First Blog

Hello out there in the blogosphere. Or is it blogisphere? I have trouble spelling made up words. And Hebrew words. What is worse, I actually have no intention of spell checking this blog because…well… it's a blog. If you have some kind of grammatical OCD, I strongly suggest that you read no further! I'll just upset you with my utter indifference to punctuation and my unwillingness to figure out how to spell check from the blog.

This is my first blog. I’m writing it in an effort to create a cyber community – something which I have no time to do in real life because I’m on the computer. That’s a lie. I just said that to make you like me.

So I'm a mom (reform, not conservative or orthodox) a singer and an actor and a playwright and a director and I travel with and perform my own solo musical. This is ironic because as a rule, I don't like musicals. My musical is a theatre piece in which the songs emerge organically from the narrative which is how I like it for now. I may change opinions about that at some point - in fact I hope I do since it will give me a broader range of what I can write about while still getting to sing. I'm a really good singer but my curse has been that I like to sing in a bunch of styles and I'm good at all of them so it was a question of "where's my voice?" Writing this piece helped me sort that out. I realized that my voice is to channel all the characters and singers that I've met and heard, to tell stories and to try to make sense of the struggles we all endure through the aforementioned activities. I'm particularly interested in how much weight we put on individual choices when no matter which direction we go on our brief journey on this planet, we are bound to face great disappointments and if we're lucky, irrepressible joy.

So right now, I lead a double life. I was told recently that I'm "intra-coastal" I like that. It sounds like a cross between a medical procedure and a sexual proclivity. What it means is, I travel between the Bay area and Los Angeles in my pursuit of the Canadian Dream...which is to attain the American Dream but with a smaller car and fewer calories. I am doing my solo show (wedding singer blues) at the Hayworth Theatre at 2509 Wilshire BLVD. THe Hayworth is run by Danna Hyams and Gary Blumsack and they are awesome people. They need a website and/or a myspace so more people can know about their beautiful space. It's truly lovely and they have their hearts and minds in the right place - great offerings - intelligent and entertaining theatre.

I am hoping to get my show to NYC (isn't everyone?) and I'm working on a screenplay version as well as a couple of cable-only TV pilots. I'm also working with a booking agent to do some one-night stands around the country. It's fun. Every night I hear my own message about pursuing one's dreams. It's a powerful experience.

I love theatre and it saddens me that it appears to be a dying art form. That's too bad since there's nothing like live performance. To be sitting in the darkness with a bunch of strangers, sharing an experience that can never be replicated - that's something! It's not the same just to go see a film. You still have the synergy with the other audience members but no connection with the performers (the one exception being Purple Rose of Cairo where the character walks off of the screen and becomes three dimensional because he's so captivated with Mia Farrow....apparently he hadn't spoken with any of her ex-lovers....). I love to have performers so close to me that I can smell them, make eye contact with them, be spit upon by them. I know that probably sounds kinky, but hey we all gotta get our kicks somehow.

Some theater that I have really enjoyed: a) anything by Culture Clash. They are insightful and painfully funny. They use their humor like a scalpel to dissect our not-so-benign racist assumptions, the history of this country and the way we all can turn our marginalizing eye inward on ourselves. They are also really fucking funny. Can I say fuck on this site? I guess I'll find out b) anything by Mary Zimmerman, especially Metamorphosis. Mary Zimmerman creates lush, visual feasts. Lyrical theatre custom-fitted for the actors in the piece. She makes them all look like geniuses. I love someone who makes my hairs stand on end c) anything by Tony Kushner. I am about to commit theater heresy right here and now and say that Tony is suffering from Eugene O'Neil-itis. He is smarter than anyone around so no one has the balls to say "dude, your play is too long, cut it." I mean this is the guy who wrote Angels in America so who are any of us to say.... I love him, he's brilliant AND Homebody/Kabul was two plays. Yeah, I said it. d) Charlie Varon is brilliant. He is my favorite solo performer right now. Check out his website for more info: www.charlievaron.com. Charlie marries keen satire with impish fun with a bluntly honest look at the demons that haunt us. He is one of the unsung heroes of the theatre world.

By the way, I am Canadian so you can't accuse me of being pretentious if I spell theatre with an re instead of an er. It's just how I was raised. I pronounce words funny and apologize a lot too. I’ve lived in the US for a very long time now so sometimes I will spell theater with an “er.” If this inconsistency infuriates you, I humbly refer you to paragraph one of this blog.

I haven’t figured out why I’m doing this blog. Boredom? Narcissism? Loneliness? A writing outlet for a hopelessly goal-oriented person? Peer pressure? I guess I’ll find out as the days progress.

Why do you blog?