Fortune Tellers, Old Friends and New

Today was a nice day.

The weather was a little chilly, it should be considering it's November, and partly sunny. But you didn't come here for a weather report.

School has been picking up a bit. More things to do and more things to have done, it's beginning to seem like I may strain my creativity simply because of all of the things I have to come up with, but then when it comes down to it, m brain finds something in it's deep recesses that give life to something (whether it's any good is another matter entirely). We had our first meeting with the MA Contemporary Acting group as well as going to the pub after class to get to know them a little better. Now generally everyone has been incredibly pleasant, here is where I met the first people to simply not give a shit about you. Not everyone acts like this, but there was a couple who I wanted to slap upside the head. But I will not let the deeds of a few ruin my perception of the lot. Most of them are nice and willing to converse about anything. My thought is that if you are going to Drama school (especially one that is as big of a deal as Central is) you should be nice to everyone you meet. You are there because they saw some spark of talent and they want you to succeed, so if you do succeed and you're up for a part that was written, directed, or produced by someone that you acted like a dick to at drama school, you can bet they're going to remember and not want to work with you. So be nice to people when you start. You have to earn the right to act like James Cameron (even though I think you should still be nice to people even if you are James Cameron) before you can turn on the arrogance.

Met up with an friend from home which was lovely! She is studying in Spain at the moment and popped up to London for a few days. We had a wonderful albeit short chat at the Punch and Judy Pub in Covent Garden... which brings me to my day today...

I got new boots. They fit (barely). So I took them for a walkabout.

The air was crisp as it should be on any Autumn afternoon. The Houses of Parliament and Big Ben glistened in the mid-day sun and I had my "Every-Richard-Curtis-Movie" moment. Walking along a path in the middle of all the hullabaloo, all of the families, couples, tourists, and locals alike.

There was a Christmas street fair on Southbank just to the east of the Eye. The air even smelled like Christmas! Mulled wine, cider, gingerbread. It was your typical Christmas gift fair, the same kinds of things I would run into in Bend or Portland, just more people. Enter the Fortune Tellers.

So I know people will go around and give you some sort of a sob story and give you a little token of something in exchange for "anything you have to give". This one lady, older, grey hair, you could smell the cigarettes on her breath when she spoke, gave me a grin sprig of some plant (I have no idea what it is) and told me it was made by the children and that all the donations they got would go to them. Okay, great, I may have some change I can give you, whatever. She then took my hand and told me that she could see my fortune and that the 25th of May is going to be a big day for me and that I should remember it. Alright, here is some change, thanks for the sprig. I turn around and there is another one who simply says put out your hand. I really couldn't think properly (which is the point I think) so I gave her my hand, and into it she put a crystal ball, the same size as a marble "Masher" (that's what they were called right?) and then my whole fortune slipped out.
I am a very determined young lady. I will travel, I'll go far. That I've been let down with love in the past, but it's made me stronger. The new year will be good for me. The 21st of April. I will be married and I will settle down, but don't let it scare you. There will be three children, the first of which will be a boy.
Now normally I would have laughed her away, but she reminded me so much of my old neighbor in Eugene that I almost started crying. I wanted to believe her when she clasped my hand so tightly to that crystal ball. She told me that on the 21st when that thing will happen to me, I'll want to come and find her again. Now obviously I know the point of these people. It's fine. But she did strike me differently then they normally do. I couldn't stop thinking about her the entire rest of the day. And now I have several ideas for stories because of the encounter. So thanks Fortune Tellers.

After meeting up with my old friend I took a little stroll around Covant Garden as all of the Christmas lights were on. I've never seen so much Christmas cheer this far out from the 25th of December in my life! I will have to venture to more areas to see their displays.

Study Break and Life Updates.

So since I've been focusing on plays I've been seeing (and how I'm in the middle of a trying to figure out a pitch for a play I want to write) I figured it would be nice to do a little life update of sorts.

All is well.

Classes are going fine. I do have some concerns with some things however I won't discuss them on the internet (if you really want to know then message me, but don't be surprised if I'm cryptic). I am having fun getting to know my cohort though. We seem to hang out quite a lot after class is out for the day. Usually this consists of getting a drink at the SU Bar (yes, there is a bar in the building) or venturing to Ye Olde Swiss Cottage Pub where some of us add fish and chips to the drink order.

