Bed Before 11?

Today I got back from Williamstown Theatre Festival, which is basically a meditative retreat in the mountains with plays. Now I'm here in mountain-less NYC. I'm really happy to be back, but I also kind of have that, "Huh? Where was I for the past two days..." feeling. Something about being in the wilderness to all of a sudden being back in the city is WEIRD! Again I have that, "Was that a dream" feel? And then I see the silly pictures I posted on FB and realize that the trip did in fact happen, and also see that theatre people LOVE posing for pictures. I also got to see my SISTER! I haven't seen her enough this summer, it's so sad! She's an apprentice at WTF (Haaa, that's literally what they call it!), which is a huge honor, but it's also an immense amount of hard work. I feel for her and her lack of sleep. AND this weekend I saw my friend Jason Marks play Max Bialystock in The Producers in Albany, NY. More on all this later!

I've been all over the place, literally and figuratively. Let's just say I had my car in the wrong gear for the first hour or so of my trip to Albany, and at one point felt like I was driving a go-cart on I-95. But, thanks to my mom and the Avis guy and a break in Hackensack, NJ, we got it all worked out. So yeah, the weekend got off to a crazy start.

Why am I explaining all this? Because I'd LOVE to talk about all of the shows I've seen this past weekend, which all were so amazing. BUT, I'm exhausted. So I have to go to bed at the wee hour of 10:50. Can't wait to be back blabbingly blogging.

Oh and also, shoutout to Minky. Glad to be back with you, girlfriend.

Happy Jersey Shore Premiere!

Today was such a RANDOM day- said like Ja'mie King. Gah, I need to rewatch Summer Heights High! I just wish the finale wasn't so depressing... poor Jonah! Anywho, at CAP in monologues I didn't go up because I didn't feel prepared, but I'm going to get a coaching with my amazing teacher, Josie Whittlesey, next week. BTW, Josie's so freaking cool. I love her and want to be her.

Anyway, monologues. I definitely want to feel more comfortable with my monologues because that's an important thing to have- I just didn't want to work on them today. I've been focusing so much on my rep book and getting that back in shape (with some songs I'm SO excited about, I might add!), and also working on our callback for Joy. I wanted to put my energy toward the right things for me at that time.

In Vocal Perf when I went to work on "Matchmaker," I forgot the first line and completely freaked. Theaaaaaaaaatre! Draaaaaamaaaaa! Tzeitel is a role I'm so right for, and the thought of messing it up made me nauseated. I pulled myself together though for the callback, so YAY!! I actually thought it went very well! What I'm excited about is I just sort of lost myself in the song and goofed around, then got grounded for the ending. I don't know, I felt good about. There was a good energy radiating in the room for me. One point was awkward because she asked why I had a female reader in the room even though the two scenes were with men. Hehe oops. I just really like reading with Grace! And I figured if we could choose, might as well choose my fave curly-haired pal. Elyse, you're my fave curly-haired sister.

Anyway, it was a good and overwhelming musical theatre day. The night ended with G at Salina's. Did I just type "the night ended..."? Why am I so serious in this post? Maybe because this day has just been bizarro! Not bad, just more like- HUH? Do you ever have days like that where you're like, wait a minuuuute... Anywho, my amazing friend Piper who I hadn't seen in too long now works there, and it's such a swank restaurant in Chelsea! Nicole Kidman's agent was there apparently. And we got dessert and drinks on the house. We felt so important despite the fact that were in this cool, intimate restaurant with our backpacks and Lululemon bags filled with our audition clothes from earlier. Will I ever grow past a backpack?

But, most important part of the night- JERSEY SHORE IN ITALY PREMIERE. And I have to say. I'm not sure how I feel about it? I love the subject matter (well aren't I just the classiest Southern belle!), but everyone looks too different! Snooki looks too skinny, and JWoww looks flat out emaciated! Her shoulder bones are so skinny and her face looks like the Joker but skinnier. And I love her and thought she was so pretty before!

K, time for bed because I have a callback in the morning and am driving to Albany tomorrow night to see my amazing friend Jason Marks in The Producers. I know he's going to blow me away! I'm so proud of all my talented friends.

