Day 33 of 33 - The Final Post

What a day! Thanks to some great friends and family, I had a fantastic time in Los Angeles. I could not have asked for a better final day.

I have many pictures and videos to add, but that will come later. I'm shooting for 1 hour of sleep tonight.

I woke up very early this morning, which was rather hard to do considering the opening night party and my late night completion of Alex's video. I was nervous about using the San Diego public transportation for the first time. That's right - I was NOT riding my bike somewhere. It turned out my fears were unfounded and I made quite a quick trip to the Amtrak station. In fact, I was over an hour early for the train and the previous train had not yet left. The first strike of luck in my favor was that I was able to exchange for the earlier train and I gained myself an extra hour in Los Angeles!!

The train ride north was great. For at least half the trip the train followed the coast line and I got a great view of the beaches, hardcore surfers, and fun beach towns and camp sites. I arrived in LA in just over 2 hours and it definitely beat the heck out of driving.

I had made tentative plans to meet up with Ben and Emily, but they were both busy until later. I was left to my own devices, which is a dangerous thing. I bought myself a daily metro card (only $5) and stared at a map, deciding where to go. I toyed with rhe idea of going out to UCLA to check out their facilities and see if anyone would talk to me about their MFA program. However, it was rather out of the way, and they are not a well known program anyway, and their graduate coordinator never answered my email, so I decided to pass. I thought I would try something touristy.

I saw a stop on the map called Universal City and I decided that sounded like a place where I might see fun movie things. I rode the metro like a pro and found myself at the entrance to Universal Ciry. A free shuttle bus beckoned to take me atop the hill. As I dew nearer, I slowly realized this was not quite what I thought it was, and really was just the entrance for Universal Studios theme park. I got off anyway because at this point I really needed a bathroom. I took the opportunity to wander around their shopping and restaurant area and gather what photos I could.

I walked back to the metro and decided to head back into town. I wasn't really interested in going back to Hollywood Blvd, where Alex and I visited last time, but I thought I would check some famous streets like Sunset Blvd and Santa Monica Blvd and see of there was anything interesting.

In short, I found there was not. By this point, I had decided to consult my IPhone on "Things to do in LA" and among suggestions for 6-7 star hazing tours, there was one mention of park just north of where I was. That sounded free, so I set my sights North.

I found myself looking at the famous Hollywood sign in the distance and I kept heading toward it, like a wise man following the north star. Eventually I ran into the aforementioned park, Griffith park. I found an awesome little walking path that wove its way up a small stream. Let's call it... fern gully. Eventually, the fern gully ended and I was standing in a more traditional LA setting of scrub brush.

At this point I had to go to the bathroom, again, probability due to Mama Testas famous fish tacos. I spied a public toilet and headed in. Now, it is dubious enough to use a public toilet in a park, in major city. But I have not before been met with the challenge of stalls with no doors!

I took care of business and headed back outside. I was thinking I should head back to the city to go meet Ben when my eyes met with a particularly steep and treacherous looking trail and... well... by now you should know what I did.






I reached the top of the first hill and saw not only a great view of Los Angeles and the Hollywood sign, but I saw a cool building situated on the next hill. I continued on this crazy trail and spilled out upon the front lawn of the Griffiths Observatory. It turned out to be free museum. My kind of place!

I did just miss the planetarium movie, but that cost money (not my kind of movie). However, I was able to catch "local noon" where the sun ACTUALLY crosses the meridian line, despite the time on my watch. See if this video gets you as excited as I was.

Ben called me and was on his way to meet up with me. I thought I would make it easier for him by going back down the mountain into town. I found a small paved path which I thought would be a responsible way down, however it ended at the iron bars of some estate. Well you know I loathe retracing my steps, so instead I slid down the side of the mountain. I ended in someone's back yard, but I fought the urge to go swimming and started walking down a beautiful street lined with rich people houses. I picked a lime off a tree in someone's yard to assuage my growing hunger.

It turned out Ben had already made it to the observatory and now had to work his way down to find me. We eventually met up and Ben took us to a neat restaurant called Home where we got sandwiches and drinks and caught up. After he drove over to Melrose and we spent some time wandering in and out of funny shops.

