Well?

I'm sure you've all been waiting with baited (bated?) breath to find out how my audition went.

Overall, I felt it went well. My monologue was awesome. If I didn't love it before, I love it now. TV monologues are just SO PERFECT for this situation. They are short, sweet and to the point. I think with a little KK work, I can take it to the next level for Midwest Theatre auditions in two weeks. Judge away, but I'm sticking with it.

My song is another story. I just didn't feel good about it. Specifically, I didn't feel good about one note. (For those of you who are musically inclined, it's D4) It's hard to explain what makes that section of the song difficult without using a bunch of music jargon, but I'll say this. In a performance situation where I would be adequately warmed up and singing throughout the show, it wouldn't be a problem. In an audition situation where I warm up before I go, but then sit around for an hour and don't have anywhere to sing and keep myself warm, it's not ideal.

I still haven't decided if I'm going to change my song or not. I have another audition this weekend and I'm going to give it one more go. If it doesn't work out, I'll change it. I've got some songs on reserve, just in case.

In completely unrelated news, how are you all dealing with the the blizzard aftermath? Have you dug yourself out yet? Chicago got walloped with snow and now we've got no where to put it. Some of the cars in my neighborhood haven't even tried to dig out. My coworker said she'll just take the train until spring. I don't have a car, but it would be really nice if people would plow their sidewalks!

In news that is more related, I think I'm going to begin a program called The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron in the coming weeks. I won't say too much about it now, but I'm hoping that putting it out there publicly will give me the motivation to actually do it. :)

With love and gratitude,
Kristi

Tomorrow Is The Big Day!

It's finally here. The day I've been dreading working toward the past few weeks.

Illinois Theatre Auditions.

To tell you the truth, I actually feel completely prepared. I have a great song (Holding To The Ground from Falsettoland) and a monolouge that I enjoy (a piece from Grey's Anatomy) This audition is one of those cattle calls where you have 1 minute 30 secs to give a song and monologue performance. This year, for quite possibly the first time ever, I'm not worried about time. I ran my whole audition last night and it came in at 1:40 the first time. I cut two sentences, ran it again and wham, bam, 1 minute 27 seconds.

Although I am hopeful that something will come out of these auditions, I'm considering this a warm up for Midwest Theatre Auditions which happen in mid-February. My goal right now is to get out of Chicago for the summer and there will be plenty of summer theatres at Midwest auditions.

I haven't had much time in recent weeks to apply the entire KK method to the monologue I'm using tomorrow. I've been doing KK Light; taking some of her ideas and trying them out, but not going through the full boat. Once I see how the audition goes tomorrow, I'll know what worked and what didn't and I'll start applying the full method to my monologue so it's fool-proof for Midwest.

Wish me lots of (figurative) broken appendages tomorrow. Say a prayer, light a candle, kiss up a good wish and keep me in your thoughts!

Kristi

Face Time

This was supposed to be posted last week, but I had technical difficulties. Better late than never!

I'm alive...barely...I promise

Hello readers-

I swear I haven't abandoned poor Kristi. Its been a whirlwind of activity in my life, and I'm seeing a slowdown here just in a bit (I go on vacation!!!! HOORAY!) where hopefully, you'll hear much more from the Eastern-end of the Midwestern pair.

The Farm Animal themed audition package went well. I think the pieces were strong (they might end up in the final 50)...but my nerves, alack, alack, alack...were not. As my supervisor says, "Pieces are more effective when there is focused energy, not sideways."

Let me tell you: I felt sideways, backways, upways, downways, allways during that audition. Ah well. There are 3 shows, three separate callbacks. As of now, I'm 0 for 1. We'll see about the others.

I wasn't planning on many more auditions until this spring, but I'm going to spread out a bit- see what I can find in the way of smaller theatres, maybe some things at the university near me. I LOVE a good independent project, and I can't wait to see what my city is hiding.

My next attempt will be looking at what I've missed-the good man's monologue that can be transformed, the monologue from the plays we all studied in school but were too afraid to (over)use, monologues made from chunks of a conversation, heck, monologues within the pages of a newspaper. I've also been listening to quite a few books on CD while driving too and from work, and I just recently finished "The Penelopiad" by Margaret Atwood. Boy, if she can't write a wonderfully decent 1st person story, I don't know who can. And her stories are good. Darn, good.

Have a wonderful holiday weekend everyone, and enjoy the fall weather...atleast for today. :)

All Best-

Whitney