Abigail Barnette's Blog, page 15

Show Diary: ASDLGLKAHDSGLKHAASKHL

I may have picked the wrong show to do a show diary for, my friendoroonies. Or the right one? I’m not sure.

After I returned from my annual UP writing retreat, the vibe at rehearsals seemed… off. The production moved from our rehearsal space and into the theater and on the first night there was no air conditioning. So, I chalked it up to that. But the next night, it wasn’t any better. There was just weird and awful tension. On Thursday, my private messages were lighting up: the theater board had called an emergency meeting for voting members only; as I’m not a voting member, I didn’t go to the meeting. On Saturday, the board announced that our director had resigned.

What the fuuuuuuu…

And the thing is, through all of this? I had felt something was off but I was really more concerned about the perpetually broken bathroom door in the auditorium’s dressing rooms. I’m part of the disability inclusion committee on the theater board and I am absolutely unhinged (pun intended) over this broken door. It’s on the accessible toilets and you can get accidentally locked in, right? Well, I hear tell that the auditorium facilities people fixed the door. NOPE. No siree, it’s just as broken as ever. So, my personal vendetta against the door means I guess I wasn’t paying close attention to whatever was happening around me. What little I do know, I’m not sharing because I’m a board member and I would like to stay that way. But last Monday was the first rehearsal of “push week” and we had zero of directors. That would have been a shock, I think, even if I hadn’t been blindsided while I was caught up in my bathroom crusade.

I hesitated to write anything about this because it was so bizarre. This has happened one other time in my entire community theater history and everything went okay, but I was like… I’m not gonna blog about this right now. I’m not sure how everything is going to shake out.

We are now three rehearsals away from opening night. And the show is…

Magnificent.

In the face of adversity, everyone stepped up. There’s always been a spirit of community in this community theater (which isn’t always the case, as diehard theater people will tell you), but everyone pulled together like a magnetic jigsaw puzzle. Suddenly, instead of four people in the costuming work area, there are six to seven every night. The scene shop is stacked with volunteers. The most commonly overheard phrase I’ve encountered has been “how can I help?” The sudden shock of wow, we’re really in a tough spot seemed to throw everyone headlong into enthusiasm and optimism in the face of adversity. And it’s paid off enormously.

It’s not necessarily the way I would have liked it to happen, obviously. I’m not recommending this to other theater companies like, “hey, you know what really makes a show pop? Losing your director two weeks before opening night.” But the show has not only gone on, it’s gone well, and I know we’re going to knock it out of the park on Friday night.

JUNE IS THE GAYEST

That’s right. It’s June, and that means I’m once again heading up to Gay, Michigan, to chill for a week of isolation with my friends. You know what you can do while I’m gone? You can read my Radish serial, Taken By The Alpha King, which has hit 2.5 MILLION views!

I will return rested, with more freckles than I had when I left, and ready to rock, in a week.

I WAS PREY edibles game

Have you seen the absolutely bonkers show I Was Prey? I started watching it on Discovery+ and I became hooked. The marketing explains that the show “recounts the hauntingly true stories of people who found themselves in a life or death situation, face-to-face with a dangerous animal.”

What they should have said was, “recounts the hauntingly true stories of people who made fucking terrible choices and ended up getting mauled by something. Come look at this guy’s stump.”

The formula of the show is pretty simple to understand. An episode tells two stories, cutting back and forth between them to keep viewers on the edges of their proverbial seats. Most episodes are what Mr. Jen calls “surf n’ turf,” because one tale will take place on land (a bear, for example) and the other in the water (almost certainly a shark), and they’re told in first person by the, well, prey. While bears, sharks, and gators lead the pack, you also get the occasional moose or hippo. Frequently, the stories are pretty hilarious. One time, a raccoon pulled a lady’s pants down. Another time, a man was shot twice by his son-in-law while being actively mauled by a grizzly (“Skeet saved my life,” the man tearfully recounts about the man who, I cannot possibly stress this enough, shot a person being attacked by a grizzly bear. Twice). A scientist with knowledge of animal anatomy shared the stunningly bad-ass realization he had while a shark ate his legs: “I know how to get that eye out.”

The gentleman did, indeed, go on to rip a shark’s eye out.

While the individual circumstances of the stories are what really make them pop (a man bitten by a rattlesnake realizes he left his cellphone in his locked truck; a ranger decides that today is a good day to leave the bear spray at the office), there are a lot of common themes and events that occur in each episode and that’s part of what makes it fun to watch. It’s one thing to laugh at the misfortunes of another (in my defense, these people survived), it’s another to be able to indulge in running jokes with the people who watch the show with you. It gives it that extra bit of oomph to place hypothetical bets on whether or not this shark attack segment will result in a dramatic stump revelation, or if the mountain lion’s breath will be described as smelling like death.

These hallmarks of the show give Mr. Jen and I so much joy, we decided to make I Was Prey into a drinking game. Lately I just haven’t enjoyed drinking alcohol. I do, however, enjoy watching I Was Prey while apocalyptically high, so I’m turning this into an edibles game. If you live in a place where you have legal access to marijuana-infused edible treats, consider the following recommended “doses” of treats for each event.

