Deep Dark Winter

So it’s been a long winter already and we’ve only had snow for a week and a half. The darkness comes early these days, too. The nicest thing about this season (for me anyway) is the feelings of peaceful isolation that the snow brings AND the fact that spring now has to be right around the corner! Oh please let it come quickly. I am working on a very restful project right now. I am understudying at the Guthrie. Please, no pity for me – I am truly enjoying not having to drag myself to the theater each night while picking up a paycheck. Of course I live with the chance that any moment… My sister just called. She should know better than to call right before a show…I thought she was the Guthrie. How dare she…my heart is slowing now. I will be alright. Ok, so an understudy gig is a little nerve-wracking.As for other projects, I am working on finishing a grant for  the Twin Cities Opera Guild. Christina and I have a educational program about opera/music-theater for high school kids. If you know of some kids in MN who could use some opera influences, please contact me with a school name.  Before I start a new project in January (Jeune Lune), I will visit my brothers on the west coast. Send your best thoughts and prayers in that direction if you would please – brother Ken is starting another round of chemo for his cancer and fighting brilliantly. Good vibes from loving readers never hurt, however. Enjoy the beautiful season. 

 

Check out my Slide Show!

Hi from Cambridge. It has been a long time since I last posted…what can I say…I haven’t developed the blog habit yet. Here are some pictures of the tour. More to come.

 

Let’s celebrate…

We had our first audience tonight. A nice crowd I must say. Very smart and very aware. We got such a warm response. Whew…We’ve been alone for a few weeks so it’s nice to add the crowd. Can’t wait for the weekend – especially Sunday when we are “open” officially.

Sister and I are rewarding ourselves for a good night’s work. She is perched on the desk chair looking at D-listed. Funny site, if not a bit sardonic at times. She has moved onto Molly Good…even funnier. Her secret surfing habits have been revealed. I hope she doesn’t read this. I, myself, am knitting a few more rows on an electric pink sweater I am making. Sometimes I look at it and wonder what I was thinking…it is pi-unk. I have faith that I can carry it off.?.?Oh have faith Jenny.

I am so glad this has all started up again. I am reminded how much I love doing Don Juan Giovanni. Figaro is up next. I can’t decide which one is harder to perform. I keep stopping myself when I am on the brink of deciding – I don’t want to jinx either one.

Come see the show if you can… Shake our hands afterwards (we greet the audience)…and ask my sister what she thought of Britney’s new single…

 

It’s only Wednesday?

The fact that it is Wednesday means two things to a performer. One – it is essentially the beginning of the work week since Monday is the official day off. Two – you have a long way to go before your next Monday off! Yup, I’m a bit tired. Our schedule has been full of exciting stuff in the last few days – tech rehearsals, a fun trip to Boston’s The Beehive (a hip and swinging arts bar/cabaret) to perform some opera and promote the show, pulling out our costumes and wearing them for the first time in a few months. And yes, we did have Monday off…but the pressure is on. It is tech week.Most performers I know are pretty adept at riding the wave that is tech week. It’s always amazing to me when I witness actors and tech crew who can smile suitably and tell clever jokes as new elements bombard our pleasant little rehearsal-accustomed life. The spectacles just got scratched, there is blood red lipstick on my cool grey skirt, I can’t find the right light to stand in for the scene with Don Juan in front of the car, can’t hear the orchestra during the last quick section of the Act I finale…stuff like that. In the end, they are only distractions on the journey to the opening and the larger task of telling a story. But it does wear a person out.Meanwhile, my “life” or the mundane regular existance that I am trying to maintain carries on. Today’s goals are simple: figure out how to get reimbursed by the USPS for a wrecked cuisiart I sent to Cambridge with insurance (thank goodness), and babysitting for castmate Momoko over the dinner break while she and her husband celebrate his birthday – Happy B-day Keith! Too bad baby Audrey isn’t in the show – man, that’s a cute baby.OK – time to get going…need to get a little rough with this day and show it I mean business. To the post-office!!!

 

Back in Cambridge!

Here I am…or here we are rather. The cast and crew of Jeune Lune’s Figaro and Don Juan Giovanni have brought the shows to the American Repertory Theatre in Cambridge, MA. I have been living with the roles of the Countess and Elvire (I am in both shows) since January, believe it or not. We started work on the shows in January 2007, opened DJG in March, Fig in April and closed the shows in Minneapolis in June.

After such a long run, I thought I would be ready to put these shows to rest in June. Not the case. I can’t wait to do it again. There are three reasons for this off the top of my head:
1) Jeune Lune – I promise I will elaborate later
2) Mozart – needs no elaboration
3) ART and the cool theater-goers of the Boston area. I love this place.

Oh..and…quality time with my sister. Christina Baldwin is in the cast too. She’s my little sister in real life. She played Carmen in Jeune Lune’s production of that opera at A.R.T. two years ago. I played Micaela (with platinum hair). Both times we have toured here at A.R.T. we room together. We used to share a room all through our childhood until I moved out to go to college, so it brings back memories, ah the memories. I look forward to being bossy in ways that are so repressed when you live apart from one another with your significant others and small dogs.

 

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