I just got back from seeing a workshop version of a new musical called X at Drury Lane. I went with fellow front row-er Sophie, she of the Movie Star Hair, and whilst there we ran into Ben: Super Fan. Not surprising, I guess, given that two of the Spring Awakening cast were in the show.

Started the day by looking up to find Gillian Anderson sitting next to me at the bus stop. Ha! That was a bit of a surprise. She's teeny in person.

Then to the show, which was pretty good. It's a modern reimagining of Les Dames aux Camellias that tried a little too hard to be shocking and provocative (the director even stood up at the end and was like, "ooh, I hope we weren't too shocking and provocative for you!!") and it suffered occasionally from some poor lyrics, but the music was on the whole was really great. Lots of close harmonies, interesting rhythms, very involving and well-sung.

The cast - two leads and an ensemble - were all great. The female lead was played by Cassandra Compton, who I've never encountered before but will now make an effort to go see in the future. Her voice was incredible. Insane range and flexibility, and she had this weird thing where her chest voice was very smoky and textured while her head voice was very clear and bell-like. Never heard anything like it before, and it was super cool, especially when she would flip between them.

The male lead was played by Jamie Muscato, and he's the main reason we went. He was a swing for Spring Awakening. (No idea why, he was better than most of the regulars. I think it was because they were grooming him to take over the lead when the original actor left). Jamie's fabulously talented. Great actor, great presence and charisma, and an amazing singer. Lots of power and control, beautiful tone, and can belt out high notes like nobodies business. He's also super attractive, which probably doesn't hurt. He spotted us in the audience before the show and waved.

Jamie: Hey guys!
Me, Sophie and Ben: Hey!

Then Sophie and I promptly died of embarrassment and a little bit of secret squee. Ben: Super Fan was unaffected. He said hi to us again at the end and thanked us for coming, and again we died a little.

Anyway, Jamie's awesome and one of those people I will go see in anything. I think he's going to make it big, because he really does have the whole package. I'm just waiting for him to get an awesome regular gig instead of doing these workshops. Here's the best video I could find of him, it's a workshop for a show called Lift that he did a few months ago, gets good around the 2:50 mark for anyone who's interested.

I'm sorry guys, I know this has become a super boring theme here, but I just have to talk about how much I hate my job or my head is going to explode.

So, after writing a very upset email to my boss and threatening to quit (which I never got a response to, incidentally) I was put on the schedule as a DM starting tomorrow. No attempt was made to set up any training for me, and my attempts to MAKE them set up training went ignored. So knowing I have to DM tomorrow, I decided to get tonight's DM to fill me in one the things I didn't know while I was working with her.

Her being the twenty-one year old with no house management experience that they hired two months ago and promoted to DM a month before me. Two months ago, I was training her, helping her learn her way around the building. Just to be clear: girl with no house management experience? Promoted in a single month. Girl with several years of house management experience? Promoted after a year and half, and only because she threw successively more dramatic hissy fits. FUCK YOU, BAC.

Guys, it was the most miserable and humiliating night. I told her exactly what I needed to know (basically, the alarm codes and which keys fit which locks) but she explained everything to me like I was some kind of mentally deficient six-year-old. "Here's the light switch, here's how you email the house report, here's how you give clearance for a show." HI, I KNOW ALL OF THAT. I've been house managing much more complex venues than this since you were in high school, and I'VE WORKED HERE FOR A YEAR AND A HALF. It was unspeakably awful, I almost burst into tears of rage and embarrassment the second my shift was over.

And tomorrow? Going to be ridiculous. I don't even have a key to my office, which I've been asking for for months, let alone to the theatre. Guys, how the fuck am I supposed to lock the theatre up when I leave if I DON'T EVEN HAVE A KEY?? I have honestly never encountered such rampant unprofessionalism before. I loathe the place. Not only are they completely incompetent, but I think the way they've treated me is so incredibly disrespectful.

We have another staff meeting next week. I think it's entirely possible I will yell at my boss, quit, and storm out. I just don't think I can take it anymore.

HEY GUYS GUESS WHAT. I finished my novel. Again. For the last time. I hope. God willing. And the best news of all is that I actually kind of like it. Yay!

So, I'm starting a new LJ to chronicle my adventures in trying to break into publishing. Instead of bitching about my life or being overly fannish, it should focus more on writing and querying and being rejected and, who knows, perhaps my meteoric rise to literary fame and fortune. (It will also allow me to distance myself from my sordid years of writing Heroes threesomes and Supernatural smut fic about directors I've worked with when I'm faaaamous, which is a bonus.)

If you're interested, head on over to cristin_terrill. My hope is that it will grow into some small resource for people trying to navigate this whole novel writing business, because I feel like I've learned some stuff writing this book and am likely to learn even more trying to get other people to read it.

And my two weeks of ticket-buying madness continues with a lecture by Shakespearean Jonathan Bate last night and a performance of Racine's Phedre this afternoon.