I love being back at school. Especially surrounded with other creative people, it just makes my heart sing. Being in this program makes me want to be better at all that I do, which is a good goal to keep in mind. Though I have a feeling I am trying to hard at times to be funny, or clever, or...something. Like I end up just looking like a fool. I really need to stop and just try and be me. Not the person that I think people will like, just me. Which I do that when I'm one on one with some people. I really can't put my finger on it, maybe I'm just nervous about it all and my social anxiety is flaring up.

I have come to some sort of cross roads it feels like. I am doing what I want to be doing and I am in the place I want to be, but it feels strange somehow, common maybe. Perhaps it's the homesickness taking its toll, but I'm not sure if want to stay after my course (which I had had hopes of before leaving). Maybe I want to go back to the states and write there. Really I can write anywhere in the world, that's the wonderful thing about it. It's probably just the homesickness. I mean if I can find a job after completing the course, I'll probably jump on it, regardless of where it is.

I miss my family. I miss my dogs and my cats and my bedroom. I never thought that seeing my room on a FaceTime message with my sister would make me so sad. I painted those walls. I decorated and arranged and rearranged that room since I was 10. And now it's not really mine anymore. Well I can always call it mine and always go back to it for a visit. But I don't think I'll live in it anymore. I hope not at least. The streets are starting to be decorated for Christmas and the stores have out their various bits and bobs, and I find myself going towards the Christmas lights (which I would like to put up in my flat) but then start tearing up when I get to the extension cords and the timers. It's the first Christmas where I can't help my dad put up the lights, the first one where I can't stand in the snow/freezing cold in my slippers when he asks what we think. I can't help my sister hang the stockings and the massive amounts of fake garland around the house or pick out the perfect tree then try and tie it to the roof of her car. My mom has said for years that we're not going to put up decorations or really "do" Christmas, but my sister and I always talk her out of it. Heather loves Christmas. Everything about it. I know my mom likes it too, she just has to be the staunch liberal that she is and say that it's far too commercialized and that people don't know what it's about anymore. Mom, have Christmas. I can't be there for it and it breaks my heart. Help Heather decorate, hang the decorations and the stockings without me and take pictures of the house when it's done.

I'm sorry if any of this post didn't make sense, I started crying about halfway through and it was difficult to see let alone type.

I'll be fine. I'll keep crying though throughout the season I expect. It's okay to be homesick. I'm homesick in the one city I've been trying to get to since I was 12. But it still hurts.

Saw Mojo at the Harold Pinter theatre last night. I will report on that soon as well. Until then, cheerio!

"Credible Likeable Superstar Rolemodel" Review

Bryony Kimmings has set out to do what many angry feminists on the internet have been pining for. She wants to create a new kind of role model for someone like her niece to look up to who isn't busy trying to be an oversexualized pop star.

Sitting in a completely full house at the Soho Theatre in Central London and watching Kimmings and her 9 year old niece, Taylor, find out what has been happening to the youth of the world and how much they are susceptible to is shocking. They make fabulous points of trying to fight against the badness, to block out the filth, and to mute the sounds of horrible things no child should hear. But how much can you actually keep your kid safe from seeing and hearing these things? You can't really. Our culture is so inundated with information of all sorts that it becomes nearly impossible to keep the bad stuff away, short of blinding and deafening them (a great allusion made in the show). So what to do?  Create a character that can be a good role model, that incorporates everything that a nine year old girl would find appealing in a pop star, and have them sing about not only things that are positive and empowering, but things that young girls want to listen to. When put together Kimmings and Taylor came up with a fictional "tuna-pasta-eating paleontologist" named Cathrine Bennett.

This show was so beautifully executed and so profoundly poignant it made me tear up to think of how far we have to go to create something that young kids can look up to. We need positive influences in young people's lives. Having spent three summers working with 5-12 year olds and listening to them talk about TV shows and movies they see as well as the music they listen to, it's staggering and at times sickening. I believe so much in what Byrony Kimmings is doing that it makes me well up to think about it. We need positive role models, those knights in shining armor. In a world where information is literally a click away, we need something bright and real to come out of the plastic and dingy world of celebrity. See this show. Take your daughters* to see this show. Take your mothers, your wives, your sisters, brothers, husbands, anyone who wants to see change in the world.


*they suggest that it is not a show suitable for children under 16 (I think 16 is the perfect age to understand the context, anything before that may be lost, possibly)

Book Tickets and find out more about the show

More on the Catherine Bennett Project

More on Byrony Kimmings

Review of "The Ritual Slaughter of George Mastromas"

A dark tale about how a seemingly good man who has done good all his life, shifts when given a unique opportunity to get all he ever has want for and more. As this change occurs we witness the downward spiral of George Mastromas life leaving him with everything except for what he wants most.

