Category Archives: News

Fleeting: Back on that Writing Saddle… Sort Of

One of the problems that have been fairly steady as of late versus ten plus years ago is that although ideas, thoughts, and stories are constant in their presence and in the imagination, the actual writing of them into a cohesive unit is far more difficult

Case in point, one of the oldest fanfictions (what author does not create “what if scenarios” for their favorite characters) the process was fairly smooth in composition. Pick a starting point and simply write. The different groups of characters from three differing places of the world had their own stories to tell before they were to meet and seeing what they were doing came easily… more than easily… it was there.

Another story written before that, the storyline was fairly straightforward, but the writing thereof was not linear, it was all over the place. One moment it was towards the end of the store, the next it was the beginning, and then perhaps somewhere in the middle. Just all over the place until the entirety finally poured on to the page and was then completed.

Nowadays find the writing just as piece meal as it was in those early days. With ideas and storyline all over the place but no real cohesive unit anywhere except in the grandiose scheme of things.

Like right now, as much as one would try to focus on a particular character… another group of characters (currently dubbed “The Musketeers”) just keep clamoring to be seen, then again, gentlemen of that persuasion tend to want for attention. What is an author to do than to write the scene involving these particular enigmatic group of gentlemen and see what would happen.

So what did happen?

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Fleeting: Why I am Leaving Community Theatre

I am not “taking a break” as it may appear to be… “retiring” might be a more appropriate term… though some people come “out of retirement” for one more show.

No… for me “leaving” is the most appropriate term for the usage here.

“Leaving” has a bit of finality to it, a kind of ending one chapter to start another one… and theatre has been a part of my life (albeit on and off) for over ten years. I will miss it, but I do have to end it.

Acting, stage managing, video editing… all of it. It has been tickling the back of my mind for months now. That this might be it, the last hurrah, though at first I thought it was after the 2014-2015 season, but the more I think about it the more I realize that this is probably better to be done by the end of the calendar year.

But why stop when I could chug along and (hopefully) do what I want? A lot of factors perhaps, some personal, some petty, but all draining in one arena or the next.

Where to begin?
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Entertainment: Beyond “Happily Ever After”

So I have been rather addicted to this series: “Once Upon a Time”. The irony is that although a fair number of my friends have insisted I should start watching it because it would be a series I would enjoy I made a point of not watching it for that same reason. Well that and the fact that I don’t always have the time to watch television shows anymore.

But then I started watching some time during the first half of Season Three when the characters went to Neverland and I was hooked (heh, Hook… Neverland… get it?). So I purchased the first two seasons of the series and got myself caught up and lo and behold I was definitely on the bandwagon.

I don’t know why I didn’t watch this series sooner… it took all the “happily ever afters” and turned them on their heads. It took all of the beloved fairytales and found ways to integrate them amongst one another from Snow White to Sleeping Beauty, from Pinocchio to Rumpelstiltskin, etc.

There were some ties in between various fairytales that were rather ingenious and inspiring that one can’t help but wonder why did it not happen before? I suppose in a lot of ways we’ll never know.

And now in the second half of the third season the core cast has been integrated with the Wicked Witch of the West… except that is the only integration. Oz appears primarily in flashbacks from the Wicked Witch’s point of view and Glinda the Good Witch makes a couple of appearances, but that’s about all. Which is too bad because I was hoping for some more…

Then again… this kind of popped up on my Facebook News Feed over a month ago. From the Disney ABC Careers, they are taking applications for writers on their current and / or new programs… Now isn’t this tempting.
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Reflection: From Words to Stage a Journey

It’s a little bit funny… This feeling inside…

Playwright's FestivalStill trying to decipher it, but nonetheless there is something to be said about seeing something that one has nurtured from a speck of an idea in one’s imagination to words on paper. Then to trust another party to take those words that you have already cut up, broken, chopped, sewn together, simmer, percolate, etc until it is ripe for someone to then cast actors and have them act those same words out for others to see…

There is just something incredibly profound about the process and I had the chance to see that happen on stage last night during the tech rehearsal prior to opening weekend.

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Endeavor: Costume Accessories Hunt

Yes… I know I have been MIA.

And yes… I know… I was putting together costumes where their pictures have yet to surface on the internet.

Well fear not… for it is that life (as in the real one) got busy. But isn’t that always the case?

