RAMBLINGS

Melody Lingers On Easter Parade
a butterfly in "Nine"

Sally Bowles at Surflight (credit by Pook Pflaffe)

ze Germans in "Nine"

Carnegie Hall

Well, gosh, I just can't even believe it's been this long since the last time I blogged on here......so I guess I will just give a gigantic update of what I've been doing since I've last blogged.

As I said, I got my equity card doing Nine at Westchester Broadway theatre, which I absolutely adored working with such a phenomenal group of women and an INCREDIBLE Guido, Bob Cuccioli. Working with such an amazing cast was a dream come true, and there were moments when I was just in complete awe that I could be a part of such a beautiful piece of theatre. In that show, I made lifelong friendships and we still continue to get together almost six months after closing! It's really incredible how wonderful this group of people is as both artists and people. And Westchester was really a dream place to work, and I feel like I became a part of a wonderful family there.

HMM...after that was two months of auditioning. I sang with jazz singer Steve Tyrell "Fly Me to the Moon" at Carnegie Hall for the New York Pops Annual Gala and it was an incredible experience. Steve is such an amazing singer and master at lyric interpretation, and also such a wonderful and giving performer as well, so that was a blast! Then I planned a cabaret of the music of the great Jared Morgenstern and Justin Starr, who write KILLER pop/ rock music. Just incredible. We did a cabaret at Dont Tell Mama's in July. It was really cool to be the first person to get to sing some of these INCREDIBLE pieces...and to get to collaborate with great writers. A very cool experience. It was also good for me as I was going through a tragedy in my life at the time, and getting to throw myself into their music and lyrics and just push forward really helped me get through the month of July.

Then came the Surflight Theatre in the end of July. I played Sally Bowles in Cabaret and Mrs. Irving Berlin in The Melody Lingers On. It is a beautiful theatre right on the beach in Beach Haven, NJ, and to get to play two great roles here was really wonderful. The seven weeks has flown by, and I made some great friends and worked with some amazing people. I am sad to be leaving here, and I hope to come back someday!

And what's next? I am going out on the road with "White Christmas," my first Equity tour, as the role of Tessie/ understudying Betty. I am really excited to get working on this and get to work with some truly incredible people.

So that's an update.... I will be better about posting, I swear!

xoxo

H

THE NEXT ADVENTURE

Next adventure: getting my Equity card doing Nine up at Westchester Broadway thatre, with an amazing cast and creative team! I am so excited-playing Heidi (A German,) understudying Seragina, and singing tip top soprano 1 lines...so tons of stuff to do. More to come.
Here's a link on the show.
http://www.playbill.com/news/article/136321-Crampton-Tolivar-and-Blackman-Join-Cuccioli-for-Nine-at-Westchester-Broadway-Theatre

Off to bed-rehearsal in eight and a half hours!
XO,
H

Gettysburg, Judy's House, and Award-Winnig Cleopatra!!!

ornate detail of the ceilings of the Coronado Theatre, Rockford, Illinois
me and Dominique eating dinner in NYCafter Red Bank show

Giving the cast a tour of Gettysburg

my mom took us out for Mexican in Waukegan!!!!

me in the snow, in front of the Judy Garland house, Grand Rapids, Minnesota!!!!! T.P.ing the hotel room with the cast after the Yankees won the ALCS ! immediate noise complaint!!!!!!

award-winning Cleopatra!

Cleopatra and The Green Lucky Charm!!!!

so ive pretty much sucked at the whole blog thing, and I am very sorry!!!! The last month in many ways has flown by, with lots of adventures along the way. The show's been going great, as I think we have really continued to develop our roles and our relationships with one another. The crowds have been wonderful, with anywhere from 300 to 2000 but always appreciative, gracious, and every show we'vd had a standing ovation!!! I am very lucky to be a part of such a talented group of people. We have been to some SMALLLLL towns but have managed to have a good time and find things to do to have a blast. Some highlights of the last month have been:

1. Gettysburg!!! I set us all up to go on a ghost tour of the Farnsworth House and it was creepy! The next day went through the cemetary and saw Pickett's charge, very sad. Then, we had a show that night. It was thrilling to get to sing "God Bless America" in such a huge landmark in American history.

2. getting to do the show with a live orchestra in Red Bank! We normally are tracked with a pianist, so it was cool and added so much to the show! Also got to catch up with Dominique and Colleen, two of my besties who came out to see the show!!!!!!

3. eating Mexican with my mom and the cast in a restaurant in Waukegan/ performing at the gorgeous, HAUNTED Coronado theatre in Rockford, Illinois. Breath-taking theatre, great crowd, although I think a ghost moved some props around on me while onstage!!!!

4. getting to meet one of our castmate's, Josh Woodie's, family in Springfield Ohio. We had a wonderful relaxing day with his family and got to see a football game and ate amazing food and had an amazing time. yay homemade chili, cookies and pumpkin pie!!!!!!!

5. Grand Rapids, Minnesota- Being a life-long Judy Garland fan, it was AMAZING getting to tour the house where she was born and raised (before her move to California) and attached museum. I e-mailed the house and begggeeedd them to let us see it, as they were already on winter hours and only open on the weekends! But they were absolutely lovely and opened the house for us! One of the directors even came to our show the night before and she said she loved it!!! I stood on the stair landing where Francis Ethel Gumm (Judy Garland) and her two sisters used to sing songs in the family room with the piano and the cast made me (they realllllyyy had to push me,lol, NOT) to sing "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" and "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" in my best Judy Garland impression!!!!!! All and all an amazing experience, one I will never forget!!!

6. watching the playoffs with the cast- amazing, fun, tense, wonderful, and just as good as being there!!! Good company, good baseball!!!!

