tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13444712605328657012024-02-07T10:33:31.315-08:00We're Actors. We're the Opposite of People.PollyPeachumhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14800663544971752836noreply@blogger.comBlogger200125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1344471260532865701.post-57268189354919571402013-05-07T20:23:00.001-07:002013-05-07T20:23:05.581-07:00Clock is Ticking, That's for CertainI didn't want to blog today, but I will! Where's my cookie?<br />
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Isn't that what we're all wondering? Where's my cookie?<br />
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Things move along. The work is good. A lot of returning to stuff from before. It's fun to go be a student again, because it kind of helps me see both how much I do know and how much I don't. It's a confidence booster in that it makes me realize how much training and work I have already done, but it's also a sobering reminder that there is so much more to know and go deeper with.<br />
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We do a lot of stuff with time limits, where we have a certain amount of time and then have to present. This terrifies me. A very short time limit of a few minutes or hours can be really debilitating to me. I just start to crack under the pressure. So I'm battling that and my worry that I'm terrible and everyone hates me. So it goes.<br />
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I think the subject matter, which is related to The Twilight Zone is really inspiring and exciting. I'm super turned on by it.<br />
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We play this game called 4 Square with is terrifying and I'm bad at but is really fun.<br />
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I'm learning and struggling and I think that's what it is. Sometimes that's thrilling and sometimes it's not. Pretty exciting though.Jessie Mercuryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01764033113458242495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1344471260532865701.post-7411005689487557112013-05-06T20:37:00.001-07:002013-05-06T20:37:10.585-07:00No Canary in a Cage for MeI am super going to try to blog every day while I'm out here doing the Ghost River Intensive in Calgary. See how long that lasts.<br />
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I'm so not reckless, and I'm so not someone who just 'does things', and this is a thing that I'm doing. So I'm really proud and excited to be out here.<br />
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Where the sky goes all the way to the ground!<br />
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Like, I did something. I took a chance. That really is hard for me.<br />
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We're going to be creating a show together...me and some strangers. There is no one from Toronto here which is JOYOUS and THRILLING. It's cool to gain some perspective that there are other markets, there is art happening all over, and also to not really have my past matter as much, and to not be able to be as intimidated by people, because I recognize the companies and the work they're doing less than I would were they all Torontonians.<br />
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Of course I'm still intimidated and dealing with all my shit about how I'm the worst in the room and no one likes me already, and all that fascinating stuff. We talked today about what makes a space safe and the thing I kept being reminded of is when Damien Atkins, one of the best teachers I've ever had, along with Paul Dunn, told me, as I sobbed about how stressed I was about the piece I was writing/performing said that my feelings were fine, but they weren't the work. And that being hysterical, even though it came from the work, wasn't the work. If things can really just be focused on finding the best way through the show, it doesn't hurt so much. I don't have to grind, and it isn't awful when someone is hard on you or doesn't like what you're doing. It's just the work. Ann-Marie Kerr could kind of do this too. Give a harsh note but it felt like she just wanted you to be better. So I just have to focus on the work.<br />
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And the work is very cool. Eric Rose is the dude what is leading it and he asks a lot of questions that make me hum and buzz. I feel like he is speaking my language. That's exciting to me. Being from planet Oddball.<br />
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Devised work, collaborative work: stuff that I love but mostly say that I love and am not really suited to. I'm trying to chill: that's my challenge to myself. Control less. Listen more. I want to contribute and I don't want to dull my excitement because I think that's actually something that's good about me, and I want to care, but I don't want to care to the point that it stops me from working. That's what usually happens. This is all practice. This is all learning. Everything is just the thing that takes me to the next thing. Is what I'm trying to tell myself.<br />
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We'll see how it all goes.Jessie Mercuryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01764033113458242495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1344471260532865701.post-47456582623646855482013-05-04T16:58:00.002-07:002013-05-04T16:58:50.846-07:00There Is Life Outside Your Apartment. But You Gotta Open the Door.I'm going to Calgary tomorrow.<br />
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I've never been west of....Burlington? No, Hamilton. Or Stratford? For someone who doesn't get to travel enough I sure don't know my Ontario geography. Anyway, I haven't really been west except that i did go to Calgary for a public speaking competition in grade 12, but I remember nothing except my abject fear and how greasy the pizza they served us was.<br />
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I'm training for three weeks with a company that knocked my socks off when I saw their show at SummerWorks a while back, Ghost River theatre. They do cool stuff, like this thing, which is the dream of what 'Modern Love' would be at some point. I saw this while I was writing 'Modern Love' and was overcome with jealousy and admiration and a feeling of having found kindred artists.<br />
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And this is what I saw at SummerWorks:<br />
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This is cool, yes? This is pretty much what I think theatre should be. I am excited. And nervous. There will be other people. That's always scary. Who will like me. Who will think I'm talented. Will I be a strong part of the team or the one that gets carried along. It's scary. But I'm really thrilled and buzzy. I'm hoping it reconnects me to theatre. I haven't been writing here because I've been in one of those moods where I go GEE THEATRE CAN REALLY KILL YOU.<br />
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And I have a bad back, because....I don't know. Because things happen. I could launch into a tirade about how I'm this hopeless, hapless person who OF COURSE busts her back before going into an intensive training program, but let's spare ourselves this, eh? Things happen. Nothing is ever perfect. Life gives no breaks. Why should I deserve them? Just keep fighting through the pain and try to see the good even when you can't stand up straight.<br />
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Adventure time!Jessie Mercuryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01764033113458242495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1344471260532865701.post-87541619334566232142013-04-01T16:14:00.003-07:002013-04-01T16:14:26.969-07:00Bing Bang Boom, Let's Get Tough Playin' Rough<a href="http://jamesgrissom.blogspot.ca/2012/12/arthur-penn-in-defense-of-friction.html">This thing from Arthur Penn is pretty interesting and really worth a read. </a><br />
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I'm difficult and sometimes I like myself for it and sometimes it gets me into a lot of trouble, but I do like it when people fight, and people care, and people are something other than what everyone else is.<br />
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I was recently told I was 'too strong' for a character, which might have just been a way to let me down, but if it is true, is one of the worst reasons for not getting a job ever. Cast strong people! Make the rest of your cast step it up! No commitment to mediocrity! Also, given the particular character, I just think it is a terrible choice and will ruin the play. Characters are strong. Actors should be strong. Give your audience, give the play, something great, or awful, or big, or insane. But something.<br />
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I want to work with nice people and I think I can be nice, and I am on time, and I know my lines and I'm very very good at showing up (this is the one positive thing that can be said of me, I show up when I am supposed to, and often when I'm not), but 'pleasant' is not the same as 'good' and that's not the same as 'exciting'. A little cackle means there's a fire!<br />
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Having just been in 'The Clockmaker' room where I was definitely the least experienced and arguably the least talented, it was really great to feel challenged and that I had to step up and that I would let people down if I was anything less than 100 percent.<br />
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I also just love a good fight when someone really cares. It can be like an intellectual colonic.<br />