I then traded hosts as Ben headed off to a prior commitment and Emily swung by to pick me up. Emily took me straight to a funny little shack with fantastic fish tacos. I may not have been that hungry, but it was worth squeezing in as many fish tacos as possible before I headed back to the north east.

We then headed downtown LA, checked out a cool used bookstore called The Last Bookstore, and met up with her boyfriend Brian to grab some beers at their favorite local bar. Brian is a great guy and was a real trooper to hang out, as he had just finished an incredibly long and hard work week and had apparently exchanged words with Jessica Simpson.

Time was sneaking up on me and we began to think about my departure train. First we decided to walk over a couple blocks and check out Little Tokyo, which proved a funny little neighborhood. Emily got a hankering for Gyoza (fried dumplings) so we stopped again at another trendy bar for Gyoza and Japanese Brown Rice Lager. Ok by me!

At last, the sunset of my trip was upon us. Due to some smart planning, we were actually only a block away from a metro line where I could hop a train right to Union Station. Travel home went off without a hitch. I finished packing and while I should be exhausted from this trip, I'm afraid I may be up all night in anticipation of my long-awaited return.

New Jersey, here I come!

Day 32 of 33

Tonight was our opening night!

Everything went swimmingly. The theatre gave me a rose, the playwright gave me some chocolates, and the director gave me dinner. All in all, it was a great day.

I'm done here, but I guess I scheduled my flight back for Saturday morning because it was cheaper. Since I have a day and I'm already on the West Coast, I booked Amtrak tickets to Los Angeles and back. I am going to see my good friend Ben and Alex's sister Emily.

I am missing Alex a lot, though, and wishing I was going home tomorrow. This video shows how useless I am without her:

Day 31 of 33

Oh man, we're getting close.

Rehearsal was cut to basically a half hour notes session this afternoon. I spent most of my morning updating this blog.

I had to go to the bank before rehearsal and I had a choice of two routes. I am on the north side of the park and the bank is on the west side. Either I could skirt the park by heading west and then south, or I could cut through the park by heading south and then west past the theater. INSTEAD, I decided there must be a path heading southwest..

Well, there was a path. I just had to ride my bike through a canyon to get through it. Let's just say it went about as well as every other time I try to ride my bike through a canyon.

After rehearsal, I headed back to the Spanish Art Village. I went here my first day in town, but that was July 4 and there was not much going on. Today all the shops and studios were open. It was a cool place because many of the artists actually do their work there and much of the art gets a very SoCal flair. The artists here also seem to have a thing for blown glass. Almost all the sculptures, jewelry and other small objects were made of blown glass designs. I may or may not have bought someone a gift here.

The show tonight was solid. Henry even admitted to me that he was contemplating leaving early to get back to his family since the show was done. However, watching the show one more time gave him some more ideas and we'll still meet up briefly one more time tomorrow afternoon. Again, I can do nothing but admire Henry's ability to pay such close attention. At this point, I find my mind wanders to almost any other thing while watching the show and I cannot come up the the nuanced notes that he does.

By the way, I thought this was a cool image. All three stages share the same green room, so they have monitors up that show all three shows going on. Technology is cool.

Day 30 of 33

Back to work today. We had a weird schedule because of the gala on Saturday night, which really threw off the rhythm of the performances. There really is nothing wrong with the show, but we did a full tech run this afternoon just to get back in the groove. Henry talks a lot about the actors listening to each other, and you can definitely tell the difference when they are and when they are not.

Even so, we broke early and I had a nice big break before the show that night. I tried to get things done at home. I'm realizing how much I will need to get done so I can get out of here on Saturday. First order of business - fix my suitcase. Remember the terrible time I had getting out here because of the stupid handle? I did not want a repeat of that. Fortunately, I'm pretty handy. Item 1 taken care of.

Next order of business - laundry. I had been thinking I would just wear dirty clothes until I got home, but I realized it's actually a lot cheaper to laundry in San Diego than in New York. So I am coming home with a bag full of clean laundry. Item 2 - Check

Finally, I need to eat the rest of my food. I was close to my luggage weight limit on the way out, so I can't afford to be bringing food home. I got together everything I had and whipped up some meals for the next couple of days. In the front we have stuffed peppers, stuffed with whatever I could not throw in to the stir fry in the back. De-lish. Item 3 check.