7. Newport, Arkansas- SO not that excited about being there at first as there were no taxis to get around, but had an absolute BLAST here for Halloween!!! Dressed as Cleopatra, won seventy-five dollars in a costume contest which I split amongst the cast , ANNNDDD had an overall amazinnngg time!!!! so go Newport Arkansas!!!!

ONE MONTH LEFT AND MORE TO COME! XOXOXO H

my first real Piano tour post

SO. I’ve been on the road two weeks now and things are going along quite nicely. I am so very happy with this cast, we all complement each other very well as performers and people and it is a wonderful breath of fresh air after an eventful summer. I don’t know if it’s the closeness of touring with a show, or just the fact that I have been so lucky to have casts of amazing, amazing people the two tours I’ve been on, but I’ve been pretty damn lucky.

me and my wig, Gertrude...Trudy when she looks good, Gertch when she looks like crap

Let me tell you a bit about the show. It is all Irving Berlin music, a review but with plot- so more of a review-sical, telling the stories of how many lives a piano can touch with Berlin’s music. It starts in 1910 and goes through 1950’s, and the character archetypes remain the same throughout the show. The show has six people in it, three couples. There is the young Judy/Mickey type, the Ginger/ Fred type, and the Ethel Merman/ whoever played opposite Ethel Merman authority figure male type. Kind of like the babies, the kids, and the parents. I play the ballzy broad parent. I go from singing “God Bless America” a la Kate Smith to singing “Suppertime” about my husband who is lost in the war to doing Lucille Ball-like comedy, an incredibly challenging, thrilling, wonderful arc to get to do every single night onstage. The audiences really love the show, many of them grew up with the music and so it’s kind of nostalgic. It is in a sense for me too being a history major and also as an artist who was most definitely born in the wrong time period.

Some highlights of the show so far have been: opening in Brooklyn so all of my friends could come- JCS 08er’s included, singing God Bless America in NC for Kate Smith’s niece, who was very wonderful and complementary, dragging my cast along to Chapel Hill to party with my college friends when we played Durham and making them eat pokie sticks!!!!!! And go to Top of the Hill, going out for a cast drink with our casting director who drove all the way up to see us, and singing Karaoke at a very interesting bar in West Virginia.

I am also a red head in this show. We went through several wig options, the first of which made me look like a certain recent Mama Rose in Gypsy when I had to wear a very similar dress to that of “Rose’s Turn” for “ Suppertime.” However, we ended up going with a more muted auburn color, which let me tell you, it is interesting maintaining a wig on the road. Thank God for my amazingly talented friend Ashley who is in charge of wardrobe and helping me tremendously with Gert.
We bought a pumpkin yesterday. His name is Herman, he will be traveling the country under each of our care and we will be photographing him in random locations throughout the continental United States until he starts to smell. But regardless, his first trip with us was to the movies yesterday.
So, we’ve hit up NC, PA, WV, and Brooklyn so far. We’ll be heading down South soon, then to Midwest, Cali, and ending in FL. December 1st we play my hometown!!!! YAYYY!!!
Off to Gettysburg I go-and I’m FINALLY going on a ghost tour after all these years of begging my friends!!!!
LOVE YOU ALL

me

ps read more about the tour at www.iloveapianothemusical.com

and here's a review from Charleston: http://sundaygazettemail.com/News/200909270886

poem

I got to writing on the bus today, and I wrote a poem about being an independent woman.

How can I live the imperfect life
Of a soulmate abandoned midway-
Broken, dejected, confused, and alone
Never dreaming that you wouldn't stay?

These imperfect pieces are scattered and torn,
Scorched and burned deeply to dust;
But as time trudges onward and life lingers on-
I find that myself I must trust.

Though it's hard when I look at the imperfect parts-
And I have to go at it alone,
I look at myself and how far I have come
And realize how much I have grown.

I'm not scared anymore I won't get what I want.
I know that I'm going to try.
I'll pick up the pieces of my broken heart
And chase after my dreams and not cry.

And I'll never look back
And I'll never allow
Myself to be broken once more
It's my heart and my life and I have to believe
That alone and alive I can sore.

Love,
ME

Back on the Road

well, Monaco is over, and I am finally on the road again, this time with an Irving Berlin show called I Love a Piano...I am having a blast and the company is wonderful. We opened today in Brooklyn and the show went great I think. We are headed to NC this week, so more updates once we open down there! xoxo
H
ps check out the schedule at www.iloveapianothemusical.com

french travels so far

So, we have been given some full no show days as well as many days off with nothing to do before half nine...while most of my friends have been going to the beach, etc., I have taken much of this time to explore the beautiful country I am lucky enough to be working in for a month. Most of my travels have been alone, which has allowed me the independence and freedom to explore and make many friends along the way. I have been more of a free spirit than usual, in that I have been impulsive and last minute...decided the days if to go to Paris...which was incredible, and a friend I mer visiting Provence showed me around via bike and then I did a full day of more sightseeing, museums, etc..... I really loved paris, my only complaint is there are too many tourists there in august...I suppose I've become a bit more european as I like to try to use the little french I know to get around....and I think they appreciate that I am making the effort to learn it!!!!!! Some highlights were ----the mona lisa and the louvre-----luxembourg gardens----moulin rouge and montmare----bikeriding to all the areas----seeing toulouse, renoir, degas,van gough, rodin, and monet at the orsay museum----the notre dame cathedral----the famous world fair ferris wheel where u can see all of paris----the eiffel tower----the statue of liberty's mini twin----my adorableeeee tiny hotel room at hotel louvre bons enfant----visiting my friends house in bastille---and singing to the cab driver on the way home---the crypt with roman and medieval ruins underneath notre dame---ze can can! Must go my flight is leaving---more to come!!!!! Au revoir xoxox H