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I think there's a way of balancing kindness and rigour, and I tend to fall on the rigour side of things, but I really believe there are environments where everyone is pushing and pushing each other and still everyone is happy. I have to believe that work can happen in that kind of room and that I can find those kind of rooms and get to work in them. Someday. Somewhere.Jessie Mercuryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01764033113458242495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1344471260532865701.post-39743749919209877812013-03-26T20:19:00.000-07:002013-03-26T20:19:04.483-07:00Gleam in its Eye, Bright as a Rose...It's really fun when things just seem to start happening in the world of the play. When scenes that you've done again and again surprise you and make a new sense and scare you and thrill you, and you are in them.<br />
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I really loved a scene tonight that has sometimes been good but not always. It was very alive, very uncertain, in a really great way. It's such a great feeling. We had a day off, so the whole play felt kind of fresh and new to me, in a way that was exciting, not as if I had never rehearsed and was in 'The Actor's Nightmare'.<br />
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And then, you can't bottle it. It disappears when you try to chase it. Crumbles if you reach for it. You can't go out and have the same show. What a pisser.<br />
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It's a kind of frustrating thing that you think you understand the play and you put all this work into it, and sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. The work takes you to the point, hopefully, that even if it isn't flying it is still moving, it is still working, it is still a show, the right show. But there's that other something, that pixie dust, that makes it worth doing. I just don't know when it's going to show up.Jessie Mercuryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01764033113458242495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1344471260532865701.post-64916434352224505662013-03-25T11:46:00.000-07:002013-03-25T11:46:12.683-07:00March Comes in Like a Lion, What Else? Still the Snow Never Melts<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
I'm here!</div>
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Yes, that's right! Sudbury!</div>
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I have been watching Game of Thrones lately, and the Sudbury landscape is such that when walking alone late at night, I have the giddy feeling that direwolves might be watching me.<br />
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Which would be thrilling. Although I have had three separate experiences, walking along Paris street in Sudbury, where I thought I saw small woodland creatures. I quickly became attached to them and gave them names. They were:<br />
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1) Mr Squiggles, a hedgehog<br />
2) Minerva, a white mink<br />
3) Gander, a great grey goose.<br />
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In reality, these things were:<br />
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1) a hunk of snow<br />
2) a piece of garbage<br />
3) a hunk of snow<br />
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If you have poor eyesight and a need to care for something, you will get your heart broken a lot in Sudbury.<br />
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The show is going pretty well. Opening was weird in the way that openings were weird, and the second night was weird in the way second nights are weird. Yesterday I felt was a good show. But it feels like the bones are there...we've spent enough time with the project and the script and production are strong enough that the show still soldiers on, even if there are those terrifying moments and slip ups and strange ghosts.<br />
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I don't like to talk about my miserable theatre school experience, but I do have to say that one thing that was beneficial was whenever they talked about just working from wherever you were, and coping. Working hard enough that you could cope with whatever ended up happening to you. That has proven to be quite valuable to me.<br />
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I feel very honoured to be in this show and working with people I've got to work with. They all have a great deal more experience than me and have been able to carve out really interesting, inspiring careers in theatre. They are, though, all dudes. So while I can't emulate their career paths, I can emulate their work ethics and attitudes. You want to be near people who you want to be near to. That's it. People who are positive and exciting and hard-working and game. I feel like I'm kind of watching them like a little direwolf, taking notes. They're really wonderful. And it's encouraging that they have had careers. Its encouraging that anyone has a career. It's quite amazing, actually. And the crew here is just the best. I'm very lucky.<br />
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Before I left my friend Rose was talking to me about how she recently had a part (in another Stephen Massicotte play) that she didn't feel was really her hit, and how wonderful it was to get to do that and how she learned that she could do it. And she said she thought this experience might be the same for me. I'm not sure if that's happened. I don't know how I'm doing. I feel a bit divorced from how I feel about my work. It never feels great....the experience of being in a show and the thrill of it and all that fun stuff and certain moments feel great, but I never ever feel like I was really good. I don't know what this means. I don't know how to work on this either.<br />
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But all in all, it's going well.<br />
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And, of course, in the birth of anything lie the seeds of its destruction and it ends in a week and I might never act again. My summer is a very large question mark....I'm waiting to hear about something to know how to proceed with something else. I have to put together a self-tape in the next few days, which is always hugely stressful, though it was a project I'd love to do, so that would be great.<br />
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I'm hungry for Shakespeare. It feels like when I am dehydrated but don't really know it and then drink water and it tastes cool and clear and like the only thing I'd ever want forever. I feel, at this point, my Shakespeare days are over, but I am longing for it like hydration.<br />
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I'm trying to make this freedom and how much energy I have and how much I want to do things, I'm trying to make all this into some kind of frenzied kinetic motion that means I put on my own fucking Shakespeare play, write my own stuff, cast myself in the roles that no one will cast me as and just take over, but I inevitably just feel defeated and lost. It's hard to convert fuel to movement. It's so much easier to just watch Game of Thrones.Jessie Mercuryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01764033113458242495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1344471260532865701.post-63674326664262572662013-03-22T07:57:00.001-07:002013-03-22T07:57:23.810-07:00Curtain Up, Light the LightsOpening night tonight.<br />
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Last night, even though I was kind of nervous and worried about my next (non existent) job and all that shit, I thought about how I am the luckiest person to even get to do a thing like this even once in my life.Jessie Mercuryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01764033113458242495noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1344471260532865701.post-10838527101732362602013-03-20T07:27:00.002-07:002013-03-20T07:27:26.345-07:00You Can Always Cover One Til He Blacks the Other OneI'm doing a show. This show:<br />
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Up in Sudbury again. I've had a lot of thoughts about my process and all the other boring things I talk about on here, but I've also been in this show, so I have not had the time nor presence of mind to blog. I will at some point, likely when we open later this week. Suffice to say I am insecure and nervous in the ways I am always insecure and nervous, and thrilled and grateful and happy in the way that theatre and getting to work in theatre thrills, gratifies and happifies me. So we can conclude that I am still myself. Sigh.<br />
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I got a huge rejection right before I came here and that has been clouding my experience and also making me re-evaluate a) theatre and b) blogging about theatre. What else is new? I am really upset about it and it feels like I dream I had died and I lost complete respect for the company and the artists that made the decision and so maybe its better I won't work with them again, but I'm still very very sad about it and all these things make me go, what is the point? So I'll blog about that at some point too. Still myself!<br />
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The thing that I wanted to share is that in the play what I am in now I play an abused wife, and have to have these marks on my legs to show where my husband has hit me. I am told that these marks look ok from the audience, although they look a bit like Craft Corner from my vantage point. The absolute best part of this is that the paint goes on wet and I can't put the rest of my costume on til it dries, so every night I sit around in my dressing room alone in my underwear, gently fanning my loins.<br />
