HOMYGOD.

Dollhouse trailer. Kind of weirdly old-fashioned looking, but I'm still excited. I have faith.

So on Tuesday night I went to see the aforementioned concert version of Chess. Originally I was supposed to go with (read: was going to drag) miss_vacant to the show, but then she went and broke her back, so I ended up going with a new friend of mine from work named Carly (sorry, Tan, you've been replaced!). Carly ended up being a good choice, since she generally joined me in my squeeing and bouncing around in my seat like a six-year-old instead of mocking me, as... other people might have done. :)

( Chess, 13/5/08 )

Then last night I went to see Derren Brown, who, for those of you who don't live in the UK, is a psychological illusionist who's also wickedly funny. Basically what he does is "magic", but he uses psychology and suggestion to achieve it. Youtube him, for real, he's amazingly entertaining. This was my second time seeing him in person, and it was possibly even more mind-blowing than the first.

( Mind Reader, 14/5/08 )

Marguerite tomorrow, and then my great week of theatre will be over!

This is the third night in a row I've woken up in a blind panic, thinking I need to start the show but I can't find my comm unit or the light board anywhere!

This seriously needs to stop. Last night I cleaned my flat for ten minutes before I woke up enough to realize that there wasn't going to be any audience coming in and being appalled at my dirty socks on the floor. Good for my flat, I guess, not so much for my sleep cycle.

So, one thing you may not know about me is that I'm a (sort of) recovering musical theatre geek. Now that the Dreaded Show is over, I'm cramming as much theatre into this week ofrelative joblessness that I can, making up for months and months of not seeing anything.

Tonight's the one I'm the most excited about, a concert version of Chess, cult musical extraordinaire, at Royal Albert Hall. They're only doing two performances, most likely because that's the most they could do due to the INSANE AWESOMENESS of the cast.

Kerry Ellis as Svetlana

I've seen Kerry twice, as Fantine in Les Miserables (yes, I STILL buy a cheap ticket to go see Les Mis everyone once and awhile, sue me) and a few months ago in Wicked when my mom was in town. This girl can fucking sing. Like, unbelievable.

( Kerry singing I Dreamed a Dream )

Adam Pascal as the American

Squinty, yes, but amazing singer? Also yes. Here's Adam singing "One Song Glory" from RENT.

Idina Menzel as Florence

Of RENT and Wicked fame, Idina is the one woman in musical theatre that every straight girl would go gay for. She's like the Angelina Jolie of Broadway. She's insanely talented, and this will be the first time I've ever seen her live after two narrow misses, so I'm REALLY looking forward to it.

Here's Idina singing "Defying Gravity" from Wicked.

Josh Groban as the Russian

Ha, I KNOW, RIGHT? I'm not much for his opera-lite, mom-friendly, psuedo-pop albums, but this boy can fucking sing (here's him singing "February Song" live). And tonight I am going to be in the same room with him when he sings "Anthem", one of the most simply beautiful songs ever written for the theatre.

Here's the One True God of musical theatre, Anthony Warlow, singing "Anthem". If there is anyone who can sing this song better than Anthony (which... doubtful, because can ANYONE sing ANYTHING better than Anthony Warlow?), it's Josh Groban. And I'm going to see him do it. Tonight. LIVE!

AND AND AND in other geeky theatre news, miss_vacant, be_cool_bec, chinese_bakery, and I are going to be seeing THIS live in October.



Haha, suckers!!

The Dreaded Show is over! Now I'll have time to get back to fun things, like answering comments from you fine people and watching lots of television.

Highlights from the show include:

1. My ASM falling off a platform ten minutes before our open dress rehearsal, sustaining the grossest head injury I've ever seen in my life. Her skin was split across the length of her forehead down to the bone, and it bled like a motherfucker. I actually managed not to faint (huzzah!!) while I tried to stop the bleeding as we waited for the ambulance. She had to have seven stitches in the end, but she showed up the next day for work.

2. My director's mother trying to climb the stage during the middle of the first act one night because she thought she'd be able to hear better from up there. Front of House only just stopped her.