"Goodness or cowardice" is the running theme throughout the play where if you didn't hear it the first time, they made sure that it was said about every 15 minutes in triplicate, not to mention the giant header that was brought in from above and remained in clear view for the entire second scene. The problem facing George Mastromas is that he has lived his life always choosing the Goodness route, the route that in the face of things most people take. We hear all about his adolescence through three specific stories told in bullet point fashion at the start of the play by all of the actors seated, recounting these tales in a staccato kind of way. Thankfully the actors are all fascinating to watch otherwise everyone in the theater would have fallen asleep, for this lasts a good 20 minutes. This "bullet point biography", as mentioned, focuses in on three stories about where George takes the path of Goodness rather than that of cowardice, knowing full well that his life will probably be better off if he chooses cowardice.

The Ritual Slaughter of George Mastromas is a morality play at it's heart, showing the audience a man who is easy to relate to, who is at his heart good and honest, but when given the option finally chooses to get what he wants even if it means ruining the life of someone else. The script is darkly comic and occasionally gives way to beautiful lines which are quickly lost to the insentient repeating of the moral: "Goodness and cowardice". This modern day Greek Tragedy even comes with it's own chorus. Guiding us through George's entire biography for 20 minutes at the start of the play would have made a full house (as was the one I was in) fall instantly asleep if it hadn't have been for the charismatic and luminous cast. The chorus even follows up and begins filling in the gaps during scene changes and even once during the scene at a very crucial point. Now I don't mind the chorus insertion into scenes, that's fine, but the point in the scene was such a huge discovery that it was almost tarnished by their immediate interruption and explanation as to what we were seeing. I understand that it did move the play along and it was a unique way to structure a modern play, but in terrible points like that it seemed to cut the actors off.

It was well acted, the sets were beautiful and the lighting was spot on, and there were times where I would close my eyes and listen to some of the lines just to hear them. There are points of brilliant dialogue and heartbreaking discovery for the characters, yet it left me feeling like I had a bucket of morality poured over me then had the bucket banged on my head a few times.

New Country, New Germs!

I have now been sick twice within the past three weeks. 

I'm pretty used to catching a cold when I come to London (most likely from the flight over) but as soon as I got over that initial sickness, BAM! Sick again! 

So as I drown myself in tea and vitamin C, I will attempt another blog post. 

Now, because of my being sick a couple of times now, I really haven't done much that was incredibly interesting or exciting (other than possibly watching all five seasons of "Breaking Bad" in a week.) but there has been some new developments in terms of what I've been up to. 

First off, I am officially a student again.  Registered and given an ID (and a CSSD tote bag!). We were all filed into the main foyer of Central School of Speech and Drama and told to hang out for a bit until someone would inevitably bring us upstairs to begin the registration process. Strange as it may be as well, my fellow writers and I managed to all end up in the same spot. The first of my cohort that I met was a young woman from Australia, who is also an actor and wants to write her own shows and stuff (much like I would like to try and do). Of us all, there are three Americans (including myself), one Canadian, one Italian, one Chilean, and one woman from Hong Kong (the rest of us hail from around the UK).
Friday was the International Student orientation/welcome, which was basically to tell us what was in the info packet again and sometimes expand. Afterwards was what is known as the "Fresher's Fayre". A bunch of tables from people around the school and community getting people to sign up for things with the very subtle placement of a bouncy castle. I got a free tote bag (always my favorite thing to get) and a free water bottle! WooHoo! Plus I was able to sign up for a library card and get access to Senate House Library, so I guess that's good.

After we sweated out standing in the queue for probably a good 20-30 minutes to get a library card (we're so cool!) we ventured down to the pub with our cohort and grabbed a pint and shared some stories (well, I grabbed a pint (cider) and so did I think one other person, the others got Coke or a half pint, what's up with that?). Everyone in the program seems incredibly nice and insanely intelligent. In fact it made me a little intimidated (I'm sorry but I can't tell you one thing about Dostoyevsky-- well maybe that he's Russian and depressing, but then again those two go hand in hand). However, on Monday, after our third orientation (this time Post-Grads only) we grabbed another pint and I was able to sound somewhat intelligent when I had to go into detail about The Great Gatsby and F.Scott Fitzgerald. So to summarize, don't talk to me about scary, depressing, Russian writers, but I can hold my own when we talk about depressing, American writers who love and use imagery to a dizzying extent.

