Auditions Are Done!

The monologue workshop class was a success. My students--all girls--all talented and beautiful worked hard on their pieces and were ready. I'm very proud of them. LaGuardia and Frank Sinatra High School for the Performing Arts were this weekend. Most of the girls participated in them this weekend. Most got called back. My heart breaks for all the kids who did not. This matters so much to them. Some of best actors never went to school here, but it's no consolation at the moment. I know rejection, so I know how they feel.

Teaching these kids was a really great experience. It had been a while since I've taught this age group, and it showed me that I really like teaching and have something to offer. I do hope to do this again next year. I would like to teach a two week workshop in the summer culminating in a production for parents and friends to come, so really it's more like a performance workshop.

I'm going to be co-directing a middle school production of "You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown!" Takes me back to my middle school years when I played Lucy in that production. I remember being so concerned how I looked that I didn't want to make the ugly face when Snoopy licks me and I'm supposed to say, "Eww, dog germs!!" I turned upstage. I was no Meryl Streep. I've gotten over that now.

As work begets work, in the middle of all this, I got a co-starring role on "One Life to Live" as Maid #2 at the sleazy Minute Men Hotel. I won't give a way the scene, but the man who was in the scene with me, John Wesley Shipp, starred on Guiding Light years ago as Dr. Kelly Nelson. He was chased by a woman named Nola, played by the terrific Lisa Brown. Where are they now? Well, John showed up in Llanview and Lisa revived her role on Guiding Light the week of it's final run.

Anyway, it was very exciting for me to be in a scene with John, and when you see the scene you'll laugh, but it was still great. I used to watch him on GL after school. The soap my mom had on. I only got to see the last 1/2 hour because I got home after it started. My husband doesn't understand the draw to soaps and I guess with reality television creeping into the airways, the viewing public doesn't want them anymore. But with One Life to Live, the only soap in New York, I want it to last! I've appeared on OLTL 7 times, not including all the extra work I did before that.

My husband and I are still looking for that one job to give us some financial security, but we have each other and our sometimes wonderful kids!