Unofficial and Unaffiliated I Was Prey Edibles Game
Every time one of these events occurs, take the suggested dose of THC. You will get fucked up.

“It seemed like a lifetime.” Any time the survivor describes time as slowing/freezing/standing still, says it felt like a lifetime (“I was only under the water for probably thirty seconds… but it felt like a lifetime.”) or an eternity, take 5mg.
When the survivor mentions how bad an animal’s mouth stinks, take 5mg. If they specifically mention that it smells like “rotten meat” or “death,” take 10mg.
When an episode isn’t a surf n’ turf, i.e., if there are two attacks on land and none involving water or vice versa, take 20mg.
When the animal returns after the initial attack to strike again, take 10mg for the second attack, 5mg for each subsequent attack.
“Suddenly, I’m on the ground.” When the survivor describes being knocked down by the land predator, take 5mg.
“I felt something bump me.” When the survivor describes the first hit from a water-based predator, take 5mg
If the episode is bearless, take 20mg
If the episode is sharkless, take 20 mg
If the episode has neither bears nor sharks, take 50mg
“I knew I was going to die.” Take 5mg at the moment in the story that the survivor realized they were in mortal peril.
Anytime the title cards are in passive voice, i.e., “Sally is being attacked by a mountain lion” instead of “A mountain lion is attacking Sally,” take 5mg.
If the survivor dramatically reveals their horrible scar, take 5mg.
If the survivor dramatically reveals their missing limb, take 20mg.
“I could feel his teeth in the back of my skull.” Whenever the survivor describes teeth in their skull, take 5mg.
When the survivor punches the animal, take 5mg.
When the punches are underwater, take 10mg.
When the punches do nothing, take 5mg.
When the survivor is wounded by something other than the animal during the attack. For example, Skeet, who shot his father-in-law twice while the poor guy wrestled with a grizzly, or the guy who stabbed himself with his pocket knife while a mountain lion attacked him. Take 20mg.
“I had to survive for my kids.” Everyone on this show has to survive for something. When they state what that thing is, take 5mg, unless…
The survivor’s motivation to survive the attack is their dog. If that’s the case, take 10mg.
The survivor accidentally left behind life-saving equipment. If, for example, the ranger forgot his bear spray that day, take 5mg.
The survivor intentionally left behind life-saving equipment. If, for example, the ranger intentionally left his bear spray in his vehicle because he’d never needed it before, despite being deep in bear country, take 10mg

You will likely ingest between 100mg and 200mg if you find the right episode. I recommend closing your eyes, scrolling, and surprising yourself. And if you’re not into substances, making it a hydration game and take a drink of water instead of edibles. Just be careful not to get water-drunk.

Does anybody in Trout Nation watch I Was Prey? Let me know if you check out the show or try the game.

Show Diary: Disney’s Beauty and the Beast: Rehearsals Week 2 and 3

I may have picked the absolute worst show to keep a show diary for, to be perfectly honest, becasue at this early stage in rehearsals, there’s not a lot to report. Much of that is due to the fact that I’m a villager. There are only three villager scenes, so I’m not called so often. Especially since we’ve absolutely crushed our blocking in record time. Which is good, because…

Covid shut-down: Mid-week three, we shut down due to a high number of covid exposures in the cast. Not everyone turned up positive, but we took no chances. All rehearsals were shut down at the end of last week, through the Memorial Day holiday. We still have some cast members out, but a five-day quarantine hopefully mitigated transmission. I’ll be masked up until tech week because I’m not taking chances.

No one throws it back like Gaston: Dance rehearsal for “Mob Song” got me and my friend Kaleigh in a goofy mood. Maybe it was the heat of the rehearsal space? Maybe it was hearing that song over and over and over again? During the number, the female-coded villagers leave the stage while the male-coded mob goes to the Beast’s castle. With nothing to do on the sidelines, Kayleigh and I amused ourselves by twerking to the song (which we weren’t singing that night; when we’re learning a dance, we do it to a recording). The thing is, I didn’t remember that there’s a line where Gaston yells something about “grab all the booty you can find.” When that line hit, the laugh that exploded out of me was like a foghorn and an airhorn having a loud three way with a megaphone. It was completely unprofessional, immature, and so hilarious that I don’t regret a moment of it.

Our rehearsal space is so hot. Just oppressively hot. Anyone who has done theater knows that your rehearsal space is always going to be either way too hot or way too cold. There is no perfect temperature in any rehearsal venue anywhere. Yesterday, I spent our ten out in my car, blasting my pits with the a/c.

“Our ten” means our ten-minute break. Here’s some backstage lingo for yous: during rehearsals, you actually do hear “take five” or “take ten.” And when it’s over, they’re like, “that’s five,” or “that’s ten.” It’s not a cliche, it’s actually how the stage manager talks. And it can be very confusing, because you have conversations like:

Me: Hey, are we still on our ten?

Someone: Yes.

This might lead you to believe you’ve got ten minutes. But you’ve actually only got three minutes left to play Candy Crush on your phone, so the ten is meaningless. It just refers to how much time you were given.