I'm One Super Duper Snooper!

I'm back, and there's not a huge picture of the Muppets at the top of this page. I love talking about myself (especially digitally!) and I often pondered why I didn't head on over to steingirl.blogspot.com more often to let my mind meander, and let my wonder wander (if you got the reference, I LOVE YOU!).

The reference = MK and Ashley's 11:00 number from The Case of the U.S. Space Camp Mission. Yeah, those twins really started solving some tricky mysteries. But why wouldn't they? After all, they'll solve any crime by dinnertime!

After hiring MK and Ashley to solve the mystery of why I didn't write on my blog, we realized: it's because I didn't like how huge the Muppet picture was, and I didn't like that I couldn't change it! And that pissed me off! To the point that I turned my head away.

So unfortunately, I took off the picture, because I couldn't make it smaller and didn't care to talk to a tech nerd about how to do it. So now my bloggity-blog is cute and simple and Annie has an aesthetically pleasing place without a huge picture on top to talk about herself! Yay!!

Today I worked on a bunch of stuff for my new WEBSITE! Unfortunately, you can't click that all-caps "website" and go to it- at THIS moment. But it's in the works and then I'll have yet another place to talk about myself! And this one will have pics and sound clips! Hung out with my friend Lauren and we were so New York-y and went to a diner in the rain to have matzoh ball soup and egg creams. Mmmm.

Then we had a wardrobe consult for our showcase with the amazing Nikole Vallins. I didn't have any dress options with me so I just stood there looking at myself in the mirror and dancing. I know exactly what I want my dress to look like, and Nikole approves (emerald green halter with an A-line), so now it's just a matter of finding it. Lauren's going to help me, which I'm so excited about because I have a literal stylist helping me!

Afterward, Grace and I worked a lot on our callbacks for tomorrow. I realized that Tzeitel as Yente needs to be how Elyse and I talk when we're pretending to be the people who live in Dana's building in Boca Raton. Grace and I also looked up a bunch of different auditions coming up. There are some good ones- I'm stoked for the City Center Encores! season. Hopefully we'll actually be seen when we go to them (RIP Avenue Q audition a few weeks ago...)!

Time to continue solving mysteries. Here we stand in our trenchcoats, trying to get involved.

Oh Right. That Last Title.

Victor Victori-huh, the clever name of my last blog post, has to do with the fact that I just turned on Victor/Victoria on Netflix and literally couldn't get through it. Could not. Get through it. Am I a musical theatre fraud? What is WRONG with me?!

I honestly was falling asleep during it. Maybe it's because I'm tired, but it also might be the fact that I reallyyyyy don't like Julie Andrews with that close-cut bob?? Come on Jules. You're adorable. Even if you were a guy you'd have a much cuter 'do.

I don't know, I wasn't into it. I guess you can't win 'em all.

Victor Victori-huh?

Dear Diary: I realized that I hadn't blogged in a while. My thoughts are all-a-jumble right now, because there's just so much going on in the Practicum right now! All exciting, all real, all totally blowing my mind- but in a good way. An overwhelming way, but a good way.

Let me recap what happened last week, because last week happened. We had our first mock casting and it went really well! I felt very calm going into the room and felt like myself as opposed to just feeling like a human-being. It turned out the CD and I both went to Virginia schools, and also both worked at the same Virginia local theatre. It's a smalll world after alllll. So that was cool getting to see, HUH! She is a normal person! Look'a here.

I got to do sides for Erma in Anything Goes. She told me though that had Pal Joey been an option, she would have given me Linda. Interesting! This type stuff is really starting to make sense to me, and I'm so glad that I agree with everything that's been said. What if I was like, HEY NOW. I WOULD LIKE TO BE EFFIE IN DREAMGIRLS. WHY IS THAT NOT HAPPENING. Instead I'm happy being the spastic white girl. Both in real life and in musical theatre.

I also had my first meeting with my advisor and it was kickass. She knows so much and again, it really took the edge off the idea of this mysterious person behind the table when you walk into a room. Auditions psyche me out, and I'm starting to see that all they want to see is individuals. That individual may not fit into the mold of the show they are casting, but screw it- as long as I'm presenting Annie Morgannie then I am set.

