94. THE NEXT CHAPTER
i made so much stuff this week!
i tend to think of my life in chapters. the past two months were my “out-of-town associate” chapter. i made good money, i lived out of hotels, i saw very little theater except for the shows i worked on, i was generally pretty hard to reach, i ate a lot of good food, i had less time than i would like for my own individual artistic work, i got used to being on my own.
i’m a couple days into the next chapter: my “back to freelancing and self-producing and remote work” era. i’m adjusting. i sit at my desk, i track my time, i am bad at remembering mealtimes, i hang out with my roommates, i take the subway, i drink my little chai lattes, i walk around my neighborhood, i am always on the verge of donating half my closet, i see so many shows, i still have less time than i would like for my own individual artistic work, i panic about money, i genuinely get emotional when people say they’ve heard of my work, i sleep in my own bed.
i have to organize my life like this. i have to organize my life, period. when i was diagnosed with adhd, i asked my psychiatrist what interventions she suggested in addition to medication. “it sounds like you’re kind of already doing them all,” she said. a lifetime of planners and post-its and hand-calligraphed bullet journals and color-coded google calendars suddenly made sense. and so did my terrible memory.
i organize the things i have to do in the present or the future so i don’t forget to do them. but i also have to organize the things i’ve done in the past so i don’t forget i did them. this newsletter is one way of doing it. my journal is another. so is my camera roll. my text chains. my notes app. my cardboard boxes under the bed.
my brain usually feels incredibly disorganized at the start of a new chapter. this time is no different. i’m writing this mid-commute and i feel like i am wearing a coat entirely made of loose ends. i’m going to put the categories of this week’s installment in a different order. (just this week! it’s already making me itchy!) tomorrow, hopefully i will organize my life. sometimes it takes a few pages for a new chapter to really take off.
p.s. this post is too long for email! click the title in your inbox or click HERE to read it on my little substack website so you don’t miss anything.
making.
i’ve always admired directors who include “source lists” for their productions, so on friday night, i finally sat down and made source lists for most of my past shows. these lists are definitely not exhaustive, but they give you a good sense of some of my major influences and inspirations during each project. i feel proud of them and also a little afraid you might think, “oh, god, we get it. sometimes you read.” eeeek!
put on my little actor cap (!) for a private workshop reading of ooo i have something to say performative QVC international shipping included play by brandon rumaker, directed by my other wonderful roommate, maya quetzali gonzalez.
still working on staffing and casting for cunnicularii. (so nice to actually be able to write the title of the project now that it’s been announced!) unfortunately, my brain is a tornado. here is a heavily censored version of me trying to get my thoughts onto paper.
also spent a while messing around in canva coming up with dummy poster designs. ultimately, sophie and i will want to commission a graphic designer, but we tend to find it helpful to react to visuals as we figure out what we want, so i’ve been testing out some color schemes, formats, and images.
also made the posters for our upcoming reading of eleven weeks of nuclear summer! coming soon!
preparing for our reading of the after wife, which will happen on saturday as part of the LPAC rough draft festival! sophie churned out an amazing new draft, and i’m really so excited to get to work with these actors. if you were thinking of coming and you haven’t bought your ticket, this is your sign to do it.
sooooo many applications and instagram posts. some for me, some for others as part of the remote work i do to stay afloat.
a photography gig! i don’t advertise for these at the moment, but friends occasionally hire me to shoot their shows, and i did one this week. i have all kinds of feelings about photography that i should probably write up in a future newsletter.
seeing.
my feelings about broadway (the business, the location) are much more nuanced and complicated than they used to be, but it still makes my heart leap with admiration and aspiration to see this picture. one day.
a reading of asilomar by dipika guha, directed by jess mcleod, as part of mtc’s ted snowdon reading series. got to text my college roommates that i had actually seen a play about the ethical ramifications of crispr technology applications!
a college production of nine. what a deeply wild show.
the late, great marin mazzie in on the twentieth century.