Speaking of luggage weight limits - I have been thinking it may not be worth my bringing home my sneakers. They weren't in great shape when I came out, but I certainly put them to the test out here. Apparently the white shoes (used to be white) were not built for bicycle riding and during my extended trips the toes started to fall off. On the grey shoes, I have worn down the rubber sole so much that my socks have started to poke through the bottom. Goodbye, old friends.

Day 29 of 33 (2 of 2)

I had to break this post in half because, believe it or not, it can take me quite a while to write these things. I know you get antsy when I don't post, so you get halves.

Well I had a thrilling ride all the way back down the mountain. At one point a traffic meter recorded me at 30mph, and that was not full speed. I finally got to the bottom, checked my bearings, and realized I still had another 2 miles to go. You guessed it - up hill.

I finally rolled in to the UCSD campus. Fortunately, the theater department happened to be at the southern tip of the campus. La Jolla Playhouse was also literally on the campus, which is pretty cool. I pulled in to the Theater Department building and realized that I was absolutely disgusting. I was in no shape to meet with the graduate director. I went to the bathroom and washed up a little, but it was not enough.

I needed to dry off, so I decided to walk the campus and try to dry off in the SoCal sun. The campus actually reminded me of Livingston or Busch campus at Rutgers, only with Eucalyptus trees. It was nice and simple. I also noticed that UCSD seemed to work off the old European system of multiple colleges under one umbrella, as I saw signs for at least 3-4 separate colleges as I walked around.



I decided I was dry enough, so I headed back to the theatre department. I had a good talk with Marybeth, who is their Graduate Coordinator. She was able to answer a lot of questions for me in regards to the program, courses of study, financial aid and other things. None of the faculty was around during the summer, so I was not able to speak to anyone more specifically about the study or what they are looking for in applicants. However, I did learn they generally get about 60 applicants and pick only 1 or 2, depending on the year. And I did pick up that they seem to be very classically focused in their admission for directors.

One email Marybeth showed me was to prospective students, where they were asked to prepare to discuss Hamlet, Tartuffe, The Cherry Orchard and several other classical texts and authors, and how they would carry out their vision and design. Sure I've read all those plays, but why can't I discuss Showboat, Cabaret, Ragtime, Into the Woods and classic American musicals? Why have a program that only turns out one type of director? I had thought they would promote directors who worked on more contemporary plays and musicals since they work with La Jolla Playhouse, where many Broadway shows are launched. Oh well.

Continuing on the journey. Marybeth pointed me to the beach so I could cool off. Fortunately, it was downhill. I passed the Birch aquarium, but this is one thing in San Diego that's NOT free, so I only saw it from the outside. I made it down to the beach, which I believe is called La Jolla Shores. It was a really nice beach that did not seem too busy. These beaches had to delineate where you were allowed to swim and where you were allowed to surf.

Going swimming in the ocean during Shark week on the discovery channel proved to be a rather unnerving experience. I just stuck to the old adage "You don't have to swim faster than the shark, just faster than the guy next to you." I spent most of my time swimming around some chubby asthmatic looking kids. However, be assured that any seaweed that dared touch my leg was severely dealt with.

I hopped back on the bicycle, this time I finally set my sights south for the way home. Guess what that means? Yup, I had to go uphill. I don't understand why I had to go up so many hills while following the coastline, but somehow San Diego makes it happen. I rolled into the "village" of La Jolla Cove. I was starting to develop some hunger pangs, but this "village" seemed way too high class for my stench.

I kept going further down the coast, somehow still going uphill, until I suddenly felt I was at the Jersey Shore. Now I knew I could stop and eat. I had made my way to Mission Beach, which is a long stretch of beach on the ocean side of Mission Bay Park, where I had come through before. It had a long concrete boardwalk (concretewalk?) with bars, restaurants, and lots of little bungalows. I found some bar that claimed to have THE BEST Margaritas, so I stopped since I have never heard such a claim before.