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<br />Jessie Mercuryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01764033113458242495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1344471260532865701.post-88712902674991194232013-03-03T12:07:00.002-08:002013-03-03T12:07:25.585-08:00Why, Charlie Brown, You Really Have to DelveI did a theatre thing last week as part of the Rhubarb festival, and I have been thinking about it a lot.<br />
<br />
I was really scared and intimidated the whole way through, which is happening now with more and more of the things I work on and is starting to maybe indicate to me that I'm not an actor? Maybe I should be like an arts administrator? Or maybe I should just hide in a cave like Caliban? I remember at school everyone always had to remind me to find the joy, the sunshine, in work, because I just tend to put my head down and hammer away at things until there is no happiness. I do feel joy, but I feel acute terror now.<br />
<br />
But anyway. What was more interesting to me was that the show and the way we approached the show demanded me to act in a way that I don't normally. And I struggled, and I got better, but not really good enough, and I learned about how to approach the show, and I thought about it a lot. I had to act less, which is hard for me. I'm pretty performative and reactive and emotional in my real life, and I have some sense that if anyone casts me (please someone cast me), it's because they're interested in these qualities. These things what I do. There's an aspect to it that's about branding, about the business of theatre, that there are these things what I do that kind of make me different, or give me a 'hit', or make me suitable for certain kinds of roles.<br />
<br />
But then there's a deeper sense, that I carry around, that they are 'what I am'. That this way of acting, what I do IS what I am, that it's true in some sense to me. It's become stronger because I wrote a one-person show that I felt really represented this side of me as an actor and want to write more and explore it and am identified with that style of performance. I have some sense that there's a way that I act and that is really who I am.<br />
<br />
And when I was asked to not do it, and the play was better because of that, and I had less of the impulse to do the habitual stuff that I do, I was still myself, in a way?<br />
<br />
It's amazing to think that any quality you use to identify yourself, either for good or bad, is a construct. I have some strongly-held idea that what I am as an actor (and as a person?) is very fast, very loud, I just throw a lot of energy at things and that is what makes me special, that is what makes me useful, and that's the only way I can be an actor, because those are the things that make me 'me'. But really, they're just things that I do.<br />
<br />
I've found this really liberating in the way that standing in front of a large and hungry grizzly bear must be really liberating.<br />
<br />
On one hand, everything is open. There's endless possibility to how to behave and you don't have to come in to things with 'your' personality, or 'what you do', because those things don't exist in any real way. Maybe I'm not just a quirky sidekick. Maybe I can write a frenetic one person multi character show but I can also sit in a chair and just tell a story simply. Freedom.<br />
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/tPc6qaEQ600" width="420"></iframe><br />
<br />
Horrible horrible freedom!<br />
<br />
On the other hand, it's scary to think of yourself as not really having anything to hold on to. Just being a vessel, or a changeable thing. These things that you are, you can't rest on them in any way, because they're just ideas that you have, they aren't real. You kind of crumble like toothpicks.<br />
<br />
How incredible that as actors we look to ourselves and we become other people and all of these are just really ideas and who are all these people that we're supposed to be?<br />
<br />
This all relates to this show about identity that I'm trying to write, but I don't really know how. I don't really know anything!<br />
<br />
Anyway. The Rhubarb show was really interesting and an incredible piece of writing that I was lucky to get to do, and I learned a lot and wasn't actually even sure how to talk about how much I learned, or what to do now or how to use anything that I thought about to move forward or do better, but if there's no 'me' that's really thinking I guess it doesn't matter anyway?<br />
<br />Jessie Mercuryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01764033113458242495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1344471260532865701.post-46191534898955302612013-02-21T18:37:00.001-08:002013-02-21T18:37:11.779-08:00Oh I Believe In YouI am having a crisis of confidence lately.<br />
<br />
I'm not sure what to make of it, but I just keep trying to think about one of my favourite parts of 'Harriet the Spy'. When everyone in her class hates her for writing about them in her notebook and she is having a terrible, time.<br />
<br />
'First she went to the bathroom because she hadn't in the morning, and when she was sitting there she wrote in her notebook:<br />
<br />
I LOVE MYSELF.'Jessie Mercuryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01764033113458242495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1344471260532865701.post-18123469044337463632013-02-11T18:11:00.001-08:002013-02-11T18:11:54.202-08:00Though It's Fearful, Though It's Deep, Though It's DarkThis is wonderful in so many ways.<br />
<br />
Isn't it reassuring to hear that others are scared too?<br />
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="281" mozallowfullscreen="" src="http://player.vimeo.com/video/58659769" webkitallowfullscreen="" width="500"></iframe> <a href="http://vimeo.com/58659769">the Scared is scared</a> from <a href="http://vimeo.com/user7252450">Bianca Giaever</a> on <a href="http://vimeo.com/">Vimeo</a>.Jessie Mercuryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01764033113458242495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1344471260532865701.post-72043234821326809812013-02-10T15:53:00.001-08:002013-02-10T15:53:43.483-08:00I've Always Said That I Was a RoverI'm cheating on my play.<br />
<br />
What's that quote? The pleasure isn't in having nothing to do; the pleasure is in having something to do and not doing it. Something like that.<br />
<br />
I have a few things that I should work on, writing wise. Nothing really has any possibility, so I'm still just kind of pushing myself along with no promise of money, or recognition, or forward momentum, but that's ok. There are still things that I have been working on for periods of time and I want them to be better and I want them to be plays that do get money or recognition or forward momentum at some point.<br />
<br />
And I've put enough time into some of them that I really need to keep going, if only for my own sanity and for something to write on my tombstone other than 'She sure could eat a lot, eh?' (Coming up with what to put on my tombstone is one of my great morbid pleasures! Other things I'm considering include: 'No one tell me what happens, I haven't finished it yet!', 'Laughing on the Oustide, Crying Within', and 'Was this food for everyone?' The great thing about them is they all also function as chapter titles in my autobiography, should I one day wake up and realize that I'm Lena Dunham).<br />
<br />
But.<br />
<br />
Here's how I feel about what I should work on:<br />
<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCLY5e7u5rptZz95-D_priNl_tDu1ZC2Ja7586GJfx730sdD4ardKxY24gbijc7JJItvXo4cG4BtmacT7Qeq__CBtY3JlbmcqrLrCghWosfo1htB4I4CSWIhOzHFeh5yc8T0jMeT-ONnU/s1600/Photo+on+2013-02-10+at+17.32+%232.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCLY5e7u5rptZz95-D_priNl_tDu1ZC2Ja7586GJfx730sdD4ardKxY24gbijc7JJItvXo4cG4BtmacT7Qeq__CBtY3JlbmcqrLrCghWosfo1htB4I4CSWIhOzHFeh5yc8T0jMeT-ONnU/s400/Photo+on+2013-02-10+at+17.32+%232.jpg" width="400" /></a><br />
<br />
<br />
And here's how I feel about unborn plays that I COULD write:<br />
<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpNXgcxsY1C7tbw_3z1KC5s0-TTkYEiLq-7Q9QSAgfKTPpmIfGlzGB_TA97n-3aeW9piDffVlZSv51Qp6Y4ivm2eU4dJ-vUq9w80cgdXpqFjSTwaf4E2A-iVm9sbK-D_O6hQnp_GiGBm4/s1600/Photo+on+2013-02-10+at+17.34+%233.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpNXgcxsY1C7tbw_3z1KC5s0-TTkYEiLq-7Q9QSAgfKTPpmIfGlzGB_TA97n-3aeW9piDffVlZSv51Qp6Y4ivm2eU4dJ-vUq9w80cgdXpqFjSTwaf4E2A-iVm9sbK-D_O6hQnp_GiGBm4/s400/Photo+on+2013-02-10+at+17.34+%233.jpg" width="400" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg77KAkRJPmyUpHdaG5n1EyWh955O9HEirdnMERVap6oiAEpkaS10AbKWvbfL2plIHQcc-LkXVv1Pc1R7gvbhI491Yl7OoK7uBqgKWC_cE39VuiwqH-fVZ_kJ8NLSfwvMoOyWt_Afaod94/s1600/Photo+on+2013-02-10+at+17.34+%232.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg77KAkRJPmyUpHdaG5n1EyWh955O9HEirdnMERVap6oiAEpkaS10AbKWvbfL2plIHQcc-LkXVv1Pc1R7gvbhI491Yl7OoK7uBqgKWC_cE39VuiwqH-fVZ_kJ8NLSfwvMoOyWt_Afaod94/s400/Photo+on+2013-02-10+at+17.34+%232.jpg" width="400" /></a><br />
<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlbjLxqi-uQjjY4z8ljw-5AYd4i8zjV-5QFLa7BxLvMrkdDGEMud0mcmoRK4_vz88BvtmLrCOh29IzUGOI480TD7mKi21S_XRvhtDgobULvAcxHsPTKzXubjCg9BnuaJlB-iLxwASwt8o/s1600/Photo+on+2013-02-10+at+17.34.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlbjLxqi-uQjjY4z8ljw-5AYd4i8zjV-5QFLa7BxLvMrkdDGEMud0mcmoRK4_vz88BvtmLrCOh29IzUGOI480TD7mKi21S_XRvhtDgobULvAcxHsPTKzXubjCg9BnuaJlB-iLxwASwt8o/s400/Photo+on+2013-02-10+at+17.34.jpg" width="400" /></a><br />
<br />
The projects that I should work on are invariably less fun than the projects I shouldn't work on.<br />
<br />
