I Could Write A Book

And it's nearly 1am
And you're wired
Because you've spent the last seven hours reading about musicals in Australia
And you're a bit frustrated because you can't access all the journals you need to
And the more you read the more you want to know
And every now and then you have "ah ha!" moments
And you feel like you get it and it all makes sense
And then you re-read your notes and realize you need more material to back up what you're thinking
But you have a mighty list to go and tackle the British Library with tomorrow
And that makes you so excited
Because you love learning and reading and theorizing and trying to make sense of it all
And you're really grateful you did that podcast thing last year
Because you have all these quotes and useful bits and pieces up your sleeve
And your sensible self tells you to GO TO BED ALREADY!
But your inner writer needs to VENT!
And your soul needs to calm down because it's so excited
So you promise that NOW you will go brush your teeth, and meditate, and journal, and sleep
To start all over again tomorrow
The end.

Idina and Marvin

Imagine you are ten and you dance around the living room with your arms up like this and suddenly you are a grown up living in the city where Mary Poppins comes from and you are sitting in Royal Albert Hall, which is very beautiful, and very big, even for a grown-up. And Marvin Hamlisch, who is the man who wrote A Chorus Line, the first musical you ever saw live, the first musical where you felt that little tingle in the bottom of your stomach telling you, “Oh! That’s what I want to be doing!”, walks out onto the stage which has a full symphony orchestra sitting on it, and he walks up to the podium and all the people in the audience cheer. And he raises his baton, and the people with the instruments know which notes to play and they are the notes to the opening of the song “One” from A Chorus Line. And you hear that familiar refrain and you suddenly feel a bit teary because there is Marvin Hamlisch conducting one of the pieces he wrote, which happens to be from your first proper musical, and here you are in London studying musical theatre and sitting in Royal Albert Hall! 

And a little while later Idina Menzel floats onto the stage in a beautiful white ball gown with a black sash. And she sings “I’m not that girl” from Wicked, and Cole Porter and Lady Gaga and she tells the story about being cast in a little off-Broadway show called RENT and how on the night of the dress-run the writer Jonathan Larson died unexpectedly of an aneurism and she sings a lovely version of No Day But Today and oh god it makes you cry. And your friend passes you a tissue. And then Idina sings For Good acapella and that is very good too. And outside the theatre you get to meet Sir Tim Rice. And he is a very friendly chap. And you can’t quite believe that the man responsible for many of the lyrics that you have sung, listened to, heard over and over since time began, is standing in front of you smiling and shaking your hand and introducing himself as “Tim”.

And then you go and share pizza with a new friend who you met in the audience, and she is lovely. And you float home on London’s wonderfully efficient public transport system and you think “oh my! What a week this has been!” Because the day before you saw a concert at the Barbican where the BBC Symphony Orchestra played a new score as live accompaniment to an old silent film from the 1920s. And it was utterly magical to be transported by an old film made over seventy years ago and even more magical to watch a full symphony orchestra play a delicious score. 

And earlier in the week you were in NYC. And last week you saw two brand new musicals. And you were a guest presenter on your favourite podcast. And in the midst of it all you get to go to school every day to learn more about musicals and be with lovely people who share your joy and your passion and your fun. And you feel very blessed to be surrounded by all this culture, this music, these wonderful people. And you walk home and the moon is shining and the stars are bright and the air is chilly and fresh, and you say, thank you thank you thank you to the powers that be for allowing me to live this life enchanted.  And you crawl into bed at 1.40am and fall asleep smiling. The end. 

Sunday Night

Happiness is coming home on a Sunday night after a long week of work and rehearsals and teaching and being able to chat to your family on the phone and throw together a pot of potato and leek soup and have a vegetable quiche slowly cooking in the oven, ready for lunches and dinners for the following week. It's slicing up a loaf of fresh sourdough bread from the markets, ready for toasts and sandwiches. It's having Adam Hills and Co. playing in the background, making you laugh as you chop spring onions and leeks and peel potatoes and throw diced pumpkin into a pot of boiling water to soften the flesh. It's finding a double yoke in the last egg. It's going to group meditation and feeling the love and being surrounded by oodles of positive energy. It's listening to podcasts on the train on the way home. It's wearing gumboots in the rain. It's the kindness and support of your friends. It's watching a musical with scripts in hands and being so close to the actors you can literally reach out and touch them. It's the magic of being able to watch productions of shows thousands of miles away on your laptop. It's about taking pause amidst the hustle and smiling and saying wow. I live a life enchanted. And it is magical. And you lick leek and potato soup off the wooden spoon and know you've done good. The end. 

