debor009

Going over my script today at La Tomate on Connecticut Avenue in DC, preparing for a meeting with the writer/director of a short film that starts shooting the 9th.  It appears I got the role, playing a corrupt Senator.  It's a meaty part.  Two days of rehearsals and three days of filming. I also have an open call stage audition on Monday in front of 50 or so area stage directors, so this weekend will be spent practicing my monologue for that.  Then full attention to the film. Now if I can just stop eating the leftover Halloween candy. (sigh) I am so bad.

The play just wrapped and I'm back to my first love, film.   I just found out that I'm in two entries in the  New York Television Festival , October 22-27.  One is The Louder the Better , written and directed by Michael Toscano, about a radio talk show host succumbing to the greed and immorality of a national network (I play the network executive, natch.) TLTB took Faculty Honors at the Columbia University Film Festival back in May and has been accepted in the Independent Pilot Competition at NYTVF. The other entry is Capitol South, written and directed by my friend Rob Raffety , which is a comedy about the underpaid twenty-somethings who work in congressional offices and political action committees and do much of the work in Washington. Capitol South is in the Samsung "Second Screen Storytellers" Contest at NYTVF and in it I play a foul-mouthed and frequently tipsy Southern Belle who's president of a conservative PAC called "Americans for America."  I...

"J.B." for American Century Theater is a confirmed success! Nice reviews at DCMetroTheaterArts and TalkinBroadway/DC .   Special thanks to the wildly perceptive drama blogger John Glass ( DramaUrge ) for noticing I was a standout in the ensemble. (Hah!)  Actually, over all of the reviews, I think everyone in cast got a plug, even the dog, Bela, a Mi-Ki who will soon need his own website.  Never appear with kids and dogs?  I'm appearing with both.  They're adorable.   More reviews are expected in the next few days.   John Tweel, Loren Bray, and Kathryn Browning Joshua Aaron Rosenblum, Joshua Dick, and Bela

Being handed a bouquet of yellow roses on opening night has me thinking about all of my favorite things.  Cashmere sweaters in cerulean blue.  My husband, who is like a part of me.  Luxury accommodations on a cruise to anywhere. Mallomars (yum). And British actress Lesley Manville. The woman whose incredibly sensitive face is an inspiration for all that I do, both on stage and on film. Lesley Manville in Another Year One wonderful thing about not being a principal in the play J.B. is that the pressure is off to carry the production.  I can relax and concentrate on making the most of a small role; one of the most important being to let the tension go out of my face and body so that I can react truthfully to what is going on around me and inside me. The role I play in J.B. is purely reactive - part of an ensemble of women whose purpose is to comment on the events transpiring center stage.  Some actors would take a purely mechanical approach to that, cueing ...

We opened in J.B. (podcast with principals Steve Lebens , Bruce Alan Rauscher , and Julie Roundtree available here .)  The  Preview had a few technical glitches and dropped lines.  Opening night we were technically correct, if a little safe.  Last night, the third performance, I think we hit our groove.  Spontaneous applause, laughter (and tears) from the audience.  Everyone in the cast pumped with adrenaline. It’s not easy being an actor and working a day job too.  I drove into the theater parking lot Friday night feeling dog tired from a week of dress/technical rehearsals every night and writing contract proposals and ad copy every the day.  Up at 5 a.m., in bed by midnight., again and again. But the minute I walked into the dressing room I felt a rush that lasted through the performance and a couple of hours after.  There is nothing else like it in the world. I read once that Sir Laurence Olivier , late in his career, was often seen sha...

For friends in the DC area, I open Friday in the Archibald MacLeish Pulitzer/Tony-winning play "J.B."for The American Century Theater .  Special deals going on. Goldstar and Ticketplace both have 1/2 price tickets available for all performances. Also two Pay What You Can performances on Thursday Sept 13 (a preview) and Wed. Sept 19 (a full performance). It's a thought-provoking play, not surprisingly. Steve Lebens and Bruce Rauscher are terrific as God and the Devil. I have a small supporting role, but come 20 minutes early for the pre-show Clown Reverie and you'll see me do a turn as the Bearded Lady. I'm searching prop and party shops for a cigar to add (as if the beard wasn't enough!) Doing is the best classroom, as the saying goes, and I find that I learn a lot from watching more experienced stage actors at their craft. Also, as Michael Caine advises, stealing whatever works.   The role of Mrs. Lesure calls for me to express serenity and faith in the mid...

The morning smells of Los Angeles.  Odd how smells trigger memories.  Odder still that after more than 30 years in the East, and a good many years since I've even visited LA, I should suddenly start smelling the cool, misty, eucalyptus-pungent mornings that I remember there. But several times over the past year, I have stepped outside, taken a breath, and been flooded with memories. I was even moved one Sunday to research apartments online. (What does this mean?) Had the first read-through on the play J.B. and got a look at the cast. Only one is a familiar face to me, and unlike The British Players cast, where it was all one happy family, only the principals seem to know each other here, so there will be a process for everyone of warming up and learning to work with different personalities.  Some of the concepts director Rip Claassen has in mind for staging the play are very exciting, and my role, though small, is not insignificant.  I was glad of that.  It's...