We don't have any mock castings this week which is nice. It's giving me a chance to catch up on Showcase stuff. In Cold Reads I got to read the part of Claire from Proof. I LOVE the part of Claire!! It's one of those effortless ones, but I don't know if I'd relate to leaving my sister to care for my crazy dad alone. That'd be tough. I don't know though, it's just an awesome role and I'd love to play it one day.

So let's see, coming up... need to keep working on Showcase stuff... working on our Tara Rubin audition tomorrow... more of Claire hopefully (hehe!), and then Girls Night! What's Girls Night, you ask? Well, it's a night where I hang out with girls who would have no clue who Bernadette Peters is... and it's amazing. It's nice socializing outside the musical theatre world sometimes. It reminds me that I'm a human being with interests outside of the theatre. It removes me from the bubble. Don't get me wrong- I LOVE being able to name every Broadway show that's won a Pulitzer. But I also like being able to watch The Bachelorette and argue over who she should pick, JP or Bentley. I'd like to tell Bentley to be fruitful and multiply (thank you, Woody Allen).

More to come. This is good. I need to write my notes down from my meeting with Nikole and Geoff, but it's nice being able to compile all that I've done on here. Because it's been a lot and I'm grateful for every minute of it!

Hi-Ho, Annie the Frog Here

Oh, hey! Didn't see you sneak up on me! For those of you who don't know the Muppets, you probably misunderstand the title of this first post. Come to think of it, you probably misunderstand this whole blog. Because apparently I have a HUGE picture of the Muppets that I can't seem to shrink and it's kind of annoying me. Oh, and did I mention they're posing with WEEZER? Also known as the writers of the song that boasts the same name as one of my favorite Olsen twin movies, Island in the Sun? Dude, Weezer's awesome.

Side note: Do you know the Weezer song "Keep Fishin'"? The video for it is a-mazing and the Muppets are in it?

Another side note: Do you know that I really don't know much about Weezer, like at all? Other than I like 5 of their top hits and happened to have seen their video with the Muppets in it? And happened to have heard their song on the opening credits of the Olsen smash, Island in the Sun?

Continuing. So yeah "Keep Fishin" is this boppy amazing tune, and I always told myself that if I were ever to be on Dancing with the Stars one day, I'd want to do a killer swing number to "Keep Fishin.'"

Yep. I'm a dreamer. I dream big. Apparently I'm going to be on Dancing with the Stars one day. Kermit the Frog will be my partner and Weezer will be playing live. Let's make that happen. I'm hoping this blog will be a big help in achieving this dream.

Promises, promises that I will eventually talk about serious things like the abundance of information I've accumulated in the first week of CAP21's Summer Practicum, but for now, I'd like to show you that the Muppets don't only jam with the rock folk. They jam...

...with the Broadway folk.

And I must say I can't think of a performer who thrashes harder...

than Bernadette Peters; A performer who slaps the bass and strips down onstage crazier...

than THE Liza Minnelli. And finally, can anyone think of a performer who would one-up Ozzy's bat fiasco and eat FOZZIE onstage?? Because I can't. Oh wait, yes I can...

Why HELLO ETHEL MERMAN in an AMAZING headpiece and an adorable and fluffy bouffant! YOU worked with the Muppets, too?

...Well aren't you one lucky biatch.

On that note, I'm off. Folks, you might be wondering, what's the most important piece of wisdom I should I get out of this magical reading rainbow experience I just had? Should I immediately go watch "Keep Fishin'" and confirm that yes, it'd make an awesome swing dance? Should I rent Island in the Sun because let's face it, the Olsens in their tweens were pretty kickass. No ya know, let's face it, the Olsens will ALWAYS be kickass. Should I DREAM BIG and know that I can achieve ANYTHING I want??

All of the above. But I'd say the MOST important lesson you should glean from this blog is that the writer is a crazy mofo who grew up having a crush on Gonzo and who is still pissed off that the pic on top of this blog is HUGE. Like, really really big.