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September 15, 2025 at 8:34 am by Claudia

I’m back and my work on the show is finished.

I’m really tired. But the experience of working with Darko and this wonderful cast of actors was so satisfying. Gems – all of them. Saturday was the first preview performance and the house was full. Oh my goodness, what a reaction! They got everything – every bit of humor, every bit of mystery (there were several audible gasps.) It was so exciting. I was sitting next to Darko and what happiness to see the joy on his face. This is his baby. As he says, he is wearing two hats – playwright/adapter and director. I think both were very proud.

There’s still work to be done as is normal in the theater. There will be preview performances at night through next Thursday. During the day, they’ll be rehearsing, fixing things, adding things, playing with lights, etc. Though Darko does sometimes ‘freeze’ a show a couple of days early. It just depends. Opening night is next Friday.

I’ve loved coaching again; working with actors, watching, noting, communicating. I love my work.

The exhausting part came from the logistics, the insane drive in New Jersey, trying to eat as cheaply as I could while staying in a hotel, that kind of thing. I’ve driven over 700 miles commuting back and forth, much of it on the Garden State Parkway, a road I will studiously avoid in the future. I have several more gray hairs because of that parkway.

So I’m tired.

But when I said goodbye to Darko, I thanked him for bringing me on board and he said “Until the next time.” So I know he’ll use me again. That makes me happy. When Darko discovers that he likes and respects you and wants to work with you again, you are gathered into his circle, his family. He is very loyal.

I don’t need to work a lot. But I do need to work.

And I can still do it.

After a year and a half of no work, I cannot tell you how satisfying this experience was.

Mother Play

May 17, 2024 at 8:56 am by Claudia

My goodness, the pansies are so lovely this year.

We’ve had rain for 3 days and we’re finally going to get a break today. Don has a gig tonight and we’re still tired from our trek into the city on Wednesday, so I have ordered him to take it easy until he has to head on out this evening.

We had a major delay on the trip into the city on Wednesday. Something was happening on the George Washington Bridge which impacted the tunnel, so there were three times as many cars and buses heading into the tunnel. Traffic was backed up for miles. In the end, the trip took 3 hours instead of 1 1/2. Since we planned our departure to allow enough time for lunch, we were okay in terms of a 2 pm curtain, but we didn’t have time for lunch and made do with 2 old fashioned donuts from Dunkin Donuts. And some water. (We did have time for dinner before we left, though, so everything worked out in the end.)

We had great seats, courtesy of Jim, and the theater itself is very intimate. It’s the smallest house of all the official Broadway theaters and it was perfect for this play.

What can I say? Words seem to be inadequate. It’s a three-hander (3 actors in the cast.) A true ensemble piece. It’s the story of a mother and her two children that takes place over the course of many years, as they move from apartment to apartment. The play is subtitled “a play in five evictions.” All three actors: Jessica Lange, Jim, and Celia Keenan-Bolger were brilliant. The play was written by Paula Vogel, and directed by Tina Landau. Two women who are 72 and 62, respectively, creating magic on Broadway. I love this play that Vogel has written (much of it autobiographical) and the way in which Landau has staged it.

Jessica Lange. My god, she gives a performance that is beyond words! She is magical, luminous, heartbreaking, moving (the same words can be used for the entire experience.) I’ve never seen her on stage before. I was stunned by her performance. (She just turned 75, by the way.) Three women over 60!

Celia and Jim gave gut-wrenching, touching, funny, beautiful performances. They were freaking amazing. (I’d never met Celia before, but I’d worked with her husband a couple of times out at the Old Globe.)

At the end of the play, the audience surged to their feet. In this case, it was a extremely well-deserved standing ovation, with cheers erupting spontaneously. It’s the best thing I’ve seen in a very long time. It is ensemble work at its finest; three actors working at the top of their game. Each of them has been nominated for a Tony Award this year.

