Another walk on the beach . . .

Aside from the middle aged man tanning nude on the beach it was a pretty pleasant day on the edge of the Pacific Ocean. Mid 70's with a slight breeze - can't beat that on October 31st. Happy Halloween!

Looking North into down town Long Beach

A cute little crane type dude that was enjoying the waves

Nothing like frolicking in the sunshine and sparkling waves

The seagulls - there is one particular stretch of beach that these guys consistently occupy - the sit and stare. I've never met a more judgmental group of gulls. They don't even move when you get close to them.

I think you'll notice I am a little tanner than normal but its the same smile :)

For Halloween I decided to be a beach bum . . . I think it worked pretty well, not a bad way to spend the 31st of October - shorts and sand.

22 days until frost and closed toed shoes!

26 Hours

I spent 26 hours this past week working as an over-hire at SCR. An over-hire is the term assigned to people who are hired to work in the shop or electrics world in addition to the people that are on staff. In my case I was working with lighting in the electrics world. At SCR there are three people that are considered staff in this department. One master electrician for both theatre spaces and then an additional person that would be termed the master electrician's assistant/board operator for each theatre space; in the case of SCR this equals three full time staff members. Over hires are added to the crew when building a show and sometimes to operate spot lights and other special things that may be needed for a production. Basically I spent Tuesday and Wednesday hanging and cabling lights, Thursday was spent making snowflakes painted on backdrops sparkle with Christmas Lights and Friday was spent focusing all the lights we hung. I got lucky and was asked by the designer to be an extra body on stage so he could essentially focus two lights at a time which meant I got paid to stand around Friday night. It made our 6pm-Midnight time frame much more bearable. I think I only actually touched 4 lights yesterday which was a nice break considering the bruises I gave my self the previous 3 days. I was told I did very well - hopefully that means I will be hired in the future if opportunities work with my intern schedule.
On Wednesday we finished early and I got stuck in traffic driving home. It always amazes me how many cars can be on the freeways at one time. At one point I was stopped for the duration of 4 songs on the radio. Somewhere during song 2 I realized I was right next to this:

Thats right - Long Beach:

 population 492,652

elevation: 29

It's Friday!

So many things have happened in the last week that this may turn out to be a very long post. I suppose that is what happens when you get lazy about typing.
I've started walking to the beach every few days with Ashley (the gal that lives in my apartment complex who moved here from MT) and the first few times we went walking we were still getting to know the area a bit. Our first trip to the beach took us down Loma St. straight to the beach. It was a little tricky because the side of the street we were on seemed to be very overgrown with plans and random construction projects - I'm not sure why we didn't just cross to the other side but it must have been because we were having good conversation and didn't think of it. We got to the beach and decided to head south on the beach path to the Belmont Veterans Memorial Pier. We arrived at the pier and made our way out to the end dodging fish that were being pulled out of the sea and whipped over head - you must need that extra tug to get them over the rail, giant seagulls and what I assumed to be piles of fish guts that littered the walkway. The pictures of the pier in the link above look much nicer than its actual state at the time I visited it. I was also shocked to see a man relieving himself over the edge of the pier less than 5 feet from where a few kids were fishing - disgusting! We quickly left the pier and headed home.
On our second walk to the beach we decided to go north on the beach path and then walked back on the sand right next to the ocean. It was quite nice with the exception of all the litter we passed. I saw 4 shoes - none of them matched each other and various bottles, cups, cans and wrappers. It has potential to be a pretty nice beach if people would take better care of it.
Last wednesday Alma called as asked if I wanted to accompany her to the LA Fashion District. It sounded like a nice excursion from everyday life so I happily accepted the offer. We headed into LA and spent probably 3 hours roaming around a handful of the shops in the fashion district. I have never seen so much fabric! Some of it was priced very cheaply but for the most part it was priced very similarly to what you would expect to find at a JoAnne Fabrics or Michael's type store. We also walked through part of the garment district where you could buy just about anything related to the way you look -shoes, contacts, clothes, wigs and hair accessories; the possibilities were really endless. Alma was looking for white sequined fabric to finish her Cher costume for Halloween and we did eventually find what she was looking for. Once that happened we had to find our way back to our car which was located on rooftop parking. Neither of us had payed perfect attention to where we parked but between the two of us we were able to piece together where we thought the car was and eventually found it. Here are a few pictures from that day:

Fabric in one of the many shops we visited

The view from our parking spot into downtown LA 

A building that caught my eye - Alma said it was a textile factory/sweat shop - I have no idea if she was right or wrong 

We also drove through the Flower District - it smelled AMAZING! 