( Jonathan Bate, The Soul of the Age )

( Phèdre )

Next up: Derren Brown's latest, a workshop version of a new musical at the Theatre Royal, and Jerusalem at the Royal Court with Mark Rylance.

Oh, you guys. Good theatre is good. You have to wade through so much crap to find it, but it's SO WORTH IT.

( Arcadia )

Oh man, I know there was more I wanted to say. It's the kind of play that really makes you think and makes you feel much smarter than you are, so I was sure I had many brilliant ideas about it while I was walking home that I seem to have forgotten now. In case, yeah, it was fantastic. It made me happy in the way that only really good theatre does, and it's playing until September, so I'm going to go see it again.

So, yesterday morning I kind of lost my mind and bought a lot of theatre tickets. I was like, fuck it, my life is empty and boring on its own so I will BUY FICTIONAL DRAMA for it. The first of in my upcoming fortnight of theatrical fiber was A Doll's House at the Donmar Warehouse with Gillian Anderson, Toby Stephens, and Christopher Eccleston.

( A Doll's House )

Up next: Arcadia at the Duke of York on Saturday. (I've never actually seen it, can you believe that??) Got a half price ticket in the front row.

I'm sure many of you have seen this by now, but I couldn't resist. I think it's healed part of the hole that was ripped in my soul when I read Twilight. Never underestimate the redemptive power of Buffy quipping and kicking ass with her pretty, pretty hair.

Apparently, according to livejournal_uk, I am going to hell. God has finally gotten himself an LJ - he's theonetruegod, natch - and has helpfully compiled a list of us sinners who are Hades-bound.

Is it wrong that I'm kind of pleased to have been included?

I finished the re-write of my novel almost two weeks ago and haven't been able to stomach the idea of writing since, but I've got another epic wedding shift tomorrow and I think I'm ready to start getting back into the saddle. Anyone got a request I can fill?

Aaaand we're back.

So there was a lovely curtain call that lasted ages and ages and ages. Just because it's cool, here's us in the front row as captured by Charlotte (who played Wendla) before the show:

( This is the last post, I promise. )

Sometimes it's just really nice to love something, you know? And it was made all the better by being with other people who didn't begrudge me that or make me feel ashamed of it. I've now got Google alerts on nearly all of the cast, because there's barely one I wouldn't go out of my way to see in something else, and I'm looking forward to the next thing to love. It's shows like this, and this kind of experience, that made me want to work in the theatre in the first place, and I only hope I can work on something so good, that engenders this kind of insanity in otherwise stable people, myself someday.

So when I last left you, we'd spent the night on the street, pwned some cheating bitches, and were in the midst of an impromptu cast/fan sing-along led by a guitar-wielding Frenchman that shut down Drury Lane.

( And that was just the first half of the day. )



But although the show was over, the night was not.

Herein is the first part of the (long) story of how I spent the night on the sidewalk, formed a gang, sang on the West End, and experienced the most amazing moment of my theatrical life.

( So there's this show called Spring Awakening... )

I'll leave part one of this epic with Sebastien the Frenchman leading a cast and fan rendition of "Song of Purple Summer":

I haven't slept since Thursday night, so the real post will have to wait, but I just wanted to take a moment to commemorate the fact that in the midst of one of the worst weeks of one of the worst years of my life, I just experienced one of the longest, most intense, surreal, fun, heartbreaking and inspiring twenty-four hours I've ever lived.

The time has come, friends, for me to make a post about Spring Awakening, which I've been seeing kind of constantly lately. Exactly one of you knows the details about my sordid history as a musical fangirl (although there are remnants all over the internet, God help us all), and it's gonna stay that way for now. Although I thought I'd left those days behind me, apparently I haven't. I just can't seem to stop going.

( The play. )

( Duncan Sheik and Steven Sater. )

( The musical. )

( The cast. )

( The lighting. )

( The experience. )

So, in conclusion, although I could probably go on and may well do at some point in the future, I am fourteen again. And poor. And maybe going to go again tomorrow, and definitely going to go again next week. Because, hell, it ends in a week and I want to be SICK OF IT by then so that I won't miss it. Like Angelo says, "like a good thing, being often read / grown seared and tedious." (Did you think I couldn't make this post any dorkier? Proved you wrong!)

Possibly fool-proof way of improving one's mood? Putting Glee's version of "Don't Stop Believin'" on repeat.

Coming up: epic post about how I can't seem to stop myself going to see Spring Awakening.

You guys, Senator Arlen Specter's Republicanism went from merely technical to non-existent today as he officially switched parties. Once Al Franken is finally seated, which should happen soon as Coleman is more or less dead in the water, Democrats will have a filibuster-proof 60 seat majority (if you count Joe Lieberman, which I don't think we should because he's a weasely little traitor, and yes, I realize my bias is showing here). Not that Specter will automatically vote with the Democrats, because that's what has always made him so awesome, that he votes his conscience, party lines be damned. But still, I'd rather have him with us than with them.