After dinner, I decided to take one last dip in the ocean. You know, just to check that the Mahi sandwich was sitting properly. I had so say my final goodbye to the Pacific ocean, probably for some time, as I watched the sunset.










I live in Hillcrest, which unfortunately means the end of bike ride trips is pretty terrible. I found myself having to walk my bike up the hill in Old Town that I pictured from the beginning of the day, because there was just no way that was going to happen. Anyway, I took the well-worn path back home and crashed.

Until tomorrow.

Day 29 of 33 (1 of 2)

San Diego Bike Tour, Part Deux

I had been hoping to make a trip up to UCSD and La Jolla during my stay in San Diego. My incredible caloric intake on Sunday from the Italian Family-Style Dinner meant that now I was going to do it on bicycle.

I headed out the same way as my past couple of trips - down the big hill into Old Town. This meant the long ride downhil. Hello, old friend, "the hill", I'll be seeing you later.

I took my bicycle down the inland side of Mission Bay. It was a series of sandy islands and calm waters that seemed to be good for water sports. I have always wanted to do whatever it is that this guy is doing, but unfortunately I have no skill for flying kites OR surfing, so I'm probably a ways off.

I knew that this was a long bike ride (15 miles by car, so probably much further for me) so I had wanted to keep it simple. Unfortunately, when you plot a route on your iPhone, it doesn't give you topographical information. I should have bee warned by neighborhoods and streets such as La Jolla ALTA, or Foothill Road, or Mount Soledad... but really that's far beyond my normal deduction skills. I did try to avoid the hills, and several times when the road pointed up a hill, I would turn my bike and go downhill another way. In the end, that only hurt me when I could not deny my cycling masochism and decided to take the high road to UCSD.

In this picture, which is only MAYBE half way up, you can already see that the bay, which is in the previous photograph, is becoming a distant memory One of the reasons I ended up going up hill was the deceptive mountain. It looks as if the mountain will reach its peak right around the corner. And then the next corner. And then the next. I turned my fourth corner, several miles up I believe, only to see another stretch of road, and I had to stop and say an expletive or two. One man in a car overheard me and said "Another half a mile!" Yeah, ONLY half a mile.

Well I finally made it to the top and things leveled out. I found Rutgers road! It matched the t-shirt I was wearing.

















I rambled along a little further, turned the corner, and guess what? Yeah, up hill!

I finally made it to the legitimate top, which is apparently called Mount Soledad. I think it is a memorial for locals that died in World War II. It also provided a 360 degree view of the surrounding landscape. See:

Day 28 of 33

Sunday was an interesting day. We did not have a performance Saturday night, which meant we really had limited things to work on Sunday. We quickly dispatched our remaining work notes, and then had the rest of the afternoon to ourselves.

Since I was already in the park, I decided not to go level up my Pokemon, and instead to do some more sight-seeing. My first stop was the Timken Art Museum. This actually was my first museum stop in San Diego, but last time I was rushed through 5 minutes before closing. This time I had time to spend. It is a small museum, but for a free museum I thought some of their paintings were fantastic. They have many interesting paintings from what I believe to be both pre-Renaissance and Renaissance eras. There were a couple which seemed to experiment with perspectives, but which has really funky perspectives.

I then meandered over to the San Diego history museum. I found that I already knew most of the information between my experiences in Old Town and at the Cabrillo monument, which is just another indicator that I had been here too long. The most interesting thing at the museum for me was this picture. It is a rendering of what the park might look like for the 1915 California-Panama Exposition, for which much of the town was built. It has this fantastic gray quality paired with this Italian inspired waterway (where there is now a freeway)

I grabbed myself a lemonade and headed over to the Spreckels Pavilion. I photographed the pavilion earlier, but today there was a free organ concert going on.
After the concert, they invited us inside to see the inner mechanics. I learned that this organ was also built for the 1915 fair and used to be quite a big deal in San Diego. I saw pictures with over 50,000 people in attendance. It saddens me to see it reduced to the current audience you see in the video.




I took a quick walk through the Japanese Friendship Garden. It is only about 1.5 acres right now, but they are undergoing a huge expansion through one of the park's canyons. I would love to come back to see what they have renovated.