It still doesn’t feel like this show is actually happening. Obviously, it is happening, and things are going super well. But since this was our summer 2020 show and it’s been canceled twice, I’m having a hard time believing we’re really doing it. It just became this mythical, far-off dream or something. After Sister Act: The Musical, where I was called practically every night from the first rehearsal on, it’s surreal to only have to show up twice a week. I’m looking forward to the entire cast coming together for full run-throughs, which starts during week seven. It’ll feel a little bit more like I’m actually in a show then. But honestly, having waited two years for this? I’m pretty sure I won’t believe we actually, finally got to do it until we’re tearing down the set.

everything is bad

due to the state of my country and events that have absolutely shattered my capacity for humor or joy or even baseline feelings of anything other than sorrow and anger, i’ll be taking this week off.

The Business Centaur’s Virgin Temp: Chapter Eleven

Need to catch up?

What is The Business Centaur’s Virgin Temp? The Business Centaur’s Virgin Temp: PrologueThe Business Centaur’s Virgin Temp: Chapter OneThe Business Centaur’s Virgin Temp: Chapter TwoThe Business Centaur’s Virgin Temp: Chapter ThreeThe Business Centaur’s Virgin Temp: Chapter FourThe Business Centaur’s Virgin Temp: Chapter Five The Business Centaur’s Virgin Temp: Chapter Six The Business Centaur’s Virgin Temp: Chapter SevenThe Business Centaur’s Virgin Temp: Chapter Eight The Business Centaur’s Virgin Temp: Chapter NineNSFW! The Business Centaur’s Virgin Temp: Chapter Ten

Blayde’s reaction to the news didn’t surprise Fiona. But the raised eyebrows of the faun and the centaur across the table from her indicated that they’d expected something more…subdued.

The three of them stood sat around a conference table while Fiona spoke to her brother with the phone’s holographic communication function disabled. Fiona waited until her brother’s raucous laughter subsided a bit to speak again. “I’m glad the idea of a man being attracted to me is so hilarious to you.”

“It’s not your attractiveness I’m questioning. It’s the intelligence of the beast you’ve managed to snare.” He indulged in another victorious laugh. “Flicka Starr? Imagine falling for that.”

“It sounds like you were setting me up to fail.” She was grateful her brother couldn’t see the disgust she felt etched into her face. What would the point be? Though, she didn’t doubt her brother would do such a thing just to hurt her credibility should she ever need it in the future.

Evil minds worked years ahead.

“I’m proud of you. I worried you might go all goody-goody and tell on me.” 

Why would you worry about that, with a demon’s mark controlling me? She bit her tongue.

Blayde’s tone twisted into one of prurient amusement. “You haven’t had to do anything…”

Marcaeus’s hand clenched on the tabletop.

Fiona shot him an apologetic glance as she made a disgusted noise. “No! Don’t be gross. I don’t even want to think about it. I keep putting him off.”

She mouthed, “sorry” to Marcaeus. It didn’t erase the dark, angry look on his face.

He’s not angry at you. He’s angry at Blayde. Why would an astral creature and successful CEO care about the opinion of a mortal like her? Blayde had wounded Marcaeus’s ego.

She continued to her brother, “But that’s what makes the situation so precarious. He’s going to get suspicious, eventually, as to why I can’t…do it.”

“Oh, I’m sure he’s aware of why you can’t do it.” Blayde snickered.

“I didn’t risk calling so you could be gross,” Fiona snapped back. “I’m trying to do what you asked me to. You said to infiltrate the company; I did. You said to do whatever it took, so here I am. In Johnson’s apartment.”

“As I said, I’m impressed. What more do you want?” Waves of smug assholishness radiated from the speaker.

“I want the footage of Larkin destroyed.” Fiona forced her jaw to relax. “No tricks. No lies. I did what you asked me to do.”

I did what you asked me to do, and you still put a demonic leash on me.

“Consider it gone.” The answer was far too easy. She waited and, sure enough, Blayde added, “After the election, of course.”

Hobb and Marcaeus exchanged a glance before Hobb typed something on his holopad.

“Right. I’m guessing you’re going to expect more work from me? At least, until your wife has her senate seat and your defense contract is brokered?” Fiona cringed; if she kept it up with the exposition, Blayde would know for sure that he was being spied on.

“It’s so nice to hear that you’ve become jaded. I take it that your time among the astrals hasn’t been the fairy tale you assumed it would be?” he gloated.

“Someone’s coming. I have to go,” she lied. “I’m not sure how often I’ll be able to report to you. He’s clingy and obsessive.” She mouthed another “sorry.” “He even gave me a ‘bodyguard,’ who I think is probably here to watch me, not protect me.”

Blayde made a thoughtful noise. “I’ve had to do that to Julia a time or two. When you earn his trust, he might remove them. Though, he might have these pathways under surveillance.”

The pathways, formerly radio waves that carried signals between cellular towers, had been replaced by the Astrals by harnessing the natural flow of energy and magic in the air. No new towers would be erected; no more forests cut down, no more need for electric machines.

So many improvements and there was her brother, vehemently opposing them all.