3. Out of six shows, a problematic set piece only fell down mid-show three times!

4. Out of six shows, I only realized during the second act that an extra had neglected to show up twice!

All in all, it was a fairly disastrous experience but not all bad. I had fun calling the show, and the staff who were in with me every night were great (my light board operator was so funny that he actually made me miss cues). This is why I hate short-run shows, most of the experience is the boring rehearsal part as opposed to the fun theatre part.

I'm pretty sure the tech director ended up liking me, so if doing this means that I've gotten my foot in the door at the Tricycle, it'll have been worth it.

Plus, you know, IT'S OVER NOW.

Tomorrow is my last day in the rehearsal room at the Tricycle, praise Jesus. On Sunday we have our load-in (or "get-in", as you silly Brits call it), and then Monday is our sole day to tech (which means incorporating lights, sound, set, etc). In fact, the production manager actually thinks we'll get the tech done in the afternoon and have time for a dress rehearsal that evening.

HAHAHAHAHA!!

In all seriousness, though, I'm kind of about to lose my mind. On the one hand, I'm really glad that the end is in sight and that we're about to move into the theatre so that I can finally get a rein on the chaos that's been making me crazy for weeks. Plus the theatre stuff is the fun part for me, and I used to make my reputation on running the best, fastest technical rehearsals ever, and I really enjoyed them.

On the other hand, I haven't even been in a tech for two years, and I haven't run one in THREE. Oh yeah, and that last one I ran resulted in what was one of the most traumatizing events of my life and I ended the day on the floor in the booth sobbing for hours while my lighting designer lay next to me - not crying, because he was all tough, but I know he wanted to - entirely too wretched to move. And I very nearly gave up on stage management entirely after that.

Running a tech is a really big and stressful job, and there's just enough ambiguity in the chain of command to make me worried that The Bitch is going to railroad all over me, which I don't know if I could take after the Chinese water torture of the past ten weeks of rehearsal with her. Plus I'm having serious ASM issues, and, oh yeah, did I mention, we get ONE AFTERNOON TO TECH. It's a hair's breadth between success and total, utter failure, and once it starts to go bad, it's so hard to make it go good again.

I'M A LITTLE ANXIOUS ABOUT IT.

So I just got home from the worst rehearsal in recent memory to find a note on my door saying that my landlord is going to show my flat sometime between 9:00am and 1:00pm tomorrow (why, I have no idea, since I'm staying here until at least January). Tomorrow is my last day off from the Job From Hell for the next two weeks - a day off I had to CON them out of - and I was really planning on sleeping until a decent hour! And what's worse is I know they have no right to do this, but it's too bloody late at night to call and tell them HAHA NO THANKS. Bastards.

So I've been feeling very nostalgic lately (damn you, Facebook!) and decided to do a little picspam of Vassar, the college I went to. It's ridiculously beautiful, like every romantic, cliche East Coast college you see in the movies. We all honest-to-God felt like we were living in a movie the entire time.

( Pretty School )

Thank you for indulging me, or politely skipping this entry entirely!

Despite all your protestations that my old one didn't look terrible in IE, I thought it was time for a change, and I'm adjusting surprisingly well. This one's so clean and pretty, and after a couple of hours it's pretty much exactly how I want it. (I leave it to my favourite OCD friend to find the one little glitch that's driving me NUTS, though. Spotted it yet, vacant one?). I'm also super-tempted now to get rid of all of my icons in favour of black and white stock stuff, because it would look so good, but I think I'll resist.

See, this is how I waste my life away when not working. Pathetic. But pretty!

Also, since I'm here: ( tonight's Doctor Who. )

Fandom: Heroes
Title: Winter in Elysium
Characters: Claire, Peter, Adam
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: 2.10
Previous: One / Two / Three / Four / Five
Summary: When Peter and Adam are too late to stop the virus escaping, three unbreakable people find themselves stranded in an entirely new world.
A/N: So, you know when I said that this was going to be the last chapter? Yeah, I totally lied. Sorry! (But the next one is the last one, I SWEAR). Many thanks to dear miss_vacant for making me not suck.