Back to the third orientation. I managed to find the rest of the writers (we tend to gravitate to one another it seems) and we were greeted by who we later found out was the Principal (he didn't introduce himself). A very Dickensian looking gentleman-- bow-tie and grey, three piece suit-- so you knew he was a higher up in the system. He told us what a big deal it is to be attending school here, but he wasn't stuffy about it. Instead every single staff and faculty member I have observed throughout the myriad of orientations we've had, everyone seems so pleasant and pretty down to earth, which seems strange for such an impressive institution. Of course my first impressions could be wrong, though I hope not. They then introduced a group of Alumni who divided us into groups where we had to go over a list of things and make basically averages of the people in the group's answers, then make a minute-and-a-half skit that covered it all. I was unimpressed by the whole thing,  and apparently wasn't the only one, the rest of the writers thought the same thing. C'est la vie.

Eventually that night we made our way back to Central where in the Student Bar (yes, there is a bar downstairs) there as a DJ and quite the situation happening. Honestly none of us thought that is what we'd find. So we danced a little and drank some more (I had one pint of cider which ended up being £5!) until a few of us decided it was time to call it a night. I was one of those. After a rather loud sing-along with "Rolling in the Deep" (c'mon, you really didn't think I would sing that at the top of my lungs, did you?) I decided it would be best for me and my cold to head on back to my flat.

The next morning I was elated to find a package had been delivered! The first of many of my things from home to come my way in fact. This one containing, posters, photographs, my favorite tea, teapot, clothes, my red pea coat (since I left my other one only my plane), and probably best of all, my mom's homemade Marionberry Jam. So I spent yesterday making my flat finally look like home.

So without further ado, here is my flat. 

The box of wonderful things!

Looking in from the entry door

Hey, that's my bathroom!

Looking in the bathroom from the doorway.

From the corner with the toilet

My shower is huge!

My wardrobe, and sink (now with dirty dishes, woops)

From the little alcove between the sink and wardrobe, looking to my bed and part of my desk

Far right corner of my room. Look at my little kitchenette!

Complete with table, two chairs and bean bag

Much Ado about the British Museum

Yesterday I was feeling loads better, so naturally I wanted to get out of my flat for longer than my seemingly daily trip to Sainsbury's and being on a budget I decided that visiting a museum was the best route. Settling finally on the British Museum I took off for Holborn Station. Now two years ago (when I attempted this blog in the first place) I lived just four blocks or so from this fantastic museum, however I only visited it I think twice on my stay. The strange thing about this visit was that I was only there for maybe four or five hours and I managed to go through the entire museum. For me this is insane! I usually take hours going through one exhibit rather than an entire museum with so many treasures. Maybe it was the fact that I was just getting over being sick, or the amount of people there that put me off, or just the fact that it was so hot in there (seriously, why is that museum so hot?) but I didn't want to stay and read all the placards. I took pictures sure, but didn't stay long. Oh well, maybe I'll give it some time and a rainy day and try again.

This morning I woke up and checked my laptop like I always do. And as I did the rounds around all the social media sites I am registered on (there's a lot), I was reminded via the Old Vic's twitter page that they were doing a production of "Much Ado About Nothing" with Vanessa Redgrave and James Earl Jones. So I got the special "Under 25" ticket (only £12 if you're under 25!) and went to a play for the first time, by myself.

So here is my review of the play, if you are interested in that sort of thing:

The set was bland. You know that Ikea desk that is really long and fits basically over your bed? It kind of reminded me of that. It was a relatively empty stage (save for a chair and a record cabinet) and this giant desk thing and everything was the same shade of dark wood grain (it wasn't what I would choose for cabinetry let alone an entire set). They also used miming in the hedges scenes (clipping the hedges back), which would have been fine if they had used the miming elsewhere in the play. But it was just for the scene with Hero and Ursula tricking Beatrice into thinking Benedict was in love with her.