After driving around downtown for a while we went to lunch at Philippe's which is "home of the french dip sandwich." It was pretty tasty - "Philippe's "French Dipped Sandwich" is the specialty of the house and consists of either roast beef, roast pork, leg of lamb, turkey or ham served on a lightly textured, freshly baked French roll which has been dipped in the natural gravy of the roasts." It is a place with a lot of history - saw dust on the floor reminded me of Moose's and the stories of Mobster murders happening in the dining hall made it that much more interesting to eat there. After lunch we took a ride to China Town. I have to say I was a little disappointed with this area because I expected it to be more alive than it actually was. There were very few people around and while there were plenty of shops they all seemed to be selling the same things. After China Town we decided we had better head back to Long Beach so Alma wouldn't be late to work. I am not 100% sure how we got to the Vincent Thomas Bridge but we did. This bridge is amazing. It goes over The Port of Los Angeles which appears to be a very busy port claiming to house almost $200 billion dollars of cargo.

If you look closely you can see the arc of the bridge in the distance

Driving up to the top of the bridge

Cargo containers - there were thousands of containers - imagine having to be the person in charge of keeping track of where everything was  . . .

The view into long beach

We actually crossed two bridges, the big one went over the Port of L.A. and the second, smaller one when over the Port of Long Beach. I'd like to drive over the bridges at night some time, I hear they are lit up quite prettily.

After our day in L.A. I made plans to go that weekend up to Glendale to stay with my good friends Maggie and Lance. We got tickets to see a production of Shakespeare's 12th Night by a company named A Noise Within. We were a part of the first audience to see a show in their new theatre space and permanent home. Which happens to be a very nice $13.5 million dollar facility. It was a good show - not the best show I've seen but certainly entertaining. We spent the rest of the weekend eating too much good food and shopping for things we didn't really need. Maggie asked me to help her find some new clothes for auditions and an interview she had coming up with a possible new agent so we spent most of Sunday exploring the Glendale shopping center. At one point Maggie referred to it as the Disneyland for adults. Tons of stores, water fountains and a trolley. Shopping doesn't get much better. We ended that day by making breakfast for dinner. Biscuits and bacon gravy with roasted potatoes, onions and red peppers. Mmmmmmm good! Monday we went to Porto's Bakery for brunch. It happens to be a Cuban bakery that makes the most delicious potato balls and their display cases are full of very tasty looking pastries, cookies and cakes. After brunch and browse through a used book store I headed back to Long Beach. It wasn't too bad of a drive, only about 40 minutes for a 28 mile drive; we had so much fun we are talking about doing something again this weekend.

I got back to Long Beach, did some laundry and went grocery shopping because I needed things I could take for lunch this week. I was hired as an over-hire electrics crew person for Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. Today is the last day and I will be working 6pm - Midnight. We've been hanging lights for the SCR Theatre for Young Audiences production of "Junie B. in Jingle Bells, Batman Smells." It has been hard work but good hard work. I have come home tired each day and am excited to go back for more. Yesterday we started putting christmas lights through the points of snowflakes on a painted back drip. This involves drilling holes through a luan type material, poking lights through it and then taping the lights so they don't fall out. A tedious job that I think is actually going to look quite nice once we are finished. Tonight we continue that project and will focus lights with the designer. Wish me luck! 26 more days (including today) until I will back in MONTANA!!!

Crazy things . . .

 . . . that happened during rehearsals that I never had time to write about. Not that there were many of these instances and I may have in fact already written about one or two of these on my blog but in case you missed them or I didn't actually write about them here they are.

Incident #1: The Monday after our first week of rehearsals I was sitting at my computer and noticed that something on the back of my leg was itching rather persistently and when I stood up to look at what it actually was this is what I found....

(this picture was taken Tuesday after rehearsal)

Roughly 25 bites that were swollen to the size of dimes. If you look really closely you'll notice that there are two bites on the arch of my right foot - those and the two bites in the exact same place on my left foot were by far the most painful and swelled at their peach to the size/thickness of half your average grape. YUCK! I spent all of Monday terrified that my room had somehow become infested with bed bugs. I washed all of my bedding and towels, vacuumed the floor and my mattress, clorox wiped all the hard surfaces I could reach and put all of my pillows into plastic bags and put them on the porch so they would heat up and boil and living critter that might have thought to make their home in the comfort of my pillows. After much research I concluded that it was likely not bed bugs but either chiggers from the beach or fleas from sitting on a neighbors porch who has cats. When I got to rehearsal Tuesday both Jenny and Deb were pretty sure I should go see a doctor but what I had read told me that you really can't determine what bug bit you from the bite. Unless you have the actual bug you may never know what decided to have a few bites. We compromised - I allowed them to take a picture of the back of my legs so we could monitor the bites - both size and number to make sure I wasn't continually being bit. I am happy to report that I have had no more bites and the evidence of being bit in the first place is mostly gone.