( Staring up at him and the tight, angry clench of his jaw, Claire realized for the first time how powerful Peter really was and how frightening he could be. )

Yeah, sorry folks. It's my one day off, so I guess I need to post thirteen thousand times to make up for all the days I've missed. Assorted fandom thoughts:

1. When did Gossip Girl get AWESOME? Was it this week, because I'm suddenly convinced. I kind of love it, and I'm excited for Michelle Trachtenberg to join the cast, because I think I'm the only person in the world who really loved Dawn (well, post-season five Dawn) and thought she added a lot to Buffy.

2. I finally watched 2x15 of Friday Night Lights. I just woke up and thought today was the day. And for those of you who are all caught up, can I just tell you how much ( spoilers. )

3. Oh my God, Dollhouse is my new favourite show and it's not even shot its pilot yet.

4. A couple of days ago I read Once Upon a Time in the North, which is Philip Pullman's latest addition to the His Dark Materials universe, the story of how Lee Scoresby met Iorek Byrnison. I really love these little books he's doing (the next one had better be about Will, or... I'll make some really mean empty threats!), mostly because of all the little clues and artefacts of Lyra's world, the newspaper clippings and maps and letters and things. This one came with a game that was mentioned in the story, which I will no doubt make miss_vacant play with me when she FINALLY finishes the books, because I'm a big dork. As for the story, ( has anyone else read it? )

5. I've completely stopped reading the Doctor Who newsletter, and I think it was a very healthy decision. Loving the new season, Donna is a fantastic companion. I love her, I love them together, I love the brief respite from the romantic drama. Can't wait to see how Rose gets worked into this.

6. Oh, Battlestar Galactica, where have you been all year? Katee Sackhoff, how did I live this long without you? So, did anyone else notice how Michael Angeli wrote an episode that wasn't the worst thing to ever happen to television? Because I literally groaned out loud when I saw his name, but "Six of One" was actually good. I feel like we've just kind of finished establishing what this season will be about, which is crazy since we're three episodes into a ten episode truncated year, so that's a little frustrating, but it's just so good. SO GOOD. And, ( bonus! ) God, I missed this show.

For God's sake. Are free and fair elections really just an illusion in this country? Reports are starting to pour in from all over Pennsylvania about various voting problems (broken voting machines, electronic machines not set to zero at the beginning of the day, voter intimidation, Obama's NAME left off the BALLOT), and guess what! They mostly seem to be happening in counties with large African-American populations. Shocker.

Not to sound crazy and paranoid, but for real, you have to start to think when this happens in a make-or-break state for Hillary Clinton after her shocking and unprecedented win in her previous make-or-break state of New Hampshire, where the widespread voting fraud that took place was almost comically obvious.

I honestly don't care if Clinton wins, just as long as she actually wins.

You just make me so sad sometimes, America.

I already made my novel_in_90 word count, and I'm looking at four long, long hours of rehearsal. So I'm thinking it's time for some fun fannish writing that isn't the WiP of Misery and Tears. Anybody got a drabble prompt?

I swear I'm going to start posting about fun fannish stuff soon (I've got so much to say about BSG and Doctor Who and Once Upon a Time in the North) but first I have to get some real life-ish stuff out of the way.

1. I've finally been convinced to join Facebook, even though I kind of hate it and it kind of ruined my life once. Mostly the people I've reconnected with are camp people (I went to this one summer camp for a decade and had the best times there, made the best friends and was/am really intense about the place), and it's had the opposite effect than the one intended. It makes me really sad. It was one thing for all those friends and good times to be just great memories, but actually being aware of those people again, hearing them talk about seeing each other and stuff, makes me miss them more intensely than I have for years. Although it is weirdly great seeing pictures of my girls all grown-up when in my head they are still the seven-year-olds who first came to me, while my boys are now in COLLEGE, which totally freaks me out. I'm just not sure I can handle it emotionally, because I'm a big baby.

