asked me to stay afterward and do some additional choreography. It rocked. He was impressed with how well I followed, and how gutsy I was when I would leap into the choreographed lifts. I was happy that he was such a good choreographer/dancer, and that he knew what he was doing. Things were awesome. As I left, he told me that I didn't need to come to callbacks the next day.

I was quite puzzled at that. However, a few days later I got an email informing me I had been accepted into the cast. Woohoo! Thusly, rehearsals for Oklahoma! start tomorrow night. I can't wait.

Last week, as I picked up my script and got fitted for my costume, I got to ask the director why I hadn't been asked to come to callbacks. He said, simply, "You were hands-down the best dancer at auditions. I already knew I wanted to cast you, and where you were going to be. There was no point in making you come in to read or sing more just for formality's sake."

So there you go :)   I was secretly hoping for the leading part of Laurey, but I think I have to vamp up my voice more for next time. I'm wanting to take some private voice lessons to learn how to sing Broadway style and belt better.  We'll see. I'm also going to audition for some of the upcoming straight plays (shows that don't have singing and dancing, just acting), which I think would be fun. We'll see about that too :)

In other theater news, I was briefed on how The Little Theater's new sound board operates, and invited to their open-mic-kind of performances called "No Shame Theater" (where you can present any performance so long as it's under 5 min and completely original). I'm tentatively working with an old connection of mine to write some music and do some choreography I've had simmering in my head for a couple years. I'll keep you posted on how that goes!

That's all for theater news. On to other equally exciting things!