Incident #2: At rehearsal sometime during the week that I was recovering from unknown bug bites we were running through a scene and all of the sudden it smelled like ammonia or some other chemicle was being run through our air system. We left the rehearsal space and settled in the lobby for the rest of rehearsal. After much searching and talking with operations we learned that a man had been working on the roof and had been stung by a bee. His reaction was to go get wasp spray and spary. The only problem was he decided to do this right next to the air in-take of the air conditioning system that fed directly into our rehearsal space. It smelled awful and Sarah being pregnant was enough of an excuse to avoid breathing toxic chemicals for the rest of the day so we moved rehearsal to the lobby for the rest of the day. 

Incident #3: One of our actors - who shall remain unnamed - had a bit of a diva moment when we placed a hat on a table during blocking. They believed that hats on tables were unlucky and a sign of death. We were pretty sure they were wrong and went so far as to do the research during rehearsal and found that this is true of hats on beds but really had nothing to do with hats on tables; needless to say, so as not to distract said actor changed they blocking anyway and we never placed another hat on a table during the rest of the process.

Incident #4: Our master electrician - who hired me to work next week - was helping fix a light before one of our preview shows and tripped. She fell face first into the ground row - basically a a piece of wood that is erected to hide lights that are set on the floor. Our ground row was cut to a shape to resemble the uneven silhouette a wheat field would look like semi jagged edges. Any how the ground row basically went through her lip and she ended up very bloody and with 7 stitches in her mouth. She is pretty tough and was back at work not the next day but the day after. We wondered if hats on tables are bad luck what does it mean when there is blood shed on your stage . . .??

Incident #5: One of the effects that happened in the show was a bunch of papers being blown off a desk by the "wind." You would not believe how difficult it is to make this happen consistently. We struggled with this every show - flat new pieces of paper are too heavy to fly and over-handled pages seem to have the same problem. We would think we had it figured out and then only two pieces would move during a show. Flying paper is hard to do.

Incident #6: The sound check was often being executed as I would mop the stage. I got really good at dancing with a mop :)

Incident #7: I particularly enjoyed watching patrons search our faces (Jenny, Deb and me) to see if we were actors as we left the theatre. There was a good number of famous faces around as many from Sarah's cast on Suits showed up to see her in the show. I met many of them backstage and they were all quite lovely.

21 Thoughts for 21 Shows

Sunday marked the 21st and final showing of How the World Began at SCR and the end of my first show at SCR. I have been in California for nearly 2 months now and thought it would be fun to reflect on that time and what I've learned/observations. So in no particular order . . .
1: I can't believe we actually did 21 shows. That is a serious increase from a run of 4 shows in the high school circuit.
2: 21 shows meant 21 lemon meringue pies that we had to thaw for performances and see two pieces eaten off said pie before it was thrown in a trash can - what a waste.
3: Yes. I swept and mopped every day.
4: I particularly enjoyed our rehearsal process because of how talkative our actors were. It was very interesting listening to them discuss their views and ideas for the show.
5: Our director took to calling the stage management team "Angels" - like Charlie's Angels because there were 3 of us and we are all women.
6: We "Angels" got stuff done - we worked very efficiently as a team, I could not have asked for better people to show me the ropes at SCR. This is us after opening:

Deb, Daniella(our director), Jenny and Me

Goofing off at the opening party - you can see the fancy lights in the background

It has been 3 days and I already miss these girls - somedays they were my sanity

7: We took this picture after our last show to send to our director:

8: I whole heartedly believe that a smile goes a long way. 

9: I'm pretty sure my smile and ability to converse with people intelligently is what got me a NEW temporary job at the theatre.

10: I was hired as an over-hire to help hang and focus lights in the theatre for the next show. It is technically only 4 days of work but at $13 an hour I will take it.

11: When you are on book (watching lines for actors) for more than 3 weeks you start to know the lines pretty well - we joked about how I would be the understudy if one of the guys couldn't go on.

12: Knowing the lines is really annoying backstage during shows when your actors start making up words or switching things around.