“Which is why I’m calling you from his private office,” she explained. “I have to go.”

She ended the call and faced Hobb and Marcaeus, a strange pang of guilt in her stomach.

“Does he speak to you that way all the time?” Marcaeus asked quietly.

His pity was unbearable. “Does it matter? The call went exactly the way you wanted it to.”

“It matters.” He paused thoughtfully. “It helps me understand what kind of man he is.”

“You already know what kind of man he is. And if you couldn’t tell from the phone call or the fact that he blackmailed his own sister into corporate espionage, you’re just not a good judge of character.” It wasn’t her job to teach Marcaeus how to be one.

“Let’s keep this on topic,” Hobb said, quiet and firm. “Tell us what you can about the defense contract.”

“Brimstone,” she blurted, and a sharp pain lanced through her head.

“The mark,” Hobb noted.

“He’s working with the demon because—” she gasped at the pain, then realized she could push through it. Whatever they had done to the demon mark, they’d weakened it enough to release secrets she couldn’t have revealed before.

Secrets she hadn’t even considered revealing.

“It’s hurting her,” Marcaeus said with a grunt of frustration. “You don’t have to tell us, Fiona.”

“It’s okay.” She took a deep breath and found her memory returning to her like puzzle pieces falling into gaps she hadn’t even been aware of. “All I know is, when Julia wins her senate seat next month, Trasket Holdings is going to sign with the U.S. Navy to supply brimstone-powered warships.”

Marcaeus scoffed in fury. “War! They plan war while we work to heal the scars they’ve already inflicted on the earth.”

“Brimstone isn’t an ecologically sound solution to anything,” Hobb noted. “It produces sulfur dioxide when it burns. It will kill vegetation on a mass scale.”

“It will never pass the requirements of the pact.” Marcaeus shook his head as if trying to convince himself.

“But the pact won’t be an issue if the Dominion Party has anything to say about it.” The party’s brief rise to power in the 2020s had been responsible for widespread famine, enslavement, genocide, and environmental destruction on a never-before-seen scale. Their reckless, gleeful cruelty had ultimately caused the astrals to intervene.

And now, they wanted to return to those dark times.

“How can they persist in their own destruction?” Marcaeus raged. “Where will they spend their fortunes when the planet is no longer habitable?”

“In Hell…” She didn’t want to suggest such a thing, but it seemed too obvious to ignore. “Maybe that’s part of the deal. Maybe they’ll get their own little paradise in Hell.”

They had believed stranger things.

“Hobb,” Marcaeus said, gesturing across his own holopad. “The gods need this information.”

“Which ones, sir?” Hobb asked.

“Chiron can be the judge of that. Draft a message for me. I’m sure you’ll use fewer expletives.” He ran a hand through his hair and scraped a hoof against the floor.

“You’re not supposed to meddle in elections,” I remind them both. “It’s part of the pact.”

“I have no intention of breaking the pact.” Marcaeus’s mouth turned down in disgust. “We aren’t like you.”

The words stung her heart, spreading truth-tinged venom through every burning vein. Tears sprang to her eyes and she turned away.

“We have no pact with Hell,” Marcaeus said to Hobb. “Keep the message in line with our principles. I will not give the humans further ammunition for their bizarre conspiracies.”

“Yes, sir.” Hobb left; Fiona could tell by the tap-tap-tap of his hoofsteps but she couldn’t bring herself to let Marcaeus see her tears.

He lingered in the room, and Fiona wished he would just go. Once again, she’d offended him. Once again, she’d put her stupid, human foot in her mouth. It was no wonder he didn’t appreciate her piping up to remind him things he already knew. Why wouldn’t he be familiar with the pact? And why would she assume he’d forget to, what, be ethical?

She wanted to crawl under the table.

A sharp intake of breath broke the silence before Marcaeus said, “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.”

“No, you were right.” Miraculously, she didn’t sound like a person who’d just burst into tears. “All I’ve done is lie to you since we’ve met, and I have the audacity to be like, ‘don’t forget the rules?’ I would have snapped at me, too.”

“You’re under a lot of strain,” he noted. Chairs at the conference table shifted as he bumped them, moving closer.

That made her smile a little, despite the gravity of the moment. No one could comfortably walk around a conference table ringed in swivel chairs. Not even if they were graceful beings of myth and magic. Not even in the chairs were sleek and expensive, which these were.

If that turned out to be the equal footing between humans and astrals, it would prove Larkin’s theory that the entire universe was a simulation.

He put a hand on Fiona’s shoulder and gave a friendly squeeze. “I don’t understand humans. I won’t pretend to. But despite your deception and your misplaced priorities, I do believe you’re trying to be better.”

“Thanks.” She chuckled in dismay and turned to him. “I know you don’t know how harsh that sounds.”

His eyebrows scrunched a little. “No. I’m aware.”

“Oh.” Well, that just made everything uncomfortable.

“I don’t want to work in opposition,” he went on. “I know you don’t, either. But a word of advice?”

She picked up her hands and dropped them to her sides. “Sure.”

“You need to learn to separate your emotions from your sense of wrong and right.”

