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m u s i n g s
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It's rock recording artist Schascle working out with my Digi Pro Tools. He's just as pleasing to the ear, too. Am I a lucky woman or what?
The play is about an everyday kind of town where a boy is killed because he's gay. I played the boy's mother, a role so powerfully written, it had me quivering in the wings in tears before my first entrance.
Playwright pal Michael (The American Chekhov' quipped Van, and he's so right!) took Van and I out for drinks and a bite afterwards. I had been wanting to work with Van for about 15 years and finally we got to collaborate with a terrific cast and this marvelous new piece. It was totally delightful, worth waiting for! While dining and dissecting, Van turned to me and said, 'You don't act. You inhabit a character. Brilliant."
Dear baby actors, I'm here to tell you that it just keeps getting better. Don't give up -- just give it time and enjoy the ride.
_____________
'You'll be ready to play buck naked on any street corner in Europe.'
Kim Crow
(to the cast of 'Androcles and the Lion', FST 1995.)
May Barton on Eva Le Gallienne from 'Shattered Applause' by Robert A. Schanke:
'At the highest level in all the arts genius communicates a vision of life ... This genius was at her most glorious ... when she cam closest to the naked human soul in each of us. for it is there that we meet something lonely, passionate, even despairing that we recognize as the human truth -- the longing to be more than we are, and to understand ourselves. It is there that we weep the cleansing tears of revelation and of acceptance.'
The day before I had my first read-thru rehearsal for the play I was directing 'Androcles and the Lion'. We had just been hit by a Tropical Storm, damage everywhere and our hearts and boots were leaden with so much sorrow, with so much wrenching tragedy. No sleep, just staying in the moment, trying to put one leaden boot in front of the other, bringing my ensemble together to create a work of joy and truth and help heal children's hearts as well as our own. We theatre people go on - it is our tradition and perhaps, our strongest gift. Sometimes it's all we can do... .
This quicktime clip was shot by Drew at 9 am to be overnited to Orlando as I flew out the door to rehearsal and begin blocking. This is the intro to the actual audition - I hope you enjoy.
Vivian and Dana and my Grandma.
It comes from my "We'Moon," the calendar
I'm using this year
Transformation
When poisons forced my hair out,
it left patches of my scalp bald, others, furry.
It left me feeling wild, out of control, unbalanced.
I decided to shave my head clean one night -
I needed to feel powerful, stronger than my illness.
I channeled all of my feelings of fear and rage,
my desire to live, into that one act;
challenged anything, even cancer,
to defy or destroy this woman standing before me -
bald head gleaming, my scalp catching light
like some kind of angelic armor.
My new image amazed me -
I was thin, pale, fierce, and Divine -
a Goddess of simplicity.
It was my soft new skull
that taught me not to fear death -
taught me how to fight and how to win.
Jamie Wright 1999
(email from my pal Michael Shattner
September 21, 2001)
...and the inspiration to light our community.
This beautiful collage was a gift from Kate Alexander and Trudy Silverstein to the cast of 'United As One'
I had the pleasure of directing Trudy's son in 'The Velveteen Rabbit for Kate at FST and treasure Trudy's first collage, a gift for all created for dear pal and colleague Dan Helfrich's Memorial Service.
"You can not destroy one who has dreamed a dream like mine"
-Anishinabe