**le sigh**

Anyway, the latest idea / obsession / hobby of mine is cosplaying, except I take it to the extreme. As mentioned in a few previous posts:
FablesCon
A Renaissance Appropriate Costume
Costume Inspirations
Corseted Inspired Costumes
Disney Bounding

I have been putting together various costumes over the past year and a limited number of pictures to show for it. Well with a photographers lined up it is the matter of getting some well crafted accessories to complete the costume.

Blame the thespian in me… without a few accessories here and there, the costume just don’t feel complete to me.

So what am I talking about? Well…
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Endeavors: Ten Minute Plays

Why have I been busy? I’ve been writing… a lot of it.

But what exactly? Well that is a bit of a loaded question with a not so easy answer so I will try.

Over a year ago I was in rehearsals for a series of one-acts, one of those one-acts was Christopher Durang’s Kitty the Waitress. In his afterword this particular ten minute play was created with the intention of being one in a series of nine cat related plays… In his original intention the fifth life. So why not create something like that?

So where would I begin? Considering that I listen to music non-stop while working I decided to go with that and listen to songs and if inspiration strikes to quickly write ideas down before I forget them and move on. So if I were to do that what songs would I use? Early on, two songs whose story popped up rather quickly were:
1) Savage Garden’s Two Beds and a Coffee Machine
2) Celine Dion’s It’s All Coming Back to Me Now

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Reflection: NBC’s The Sing-Off Season 4

So I totally mis-understood the televised schedule for this little gem and decided that since it is already a few weeks after the “finale”, I am probably better off just posting my thoughts about NBC’s The Sing-Off on my personal blog as opposed as on the PureTVNet.com blog… at least until I get my life back to relative normal instead of burned-out.

In case you don’t know, NBC’s The Sing-Off:

[…] showcases the country’s top a cappella groups performing popular songs in ways that viewers have never heard before. “The Sing-Off” has no lip-syching, backup bands or safety net.

Granted even though the series has been on hiatus for over a year, it was nice to see this back on the airwaves. However, one cannot help but wonder if this was because of the slowly growing success of Season Three’s winner Pentatonix?

And if you have been living under a rock for the past year… here is Pentatonix’s Evolution of Beyonce:

The fourth season of “The Sing-Off” showcased ten a cappella groups over seven weeks of singing, competing for a recording contract and $100,000…

So who won?

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Fleeting: Getting a Netflix Account

I blame my beau… affectionately of course, because he actually introduced me to some fun shows and those that I really want to know more about…

But I was doing quite well in grossly limiting my television viewing by a significant amount. Now I have been introduced to a fair number of shows that appears to only be available on Netflix…

So what shows finally got me to jump on the bandwagon?
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Fleeting: Going off the Radar

Not because I don’t want to continue blogging… but because there is a shift happening. In particular So You Think You Can Dance and America’s Got Talent are both going on and guess who gets to write those?

Yep… me.

But also I have been going back to my writing projects and have been working on a few projects here and there. So the shift of my blogging would probably end up focusing on whatever writing project I am working on…

So what would I reveal?
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Fleeting: Why “Dancing Through the Universe”?

Why yes… it has been a while and I am well aware of that. So what have I been doing that has been keeping me from writing and blogging?

I’ve been busy. I was on stage or off stage for various shows. Going to see shows in the area… working on my day job, or attempting to blog for Dancing with the Stars.

Eventually balls needed to get dropped because there has been something else that has been keeping my attention:

Writing.

Or more precisely development. Considering I have a fair number of writing-related projects on back burner and was not able to be a part of any of the summer shows coming up, this has become a rare opportunity to focus on that aspect of my life that I haven’t really touched for years (well more like over a decade and a half but who’s counting really?).

So what does any of this have to deal with the title of this post?
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Reflection: Blogging at the Pure TV Network

I think I am burned out… at least when it comes to blogging on Pure Dancing With the Stars.

Well I kind of knew that when I wasn’t interested in working through the spreadsheets during the off season in favor of doing more personal stuff. But I think what did it was when I didn’t even have the Pre-Season Elimination post started and the start of the season was a day away, that was when I knew.

It’s not that I am overwhelmed… I am never overwhelmed, I love to keep busy and having a million plus one projects on my plate so every moment of my life is kept busy and if something else were to fall through I could sift through all the umpteen number of projects and work on something else.

I think what is doing it is that I am focusing more and more on being creative as opposed to analytical.