You know what's great about a play that isn't written yet? There's a certain gleeful period when it's more than just a spark, it's a whole image, or character, or idea, there's some fuel in it, but before it's a play that's full of holes and problems and damn characters who don't do anything. This is usually, for me, the same gleeful period when it's something that I am interested in, but don't care enough about yet that it's pressure, pressure, oh my god so much pressure. The play doesn't have to be anything yet, and I haven't put enough time into it to feel like I need to make something out of it, it's like what the romantic idea of writing is, that an idea just comes and you are swept away by it and transported and then you stop and continue to live your life with this wonderful little fairy of a story humming along inside you. Possibility.....<br />
<br />
This lasts for usually about five pages.<br />
<br />
BUT IT'S SO GREAT WHEN IT'S HERE.<br />
<br />
It feels like Santa Claus, like someone just popped in to give you presents. You let your old, fat, boring play deal with itself and spend time with your hot new play lover.<br />
<span style="text-align: center;"><br /></span>
<span style="text-align: center;">Until that play lover deserts you and leaves you stuck after half an hour. BUT UNTIL THEN......</span><br />
<span style="text-align: center;"><br /></span>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMnyuL03zLsTj49fZ3wkrn_h0zR3BnLBi_wGdDkWWUFONacfyEqAiSexjPK__LQvCFogcTp1DC0DCPVFHFVcTDGByBZV95wdVSM1JKJLb5VDPMC3FwQ4BPKsWhgWw0MfDb2AfQOlnjdLA/s1600/harriet2.bmp" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMnyuL03zLsTj49fZ3wkrn_h0zR3BnLBi_wGdDkWWUFONacfyEqAiSexjPK__LQvCFogcTp1DC0DCPVFHFVcTDGByBZV95wdVSM1JKJLb5VDPMC3FwQ4BPKsWhgWw0MfDb2AfQOlnjdLA/s640/harriet2.bmp" width="628" /></a>Jessie Mercuryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01764033113458242495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1344471260532865701.post-37918682778338765262013-02-06T17:18:00.000-08:002013-02-06T17:18:09.487-08:00Check Your PersonalityThinking a lot about 'type' and 'hit'.....partly because I have some new headshots and I stare at myself and think 'who is this person? who do you cast her as?', and partly because I'm struggling when I get cast as my type and also when I get cast against it, and it's kind of endlessly puzzling to me.<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
This is one of those boring business type things that I hate, but really, if I put a little bit of time into the boring business stuff and get better at it, conceivably I have a better chance of being able to act and make theatre all the time, and so I'm willing to put up with it.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
There's the person/actor that you are, that people immediately peg you as and that you are easily. And things being what they are, for me that usually breaks down as 'ugly'. I get parts that aren't for pretty girls. There's some wonderful stuff in there and I've had some really cool opportunities and there are, actually, some parts within that hit that I would really like to play professionally...Maria in Twelfth Night, maybe (which I've done but never for cash really and I GOTSTA GET PAID). Or some of the women in 'Our Country's Good', which I'd love love to do. Or Sonya in 'Uncle Vanya', which is a huge huge dream role. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
And I know I can do that stuff, and when I see that stuff in the breakdown (key words: plain, lonely, quirky, clumsy, supporting) I'm like, 'awesome!'. But then there's another part of me that wants to be challenged and wants to be seen in a different way, partly because it's frustrating to always think of yourself as a hideous troll, and partly because, you know, you dream of the great parts, you don't always dream of being the maid. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
The weird thing is sometimes I get one of those parts and I freak right out and spend weeks saying how I'm not pretty enough to do it and I'm miscast and I talk myself right out of that. Under special skills on my resume, I have 'making myself feel bad'. There's this duality of not believing I can do it and FIERCELY believing that I can do it, both at the same time. Of KNOWING that I'm that funny ugly maid and also knowing I'm not. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I'm writing a one-person show about self and the myriad of selves we are, and I know for a Tim Hortons commercial you just need to be one thing, but, like, sometimes I'm a mom, and sometimes I'm a sidekick, and we're all so many different things, and even the 'me' that isn't, that I dream about, there's a reality in that somewhere. There's at least a theatrical reality in that, in the same way that if we're all witches or in Italy or on a spaceship I can at least be a version of myself that might not really exist, can't I?</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
ISN'T IT AMAZING THAT THERE IS A SELF THAT DOES THIS THINKING ABOUT ME? Man, sometimes I think about the brain and I just have to go eat something. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I really think that knowing what roles you can play and how to present yourself in order to get in the door and start working is a smart thing, but then there's a point that you want more. Beyond that, I don't like that I think of myself as only one thing. It's limiting me. I dont' want to think that I can never play certain roles because if I have to think that way I don't know how much longer I'll be able to keep going.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
It's an amazing thing, this in-between of reality and fantasy. You need a fantasy, but you accept reality? You strive to be seen as more than you are while staying who you are, or discovering who you are? Identity is defined by what people peg you as, but you keep dreaming? You create the fantasy of the play with (or in spite of) the reality of the actors. Very weird. Very rabbit hole. </div>
Jessie Mercuryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01764033113458242495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1344471260532865701.post-34021518851978048742013-02-05T16:49:00.000-08:002013-02-05T16:49:21.277-08:00No Need to Tough It When You Can Slough It Off This is what I'm trying to do:<br />
<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBlOASfQ-9PD0DcFNvE7JP0LGvSeMf4utS_4YA_ZKRNi2-hFOWglawgVztrp6rkf4Zx3JVsbza9EnbqrPdAfU4_Vpl_29c_O7cDlPeEyRLKHOzC69EqMaA4RKBGSmx-z_LSlnDCAXwqM4/s1600/anthony+hopkins+wisdom.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBlOASfQ-9PD0DcFNvE7JP0LGvSeMf4utS_4YA_ZKRNi2-hFOWglawgVztrp6rkf4Zx3JVsbza9EnbqrPdAfU4_Vpl_29c_O7cDlPeEyRLKHOzC69EqMaA4RKBGSmx-z_LSlnDCAXwqM4/s640/anthony+hopkins+wisdom.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
<br />
<br />
In a less delicate way:<br />
<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOmEZgNtOuqrUYW_VcVLxdydQhDRyu7fcC4GYZF3-mv7caB_MzTRO29-KMkZWhlCl-gkDc9l2Qig_DqCba7ihRzGBN1IaPskhDkKm56M5GX3MZJIlWokHGJa9jKDDHXIggIQB1ntZdMN4/s1600/dude+wisdom.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="476" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOmEZgNtOuqrUYW_VcVLxdydQhDRyu7fcC4GYZF3-mv7caB_MzTRO29-KMkZWhlCl-gkDc9l2Qig_DqCba7ihRzGBN1IaPskhDkKm56M5GX3MZJIlWokHGJa9jKDDHXIggIQB1ntZdMN4/s640/dude+wisdom.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
<br />
<br />
I am aspiring to LEAVE IT ON THE FLOOR. Like Beyonce.<br />
<br />
I walked away from an audition feeling like crap today (argh. Blargh. MY ONE SHOT. Blargh), but recently even if I've had a good audition I've walked away and started obsessing about everything I said and did and what it meant.<br />
<br />
And honestly it's not so much the torture of that that bothers me....I'm quite accustomed to the torture of auditioning and of my own mind, but there's something so BORING about caring after a certain point. Like today as I was getting ready I started to panic about my hair, but after a certain period of time, I just get sick of myself being someone who is willing to spend that much time and effort on their hair. I actually bore myself. And it's boring to complain and it's boring to make excuses for myself (which of course I do). Who really wants to hear about a crap audition? Unless you vomit fireworks or somebody starts screaming, it's just not that interesting. So....I just want to move on from things once I did them. I did it. I work hard. There are lots of possible outcomes (really only two), but lots of ways to come to those outcomes and lots of things that can result from either one of them. So.<br />
<br />
Beyonce.<br />
<br />
Also Tupac:<br />
<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgE0Ryv0o8uh3qLCB6wgMcldWihLQnO3gWoZP2xaqWn63rK6Cy36kL2ypa2GpztrAopl3ee33dzndjCZ0HgdN_sYNFVU0AiVp6XLyAaI6DEH8-I8UVEV-65tBIgUTyU3RbZuacBP0ZC_Kk/s1600/tupac+wisdom.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="600" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgE0Ryv0o8uh3qLCB6wgMcldWihLQnO3gWoZP2xaqWn63rK6Cy36kL2ypa2GpztrAopl3ee33dzndjCZ0HgdN_sYNFVU0AiVp6XLyAaI6DEH8-I8UVEV-65tBIgUTyU3RbZuacBP0ZC_Kk/s640/tupac+wisdom.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
<br />
LEAVE IT ON THE FLOOR MOTHAFUCKAS.<br />
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Because I only want to be fascinating and thrilling and sassy, just like Beyonce! Isn't it wonderful to meet a fascinating person? A lot of people are not interested in showing you how fascinating they are, and a really good way to show people how not fascinating you are is to complain about shitty auditions. And a good way to be fascinating is to be BEYONCE!!!!<br />