13: Opening night parties are pretty amazing - open bar, buffet tables, fancy lights - all things that make a good party are in practice.

14: Head lamps are apparently a new "thing" in California theaters - I've had mine since I was at good old U of I and every one here was so impressed that I knew it was a useful tool in theatre when I got mine out.

15: Headset chatter never goes away and always manages to amuse no matter how hard you are trying to ignore it.

16: A show always seemed to resonate better with the actors when the audience was more vocal.

17: Younger audiences were more inclined to give standing ovations than older audiences.

18: Our show pretty consistently ran an hour and 34 minutes which meant that I was often home by 10:15pm - a very early time that I expect to be later with all my other shows except the Theatre for Youth Show I will be working on which will have me at the theatre by 7am most days and then home by 4pm.

19: A good lighting design always makes me happy - for this show the back drop to the classroom was the Kansas prairie. We got to see a lot of pretty Kansas sunsets.

20: Reading a book by the pool is just as fun as reading a book by headlamp back stage during the show. I think I read 5 books/plays during our run.

21: I love love love love LoVE my job! I am so glad I was chosen for an internship and I can't wait to start on my next show even if it will only be for 2 weeks.

area code 406

One good thing to come of the heat wave the last 2 days was a chance meeting at the pool. Wednesday I was laying out in the sun and was joined by another girl. We were the only two people enjoying the pool in 98 degree weather. We said hello and that was about all. Yesterday I was at the pool again and saw the same girl. We struck up an actual conversation this time and I found out she had just moved here from
MONTANA! I should have known she was from good old MT from how nice and normal she was. Though not born and raised, she had been living there for the past 12 years. She moved here to live with her mom and they live in the building next to mine. She understood all of my thoughts on California and pretty much agreed with all of them too. We have plans to hang out and perhaps go walking/running on the beach in the very near future. More proof that Montana really is the best place around. It was a welcome relief to meet a genuinely nice person in the midst of all of the craziness that has been happening recently - basically everything having to do with my living situation got turned upside down and at this point I am in a holding pattern waiting to see what is going to happen. Anyhow she gave me her number so we could hang out again and it stared with the numbers 406 :)
It has cooled off today and there is a nice breeze at the moment. Not sure if it is cool enough to bake cookies but I am seriously considering it. Enjoy the weekend!

98 Degrees

Various sources on the internet and electronic signs around town this afternoon have posted temperatures ranging from 95 degrees F to 100 degrees F. It is October 12th and I am melting and so is all of the chocolate I have in my cupboard. I really thought we were past heat like this down here in Long Beach, on the ocean, where it's not supposed to be this hot anyway, but apparently I was mistaken. Needless to say I spent another afternoon at the pool, snoozing in the sunshine and reading a few pages from my book.
I'm about to head to Costa Mesa for this evenings performance of How the World Began. After that first reviewer the others have all been pretty positive. We have 7 performances left - the last one being a Sunday matinee. Hard to believe that we are almost done with this show - seems like yesterday we were sitting in our rehearsal room listening to the actors go through their table work. After Sunday I am on a three week vacation from the theatre. My next show will be a two week assignment to SCR's annual Christmas Carol and then I'll be home!

Two more reviews . . .

Two more reviews were published this week detailing our show "How the World Began." I am happy to report that these were much more positive reviews which seems to agree with the general perception of our audiences. SCR has been trying something new with our show and hosting talk-backs after EVERY performance. This is their way of gauging audience reaction and so far it seems to have been very successful. On occasion one of the actors joins the host on stage but it is usually some one from the literary department or the artistic director. So far I have been too busy putting props away and making sure everything is where it should be before we go home that I only catch bits and pieces of what is being discussed but as I said before people seem to be enjoying the show and the talk back.

The two reviews:

http://www.examiner.com/arts-in-los-angeles/austen-s-pride-treischmann-s-new-world-at-south-coast-rep

http://www.dailypilot.com/entertainment/tn-dpt-1007-titus-20111006,0,6084511.story

We are heading into another 5 performance weekend tonight so I conditioned myself by laying out at the pool for a few hours. Can you believe it is October 7th and it is warm enough to lay outside at the pool? It was quite nice and I was joined by to foreign exchange students who are studying at USC-LB. They are two very nice girls from Germany who seem to be fascinated by my work at a theatre. They both are in an introduction to theatre course and are always very excited to tell me about their most recent assignments and ask my opinion on various aspects of what they are learning-it makes for an interesting afternoon.
Happy FRIDAY to whomever reads this little blog! Enjoy your weekend!!