my wonderful roommate ari’s latest drag show. it was adventure time themed. i have seen not one single episode of adventure time. ari was still great.
dia chelsea with cathy and gabby (both former roommates, both still wonderful). dia chelsea features a single exhibition at a time; this time it was el abrazo by delcy morelos. also, cathy has her own substack tracking her journey visiting every museum in new york city in alphabetical order!
also, here is a photo of gabby and a photo of me taking that photo of gabby.
there was also this unbelievably perfect shaft of light illuminating the face of one woman sitting on a bench inside the exhibit. i love when i get lighting design inspiration out in the wild.
we also hit up some galleries on the same block.
and spied some more cool art out on the street.
the entire donut-making process on display at krispy kreme, featuring bright green donuts for st. patrick’s day, and the park slope st. patrick’s day parade.
the border of bushwick and bed-stuy.
and some more odds and ends from around the city.
this is genuinely how i feel whenever i wear my favorite outfit.
i bought an oracle deck. every morning i pull a card and leave it out on my desk as a reminder.
finished my rewatch of the good place. it’s so good — deeply funny, wildly inventive, and genuinely optimistic about human nature.
restarted girls5eva, which is very silly fun and has some excellent musical numbers that scratch the same itch that crazy ex-girlfriend does.
reading.
finished good material by dolly alderton. i’ve been really happy to be reading hard copy books again. ebooks have been a life saver while i lm traveling, but i’m way more likely settle into bed with a paperback than an ipad. i took photos of so many pages but am just going to share this little bit.
started the pisces by melissa broder. true accident that i painted my nails the same color as the cover!
life is imitating art over at circle in the square. last week, climate protestors interrupted a press performance of sam gold and amy herzog’s new production of enemy of the people, starring jeremy strong and michael imperioli. timeout compiled some audience videos and managed to interview one of the protestors. adam feldman captures just how intentionally meta the whole thing was below.
even michael imperioli says he thought the protestors were a surprise move from gold. (he also explains away his aggressive response to the protestors as “being in character.” meanwhile, jeremy strong called out “he’s right!” as a protestor was being forced out. is everyone over there just full method? how can we know?)
later, variety interviewed the same protestor (one of three), who made an excellent point (see below) to counter some of the complaints (see the new york times review of the play, which devotes more ink to the protestors than the actors).
the vulture review by sara holdren is, as always, well worth reading. anyway, i do kind of think this whole thing is going to sell tickets. i’m going to start joining the lottery…
for the kate middleton conspiracy theorists among us, let it be known that i think it’s her in the tmz grocery shopping video and am relieved she appears to be doing well. and somehow, her apparent good health manages to make the entire debacle more strange, not less. this was a good read about why this whole situation was such an captivating microcosm of our current “choose-your-own-reality information dystopia.”
i’m trying to get better at small talk. i think it’s worth it.
this interview between emily blunt and anne hathaway was good, especially the below bit.
i have to say, as a woman director who often gets called “mom,” it’s genuinely refreshing to see someone parentify a man director.
tony kushner on jonathan glazer’s oscar acceptance speech.
a list of virtue names that i won’t link here because i think the blog that published it might be infested with malware. i think virtue names are so funny. also feel grateful my name isn’t prudence.
rachel elizabeth’s hot ghoul diaries. moments that got me included:
“some things never change, like me reminiscing aloud about my worst life choices before noon. my sunflower friend says they were acts of grief and that no one grieves in a morally perfect way.”
“we went on a few dates last fall but it didn’t work out (he got to know me). i’m proud of my ability to stay friends with people i’ve shared music and spit with. it’s like practice for my inevitable divorce.”
“this is why i stay in touch with people i’ve slept next to. there are parts of me i need back.”
hearing.
sometimes there is a song you think you know and then you stop listening to it for a long time and you hear it again and realize it means something completely different than you thought.
JONI MITCHELL IS BACK ON SPOTIFY I REPEAT JONI MITCHELL IS BACK ON SPOTIFY!!!