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Upcoming Reviews and Why Am I Behind in Posting…

Why yes… I have been quite busy… busy doing a lot of things, seeing shows, going to conventions, listening to audiobooks… here is what is upcoming as soon as I find time to sit down and write them out:
LITERARY REVIEWS:
– Christopher Moore’s A Dirty Job
– The Blind Side and other related audiobooks to Michael Oher’s life
– Veronica Roth’s Divergent
– Kill Shakespeare Graphic Novel Vols 1 & 2

THEATRE REVIEWS:
– Kill Shakespeare: the staged graphic novel
– Priscilla Queen of the Desert: Chicago Tour Stop
– Catch Me if You Can: Chicago Tour Stop
– Big Fish: Pre-Broadway Engagement
– American Idiot: Chicago Tour Stop
– Anything Goes: Chicago Tour Stop
– Village Theatre Guild’s A Hatful of Rain
– Denver Performance Center’s Sense and Sensibility (Musical)

TRIPS:
– Fabletown and Beyond Convention in Rochester, Minnesota
– Disneyland / Disney’s California Adventure (from February)

Yeeeeeaaaaaah, I am a wee busy. Not to mention that I am also in another theatre production (on and off stage work) and have other blogging duties to catch up on….

At least you all will know why I’m a wee slow at the moment. 😉 Hopefully I’ll start picking at that mountain before it becomes too high.

Right.

Fleeting: Joss Whedon’s adaptation of Shakespeare’s “Much Ado About Nothing”

For anyone that knows me, you would know that my favorite Shakespeare comedy would be “Much Ado About Nothing” (with “Twelfth Night” being the sentimental second). So when word got around in late 2011 that Joss had completed filming an adaptation of said Shakespeare comedy… let’s just say I got all obsessed about it very very quickly.

Why? Because Joss not only adapted my favorite comedy, but he also brought on board a vast number of actors from his previous projects… and considering how big of a fan I am of the science-fiction / fantasy / comic feel that Joss tends to create… well what do you expect.

That and the fact that I am a MAJOR Nathan Fillion fan (though you probably wouldn’t know it at first glance).

So why am I in such a tizzy? Well because of this:

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Possibilities: So Now What?

After several months of being busy non-stop during the days and evenings both on weekdays and weekends I suddenly find myself in a position where I may actually have time to kill.

So now what?

Well… if you have read a few of my previous posts I have left clues here and there as to what I could possibly have on the back burner:

WRITING / BLOGGING PROJECTS
Ever since Seth Rudetsky’s off chance comment of turning the musical Chess into a movie… my imagination has been going into high gear of inspiration of various writing projects that I wanted to get back into or desiring to start again.

Also with various reality television shows coming back in March… my blogging endeavors will take over once again particularly for:
NBC’s The Voice: Monday, 25 March at 7:00 pm Central
ABC’s Dancing with the Stars: Monday, 18 March at 7:00pm Central
And hopefully (time permitting) NBC’s new matchmaking reality show:
NBC’s Ready for Love: Sunday, 31 March 7:00pm Central

Where could you find the above? Well my posts for Dancing with the Stars you can find over at Pure Dancing with the Stars aka PureDWTS.com and all the other would be at Pure TV Network aka PureTVNet.

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Fleeting: Blithe Spirit by Noel Coward

Someone once told me:

If someone claims to have been in love multiple times, they don’t really know what love is

The irony in this statement is that I remember once upon a time when a small group of us were talking about whether we have ever been in love before. And we went around the group… a few of the people have been in love multiple times or believes that they were in love at the moment. But me? I had to think, I grew to love one guy… I liked others… I was in love with the idea of being in love with another guy… but being in love with someone? Nope, hasn’t happened… at least not the full fledged thereof…

There are some people I know that are with someone because it is comfortable and eventually they have grown to love one another… a kind of jaded view on the concept of love but when you’ve been burned over and over again could you blame them? There are others that jump from person to person to person because chances are deep down the idea an concept of being alone frightens them… even though to every one else they appear to be guy or girl crazy…

I am not saying that I am any better… but speaking as someone that has been alone (voluntarily) for close to seven years straight and makes a conscious effort to be alone after a falling out of a relationship as opposed to jumping straight to the next person waiting in the wings… well I would like to think I have a better feel of the kind of person that I am.

Which is kind of odd that my latest role was the part of Elvira in Munroe Park Theatre Guild’s production of Blithe Spirit. Early in the process the director sat down with myself and a couple of other actors and went into more detail as to how these particular characters are acting and reacting in particular situations.
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