Frankly I hope this is one more nail in the coffin for Republicanism. I think our political problems are mostly systemic and that real, lasting change can't be affected until we change the system - regardless of who is in charge and how many Ds there are floating around - but in the meantime, I'll settle for a strong progressive president and a cooperative legislature that will support his agenda.

So take that! Ding dong, the GOP's almost gone, let the progressive revolution begin!

My brain is mush from the Novel of Doom, so I borrowed this icon meme from gatheringlight.

Make a list of all the characters in your icons. (If you have more than one icon for a character, they only go on the list once.) Alphabetise it. Take the first two characters on the list; that's your first battle. The second two are the second battle. And so on. Then write your reaction to each battle.

( Character Icon Battle )

I tag everybody!

So I'm back in merry old England. Internet access was a bit dear in Paris, so if I haven't responded to your comment or email or whatever yet, give me a day or two, I promise I'm not ignoring you.

Have I mentioned that I'm not very good with change or disruptions to my routine? Yeah, that's a bit what that freak-out was about. I took the next morning off (by faking a work emergency I had to deal with, because I'm a coward) and wrote a few thousand words and got some time to myself, and after that everything was much better. I had a lot of fun in the end, saw some really beautiful things and accidentally discovered some amazing places and finally got to use my five years of French and spent too much money and ate lots of good food and all those things you do on vacation.

There are a few pictures under the cut, and there'll be many many more in my photo diary of the year soon. Whenever I can find the time to sort through the ten million pictures on my phone.

( Gay ole Paris. )

Also of note, pretty sure I saw Enver Gjokaj (Victor on Dollhouse) on the metro. We had a nice little moment. Or else he was just some random dude that I had a moment with that in retrospect would be really weird. Pretty sure it was Victor, though.

So yeah, I've basically come to the conclusion that screw my job and screw the job search. Agonizing about it and hating myself hasn't actually brought me any good work, so I'm just going to remove that superfluous level from the equation and instead concentrate on my novel and going to Paris at a moment's notice and just generally finding ways to make myself happy. (Hopefully really cheap ways, but whatever). I've been doing this for a few weeks now, and I gotta say, it's much more pleasant than my old approach to life. I highly recommend it.

So, it's been an odd few days. I very nearly got myself fired from my job last night, which was interesting. Increasingly the topic around our office has turned to how unhappy we all are with work and how much some of our bosses suck. This is dangerous, because our office has an anteroom that leads into it, and so someone who's approaching can hear what's going on inside long before we know they're out there. Of course, given my luck lately, what happened was I was complaining about our facilities manager just as he walked in the room. Granted, I think what I was saying was totally justified, because I was responding to a story my coworker was telling me about how he'd been insulting my line manager - who's one of the few managers who I don't loathe and who does their job properly - by saying she couldn't run her department as effectively as he ran his. I happened to say BULLSHIT nice and loud just as he walked into the office. All five of us inside just kind of froze and looked at him, and he had this look on his face that left no doubt he'd heard what we were saying. He doesn't actually have the authority to fire me, and I doubt he knows my name anyway, but it was kind of a heart-stopping moment. I laughed hysterically as soon as it was over, though, because horrible as it was, I can't stand this man and everything I said was true. This is, I think, not a good sign about my current state of investment in my job.

And... now I'm in Paris?

I don't know, it happened really suddenly. I was getting (obviously) very frustrated with work, and my friend Anoushka just quit her job, so somehow she convinced me to go. I've never been before (shocking, I know) and always wanted to, so in some ways its amazing. It's really beautiful. But Anoushka's even more neurotically organized than I am and has scheduled our every fucking minute, fourteen hours a day, which is leaving me feeling a bit stifled and stressed. Not really the point of a vacation, n'est-ce pa?

And mostly what's worrying me is that I've reached a crucial part of my novel rewrite. I've been building up to it for weeks after diving right in failed miserably and now I'm worried I'm going to lose momentum if I don't keep writing while I'm here and it will all be for nothing and I'll be left floundering again. I've tried telling her that I have some things I need to work on (deliberately vague, yes, and mostly I told her I needed to work on the copy-editing I do for Mom sometimes and the job applications I have to fill out), but she didn't really accept that? So I'm not sure what I to do. I'd be thrilled to just sit in a cafe with a nice view tomorrow morning and work on the book, but a) I don't want to hurt her feelings by telling her she needs to entertain herself for a little while and b) I don't think she'll let me anyway. I've only just arrived this morning, but a big part of me really just wants to go home and use the days off of work to write. How pathetic is that? I'm such an awful traveler.

And God, can you believe I first complained about going to Hawaii and am now finding something to complain about being in Paris? I'm terrible.