I followed some music I heard blasting, which led me to the international cottages. They have a lawn surrounded by cottages representing most of the countries of the UN. Today, Columbia was celebrating their Lawn Day with concerts and a food stand. You could stop in pretty much any cottage to get a pastry or coffee of the local culture. However, I was flush out of cash (due to my earlier lemonade) and felt I could not spare anything for the suggested donation. I snapped a blurry picture of the Irish cottage.

I finally headed back to the theater, where Hershey Felder had again set up a family dinner for everyone. During our rehearsal, we could smell him stirring up the bolognese (while wearing all black, of course) so I felt I needed to go back and check it out. Well, it was quite the spread! I helped myself to two servings plus desert, therefore concluding that Yes I would have to ride my bicycle up to La Jolla on my day off and No, I could not just rent a car.

The preview went well, but generally seemed sloppy. The director decided, and I agreed, that we need a full brush-up rehearsal on Tuesday before performing again.

Day 27 of 33

In a week's time, I will be home!

We had a funny day today, because The Globe was holding its semi-annual gala tonight for fund-raisers. We had rehearsal in the afternoon but no show. Nobody in the cast or company was invited to the gala because I guess we didn't make enough money.

It certainly looked pretty spiffy out on the courtyard.

I went in early this morning to finally get a look in the Botanical building, which had interested me for weeks. It was a cool building and worth my 15 minute walk, but probably not a whole lot more. One of the coolest plants I saw in there was a Staghorn fern from Austalia, which they had just growing out of the wall. This was my favorite one because it was huge and seemed like a mustachioed Texan. I thought it was going to start talking to me and quizzing me on the stats of the Dallas Cowboys.

We had our short rehearsal where we got a chance to work through some things. So much of what we rehearse now is dependent upon reactions in the preview performances, so it was a relaxed day. Tomorrow we come back for some more rehearsal and then our second preview.

John, the playwright, decided he was going to a Padres game tonight and invited me along. As an aspiring director, I figure it is always smart to hang out with successful playwrights and I gladly accepted. I find it funny that, even though baseball is my least favorite professional sport, I have been to more professional baseball games than any other sport combined. I made my way back to Petco park, loaded up another hot dog, and tried to figure out why sober people would enjoy the game.

Day 26 of 33

Thanks for the well-wishes tonight! It was our first preview, which is not quite the same as opening, but exciting none-the-less.

It went very well.

It was exciting standing out in the plaza, since all the Globe shows started at the same time and all the patrons come together outside, grabbing snacks and drinks.

I met the director and we headed in to our assigned seats. I peeked in the program and there it is, my name! I know it's not that big of a deal, but hey, it's something.

The preview went very well tonight. We have been dissecting the play and delving into the characters and motivations over the past couple of weeks. To be honest, I was afraid we may have been avoiding some of the pure humor of the play. However, the audience tonight not only laughed in all the right places, but gasped, booed and listened in all the right places. It seemed like a very promising preview performance and I look forward to what we learn from this.

In case you were wondering, this is what you should look out for if you ever attend a preview performance. This is my setup for taking all the notes during the performance. If you see this at show, look next to the person holding it and you are probably seeing the director.

It turns out that tonight was also the Opening Night for the next Hershey Felder show, where we portrays Leonard Bernstein. After our notes session, I went with the director and designers to the opening night party. None of us had seen the show, but we figured we could gran some free food and drink. I was glad to have this opportunity because most nights the director and designers go out to dinner together between the afternoon and evening rehearsal, but I really can't afford to go. They seem to know each other through connections at Yale, so I would like to build some relationships there. Also, the free food and drink never hurts. The company manager tried to pass it off on me, but I can only carry so much while riding a bicycle.

Tomorrow we only have rehearsal because The Globe has their Gala for donors in the evening. Supposedly there is a karaoke party somewhere, so perhaps I will make my way to that.

Day 25 of 33

We had our Invited Dress tonight. I am used to the Invited Dress being just friends, family, and other theater people. The Globe, however, has a lot of volunteers that act as ushers and other things, and they get invited to these Dress Rehearsals. We had a decent crowd, but they were mostly quiet and complaining about the cold, if you catch my drift.