Melbourne

image from ineedaholiday

Once upon a time yesterday there was a girl called Lulu who liked musicals very much. She liked them so much that one she decided to fly all by herself from Sydney to Melbourne to see some new musicals. So she booked her ticket and off she went. When she got there she was very excited because her hostel was right by the river and in walking distance to Federation Square and the Melbourne Arts Centre, which are both very lovely. 

After walking down by the riverside and admiring all the pretty sculptures lining the riverbank, Lulu took herself to the Australian Centre for the Moving Image to see the current exhibition, “Dreams Come True: The Art of Disney’s Classic Fairy Tales”. Lulu spent a few happy hours wandering the halls of the exhibit, admiring how clever the people at the Disney Studio were and still are, and getting a little bit teary at all the lovely princess stories and remembering just how much they are a part of her psyche, even if her university educated feminist self says that the messages they espouse are a little bit dated. The critical part in Lulu’s mind also wondered about the stories not being told in the exhibit, for example, why/how/when did the Walt Disney Brothers Studios become just the Walt Disney Studios. Lulu remembered from her university days that there is a lot of story being told in what is purposefully left out, and she made a mental note to investigate it further later on. 

Then Lulu made a mad dash for the Melbourne Arts Centre, which was luckily just a hop, skip, and a jump across the river. She collected her ticket, and went downstairs into the Fairfax Theatre to watch Program One of Carnegie 18, a new musical theatre development program. In short, it was utterly wonderful (if you would like to hear the longer version of this part of the story you will need to keep an eye on Flusical for Episode 6: Carnegie 18). Lulu laughed, cried, held her breath, and was filled with utter excitement at the high level of talent, and the wonderful new works on display. In the interval she met a lovely lady named Jan, who happened to be the editor of Australian Stage Online, the newsletter in which Lulu found out the London Central School was holding Sydney auditions. Lulu thanked Jan profusely for changing her life for 2011, and with much discussion about musicals and Australian theatre to be had, Lulu and Jan sat above the river eating wicked but utterly delicious treats.

In the late afternoon, Lulu was lucky enough to interview Vanessa Pigrum, the Artistic Director of Carnegie 18, for Flusical. Vanessa was very lovely, and Lulu was left feeling inspired and ready to take on the world. The second program of Carnegie 18 was equally as exciting and moving as the first program, and Lulu was particularly taken by the new opera about netball. She had no idea that the drama of netball could be so fitting for an opera. Or that sopranos could be so funny. 

By now the sun had set over Melbourne, and while most other folk were watching the tennis, Lulu made back for her hostel. Sitting in the kitchen writing up her notes for the day, Lulu had a wonderful conversation with a Canadian traveller. They talked about politics and nations and the state of the world and indigenous affairs and national identity. It was very lovely, and it was only when the kitchen was closed for the night did the conversation come to an end.

Four hours later Lulu was back at the airport, and by now she was very tired from her grand adventure and severe lack of sleep. Thankfully adrenalin and inspiration were abundant, and helped her to stay awake throughout the day so she could work, edit the next episode of the podcast, and write about her adventures. And then she collapsed into bed to dream about all things musical. 

The end.

19 Lovelies

Just because it is the nineteenth day of the year, and the nineteenth day of the month, here are nineteen things inspiring me at present...