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Tomorrow I have another audition, but in general I'm quite concerned about the lack of auditions I've had for summer. I've submit to a lot of places and none of them even want to see me. Could it be stories of my rampant boorishness and ceaseless swearing have reached them all the way in the regional theatres of southern Ontario? Has my unfortunate reputation preceded me? Hopefully something will come through for the long hot summer although I'm not sure what my options are.<br />
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Otherwise, I've been watching this endlessly. It's Thea Sharrock's really wonderful production of 'As You Like It' at the Old Globe from 2007. It is all on YouTube, in 12 parts, quite well done, and how I've been spending my time the past week. 'As You Like It' is my favourite Shakespearean comedy because I think it is frothy and glorious and full of love, and this production really captures that fizzy feeling. I just love it:<br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/zAem7-Rwaec" width="560"></iframe>Jessie Mercuryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01764033113458242495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1344471260532865701.post-30884545221727160002013-01-30T17:17:00.003-08:002013-01-30T17:17:57.898-08:00Well the Lord Made Me a Lion, But the Lord Forget to Make Me BraveOh man, I guess sometimes I forget that I have a blog. No, I remember always that I have a blog, but I figure you probably aren't interested in hearing most of the thoughts in my little head.<br />
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I had nothing to do and now I have to do much to do and this is a problem like what my friend Caitlin quoted from my first fictional husband Chandler Bing (actually it's Ms. Chanandler Bong) when she wrote on my facebook wall: 'Oh no. Two women love me. They're both gorgeous and sexy. My wallet's too small for my fifties and my diamond shoes are too tight!'<br />
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aka NOT A REAL PROBLEM.<br />
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But what's the one thing I like more than Muppets? More than Brownies? More than when children fall down and their parents dont' want them to cry so they make absolutely no reaction and yell, 'you're fine, get up!'? Yes, inventing problems.<br />
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I'm doing an application and I'm just overcome with the dread that someone's eventually going to read it. And if they read it, they'll judge me and think I'm terrible, and I'll live the rest of my life NOT KNOWING that whenever they see me they'll go, 'Oh, there goes that crappy theatre person'. This fear expands to not being able to show the work to people before I do it, not being able to tell people that I'm applying or ask people to work on things with me (BECAUSE THEY WILL REJECT ME).<br />
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It's really hard to do work and then it's really hard to show it to people.<br />
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I have some auditions too, and it's the same thing. The terror that they will think, 'God, is that what you think is good? Is that your best?'<br />
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Putting yourself out there artistically is just really terrifying. And while I've been doing it for a while now and survived it, even when it went poorly I am still, technically, alive, and I am still, to some extent, creating, and I am still, to a smaller extent, getting to perform on occasion, it still feels really scary. How can it not? If you care about something, it hurts to see it hurt. Or thrown away. Or just not recognized. I don't think this is a debilitating fear, because I do keep going. i feel that I'm really vulnerable and live on the precipice of quitting, but I do keep going. Somehow. But it is a fear that's preventing me from sharing the work as much as I could.<br />
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Because getting other people on board would be great. Being able to get feedback from more people would be great. Not being worried that when someone says, 'I don't want to direct your show', or 'this doesn't work for me', it really means, 'you are the least talented'. And if it means the work gets better, I really want to do it. But that means I have to overcome something and OH GOD I'LL DO IT THIS AFTERNOOOOOOOON!<br />
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Brave is hard, eh? Brave has fear in it. It's hard to move past fear.<br />
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Also, 30 Rock is ending tomorrow and Liz Lemon is my spirit animal and what am I going to do?<br />
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<br />Jessie Mercuryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01764033113458242495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1344471260532865701.post-18827736719768449912012-12-31T12:59:00.000-08:002012-12-31T12:59:38.207-08:00One, Two, Three AndHere's the plays what I saw in 2012. Most of them, at least:<br />
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1) Living With Henry, The Washing Machine, The Tiki Bikini Beach Paradise Party A Go Go, Hypnogogic Logic, LoveSexMoney, Loving the Stranger at Next Stage.<br />
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2) The Blue Dragon (Mirvish)<br />
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3)The Book of Mormon on Broadway!<br />
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4) Follies (Broadway)<br />
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5) The Golden Dragon (Tarragon)<br />
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6) Penny Plain (Factory)<br />
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7) Kim's Convenience (Soulpepper)<br />
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8) The Who's Tommy (UC Follies)<br />
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9) One night at the Rhubarb Festival, second week (Buddies)<br />
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10) The Small Room at the Top of the Stairs (Tarragon)<br />
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11) Frances and Marybeth (at Factory)<br />
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12) Clybourne Park (Studio 180)<br />
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13) Gruesome Playground Injuries (at Theatre Centre)<br />
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14) The Real World? (Tarragon)<br />
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15) Venus in Fur (Broadway)<br />
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16) One Man, Two Guv'nors ( Broadway)<br />
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17) Lost in Yonkers (HG Jewish Theatre)<br />
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18) Bring it On! (Mirvish)<br />
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19) Rent (Lower Ossington)<br />
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20) Some stuff at Fringe: Fishbowl, The Dinner, Transit Diaries, Help Yourself....quite a few things there, but I don't remember it all very clearly. I think I saw about 12 this year.<br />
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21) When It Rains (Summerworks)<br />
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22) Macbeth (Humber River)<br />
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23) Tear the Curtain! (Canadian Stage)<br />
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24) Mister Baxter (at TPM)<br />
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25) Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (Broadway)<br />
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26) Grace (Broadway)<br />
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27) Miss Caledonia (Tarragon)<br />
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28) Delicacy (at Factory)<br />
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29) Speaking in Tongues (Canadian Stage)<br />
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30) Eigengrau (Red One)<br />
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31) Bloodless (Theatre 20)<br />
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32) A Theatre Hetarae Event (at TPM)<br />
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33) Ignorance (Canadian Stage)<br />
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34) This is What Happens Next (Necessary Angel)<br />
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35) Terminus (Mirvish)<br />
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36) War Horse (Mirvish)<br />
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37) It's a Wonderful Toronto (TPM)<br />
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38) Sleep No More six times.<br />
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This seems incredibly low because I feel that I see quite quite quite a lot of stuff. There is this awful trend of not giving you a ticket which means I can't put the ticket in my book, which means I don't remember it, and the same with a program. There were definitely a handful more, and even more that I missed and wanted to see. Oh so much theatre. Oh good lord.Jessie Mercuryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01764033113458242495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1344471260532865701.post-67389109860737966012012-12-11T22:38:00.002-08:002012-12-11T22:38:58.679-08:00It Needs WorkThat 2 a.m. moment of clarity where you realize your play makes no sense.<br />