Her mouth dropped open, and a small, outraged noise squeaked out before she silenced her instant defensiveness.

“When you can tell the difference between what feels right and what is right, you’ll save yourself a lot of heartache.” He cleared his throat as if to wash away the regret in his words. “Thank you, though. For calling your brother and providing us with what we needed to know.”

“I’m happy to help. Anything that can take him down.”

Marcaeus nodded, his face taking on a grave cast. “Fiona… this isn’t a personal vendetta against your brother.”

“I know,” she squeaked, her throat suddenly dry under Marcaeus’s intense gaze.

His hand fell on her shoulder again, but not in the same friendly pat. It was a light caress that stroked down her arm to her elbow. “But after what I heard on that call… it almost became one.”

She shivered and swayed on her feet. The silence was far too heavy. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you before. About the brimstone.” 

“The mark prevented you. It’s not your fault.” He dismissed her apology easily and moved away, the moment thankfully broken.

Maybe there hadn’t been a moment at all. It wasn’t outside the realm of possibility that she could be imagining tension where there wasn’t any. She’d always been the most sentimental one in the family. They’d certainly mocked her for it enough. Maybe the astral marriage had wormed its way into her subconscious and dug up goofy notions of romance she’d associated with weddings when she was a child.

Or maybe it was the invisible tattoo that she somehow still knew was on her skin. “Hey, did I hallucinate, or did we have matching tattoos when we went to bed last night?”

He confirmed her suspicions. “We still do. Don’t worry; they’ll only be visible in moments when the bond is strong.”

“Like, if we were in love?” she asked, and her voice squeaked on the most inopportune word.

If he noticed, he let it pass without adding to the awkwardness. “If we were feeling particularly fond of each other, yes. Occasionally, I’ll see Chiron’s appear and know it’s because Chariclo is thinking of him.”

She held out her arm and examined it, a little disappointed. It had been a really pretty tattoo. It was a shame she’d never see it again. “That’s really sweet.”

“I suppose it would be,” Marcaeus said with disinterest. “There are other times it might be visible. Stages of the moon, things of that nature…”

His sentence died off, and she wasn’t sure how to respond.

“Well, I suppose we need to get you moved in properly.” He gestured to her, and she looked down at her clothing.

Yikes.

“Sorry, it’s all I could find to wear,” she began.

“No apology necessary. I didn’t have the forethought to provide for you.” He snapped his fingers. “We’ll also need a glamour to match how you looked when you were first hired. I don’t mind you wearing your usual form around my home, but—”

“But no one can see Fiona Trasket hanging out with you.” She wasn’t totally clueless. “Flicka Starr, all the way.”

“I’ll send someone to help you choose Flicka’s wardrobe.” He stressed the name, and Fiona understood. Her style would not be Flicka’s style.

That was kind of exciting.

“And you’ll need a dress for the gala.”

With all her worries about Larkin and espionage and sudden trips to other realms, Fiona had forgotten the anniversary of the Great Reversal. The night when everyone in high society met and mingled and pretended to put aside their differences for a few hours to celebrate the “miraculous” day that the Earth’s temperature had finally dropped below the threshold of crisis. It was supposed to be a non-partisan celebration, but with an extremely vocal minority still insisting the planet had never been in danger, to begin with, the parties seemed hollow and pointless.

Especially now that Fiona knew what could become of all that progress if her brother got his way.

Blayde would destroy the planet rather than admit defeat.

Show Diary: Disney’s Beauty and the Beast – Music Rehearsals Week One

For every single musical I’ve been in (and I’ve been in a super lot), the first rehearsals are always music rehearsals. The first week of Beauty and the Beast rehearsals for me covered two particular songs: “The Mob Song” and “Belle.”

I get to sing my favorite line!

In “The Mob Song” I’ve always loved the line, “We don’t like what we don’t understand/in fact it scares us/and this monster is mysterious at least.” Whoo hoo, my friends, whoo hoo, first sopranos sing on that line. One of my favorite things about being in an ensemble is that you often to get sing the most iconic songs. Also, sometimes having a featured role is pretty lonely; when we did The Wizard of Oz and I was the Emerald City Guard, I sang “Merry Old Land of Oz” and got some good laughs, but I was only in a few scenes and most of them were with The Four (our director’s shorthand for Dorothy, Scarecrow, Tin Man, and Lion), who had their own bond. The ensemble had their own relationships, too, so I always felt a little like the odd man out during that show. Not many rehearsals, no real chance to “hang out” with the rest of the cast, it was kind of isolating. This time around, I don’t have the spotlight, but I do get to have fun with my castmates and sing the songs that were the most fun to sing when I was a kid.

“Oh, Alan.”

Some of us in the cast are fresh off Sister Act: The Musical, which was also composed by Alan Menken. And during Sister Act, I had some real feelings about the music that, while incredible to listen to, was total ass to sing. For example, this was just one of my notes as Sister Mary Patrick:

During rehearsals, the musical director and I would often shake our heads and say, “Oh, Alan.” This has continued on into Beauty and the Beast, due to having the same musical director.

My cheese dreams were dashed.