On my dinner break, I headed to Jack in the Box to redeem my voucher for two free tacos (a nice break from rice and figs). Someone stopped and asked me for directions on my way there, and I knew where to send them. I have officially been here too long.

Day 24 of 33

I'm behind again, forgive me. In addition to it being tech week, the NFL is back and mad roster realignments have taken up the majority of my internet time.

On Wednesday we had our second 10 out of 12. We were able to run the show twice, do notes in between, and still have a photo call at the end of the day. It was fantastic to see the difference in the two runs with the notes. You don't always get progress like that, and we appear to be way ahead of the curve.



I have moved into leftovers mode on the food front, because I really can't take food home with me and I need to finish off what I have. Most of my meals today consisted of variations of rice, corn, and figs. They may need to fumigate this apartment after I leave.

Day 23 of 33

More technical rehearsals today.

We had a 10 out of 12 today, which means we can work 10 hours of a 12 hour period (we took a 2 hour dinner). In that time, we managed to finish teching the show, including a very complicated scene in Act 2.

I often find myself in one of two working conditions in the theatre:
1. I am given meticulous details on what to do, to the point where I feel as if nobody trusts me to do anything myself.
2. I am given almost nothing to do, to the point where I worry I'm not doing something that everyone expects I should be doing.
In this case, I find myself in the latter. I am mostly left to my own devices, with the exception of occasionally jotting down a note. Perhaps I should volunteer more ideas, but I don't want to interrupt or go beyond my bounds. Also, I find it very interesting just to take everything in. I figure nobody can be too upset with me, since they aren't really paying me anything, but I wish I could actually make some impressions.

Well... another 10 hours tomorrow!

Day 22 of 33

Oh gosh, I've hit the last third of my time here in San Diego. Fortunately, I think I have already done and seen so much, there's not much more I feel I absolutely MUST fit in. Hopefully I can find some time to see some friends from LA, but that may be a stretch.

Today was my day off. Instead of going on some grand adventure, I spent the day trying to line up work for when I get back. I played some smart moves so I think I can go back to the jobs I left... but I'd rather not have to do that. I realized how few people I actually know in high enough places to get me some jobs. I started emailing people I did not know, because I figured only good things can come of it.

In the afternoon, I went to see a reading of a developing play by John Cariani called Last Gas. John is one of the actors in the festival shows (and very good, at that) and is the author of one of the most popular plays among regional and summer stock companies in Almost, Maine. Henry, the director of Shaw was directing the reading, and a couple of actors in shows from The Old Globe acted in it. Note: the picture is not THE reading, just A reading for clarification of what a reading looks like.

I found out that Alex had actually seen this same play in a previous incarnation when it was staged at Portland Stage in Maine. I talked to John briefly after the reading and he said that, because he had already seen a staged production, he could not stand seeing a reading of it. I think everyone in the room really enjoyed the show, though.

It reminds me that I really want to work on developing some new shows. I wish I had a great venue in New York that was willing to just give up a room to have a reading in.

I had some more adventures in cooking last night, as well. When I first went to Nebraska and ordered tacos, I was surprised to find them not in a shell, but laid out on what I called corn latkas. Well, I tried making my own corn tortillas and discovered why. It was extremely difficult to roll out the corn flour into small pancakes, and then to try and transfer these to the frying pan to solidify. I made quite a mess on the stovetop here. Fortunately, I'll be leaving soon so I probably don't need to clean it up. Long story short, making nice tortillas for soft tacos was not in the books.

I then took some sliced garlic and threw it in a pan with some oil and lime juice, then threw in some shredded chicken to get it to a nice brown. Right before taking it off the heat, I gave it a little sip of corona.

The final product looked like this. We've got the corn latka topped with the chicken. On top of that is some home made guacamole (Yes, I finally made some!), some diced tomatoes and tomatillos, and cheese. Delicious.

Day 21 of 33

We started technical rehearsals today. Apart from one scene in the second Act, it is not a technically difficult show, so we managed to get clear through the first Act today.

