costumes and vests

 

morgan spent the day sorting costumes and memorizing lines for a film with a friend from college.

zuzu playing with my knitting project.

a magical night: morgana's play

beth, or william shakespeare's macbeth, adapted and arranged by morgana, (who also goes by morgan and the pronoun "they" - i will be taking turns with both names and pronouns in all future blog posts) opened this evening on a very rainy day. the day was so grey and rainy that barbek (morgan's lead actor) suggested morgan pick up several umbrellas in case the skies opened up during the performance. the wet trees and damp air made for a perfectly wonderful and dismal setting for macbeth. (for this production morgan rearranged several scenes, included scenes that are often omitted, and omitted scenes that are always included, and also wrote a monologue for lady macbeth at the end.)

these are the only photos and movies i have of the production, and they are so poor that i'm not sure you can get a good sense of the cohesive energy and ensemble work of the actors. morgan did a wonderful job bringing everyone together, and i thought the casting choices were innovative and impeccable. i think the age range of the show went from eight years to forty five years. it was fun having our young friends in it.

i filmed this section at the very end, when the skies finally opened and a fine drizzle grew into a steady rain. everyone watching opened their umbrellas and the patter of the drops blended in with the gentle pounding of the drums and the last words of the actors. as our friend steven said, it was a magical night and the best performance of macbeth he had ever seen.

brava, morgan - director, scene designer, lighting designer, props master, writer, stage manager and . . actor! (on the last minute morgan had to step in as lady macduff).

 pics from wednesday's final rehearsal (waiting for the moms to pick up the younger actors) with (from left to right) lucia, hudson, anika, charlotte, morgan and jenny, morgan's girlfriend. it was so nice that jenny could be here for the rehearsals before returning to london. she was in the states for a maths conference in ann arbor, michigan, and visited with us for almost two weeks.

 i think they were discussing aspects of the rehearsal in the courtyard . . 

while having a little bit of ice cream i found in the freezer.

the assistant director and dance instructor/choreographer, amelia.

deychen in oxford

our friend deychen is in oxford for a five week shakespeare acting intensive. morgana had fun visiting her over the weekend.

it's incredibly beautiful! maybe when deychen returns she can fill me in on the names of the different buildings and which ones she had classes in.

morgana in austria

 morgana is very happy to be in austria again and i think this view of her morning walk with sweet lara shows why quite adequately!

 she began her acting school in innsbruck and so far has been enjoying her classes: tap, voice, singing, scene study and playwriting (she's writing a piece for her class to perform in the spring).

 all week she's had fun exploring the town and finding delicious pastries (sweet and savory) to eat.

 this is not difficult to do in tirol!

 delicious jams and flatbreads . .

her school bag . .

it's looking much more fall-like in austria than in nyc!

berries and coffee and off to see marlene

we've all been enjoying summer berries.

 morgana went with chanda this morning to see her acting teacher marlene. 

 chanda will stay for the class but morgana will go rock climbing at the gym until she meets her teacher for coffee.

the bag she has is one made from cement sacks in thailand. 

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now i'm off to the green market and then greg and i will attempt to clear some junk out of the second bedroom . . i also posted about morgana's first day on the job here.

acting presentation

 we were a little late getting to chanda's presentation, even though it was only half a block away, but luckily we made it in time to see chanda's monologue. above is a pic of greg waiting for a break in the scenes so we can slip into the room.

 after the show, talking about how it was put together. all the students wrote their own monologues. my favorites were chanda's about having the superpower of breathing underwater, and another young girl's about waking up to construction noises everyday and how the construction sounds never end. unfortunately, her monologue is all too true for our neighborhood. developers have taken over and luxury apartments are springing up right and left. it's rather disturbing. i'm just amazed that none of these buildings need to include lower income apartments, and also amazed that anyone can really afford these places. a two floor apartment just sold for twenty five million on west 11th street. yes. you read that right. twenty five million . . for an apartment in a luxury building. here's the description in the new york times.

well, sorry about that diversion . . here's the class with marlene their teacher. morgana did a similar show with her about four years ago called what are our kids thinking. i stayed to watch the class do improvisation exercises, but greg left to watch a seminoles football game and morgana left to babysit.