Another fun aspect of theater is finding out which lyrics you’ve misheard over the years. But not this one. Oh, no. Not this one.

For years now, I’ve thought that in the end of “Belle,” someone was asking for, “some cheese/10 yards.” When I say years, I mean like THIRTY. For three decades, I’ve been periodically consumed with the idea of ten yards of cheese. Thirty feet of cheese, yous all. Imagine it. It’s absurd, but also admirable? And like… goal?

Well, guess what? The line isn’t, “some cheese/ten yards.” It’s “some cheese/a pound” and someone else just happens to be having a conversation at the same time that involves “ten yards” of something.

My world is irreparably shattered.

I made a new friend!

Of course, I don’t remember his name. Danny, maybe? I probably shouldn’t guess right here because I might accidentally use his real name and I said I wasn’t planning to do that. Drew? I don’t know. Anyway, I asked him if he was wearing eyeliner and told him that if he wasn’t, I wouldn’t be happy for him. He was wearing eyeliner, so now we’re friends. He might not know that. The thing is, I was trying not to collect any more handsome friends because my friend Handsome Jack (real name, that I call him) once looked so spectacularly handsome that I didn’t know how to react and I spiked my phone like a football, right onto the parking lot pavement. I don’t have the kind of dough to just keep replacing phones.

A missed rehearsal

I should honestly say “the first missed rehearsal.” This theater is really good and nice about working with people with disabilities, so when I’ve been ill or having a bad pain day and I have to call off from rehearsal, I don’t feel like anyone will be shitty about it. I try hard not to miss rehearsals, but inevitably my disability interferes.

Of course, due to covid, we have people quarantined now. There were only two covid cases during Sister Act and considering the cast size of like, forty people or whatever? That’s pretty impressive. Also, neither of us got infected at rehearsals; we could both confirm exposure to infected persons/groups. It was totally wild. From what I understand, we go by the same protocol as Opera Grand Rapids, and it seems to be working for them and for us. I just very much appreciate that the organization is worried about keeping us safe.

Pancake Pre-Game

I’m not good at making smart choices. I am good at dragging otherwise smart people along with me on my bad choices. “I want pancakes,” I told my friend Anastasia (that’s a real name, she doesn’t care). “I’m going to have pancakes before rehearsal. Wanna come?”

Now, keeping in mind that my friend Anastasia is a PROFESSIONAL OPERA SINGER, for some reason she AGREED. And went to pancakes with me. And the pancakes were glorious.

But you know what wasn’t glorious? Trying to sing with a stomach full of pancakes. During warm-ups, I looked over to Anastasia and silently mouthed, “I’m gonna puke.”

I didn’t puke. But I did learn a lesson.

If I’m gonna eat a bunch of pancakes right before rehearsal, I have to remember to just pretend to sing.

See also: benefits of being in the ensemble.

SHOW DIARY: Disney’s Beauty and the Beast – First Cast Meeting

The other day, I was thinking about the highs and lows of the recent production of Sister Act: The Musical that I was in (I was Sister Mary Patrick and I was fabulous) and how I wasn’t bright enough to write any of it down in my journal.

See, the thing is, between auditions for that show and the beginning of rehearsals, my BFF Jill died. And it sucked. And I stopped writing in my journal entirely and I didn’t want to go to rehearsals and I very much considered dropping the show completely. Cooler heads prevailed and I stayed in the show and I’m glad I did, but all those fun, quirky little things that happened during rehearsals that I would love to remember are gone now, lost to the holey memory fog of grief.

I’m still not ready to open up my journal and get back to it; it was a brand new, totally awesome notebook and I’m furious that Jill died only a few pages in, but even those few pages I did write were written by a person who used to be me. I’m still in that phase of trying to figure out who I am now, so there’s no point in ruining another notebook with a false start.

But then I was like, hey. You have a blog. And people who’ve never been in a show might really enjoy reading about what it’s like. And people who have been in shows might be interested in seeing what it’s like at my theater.

So, I’m gonna dump all my theater stuff here. With a few caveats. Unless otherwise noted, I’m not using the real names of any performers or staff or crew. And I’m not going to put a lot of juicy gossip or anything like that in here; I’m generally peripheral to off-stage drama. I’m the person people come to when they want to vent about someone else, and I don’t want anyone to worry that I’m going to put it on the blog. But I will talk about how I feel about things realistically and mention, you know. Appropriate stuff to mention.

Last night was the first cast meeting. You know how I just said I’m not going to say negative stuff? I’ll say negative stuff about cast meetings. I don’t care what theater I’m at, I loathe the cast meeting and I refuse to make it a secret. I especially loathe cast meetings that include a script read-through because a) we will be reading the damn script every night for like six weeks and b) let’s just get into it, I’m ready to go. Luckily, last night’s meeting didn’t have a read-through. It was the standard Center Stage Theater welcome night, where things get explained to newcomers and reiterated for people who’ve been there a while. We cover stuff like how nobody is allowed to be a dick, we’re a queer and disabled safe-space and your ass will get booted if you don’t respect that (not in those exact words, of course), and various fundraising and ticket-selling opportunities we’re doing to publicize the show.