2. Why has no one ever told me that my layout looks awful in IE?

3. I got an email from this woman who is the CSM for the Bush Theatre, a really respected Fringe venue. She wants to know if I'm interested in working there for about six weeks on their new production, unpaid, doing rehearsal babysitting and prop sourcing, two of the aspects of stage management that I loathe the most. Part of me thinks I should take it because it's only six weeks and I might make some valuable contacts, but another part of me knows that I'm actually too qualified to continue working for free (especially when I could be using that time to work at my paying job, looking for a new paying job, or going home to the States for a couple of weeks).

Poll #1174232 The Bush
Open to: All, results viewable to: All

What do YOU think I should, since I am incapable of making decisions myself?

It's been about three months, which means it's time to start looking for a new job! Bahhhhh. Why did I want to work in the theatre again? I loathe this whole process.

For one thing, when it comes time to find a job, I get all panicked and start applying for anything and everything I'm vaguely qualified for, but then I end up in situations kind of like the one I'm in now, doing jobs I don't like/don't further me at all in what I really want to do or where I don't actually make enough money to, you know, eat and stuff. But it feels wrong to be choosy when I'm facing looming unemployment, you know?

In any case, I have the first two of probably many applications going out tomorrow morning, although I'm not sure what to apply for after that since there are, like, NO JOBS ANYWHERE. I'm considering just moving back home and living with my mom and her dogs forever. This whole 'being a grown-up' thing is vastly overrated and not entirely working out the way I'd hoped.

So it's that time. Forgetting Sarah Marshall is now in big-time promotion over here, which means Kristen Bell's face on the side of buses. As you may know, I have a somewhat irrational and occasionally intense dislike for La Bell and just the sight of her makes old bitterness start to rise like bile inside of me, but I am taking comfort in the following things when I see her face on three buses a minute during my daily commute:

1. Jason Segal and Russell Brand are clearly the stars of the billboard; KB's an afterthought at best.

2. Kristen's face is obscured by her arm and the seam of the billboard, which cuts right through the middle of her head. HA!

3. What can be seen of her face is pretty unflattering. She looks kind of like a man and/or monkey.

Petty and vindictive? Yes please.

So I'm sitting in Starbucks writing, and the most extraordinary pageant is playing out in front of my eyes. There's this young woman, probably 27 or so, sitting at a table near me. She's really very pretty, and the men in here are just flinging themselves at her in a manner I have NEVER EVER witnessed before. First, one of the employees brought her another coffee completely unprompted, practically falling over himself as he offered it to her, which she took with a gracious smile and thank you despite the fact that she's not even halfway through her first cup. Then, probably two minutes later, someone on his way out with a group of friends stopped at her table and asked her for her number. Uh, what? And a few minutes after that, a man sitting at another table got up and asked her if he could sit with her, and now they're chatting like old friends. This must happen to this chick all the time, because she is completely unfazed by the attention.

Is this really how the world works? Is this really how straight men act? (It's been awhile since I've known one of those). What totally transparent idiots. Makes me glad I'm not particularly good looking, actually, because I would think behavior like that would make you awfully cynical about men. I mean, she has to know the complete strangers flinging themselves at her aren't attracted by her by her glowing personality or intellect, so mustn't that cheapen the whole interaction? When one of these guys becomes her boyfriend, won't she always have to wonder if he'd still like her if she wasn't so gorgeous? How exhausting.

Just a little pointless nostalgia for you guys. Who else was watching the exact moment that Kristin Chenoweth became famous?



And does anyone else continue to be baffled that the producers of Pushing Daisies shamefully passed up the opportunity to give her a duet with Raul Esparza? Why cast Raul Esparza as Kristin Chenoweth's love interest and then NOT LET THEM SING?

Christ Almighty, Torchwood.

( Season Two finale )

This is my last day off for the next two weeks, and so far I've fielded three phone calls from my director, one from the theatre administrator, four from the cast, and a half a dozen more e-mails. And now because the director has a cold, I'm doing her job for her today and setting all the calls for next week. See, folks, it's because of this knuckle-headed stuff that I'm so stressed.

THIS IS NOT RECUPERATIVE TIME OFF.

This is one of the few ways in which house management is and will always be vastly superior to stage management. It never follows me home.