Then there is the question of the plot. They set it in the English countryside in 1944. Now the farm where Beatrice and Hero's families live is right next to a US Air Force base that is housing the Tuskegee Airmen (or another regiment along those lines). This is a really cool idea, apart from the fact that Don Pedro and his men are returning from a battle in which nothing actually happened, which probably wouldn't have happened in 1944. This meant that Don Pedro and all his men were to be African American. Again, great idea. But that means the British actors have to speak with American accents, which some of them can do, but others...not so much. Now a largely British audience wouldn't notice the small pronunciation mistakes and probably don't notice when someone who is supposed to be from Tennessee (as marked in the program) suddenly slips into a Texas drawl. And you know, no one is perfect so I do not hold the actors at fault for this, accents are hard to do when you have a certain way of saying things. However, if the dialect coach is doing their job correctly, they would have marked these things and I should not notice them this late in the run?

On to the acting. James Earl Jones and Vanessa Redgrave are fabulous actors, there is no denying. That being said I really think that something was amiss in this production. Now I am all for changing things up a bit and casting Beatrice and Benedict as two older people, in fact that was one reason why I was so excited to see the show, but it didn't really work for the characters. The line deliveries were skewed somewhat and it made the play seem to drag on. Jones' lines kind of ventured into the realm of an old man getting lost in thought then forgetting what he was talking about to begin with. Redgrave even teetered on the edge of some crazy spinster aunt. Although I think that Beatrice is a little easier to pull off than Benedict is (in this sort of production) but both of them just fell flat for me. The man playing Don Pedro I actually thoroughly loved, did a really fantastic job (except he said "issue" the British way, not the American way and it drove me nuts). Don John, was creepy and sketchy as hell, which was great, but his accent was way forced which was not. Hero was too bland for my taste, and Claudio was a little too emotional for what a man in 40's would have acted like, I think (but then again this is Claudio we're talking about)

So in conclusion, age-blind casting is great, when done correctly. The characters don't feel like they should when they are played in their 70's and 80's-- it's a different play then. And when your directing is as bland as your set, it leaves you with a very sparsely laughing audience and a rather lackluster "Much Ado".

All in all, I was so happy to go out and see a show. It's been too long and my soul feels full, albeit a little disappointed in the show.

Narrow Boats and Cups of Tea

Social media can really be a useful tool. Where as years ago if I was to travel to a foreign country and not know anyone, I would have to search out people and meet them the old fashioned way. Face to face. But really who want's that sort of thing anymore. Sarcasm aside, I have had the good fortune to connect with people in my program via Facebook. So when I reached out to them on Friday to see if anyone wanted to get a cup of coffee or something before the program actually starts, one woman replied with an invitation of her own. She is originally from Oxford and lives on a Narrow Boat and as such was making her way down the Thames to London, a process that can take around a week to complete. So because of this fact she decided to invite me to pop on the boat for a bit, which of course I leapt at the opportunity. So on Saturday morning I found myself on a train to Maidenhead to meet this new friend. Kate is a middle-aged woman who has recently decided to get a masters in writing having been made redundant a couple of years ago (an all too common sign of the times, I'm afraid). She has actually produced a few things already, even taking her show to Edinburgh this year. She and her friend, Heather, were so welcoming, making sure I was comfortable, warm, and made some lovely soup and tea to enjoy along the way. 

We eventually got to stop off at Windsor and "played tourists" as Kate put it. Although we didn't do a whole lot with the Castle as the queue was very long (expected I guess for late afternoon on a Saturday), but we did run into a little show from a few groups of Morris Dancers. 

 According to Wikipedia:

 "Morris dance is a form of English folk dance usually accompanied by music. It is based on rhythmic stepping and the execution of choreographed figures by a group of dancers, usually wearing bell pads on their shins. Implements such as sticks, swords and handkerchiefs may also be wielded by the dancers. " x

 It was amazing to see some of the groups accuracy and enthusiasm with these dances. 

We ventured down the river a little ways and then attempted to moor so that I could get out and find the rail station and make my way back to London. Unfortunately for us, the Thames has a bottom and we found it. After freeing ourselves we went back up river to Windsor where there were plenty of spots for me to hop off (not before taking the tiller myself!) and eventually finding the station and heading back to London. 

Unfortunately for me, every year I come to London I catch a cold. And this year was no different. So for the past two days I've been drinking copious amounts of tea and taking some cold meds that make me really dizzy sometimes. But at least it's a good way to catch up with the time change, I suppose (and a good excuese to watch the series premier of Downton Abbey, which was on last night). So for now I'll pour myself another "cuppa", continue with my marathon of "Sherlock", then eventually go to bed. 

That's all for now dear friends, hopefully I'll be well enough to catch "Othello" at the National with Rory Kinnear before it closes.