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AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHJessie Mercuryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01764033113458242495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1344471260532865701.post-59163049352808643782012-12-09T19:34:00.001-08:002012-12-11T22:39:37.737-08:00Any Moment Big or Small Is a Moment After AllI had an audition this week that was for something pretty big, in the grand scheme of things (and completely insignificant in the GRAND scheme of things, but if we're going to think that way, we might as well just give up on blogs altogether. Also maybe on our lives.). One of those rare auditions that you're like, 'Oh, wow, I'm auditioning here! Someone that I know is going to see me! This could really change my career and this could really change my life and this could really change my self'.<br />
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And that's pretty terrifying and enough to make you shit pure liquid out your pants, but as I was waiting in the hallway to go in I had this weird kind of peaceful thought:<br />
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'Welp. At least I can say I did this'.<br />
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And the audition itself kind of became the story and I pictured myself telling it to someone at some point, that I had auditioned there, in the same way that maybe I'd tell someone I once stood at Four Corners, and like how excited I get when people tell me that one time they met Madonna or ate octopus or saw the Northern Lights, someone would hear me say that I had once been there and go, 'Wow!'<br />
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If a career in theatre can be enough in those moments, if the mere fact that I would try and fail, and show up was enough, it would be incredible and I would be so satisfied and happy. I think. If as far as I got could still be amazing, even if I never got paid to do it and never made it to Stratford or Broadway or even onto another stage again, that would be something, and maybe I would be more grateful and peaceful and probably eat fewer carbs.<br />
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I don't think there's a lot of hope for me moving forward in this, so I'm trying to hold on to that feeling. I feel lucky to be seen and I'm glad I got to go in and I did something, and I think I did it ok, and maybe what I did was too weird and immature and maybe I'm too weird and immature, so maybe it just isn't a good fit anyway, and let's just be happy for the moments that we did have together. But there's this ominous feeling of 'what's next' and the worry about that and the fear of that feeling of rejection, knowing how I will feel even though I'll try so hard not to, and ick.<br />
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In the meantime I'm overhauling a play and I'm finding the slaughter of my babies to be depressing and thrilling all at once.Jessie Mercuryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01764033113458242495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1344471260532865701.post-55548667148239604912012-11-20T07:14:00.000-08:002012-11-20T07:14:22.425-08:00Dramas Annoy Us and Ruin Our NightsAll I'm gonna say is I saw a play the other night that everyone else is saying is really amazing and is getting great reviews and has incredible actors and I fell asleep.<br />
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Like not 'asleep' asleep, my eyes were still open, but I would leave and venture so far off in my mind that every time I returned to the play I was surprised by what the characters would say, because there had been simply no precedent for what they were saying. Although, there probably was, I just was sleeping through it.<br />
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'Whoa! Where did that come from? She sure is angry. Oh well. Off I go again...'<br />
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I wrote monologues and thought about my own plays, and my own life, and watched more entertaining scenes involving myself and the life I wish I lived in my mind. Practically from the beginning. I'm sure it's a really great play, I just was totally not there for it.<br />
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I feel like I probably have no right to say this. All these critics who know so much more than me are loving it and other people in the theatre seemed to be having an all right time. But the facts are, officer, I was bored.Jessie Mercuryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01764033113458242495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1344471260532865701.post-75682720574177070412012-11-19T11:36:00.000-08:002012-11-19T11:36:23.309-08:00I Got a Rock and Roll Girlfriend<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgv_o7g00JYj6VBSkV9raGatLXIc1My4s9Nnmxjik1BiYSGTfjt-2sGjqGoBqcmWxnTYs-dcUHaTrb1vvmgRR5xo9zGCvjpHhH638RXoaWtKpl7RQcYooIH4Uhcq5K-NbINbEq75xSltAY/s1600/patti+robert.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgv_o7g00JYj6VBSkV9raGatLXIc1My4s9Nnmxjik1BiYSGTfjt-2sGjqGoBqcmWxnTYs-dcUHaTrb1vvmgRR5xo9zGCvjpHhH638RXoaWtKpl7RQcYooIH4Uhcq5K-NbINbEq75xSltAY/s640/patti+robert.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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I've been reading Patti Smith's <i>Just Kids</i> lately. I have developed this habit of rereading books immediately after finishing them. I'm finding it hard to feel 'done' with things, I finish something and feel there's more to be mined. There were a few plays I couldn't put back on my shelf because I felt I had to have them around all the time. So I'm in the middle of my second read of this one.<br />
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Patti Smith and Robert Mapplethorpe have this amazing relationship that fills me with envy and romantic longing.<br />
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And because they're artists, and he became a photographer, there are all these amazing pictures of them that I just love.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidS-zWOHz9u0OF1MlzsTFGS0BaqUDScs0YhHa9CC0EQR1NkYRaej4PLwMNDcrdPlHYqd5vaBP6321Cp1GUGZhyphenhyphenN7V9ugzDJkelJrRxzoJTEHRWNDiNz76aST53gF2ZUinaegRGeZmbFr4/s1600/patti-smith-robert-mapplethorpe.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="436" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidS-zWOHz9u0OF1MlzsTFGS0BaqUDScs0YhHa9CC0EQR1NkYRaej4PLwMNDcrdPlHYqd5vaBP6321Cp1GUGZhyphenhyphenN7V9ugzDJkelJrRxzoJTEHRWNDiNz76aST53gF2ZUinaegRGeZmbFr4/s640/patti-smith-robert-mapplethorpe.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg13Ikkk6JYGCjmWvOoODHnd_D6OB_08jaJjKh2fomxyNvHR2rRIr5Ol9H4BkF7w8Sx9CWTqCpTZYZ4g7N2YVzBp77sIkVRVoZJmxxHUMDYVjSnVLuqd8b_LIzEF_K4YS7luenMJl_maaU/s1600/Patti+6.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="430" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg13Ikkk6JYGCjmWvOoODHnd_D6OB_08jaJjKh2fomxyNvHR2rRIr5Ol9H4BkF7w8Sx9CWTqCpTZYZ4g7N2YVzBp77sIkVRVoZJmxxHUMDYVjSnVLuqd8b_LIzEF_K4YS7luenMJl_maaU/s640/Patti+6.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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They are so the cool kids. I wish I had pictures like this. I find them really inspiring in a melancholy way. </div>
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Apparently Robert Mapplethorpe would look at all his pictures and say, 'That's the one with the magic'. I think these all have the magic, but I mostly just love the idea of looking at things that way. And having the confidence to know which one did have the magic. He was right though. His stuff is amazing. And magic.</div>
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There's something about all these pictures that is so lovely, so artful and yet so unposed. Easy edgy. I think this is what 'cool' is, although having never been cool a day in my life I don't know if I'm qualified to judge. </div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjs8Cm2_B15skU_m8tcjt5ubKO38cZs725p14-hKJOtq5TYjc5Aot8-ug_YWbM-4lwrZSEmxHrPPo5JIF_4btWeZf6_2LUpLHA9UjJrHjSFJv2ZomU9_HeblWxhOdFjQiz72vevilAHvDQ/s1600/patti-smith-robert-mapplethorpe-homotography-6.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="440" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjs8Cm2_B15skU_m8tcjt5ubKO38cZs725p14-hKJOtq5TYjc5Aot8-ug_YWbM-4lwrZSEmxHrPPo5JIF_4btWeZf6_2LUpLHA9UjJrHjSFJv2ZomU9_HeblWxhOdFjQiz72vevilAHvDQ/s640/patti-smith-robert-mapplethorpe-homotography-6.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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Don't you wish you had a friend like this?</div>
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Don't you wish there was someone who understood that doing things like taking amazing pictures of yourself is equal parts cool and goofy, and loves that?</div>
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Patti Smith talks about how they could work together, on separate projects, so happily. And how PROUD they were of each other, how giving, artistically. </div>
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I'm trying to learn to be less jealous and intimidated, to be more loving of other artists, because obviously I know how hard it is, and we all have to be held with so much grace. I wish I had nothing but joy for everyone else who I was competing with, for everyone who is trying, like I am, to do something incredible. But it's hard. It's hard to be fully behind someone else when you want what they're going after too. It's hard to not feel jealous. For me anyway. </div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhboCKZfN9UffKZv-uEs8lXIeF-EwsGBH_G8GapiO-SQshfDuSjQcqo2ZnEooUpjW_uU-PBBx9b9_HRaljtslzoZi82cdSLGjAFYWjKukIJ_0C_8pzezqcqTAwIIHKVgVOR1G8oAypJb4A/s1600/patti-smith-robert-mapplethorpe-homotography-3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhboCKZfN9UffKZv-uEs8lXIeF-EwsGBH_G8GapiO-SQshfDuSjQcqo2ZnEooUpjW_uU-PBBx9b9_HRaljtslzoZi82cdSLGjAFYWjKukIJ_0C_8pzezqcqTAwIIHKVgVOR1G8oAypJb4A/s640/patti-smith-robert-mapplethorpe-homotography-3.jpg" width="426" /></a></div>