Two Birthdays and Opening Weekend

I can't believe how quickly time seems to be flying by. Seems like just last week I was unpacking my car and looking for a bed to buy on craigslist. Yesterday we wrapped up the end of opening week which was crazy busy why I haven't written anything for awhile.
I'll start at the beginning. The first part of our week at the theatre was rehearsals followed by previews. A preview is a run of the show just like it would be when we are open but it can still technically be considered a rehearsal. Those were looong days. We would arrive at the theatre 11:30 and get ready for rehearsal. From about 12:45 until 5:45 we would rehearse the show. Our cast has been particularly vocal so we spent a lot of time listening to discussion, moving furniture around to try new blocking, waiting for the lighting designer to fix cues and re-setting the stage to where ever the Daniella would want to work from.
At 5:45 we would go on dinner break for about an hour then come back to the theatre and get things ready for the show that night. The show itself runs pretty short, about and hour and a half with no intermission so we get done fairly early in the evening but we have to shut everything down and wait around until the end of notes - the director meets with all of the designers to get feedback and talk about things that need to be changed before the next preview and sometimes that takes a long time. So most nights I was getting home at about 11:30pm. I have to say our previews went pretty well at least from my perspective back stage. I have spent so much time running lines with our actors that I seem to know the show pretty well - word for word. Also during previews we were implementing script changes. The writer was back in town and they decided to make some changes - mostly cuts which made the actors pretty happy because it is always easier to get rid of a page of dialogue than add one a few hours before a performance. That was how most of the week went.
Thursday after our last preview I went out with my roommate in Irvine. You could technically say it was my first night out on the town in the OC. It was the birthday of one of her friends who had been over to our place and met me and he decided to invite me as well as her. I have to say it was pretty fun. I met them after they had dinner - a big group of people, maybe 15 or so - and we went to a bar, I have no idea what it was called but it was loud, there was a small dance floor and a live band. So we danced the night away and I met more of her friends. It was a pretty fun night and luckily for me Daniella decided to start rehearsal at 3:30 so I didn't have to be at the theatre until 3 the next day.
Friday was opening night and I found myself with the same jitters I've had at every opening night since I've been involved theatre. Deb and I had checked our preset list, the lemon meringue pie had thawed and we were ready to go. We had a pretty full house and they seemed to respond pretty well to the show. After the show was over the theatre hosts a big party on the terrace - basically the outside patio to the entrance of the theatre. There was an open bar along with stations of appetizer type foods. There was a table that was serving grits, a table with vegetables and fruit a dessert table and people walking around serving appetizers - mini chicken pot pies, chicken meatballs and mini grilled cheese sandwhiches. Music was playing and we bounced around chatting with all the theatre people. When they started turning the lights out on use we migrated to a bar down the street with the pride and prejudice cast and partied a little more. It was really a fun night. Unfortunately it was followed by a two show day.
Saturday we had a matinee and night show. It was also Jarrett's(one of the actors in our show) birthday so the stage management girls decorated his dressing room and I baked a pie. It was a fun little celebration and everyone loved my strawberry pie. It was the first time I had tried baking a lattice crust and I think it turned out pretty well. I'll post pictures eventually. Saturday almost the entire cast spent dinner break sleeping or lounging on couches recovering from friday. It is so crazy the way a show works. Friday we have a director and Saturday she's gone. Already back in New York. The show is all ours and it is our responsibility to make sure it doesn't change drastically from its original intent.
Saturday night I was in bed by 11:30 exhausted and desperately needing sleep to survive Sunday - another two show day. We all made it through the two shows on Sunday and I had big plans to go grocery shopping, do laundry and find a used book store today on my day off but so far none of those things have been accomplished. I did however manage to make biscuits and gravy for breakfast. Mmmmmm good! My roommate is in vegas for the weekend and won't be back until tomorrow morning - I kind of love having the house to myself, very relaxing and no worries about her bringing home guests at the last minute.
The first review came out on our show and it wasn't particularly good. We got an email from our director to be aware of it but to avoid discussing it with our actors. You can read it here: http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/culturemonster/2011/10/theater-review-how-the-world-began-at-south-coast-repertory.html
Bad review or not I still get paid and so do the actors. I wouldn't necessarily say it is a bad review just kind of ho-hum and it does a good job of explaining the action of the show for those of you that won't get to see it. It will be interesting to see if other reviewers feel the same.
HAPPY MONDAY!!