I felt that I was able to provide some help today, which was great. With everything going on, the director would occasionally ask me to relay some notes. Also, I have a good relationship with the playwright, so I would go back and forth between the two and try to keep everything going smoothly.

I tried to snap a couple pictures of the theatre and backstage, but only when I was alone, so as not to reveal myself as starry-eyed. This is one of the hallways around the theatre. Immaculate except a few boxes scattered around. Apparently this theatre is very new, perhaps only 2 years old or so.

It was fun to work in a professional atmosphere with professional designers, because I think I don't often conceive of what could be possible, as opposed to what we get stuck with on the summer stock and off-Broadway circuit. Although the show is very simple, we have some fairly complex technical elements during transitions that are very nice and beat the heck out of a blackout.

Generally it is frowned upon to take pictures of the set outside of publicity, because it is considered the property of the designer. Since I'm pretty sure the readership of this blog is limited to my parents, I felt it was probably safe.

I may not have mentioned this before, but we are actually working in the round. This offers a unique set of obstacles and I'm glad to have the opportunity to assist on a show in the round before doing it myself.

I went home for dinner break, and got ready to come back for that night's session. There was supposed to be a shuttle that picked us up at our housing at night and brought us all over to the theater, so we don't walk through the park at night. However, the pickup time came and went and there was no bus nor anyone waiting for it. I jumped on my bike and sped back to the theatre (I'm pretty fast, so it was not an issue).

I discovered that Hershey Felder, who was doing a show in another theater in the complex and I mentioned earlier, had sprung on dinner for everyone! There was a huge spread in the green room with pastas, dips, salads, and deserts. All the actors decided to hang out and get free food at the theatre instead of heading back. The stage manager then thought they should cancel the shuttle since nobody would be taking it. Apparently, I went forgotten in all these proceedings - Womp Womp Womp...

Well tomorrow is a day off. I think I need to spend some time on my career instead of leveling up my Petilil on my illegal Pokemon game. Where would I like to be n 5 years? I'd like to not be forgotten!

Day 20 of 33

We go into tech rehearsals tomorrow, so we took another easy day in rehearsal. It is rather unconventional to begin tech at the end of the week, because it can be a grueling process, but that is how everything lined up for us. Today was our last day by ourselves in the rehearsal space, so we simply did some scenework and then ran the play again. Again, everyone reiterates that it seems to be in very good shape.

I've grown increasingly frustrated with my position in my career. Not in regards to the process out here, which I am enjoying tremendously, but with the realization that I have nothing to come back to. I now have a great Assistant Director credit to add to my resume, but it only gets me so far. I started to apply for a directing fellowship for new directors, but they want a reference from a theatre professional who can evaluate my directing. I can come up with something, maybe, but it would be a stretch.

If I had done work that a "theatre professional" had seen, and I felt it was good enough to be critiqued, then what would I need a new directors fellowship for? Wouldn't that make me a theatre professional?

It is frustrating because there is no good track to get where I want to go. There are no entry level jobs in directing, and I find myself playing the endless game of Chicken-and-Egg (you know, which one comes first?).

As I go through the business, I find more and more people connected with the Yale Drama Program. When I went out with the director and designers the other day (who had all gone to Yale) I mentioned that I was looking into the program. The Lighting Designer responded "For Directing, where else is there?". He was being completely honest with this question and not facetious. There are a couple of other good programs, but that question really shows how important a degree from Yale is.

Now I feel like I need to rush to build enough credits and references just to be able to apply to Yale in December. Their website says they want my resume to show at least two years of professional directing outside of college. If I had two years of professional directing, what the hell would I need graduate school for?! However, I worked with a director at Shakespeare Theatre of NJ who got into Yale Directing program directly out of college, so I'm not sure how strict they are with that and how much they just put that to scare people off.

It just continues to overwhelm me that it should be so difficult for me. I know that I am smart enough, talented enough, and hard-working enough to work as a director. I have to know that in my heart or I can't go on. I just can't get there fast enough.

Day 19 of 33

Today was a pretty interesting day. As I mentioned, we had our designer run-through today. It looked like the show was in great shape. I took some sparse notes, and the past couple days I have felt my notes have been on point and I'm on the same page as the director. I am looking forward to tech rehearsals on Thursday and possibly having some more to do.

