At a certain point in the recent past I departed Los Angeles, to spend what promises to be an incredible month in Edinburgh Scotland.

For those who do not know, I was cast last minute in the new show Lovelace: A Rock Opera written by Anna Waronker and Charlotte Caffey (two amazingly talented and ridiculously sweet women), and the show is making its international debut this week in Scotland at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival and I am stupidly and ridiculously grateful and excited to be a part of it.

Now, I’m new to a cast who have been working to bring the show to life for 3 years or so, and coming in as a last minute replacement, less than a month before the show opens, with only 5 rehearsals means that in rehearsal, you don’t really have time to socialize or get to know anyone, you are spending all of your down time, reviewing blocking and lyrics and figuring out what the hell is happening in general. SO the first real social time I had with any of the cast was on the 10 hour flight to Heathrow.

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Twas Amazing.

There are 4 women in the cast, sadly Jill was not with us, she flew in on a later flight, but the three of us were all seated together, which was great.  We also had Robert, our flight attendant, who was HIGH ON LIFE (or possibly speed) and really wanted us to try all of the delicious wines that New Zealand has to offer…

GO TIME.

After a few glasses, and lunch, Katrina (who plays Linda Lovelace in our show) dropped a bomb that would rock the whole plane…”I have a dolphin, and we’re going to need to take pictures of him.”

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Me. “I’m sorry, I thought you just said you have a dolphin?”

Katrina. “His name is Rolph, he speaks with a latin accent”

Me and Rachel “________”

She then pulls him out, NOW, some might call Rolph a 2 dollar hand puppet from the clearance rack at Ikea; but I call him a friend.

Isn’t he beautiful?

What a smile!

(He was thirsty)

(he imprinted on Rachel… jealous much!)

We then needed a group picture with Rolph to commemorate our time together

We didn’t think our flight attendant Robert saw him, but then he said in his adorable Kiwi accent

“ye, put the shawk up a beet higha there” (that’s me speaking New Zealandish if you didn’t know)

The point is, even though I never got a Bloody Mary, and even though I couldn’t get through Hottub Time Machine because it was all glitchy on my screen,

I met Rolph.

And he changed my life.

and much less important, the girls, I’m sorry, Women, in my cast are amazing, I had SO MUCH FUN with them on the flight,

there is nothing to make or break a relationship like shitting together on a ten hour flight (I’m sorry, I just realized that I accidentally typed “shitting” instead of “sitting” but it seems really wrong to change it at this point)

We went through it on the flight, we laughed, we cried (mostly because we were laughing so hard), we drank wine.

Katrina said  “Tuesday” and stared in the distance (thats annoying cause its an inside joke that I would have to explain and then it would make it not funny, when it truth it was REEALLY funny…Okay here’s what it was, I asked Katrina “whats our day off” because we only have one in the month that we are here, and she gazed upon me with a look of pure focus and said…”Tuesday.” And I looked at her with the same level of focus and nodded, then she nodded, then I nodded and about 4o seconds into this, she say’s ” the 17th” !!!!! LO freakin L right….right…no…okay see you had to be there, me I’m having a hard time typing right now because I’m laughing so hard just thinking about it. IF YOU DON’T WANT TO HEAR MY LAME STORIES THEN DON’T PRESSURE ME LIKE THAT)

It was great, got here and found an amazing Thai restaurant where the deliriously exhausted group of us ate (I of course had a burger and a beer, it was so good and only 5 bucks!) next time though I’ll probably try something Thai because it all smelled amazing.

Its beautiful here.

I already don’t want to leave.

aaaaaahhhhhH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So much to do before I go, I have one more Sunday performing in the world premiere play Verbose Gourmand’s 7/25 at the Hollywood Fight Club Theatre on Sunset and Highland.

The big cherry is Mind Majors an LA based production team that I have recently fallen completely in love with, and I think the feeling is mutual. I’m just really excited to be working on music again, fun, funky, soulful… AAAAHHH! I’ll keep you posted.

Love, light,

So much magic

aaaaahhhhh

Today I went to a Japanese restaurant downtown in Little Tokyo, it was my idea to go and I was really excited about it, was I in for a surprise.  It was so surreal, people speaking Japanese and me understanding them, the menu, the decor, it was SO Japanese…it was too Japanese…it made me sad.

I remember when my mom moved out of our childhood home, the house in which she raised her four children, the house where I swallowed a quarter, the house where my cousin Sarah and I staged a full two person production of Les Mis, where my sister Laura swallowed a jack (we were very hungry children, and loved shiny things…still do), the house where I chased my brother Logan with a fork, a house full of memories.

I was already living in LA when she moved, so although it was sad, I was a bit removed from the emotion, so caught up in my daily grind, it wasn’t until I went back to visit with a boyfriend that it hit me, I wanted to show him the neighborhood I grew up in, and asked my mom if she would come along, I knew that she would have a slew of stories about every corner, embarrassing anecdotes that I’d forgotten, but she refused, when I asked why, she said simply, “too sad.”  I didn’t get it.

Today, in that restaurant, it was surreal, I told my date, “I feel like I had a dream I was being chased, and woke up with blisters.”  Japan was a dream, and today, as I summoned the waitress with a friendly sumi masen I realized that it was real,  lol, that really two months ago, I was living in Japan, I woke up, and all of the details came flooding back , and once again mother proved right…too sad.

Some memories  are so close they sting, not because they are sorrowful, but because they are so joyful.

I miss my friends, in the best way, I feel so ludicrously blessed to have them in my life, I love them so much I want to fight about it.

I want to line them up and punch them in the face and/or stomach and then cover them in hugs and kisses.

I want to sing with them again.

I want to dance with them again.

I want them to make fun of my Nihongo.

I want to embarrass them by putting this hideous picture on my blog.

But mostly I just want to honor them and the experience.

What a great ride.

I feel better now.

Thanks for reading.

ps. (two of the pretty girls from that picture up there, read em’)

Katie Nunez’s Blog

Beck Corley’s Blog

Arrigato Chu hi!

Sunday, we had a chance to see the show that we will be performing  5days a week 5shows a  day, beginning 9/1, and I was a bit…shall we say…anxious. I mean, this is going to be my life until April…what if I didn’t like it?!

That wouldn’t have mattered, I’m a professional, and its a job. But how much better are jobs when you absolutely LOVE them? Am I right? No need to answer that. We both know the answer.

So we sit down in the theatre, which seats about 1500, and is BEAUTIFUL, it has a very intimate feeling, it reminded me and Katie (one of my fellow singers) of The Pasadena Playhouse, not the look, just the feel.

Anyway, the theatre was PACKED, totally and completely, and they told us that it is like that every show! There are patrons who have annual passes and are just fans of Big Band Beat (that’s the name of my show) and will queue up for every show. They come to the park and thats all they do!

SO, the lights dim, and  I start getting excited, it goes to black and then the music starts and the lights start dancing all over the curtain, the curtain rises and there is the Band! I totally got chills and started giggling like a school girl.  The show opens with  It Don’t Mean a Thing, which as we all know is one of the greatest toe-tapping songs of all time.

I don’t need to do a full play by play, lets just say the show was AMAZING, and  I can’t wait to be in it!

Me singing Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah at my farewell show “Hello Tokyo”
Having a hard time keeping the tears in on this one. But that my friends is cabaret!

Todd Schroeder, Musical Director extraordinaire on piano.

Opening number from my Cabaret show “Introducing Kasi Jones” this clip is from the May 22nd Performance, hope you enjoy!

The Next show is July 22nd at the Gardenia Room.

See Upcoming performances for Details.