1. My job. I love getting paid to watch a profesh musical every day. It is amazing.
2. Being in a new Australian musical, Wonderland. Working with beautiful, lovely, talented, and awesome people.
3. Seth Rudetsky. Whenever I am down, sad, or lonely, Seth is there with a deconstruction to remind me that someone is as obsessive about musicals as I am. Perhaps even more so.
4. MusicalTalk. Every episode I learn something new. It inspires me to learn more, to get my hands on every musical ever recorded, and to watch everything that comes out.
5. The absolute plethora of musical activity happening in Australia right now. Carnegie 18, Jersey Boys, Wicked, Hairspray, Mary Poppins, Xanadu, Rock of Ages, Doctor Zhivago, Legally Blonde... We are not a cultural wasteland of despair.
6. My beautiful friends. You know who you are. You are amazing.
7. Playing flute and learning new music.
8. Watching people rally together to help each other in the flood crisis.
9. Singing in front of an audience. Singing at home. Singing in rehearsal. Singing lessons.
10. Writing every morning for half an hour.
11. Knowing that I'm moving to London to study musical theatre.
12. Knowing that I'm going back to summer camp in June.
13. Going back to the markets and seeing all my lovely vendors again. Eating beautiful food.
14. Nemo, my regular "The Big Issue" vendor, who always has a smile and a story about the current issue
15. Running weekly morning meditation sessions in Glebe and sharing what I've learnt and knowing that  others are benefiting too
16. Amy Krouse Rosenthal and her 7 things. Always Trust Magic, Beckon the Lovely, Connected, Do, Empty Spaces, Figure it out as you go, Go to it.
17. Researching, writing, and recording episodes for Flusical with Flick.
18. Going to dance class and being surrounded by beautiful, talented people, and being pushed to be better
19. Breathing into the moment and trusting that it will be ok.

Christmas Stocking

Christmas has passed and it’s now the season for taking stock of the year. Some of this year has been awful. But you breathe into the pain, and you just keep breathing, and suddenly you find that you are surrounded by an absolute plethora of amazing food, music, family, friends, and theatre. And you come to the end of the year with the ability to say that much of it has been utterly wonderful. In no particular order, the beautiful, inspiring, exciting, and lovely things in my life this year have been...

• The Eveleigh Farmer’s Markets with my bestie Len
• Starting dance, singing, and flute lessons again
• Starting Flusical with Flick
• Starting the Movie Musical Project
• Learning to cook pasta, ice cream, polvoron, bread, pastry, and cheese from scratch
• Quitting the security of a full-time job to pursue theatre and it being utterly wonderful 
• Getting paid to watch Jersey Boys several times a week
• Moving to Ashfield with beautiful housies 
• Developing my personal meditation practise, obtaining my Meditation Facilitator’s Certificate, running morning meditations in Glebe
• Performing in The Pajama Game and meeting all the beautiful wonderful people at Strathfield Musical Society
• Singing with the Bling Band
• Running my first City to Surf  
• Discovering MusicalTalk, Seth Rudetsky, Amy Krouse Rosenthal, and Superforest 
• Knowing that I am surrounded by the most beautiful, talented, wonderful, supportive friends
• Knowing that I have incredibly beautiful, talented, wonderful, supportive families 
• Working with amazing people 
• Seeing Shoshana Bean, Donna McKechnie, Stephen Schwartz, and Liz Callaway perform in Sydney and Brisbane 
• Being accepted into the London Central School of Speech and Drama Masters of Music Theatre program

Podcasting

Last year I started listening to a FABULOUS podcast called MusicalTalk. Every week a group of Brits get together and talk about musicals. Their focus is mainly on London and the UK theatre scene, with occasional dips across the pond to talk about what’s happening on Broadway. They talk with actors, directors, writers, stage managers, audience members, all the plethora of folks involved in making musicals, and have a whole list of very well known industry folk on their interview credits including Stephen Schwartz, Alan Menken, Anthony Rapp, Johnny Depp, and Stephanie J Block to name but just a few.

So a couple of weeks ago, I was listening to MusicalTalk and I thought, I like talking about musicals! Why don’t I do my own podcast? And talk about Australian musicals? And in a rush of excitement I told the girls at dance about it. And they got very excited. And then, last Thursday after Chris had whipped us into shape in Broadway Jazz, Flick and I sat down and attempted our very own podcast. The results are here for your listening pleasure. In this inaugural episode we talk about our first experiences of musical theatre. It was ridiculously fun to sit and talk musicals. It was ridiculously fun to sit and edit the thing (thank you Apple and your wonderful GarageBand invention!). In short I had a total blast. Do what you love. And you will be happy. The end. 

PS. We need a name for the podcast. Suggestions welcome!