After rehearsal we had some meetings to attend with tech staff and designers, and then we grabbed a drink with the lighting designer.

I went to see "Amadeus" tonight, the final show playing in rep at the Festival Stage. It is a fabricated story based on the rumor that Salieri had poisoned Mozart. I thought it was very well done and well acted and I had a lot of fun.

Sorry, no grand musings or funny pictures tonight.

Day 18 of 33

When Marketing Initiatives Backfire!

More on that in a moment. I had a fun day today. We had another good rehearsal and are homing in on tech rehearsals. The designers come to watch a run tomorrow and we get into the theater on Sunday. Generally, tech is crazy, but I have a feeling this one won't be so bad.

After rehearsal, I went back to the San Diego Museum of Art, where they had an exhibit of Spanish master painters called From Greco to Dali. I learned a decent amount about Spanish painters in my High School Spanish classes (Kudos, Senora!), so I was interested in going.

It was a nice exhibit, and just my size. It was very interesting to see the distinct change from the early religious styles to realistic to surrealistic. I thought it would have been such a nice finishing touch to the exhibit if they could have tied in local art that perhaps tied back to Spanish influences.

I headed home for dinner and to run some lines with a cast member. However, I began to hear the call of the nerds. The Comic Con opened today and, while I really have no interest in most comics or superheroes, the gravitational pull of so many nerds in one place pulled me in. I hopped on my bike and sped downtown. The highlight of my night was going to be a free performance from Cirque du Soleil on the side of Petco Park, the baseball stadium.

I had a great time at Comic Con. The people-watching alone was worth the trip. Most events were reserved for people with badges or tickets, but there were some fun things to do. One of my first stops was into the faux-museum set up by Conan O'Brien featuring all the fan art for his comic persona, The Flaming C. Literally, they managed to fill an entire store with fan art, and gave out food and swag to boot.


Many of the restaurants had been taken over by tv networks or companies. One of the pictures above is at the "Cowboys and Aliens" Saloon, named for the upcoming movie. The SyFy channel took over the Hard Rock Cafe and turned it into the CafeDiem from Eureka.

I found two more temporary exhibits that must have taken over empty storefronts or warehouses. One was for Monstergeddon, a superhero themed Monster truck show. They were showing off some of their cars and selling tickets for their next show, coming to San Diego. Most importantly, I found the SEGA Arcade. They had an entire club littered with gaming systems to promote their upcoming games. True to their word, many of the games had an arcade feel to them. I tried playing a handheld game, and then a destruction game for XBox. The Highlight, though, was a new hands free Zombie Slasher that they were featuring in its own private room. The game used the Microsoft Kinect hardware so that you use no remotes, but stand and control your character as you bash and slice hordes of zombies. I found it sort of frustrating. It might take time to get used to, or it might need some tweaking.

I walked around for a little more, but we were getting close to the Cirque show. In my limited experience with Cirque shows, I knew they were better with a buzz. I downed a beer at a hopping outdoor bar, and headed to the ballpark. People were already taken seat in the prime real estate, so I found a comfy piece of pavement and waited out the next 25 minutes.

The audience counted down the final ten seconds and then grew completely silent in anticipation. The show started amid cheers, but then they apparently had some technical difficulties with the sound. They played around for a minute or so, with a mostly supportive crowd (it was free, after all) and then got it up and running.

They performed a fight between about 10 characters running up and down a wall, although it seemed like you had an aerial view of the fight. There were only 2 live characters, though, and the rest were being projected. In my opinion, I thought it was OK at best, but I understood their real performance was in Vegas and they were lacking some. The fight came to a close and everyone got ready for the next scene.

Instead, we were greeted with a sign that read "See the rest of the show at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas". The entirety of the show, INCLUDING technical difficulties, was 7 minutes. A roar went up from the crowd and people started booing the performance. They had built up this performance, and people like me found themselves waiting for over 3 times longer than the show lasted.

When marketing your event, it's important not to show too much to give away, but to show enough to get people interested. A good show may have sold tickets. This definitely did not. Bad move.