I hate meetings sooooooooooo much. Generally, I take it as an opportunity to get some crochet time and zone out. That’s not to say I don’t care about my friends on all the various committees who speak at the meeting and put in some hard work, but the noise and fidgeting and heat and closeness of about two-hundred people crammed into a church basement is sensory hell. I don’t think anyone faults me for having a total shut down to cope.

Why are there so many people? Because CST casts every person who tries out, so long as they’re over six years old. It doesn’t matter if you’re disabled or neurodivergent, it doesn’t matter if you’ve never done theater before, it doesn’t matter if you’re 100 years old and someone needs to remind you that you’re currently on stage in a play, Mabel. If you audition, you’re in. We will find a way to put you on stage if you want to be there (and you’re willing to put in the time and effort).

One-hundred and eighty people auditioned for this show. As of last night, we had a total cast of like a hundred and twenty-eight. Some of those people are kids who have parents and guardians so. You know. It was crowded, and I knew that it would be going in and everything turned out fine if exhausting from an over-stimulation point of view. I’m not sure what size cast we’ll actually end up with; I know at least one person dropped after last night’s meeting because they hadn’t realized what an enormous time commitment it was going to be.

People drop for all sorts of reasons. Some of the original one-hundred-eighty couldn’t be cast due to conflicts late in the rehearsal schedule. Some had their hearts set only on one particular role and asked not to be cast in anything else. Some maybe saw the cast list and were unhappy with it. One teen I know and have worked with several times dropped not because of anything to do with the cast list or the production but because she’d been doing back-to-back-to-back shows since our production of Moana Jr. back in October and, despite getting a named role with featured solos, she’s just too exhausted to tackle something as big as Beauty and the Beast as her fourth consecutive show (her last one closed on this past Sunday, the day before our rehearsals start).

There are so many reasons that people fall away from a cast between the posting of the list and the first rehearsal, but there’s also a bittersweet, psychological component some performers can’t get past: what if you’ve always dreamed of playing a particular role, finally got your chance to audition for it, but ultimately have to watch from the ensemble as someone else lives out your dream? For some people, that’s not a hurdle they can get past.

Performers get a bad rep for being divas or egotistical, especially in local theaters. And I’m not going to pretend some people aren’t divas or egotistical. But other times, loss of interest in a production when one doesn’t get the role they wanted is simply a matter of disappointment that has to be nursed from afar. In a town as small as Kalamazoo, big, splashy musicals bring out lots of talent (and it doesn’t help that there are two colleges with notable performing arts programs located right in the heart of the city), but you might only have one chance in your entire lifetime to reach for the bucket-list role you covet. Most theaters operate on a ten-year-plus wait time between repeating shows, and some simply don’t get repeated. My first role at the Kalamazoo Civic Theater was in a production of Rags back in the 1990s, and I’ve never heard of another local theater doing it ever again. Missing out on a local community theater role really can feel like closing the door on your dreams, because you never know if you’ll get the chance again, or, if that chance comes, if you’ll still be the right fit for the role.

One actress, disappointed with the casting of Beauty and the Beast, confided in me that she couldn’t find it in herself to congratulate the person who ultimately won the role that she’d had her heart set on since the season was announced. “Does that make me a bad person?”

I don’t think it does. Maybe if that actress holds onto that grudge for ten years, it would. Maybe if she treated the person differently from here on out, being cold and snide and terrible about it? Sure. But being unable to be hyped-up and happy for someone who got the thing you wanted immediately after they got it and you lost it? To me, that’s understandable.

What I don’t understand are the people who do act shitty toward folks who get bigger parts. A few years back, I went into a first cast meeting and greeted someone I considered a theater friend. She turned away, pointedly and obviously starting a conversation with someone else to drive home the point that she was ignoring me. We’d both been called back for the role that I got, and though later she apologized for her actions and I told her I understood… I kinda don’t. It wasn’t my call, it was the director’s, and there was no need for the nastiness.

Another time, an actor who’d had the lead in the previous show was upset to be given a featured, but not lead, role in the next. He accepted it, then for several weeks either turned up to rehearsal in a terrible mood, refused to expend any effort in the rehearsal process, or just didn’t bother to show up at all. After a few no-call/no-shows, his part was recast and he went on to bad mouth that theater to anyone who would listen. He hasn’t been back and frankly… good riddance? Nobody needs that kind of attitude and negativity around. Which is one of the things I really, really like about my current theater: everybody puts on their big kid underoos and gets to work, and the people who don’t like a positive atmosphere tend to drift away.

There have been many a company meeting that I’ve attended, holding back a chest-burster of disappointment and tears because the finality of how everything shook out finally hit (being called back for, but not being cast as, Maria in The Sound of Music was all-time emotional theater low for me and I almost did quit that cast at the first company meeting). Last night wasn’t one of them, though I was pretty bummed to lose out on Le Fou, the role I received a callback for. I knew I was a longshot because, hey, AFAB and turning forty-two on the second weekend of performances, so while not getting the role stung a little bit for a couple days, I’m perfectly happy being Milkmaid in the opening number, “Belle.” I get to say a “Bonjour,” so what else can you ask for?