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It's frustrating that the community feels more like competition than community. I don't want it to, but I'm perpetuating it with the way that I feel. </div>
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<span style="text-align: start;">I said to someone a while ago that I think I want a creative partner the way most people want a romantic partner. The idea of finding someone who loves your work and pushes your work and creates things with you and makes you better and understands and is your little armour to the world, the thing that wraps you and protects you and lets you go into battle. I'm very in love with this idea. It's never happened for me. </span></div>
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<span style="text-align: start;">There's also something, to me at least, about the friendship being the work of art in itself. I'm writing something about that right now, but there's something about the creation of yourself as you're working on something, the falling in love with who you are because of the amazing people you've managed to get around you, that are working on this thing too. You work on a project and you fall in love with the people who are also working on it, and it makes you feel cool for a second too. The reflection of your love makes you beautiful. And that in itself is an artistic creation.</span></div>
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<span style="text-align: start;">You create yourself in the work you do and the relationships you cultivate, and the self you create is the artist you want to be. </span></div>
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<span style="text-align: start;">I don't know. </span></div>
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<span style="text-align: start;">But there's something here that's beautiful and rare and intended and mysterious and of a moment that stays with you, and I think those are all things that great art should be. </span></div>
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'Where does it all lead? What will become of us? Those were our young questions, and young answers were revealed.<br />
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It leads to each other. We become ourselves.'<br />
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This is my favourite picture:</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCYS2DoAgVxNxuguS6MjKi1GranaXDPw7S3ocLgMLh9cHm1s0BvgYCLiqf-XMGGfJo2H-ME7tgtC10L76WEp-zpIAcxob6-aUfnmPJWCIshVqOmWzF8ohCF0eqtQwR9owHTYnIXA8pi-w/s1600/Patti+3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCYS2DoAgVxNxuguS6MjKi1GranaXDPw7S3ocLgMLh9cHm1s0BvgYCLiqf-XMGGfJo2H-ME7tgtC10L76WEp-zpIAcxob6-aUfnmPJWCIshVqOmWzF8ohCF0eqtQwR9owHTYnIXA8pi-w/s640/Patti+3.jpg" width="395" /></a></div>
Jessie Mercuryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01764033113458242495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1344471260532865701.post-81012222432879025682012-11-15T11:48:00.003-08:002012-11-15T11:48:53.176-08:00Pick Your Left Foot Up When Your Right Foot's Down<a href="http://articles.latimes.com/2012/nov/12/entertainment/la-ca-angels-in-america-20121111">This is an interesting read.</a><br />
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I'm doggedly applying for some grants right now, even though I don't know what projects are really valuable and I should keep working on and am generally feeling a little eek. I love Angels in America, and the scope of it is so incredible (I've said the same thing about my ongoing lover, Sleep No More), and I wish my work didn't feel so small and insignificant. But then if I write something for more than three people, it might never see the light of day.<br />
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This balance between how to make art and then how to get ahead and be business like so that you CAN make the art you want is very tricky and I don't know how to balance it. And of course, just thinking like that makes me frustrated because shouldn't I just create, create all the time, huge things and do it for the sake of themselves, and if no one sees it it doesn't matter?<br />
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I can't think that way. Because it does matter. Like Roy Cohn says in Angels in America, 'clout'. You need to be noticed. You can't push into a vacuum. It will suck you right up.<br />
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Anyway, that was one of a few inspiring things I've been surrounding myself with. Reread Angels last night. I will finally see a version of it next summer because a theatre company here is putting it on and I'm so excited. It really is a thrilling piece of work. So exciting to see something so big, all those ideas be chewed on like that. Ugh, start small, get big? Go big or go home?<br />
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My friend Jenna and I saw a play the other night that wasn't the most inspiring, but we were both kind of wracked with desire to be up on stage. And then we talked about whether it's better to just throw caution to the wind and throw something up and if it fails oh well, or if something has to be good, has to have a certain value or it wasn't worth it anyway. This kind of relates to this big/small debate. Do you do what you can just because you can, or do you wait until you can do something huge, but risk that that time will never come?<br />
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Of course, my feeling is to do something impossible immediately, but I get in to trouble an awful lot.....Jessie Mercuryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01764033113458242495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1344471260532865701.post-12146254496800483962012-11-06T15:56:00.001-08:002012-11-06T15:56:21.514-08:00It's a Quiet Thing<span style="font-size: large;">Here's the anatomy of my rejection. A break down (how appropriate!):</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">1. A blow. Punch. The air is pushed out of my stomach like you're stepping on a balloon. I get that winded feeling where everything sinks, the whole of me reels in to my stomach and then evaporates in all directions. Like that camera shot where things simultaneously move closer and farther away. That's also the visual image I've had when I've experienced the worst of my panic attacks. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">It's a gasp of air that doesn't make it. A chunk of bubblegum that has been rotting in you for years, and you never noticed it til right now, all of a sudden there is a rock inside of you. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">And stillness.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">2. Immediate depression. Low grade, kind of petulant sadness. Little kid sadness. Not the sadness of children, which I think we all know is unending and would melt you if you saw it, but the sadness of little kids, when they cry and no tears come out, when they fall and look back to you to know if they're hurt or not. Sometimes solved by ice cream or a lash of whiskey. This doesn't last very long, this one. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">3. That amazing part of me, of all of us, that survives, the part that is not destroyed by the fire, but purified, kicks in. 'Oh well'. A certain resilience. This is the part of me that keeps me from falling off tall buildings. I dont' give it a lot of credit, but it is there. It, again, doesn't last long. It goes, 'There will be others. It is their loss. Oh well. Who cares?'</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">4. Immediately silenced by the hideous hose beast who lives in my heart and says, 'I CARE! I SUCK. I HAVE NO TALENT AND WILL NEVER BE ABLE TO CHANGE MY LOT IN LIFE. GIVE UP GIVE UP EVERYONE IS LAUGHING AT YOU. FALL OFF TALL BUILDING!'</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2fiRRWpKG56RPZUQloB2uxUF4fUAyw3wlndNRpL9rQ0zmaOxE1X2o3BCBUgYZsEe_lYGr7F0y4CDYXqpe2KarEvvI59QFfiCxo-tGoCT7f820KBm3OepJUApj_E0L0c3Iedsm_J_pUtQ/s1600/Madam_Mim_as_a_Dragon.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="483" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2fiRRWpKG56RPZUQloB2uxUF4fUAyw3wlndNRpL9rQ0zmaOxE1X2o3BCBUgYZsEe_lYGr7F0y4CDYXqpe2KarEvvI59QFfiCxo-tGoCT7f820KBm3OepJUApj_E0L0c3Iedsm_J_pUtQ/s640/Madam_Mim_as_a_Dragon.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">(We know who this is, right? This is Madam Mim as a dragon from the Sword in the Stone! It's amazing how much she looks like me!)</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">5. Then, I get a kind of numb quiet feeling. Empty. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">A huge part of being rejected (as an actor, but even more so as a writer, which is the current rejection I'm dealing with), is the feeling that no one cares what I think. No one feels the way I feel. No one is interested in what I have to say. This becomes terrifying as an artist and makes me think that I'm not an artist, and then it goes deeper and makes me think I'm not a human being. I look at stuff that goes on, or is accepted, and am flummoxed (an excellent word, that, excellent). It makes me think that I don't get what everyone else likes, so of course they don't get me. It's what loneliness feels like. It's that moment at the part where everyone is having so much fun and you start to cry. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">Numb numb numb. Something vibrating so intensely that you can't see it moving at all. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">I flip back and forth between this numb feeling and total despair. Occasional rallies from within of 'you can do it', or whatever. The most effective of these are when I pretend that I'm being interviewed after a great success, and I say these places that didn't support me, and look where I am now, fuckos! Does that make me petty? Probably. I am not getting better at handling rejection. It slays me. It slays me. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">And then, I guess, there's the carrying on. At some point I won't carry on. At some point it will be the end. I'm never sure if I'm at that point. I always think I am, but then something happens, I do something, and even if I remain distinctly not a success and distinctly frightened and confused, I do something. Right now I feel that I'm not carrying on, but I am. I think. Still angry and hurt. Still so frustrated. But I'm reading Patti Smith's 'Just Kids', and listening to Joe Tex, and watching PT Anderson movies endlessly, and reading about theatre that's being created elsewhere in the world, and I feel that these are a part of carrying on, in some way. The fuelling. The wondering and wandering. Maybe? I dont' know. It feels like a not-low grade depression, but it's also full of stuff that is beautiful and inspiring. Even if I can't be inspired right now, it's there. I'm absorbing. I hope. I really hope that this is a calm, this is an ebb, but there's something else that I'm just gearing up for. I'm not sure though, honestly. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">I feel as if I might be quitting but I also feel as if I've just begun to fight. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><iframe allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen" frameborder="0" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/szEAqKbAGz4" width="420"></iframe></span>Jessie Mercuryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01764033113458242495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1344471260532865701.post-23751536223743123622012-11-04T08:57:00.001-08:002012-11-04T08:57:29.621-08:00Though You Sometimes Do Come By The Occasional Black EyeWe are having a rejection supersale over here!<br />
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Rejection over here! Rejection over there! Rejected from things I don't even know if I care about (BUT I DO!)! Rejected from things I wanted very badly! COMING OUT MY EARS!<br />
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It comes in such amazing waves somehow. Bam bam bam.<br />
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Anyway. That's great.<br />
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This is mostly writing rejection, because I haven't been on an audition in ages! Hooray! I had a few auditions in the later part of the summer and didn't get anything! Yippeee!!!<br />
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And now we have this wonderful fall look of not being able to move forward in writing.<br />
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It's really hard to keep going and find motivation when you just feel like you're being slammed. Some are just unfortunate (you send a play that you spent weeks on, three days before the deadline, and then they say that they reached the quota that night and your script won't even be read. THANK YOU SO MUCH!), and some are just, 'but...but....why don't you like me?...I did everything right....'. They suck equally.<br />
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If I were a cool person I would embed a .GIF here, BUT I'M NOT.<br />
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I had a relatively fecund creative period, of creating a lot of stuff and submitting it. I have a lot of projects now at varying stages of development but absolutely no where to put them and no one to work on them with. Hmmm. That thought has me pretty much bone dry, in terms of both ideas and desire to work.<br />
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All I want to do is watch movies allllll the time. All the time! The work that others have already created is somehow much more fulfilling than the angst my own work causes me.<br />
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There are three more things I should hear back from in the next two weeks, and I'm pretty sure they'll all be 'no's'. Two more will come sometime after that. In the meantime, I can either keep applying for other things, or I can watch 'GoodFellas' for the fifth time in three days.<br />
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Who knows what will happen???Jessie Mercuryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01764033113458242495noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1344471260532865701.post-29106631751087242242012-10-27T15:09:00.004-07:002012-10-27T15:09:53.432-07:00Then From Out of the Blue and Without Any Guide...I hate my ideas.<br />
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I'm so incredibly limited by my own brain. My stupid, unoriginal brain.<br />
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Whenever anyone else has an idea I think it is just the best thing ever and then I crap all over it with my stupid ideas about what could happen next. I love step two. If you come up with an idea, I will get really excited about it for you and tell you a million directions you could go with it. I just wish I had a single original idea myself.<br />
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I'm trying to let other people's ideas just be: keep my enthusiasm and be a supportive, silent friend who listens and asks instead of saying, 'LET'S SUBMIT IT FOR FRINGE! I LOVE THIS, I'LL BE THE SECRETARY!'. Maybe I just have genius friends. I really believe that people have to own their projects, that a dramaturge or feedback giver or whatever is there as a sounding board, instead of someone who has to 'fix' things. At least before the play gets up. At least when the play is struggling to just be what it is on its own terms, when it can't even walk yet. So I'm working on being excited in a quiet way. In a 'you be you' way.<br />
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It's difficult.<br />
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The other thing I'm learning about my own ideas is that when I have one, I want to give it to someone. I want someone to say, 'yes, this deserves to live'. But inevitably, they want to turn it into their own thing, or they don't get as excited about it as I am. I don't even know what I'm looking for when I tell someone an idea too early, I just feel a compulsion to do it. And it always ends up disappointing me. I just need too much encouragement, no one could ever give me enough. Plus, I'm so stubborn that the second someone says, 'Do you know what you should do?', I want to never do it ever, out of sheer obstinance. What a monster I am. Impossible to work with or even be around.<br />
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So I have an idea now that is so so so far removed from being anything. It's barely an idea. It's like half a thought. It's a 'thoug'. But it has a bit of a glimmer and a gleam to me so I'm trying to keep it to my damn self. See if I can bring something into being myself. Eventually it will need someone. Actually, I have one show that is now finished a second draft and so desperately needs someone, needs someone to come in and look at it and help me. But this idea isn't there yet. If I don't even know what it is, how can I ask someone to love it?<br />
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So sit on it, Jessica. Keep it to yourself. For just a minute. Incubate. Mother duck. Mother hen.<br />
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This need to share, this compulsion for validation is related, I think, to my original love of theatre, which was that it was how I met cool people. The theatre is the closest I have ever felt to having friends. I want other people to want to work with me and like my ideas. But I'm alone. I don't have a company, or partners. I work by myself. There are a million independent artists in Toronto, and they don't ask me to work with them. No one is interested in what I do. This is an endless sadness to me but is the way things are. And maybe the benefit to this is that I get to really form things myself and see what they are to me before I give them away. So I have to hold on to them for a bit.<br />
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It's difficult.Jessie Mercuryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01764033113458242495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1344471260532865701.post-25405717859633698512012-10-19T16:12:00.002-07:002012-10-19T16:12:20.412-07:00Someone tell the story, someone sing the song.Read <a href="http://www.dispositio.net/archives/1225">this</a>.<br />
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Love it. Causing a lot of pain because I think that's what I'm trying to do in the play that I'm writing that I affectionately call 'the worst play ever written' (or, alternatively, 'the roadside baby', as in the baby that maybe should be left for the wolves), and it's very hard. Damn, it's hard. So easy to talk, to use language in a way to evoke and recreate and image, so hard to make language move and push and stab and run and have characters do the same.<br />
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This thing of 'action' that we apparently do all the time naturally and knowingly and unknowingly in life, why is that so hard to bottle and stage? Stop trying to bottle it, Jessica. Then how do you conjure it?<br />
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Garrrrrrr. Losing faith that I am, indeed, a writer. Having similar fear about acting, and prospects of ever acting again. Gar. Angst. Blergh.Jessie Mercuryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01764033113458242495noreply@blogger.com0