the trick or treaters

greg met me to help carry home parcels from my shopping trip today. we passed hb right when morgana and chanda were running from the dressing room to backstage for their entrance in balm in gilead . .

balm in gilead

korrina has been stage managing the hb ensemble's balm in gilead by lanford wilson. morgana and chanda have been ushering and staying to go on in the last scene as trick or treaters.

lanford wilson's play about prostitutes and drug addicts sings with sadness, humor and abuse. it's not easy to watch. i'd actually prefer working on it in some way, rather than watching it. hb studio always does an honest and heartfelt production. greg will see it tomorrow night. so far i'm not going. it'll be the first one korrina has stage managed that i haven't gone to. i did manage to get myself to see the rimers of eldritch . .

acting and kitchen repairs

 morgana, greg and i attended chanda's acting class presentation.

 the students and their teachers (voice, movement and improvisation) gave examples of their voice and breathing exercises, dance movement combined with poetry, and improvised scene study. it was very relaxed and you could tell the kids were comfortable being there and really enjoyed their work.

greg went out to our old neighborhood in brookyn to pick up a part for the oven. unfortunately, it's still not working . . what's the next step? we'll try replacing the bottom oven coil.

saturday

chanda's violin repertory class was cancelled as her teacher was ill. she went to morgana's acting class to work on a scene with her. other than that, we're still in holiday mode. no other classes have started up, and we haven't resumed our lessons yet. we usually put away the christmas tree ornaments, but we're having some friends over tomorrow afternoon for an epiphany celebration, so we're leaving it up a little longer.

in the afternoon, greg, morgana and chanda and i went for a walk along the river. the weather was rather mild, with a balmy breeze blowing over the water.

in the evening korrina came home from buffalo. she had a wonderful time and came back with some purchases from toronto, including two decks of cards for us with niagara falls on the back for us to use when playing may i. we'll also celebrate three kings now with her. chanda requested egg casserole for breakfast in the morning, as it's what we had last epiphany.

halloween morning and early afternoon

chanda was the first one out this morning in her costume . . she went off to acting class dressed as a pilgrim. oops! actually, i was the first one out of the apartment . . i went to meet korrina at penn station and help her home with her backpack, pikachu pillow, and sleeping bag. she came home from her sleep away tired, but happy.

the pilgrim costume is actually one we didn't make this year. we borrowed it from c's good friend sami. it's a sweet costume.

after class we worked on making apple pies for our dinner at janet's after trick or treating. we made one pie for the get together, and one pie for us afterwards, at home.

morgana was extremely relieved to find the blouse korrina had made for a costume a few years ago. she thought it would be perfect for her jedi costume, and it was. she also braided her hair on either side and then i did one long braid. she's actually a character from the jedi apprentice series of books by jude watson: siri.

morgana quickly vacuumed the house before we ran off to gingerbread rehearsal.

morgana wore her jedi costume to rehearsal, but chanda decided to be an immigrant girl for it. she thought she would be able to dance more easily in this dress.

it was a bit chaotic, first, at rehearsal. but, melissa soon got everyone in order and they worked for an hour before being released to the halloween night.

here they are on the way home in the subway station. c is wearing a beautiful shawl janet made for me. it's perfect for an immigrant girl . . but she didn't wear it for the rehearsal, so i had to include this photo.

there was a great band playing on the l line on the way home. everyone was out, traveling, working, going to parties, having fun dressing up. we thought these guys were good and enjoyed listening. the drummer, of course, reminded me of jason (as drummers often do) and i thought he was wearing a waldo hat, which also reminded me of jason (and of adam).

(unfortunately, i think i turned the sound off on my camera . . so there is no sound for this movie!)

saturday, early afternoon: reading shakespeare

morgana has been working on viola's twelfth night speech from act II, scene ii. i pulled my first folio edition off the top of the book shelf and we laid on the bed this afternoon and began to read the play together.

we each took turns reading, and the other followed along.

i read from the first folio, and she read from my collected works of william shakespeare that i got years ago from my mom and dad one christmas when i was . . a teenager. it's fun! much more fun than reading shakespeare quietly to oneself, all alone!