Plus, I gotta be honest, it was about time for me to be in the ensemble, just for fairness sake. In the past four shows, I’ve had featured roles: the above mentioned Sister Mary Patrick; Hunyak in Chicago; the Emerald City Guard in The Wizard of Oz; Mrs. Gloop in Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. It was starting to feel a little uncomfortable and greedy on my part.

My kid gets a big time to shine in this one, as well. She’s been cast as the Sausage Curl Girl in the opener, and she’s thrilled. We’ve done several shows together and, she’s quick to point out, this is the first time she’s had more lines than I do.

The first cast meeting and all the emotions that go with it is in the bag. Now the hard work starts.

It’s been some weird time.

Not to complain, but I feel like a lot of us are having a few weeks in a row here where it’s like… this is something you blame on astrology. This is what people mean when they say Mercury Retrograde or Neptune is in Uranus or whatever. I don’t know a lot about astrology, and I slept through most of astronomy. But what I mean is, it just feels like time and events are intensely weird.

Does it just seem like there’s more of everything? I’m sitting here in my bed, typing this up, feeling terrible because I somehow feel like I’m not doing anything.

I don’t have any deadlines.

I don’t generally work super hard on Mondays.

I had to drive my pet rat to the crematorium this morning because I came home from a disappointing Marvel movie and found him dead, so from now on, I’m blaming Benedict Cumberbatch for the death of my pet.

But for some reason, I feel like I’m dropping the ball because I’m sitting in my bed and not at my desk.

And I know that it’s not just me. It seems like everyone is in a constant state of feeling like they might have left the oven on. That includes people who don’t usually struggle with their mental health. Even they’re feeling like they must be forgetting to do something.

I’m constantly sure I’m the only one who isn’t “back to normal” while realizing how absurd that sounds. There is no normal anymore, not even for a few seconds, because everything is in a swift state of change. Things are moving too fast and everyone feels too slow.

Maybe not everyone. I see Facebook posts from people doing their gardening or going on tropical vacations and they’re smiling and it looks exhausting. Am I supposed to be back to that kind of thing? It’s an impossible climb. I haven’t returned pop bottles this whole time and yet I buy more pop. I don’t know what to do with them. They’re just sitting in my garage. If we go to war and there’s a scrap metal drive, I will be crowned your king and your god.

So, is everyone back to normal? Am I the lazy one? Are all the other people out there talking about how they feel this exact way only feeling that way because they’re overachievers and actually everything in their lives is fine?

I had losses this week both human and animal and I don’t even have time to feel sentimental. I’m too busy feeling like I’m running behind or dropping the ball. I’m too full of other grief to add more on top of the grief I’m trying to ignore. Again, I’m not alone; a million people in my country have died from Covid, and for every one of those people there are the people who knew them and grieve them and that’s just a lot of grieving people probably dealing with their grief in unhealthy ways.

But there’s so much other stuff to worry about, stuff that’s moving fast. How can I keep up if I can’t keep up with my life on a normal slow day?

It’s not just me, right?

TAKEN BY THE ALPHA KING debut week! Everything you need to know!

How excited am I about the fact that my latest project, Taken by the Alpha King, debuts on the Radish fiction app THIS FRIDAY?!

SO FREAKING EXCITED!

The thing is, this has been kept under my hat, air-tight, no details, don’t give stuff away, Jenny, for so long now that I feel like I’m just gonna blorf out every single plot detail in my excitement. So, I’ve put together a primer. A “what you need to know about Taken by the Alpha King.“

What is Taken by the Alpha King?

So glad you asked. Taken by the Alpha King is a new series on the Radish Fiction app. It’s a high-heat Urban Fantasy/PNR with some tropes that are a little bit different than you’ve seen in my Abigail Barnette work.

What’s it about?

The story is told from the POV of Bailey Dixon, a werewolf who’s just returned to her pack after five years of living in the human world. She invoked an obscure pack law to delay her official transition into werewolf life and now she’s back to make that final decision, which also involves accepting an arranged marriage.

But while she was away, the formerly stable pack plunged into political turmoil that ended with their king in exile and a new king on the throne, the ruthless and power-hungry Nathan Frost. When he sets his sights on Bailey, he’ll stop at nothing to have her, even if it tears the pack apart.

Now, slather that with some Norse, Greek, and Roman lore, millennia-old ceremonies and laws, court intrigue, gruesome executions, hot sex, and a heroine who surprises herself with her ability to navigate tricky situations.

What kind of reader is going to like this?

Current readers of the monster romance genre, werewolf fans looking for a different spin on the creature and legends, and anyone who longs for the early 2000’s Urban Fantasy boom.

Gimme some tropes. I like things specific.

Werewolves, fated mates (sorta), enemies-to-lovers, alpha hero, breeding, and some light BDSM scenes.

What about content warnings?

Gore, cheating, and some readers might be uncomfortable with the slight cult vibe of the pack.

Can we read this on any other platforms?

Nope, this one is a Radish exclusive and I’m so psyched at their commitment to putting my vision for this world out there! So, download the app and hit those chapters Friday! And be sure to check out the sneak peek going on!