I am so grateful we went. The entire experience in that theater was a gift that I will never forget. I am still thinking about it and suspect I will be thinking about it for a long time.

We went backstage afterward and met Jim in a reception room. The three of us had a great conversation about the play, and Jessica, and time, and the process of working on the play, and what did Jim do for his audition piece when he auditioned for the grad program at USD because I couldn’t remember, and his wedding anniversary, and how much we adore each other, etc. I choked up when I talked about his growth as an actor since those days in grad school. He is simply marvelous in this show. I am so proud of him, of the person he has always been and remains to this day. We did get to meet Celia (who also had a friend at the performance.) But I think Jessica stayed in her dressing room. And I know Jim was headed to his as we left – it was a 2 show day and he was going to take a nap. This play is gut wrenching, as well as life affirming, and I imagine doing it twice in one day takes a toll.

Here we are. I love this guy.

I have seen and worked on countless plays in my lifetime. The occasions when I walk away from a performance feeling stunned and shaken and moved are truly rare. That happened with this play. A gift I will not soon forget.

Mother Play has a limited run and it closes on June 16th. If you can see it, do. It’s extraordinary.

Stay safe.

Happy Friday.

Wednesday Thoughts

January 24, 2024 at 9:11 am by Claudia

♦ This girl always gets a lot of comments on Instagram.

It’s the hair, of course.

I wanted a Ferro Doll with curly hair for a long time. Though I envisioned her having dark hair, I ended up with this light-as-air curly blond hair. I’m happy it turned out that way.

♦ Oh, the weather. After a bit of snow late in the day yesterday, the rain turned to ice, and at some point today, it will turn back to rain. Any time ice is involved, we stay in the house until the issue is naturally resolved (if possible.) Looks like it will be resolved later today, so we’re going to sit tight in our little cottage.

♦ I’m trying to get motivated to start working on the Beacon Hill. For heaven’s sake, I’ve had it for at least 3 years and, except for my initial clean up and removal of unwanted large curlicues, I’ve done nothing. I think about it. I look at photos of other Beacon Hills. And I do nothing. Today, I’m going to look at IG miniatures accounts for inspiration. It’s huge, it’s blocking the light in my little cubicle, so it might as well block it prettily, you know what I mean?

♦ On a totally different subject, I want to address the cheapening of the standing ovation, something Don and I have observed for several years. When both of us were young actors, a standing ovation was rare. On those special occasions when you were on the receiving end of a standing ovation, my goodness, you felt as if you had landed on the moon! Everyone hugged each other backstage, holding that brief moment in time close. Amazing! Indeed, even into our middle age, they were rare.

Now? Every darned performance, the audience pops up immediately and applauds. It’s expected now, though why it is, I don’t know. It should be rare, magical, something to hope for but not count on.

I see a lot of theater, as you know. I can’t remember a time in the past 6 or 7 years – maybe even 10 years – where the audience didn’t stand and applaud. And, quite frankly, most of those performances, though good, did not deserve a standing ovation. They weren’t extraordinary, another word that is thrown around so much that it has lost its meaning. (I’m guilty of this occasionally.) Yes, applaud warmly, acknowledge the work of the actors and everyone involved, but don’t stand unless it’s remarkable.

The audience has made a collective decision that applauding means standing as well.

It doesn’t.

I feel sad for actors nowadays who will not experience the wonder of a true, unexpected, and rare standing ovation. It really was something special back in the day.

When the automatic standing ovation occurs, I stay seated. Occasionally, as when I watched Hamilton, I surge to my feet, as well. But only rarely.

There’s a whole list of things like this that have lost their original meaning and import and are now just another thing you say or do that means far less than it used to.

Don’t get me started on ‘awesome.’

This has been on my mind again since I saw the first preview of Dial M for Murder, which was okay but just okay. Nevertheless, like a collective jack-in-the-box, the entire audience popped up and applauded.

I stayed seated.

My thoughts for the day.

Stay safe.

Happy Wednesday.

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