Happy Holidays All~

I remember living in NYC years ago and checking out the theater listings in The Times or New Yorker. At most, their may be one or two solo shows being produced, most often by top names like Spalding Gray, Eve Ensler (back when The Vagina Monologues was a one woman show) or Anna Devear Smith.

These days it's very different. I recently counted 30 Broadway or off-Broadway shows that were solo (and that doesn't count all the festivals that have sprung up and the off-off Broadway shows as well as solo shows all over the country)

One Broadway producer told me that she was always on the look-out for great solo shows because they are so much less expensive to produce and much lower risk than large cast productions.

Two years ago, I took my daughter to NY to see Vanessa Redgrave playing Joan Didion in "The Year of Magical Thinking". She sat in a chair and talked the entire piece. That was the set. There were some absract backdrops that came down behind her at a few different times in the piece. It was stark as the subject matter, intimate and perfect.

The amazing think about solo shows is that they can be done anywhere. Once you have developed your solo show, all you need is a space with a stage (be it a bar or Broadway) and you can accomodate your piece. As an actor you will never feel more empowered than to develop your solo show because you can literally do it anywhere.

I know of one musician I worked with who is taking his show on tour in the same Texas roadhouses and bars he has played before. Only, instead of just his music, he will be telling the story of his life and the where the songs fit in with that time in his life.

Students of mine and I have done shows in festivals in different cities, bars, churches, yoga centers, dance studios and large and small professional theaters.

When I do my own shows here in Santa Fe, I have always been able to more than break even and usually walk home with a few thousand dollars in my pocket after expenses for a two weekend run (at $15 per ticket). Every economy is different, and every place is different. But, I have been able to negotiate free spaces by splitting the door or getting the door while the space got customers who would buy drinks. I have had shows sponsered through grannts and foundations give me large sums to produce shows that fit in with their mission.

Once you have a show under your belt you can go anywhere you want with it. It's your vision. It'syour dream.If you're a professional actor, the best part is you'll never be going on casting calls waiting for someone else to give you your destiny. You give yourself your destiny.

From putting yourself out there in your very best light, showcasing your talent, you create your future. One person shows are the THEATER OF NOW!!!! They are about empoerment, transformation, authenticity and always, always stories. The world is waiting for yours!

DON'T WAIT! MAKE 2009 the year you write and perform your ONE PERSON SHOW! 2 slots are still availble for Project Life Stories Year Long One Person Show workshop in Santa Fe and if you live out of state, schedule your 4 DAY INTENSIVE to write your show! For information about either class, e-mail Tanya@ProjectLifeStories.org

 

This week I am sooooo...busy, but all with some amazing monologue shows I am directing.

I have a year long class that meets in Santa Fe. The class begins every January and is called "How to Create a One Person Show"....In December, the whole class performs excerpts from their complete solo scripts that they have written and embodied during the year. This year I had 7 amazing students, all of whom are performing in the showcase on Dec 5 and 6 at the Railyard Performance Space.

Let me share a little about their upcoming shows, which are as diverse, eclectic and amazing as all of them....

Maida Rogerson, an incredible actor from Toronto has put together a show about a woman who has a stroke....She plays 3 characters in this show....The woman who has had the stroke who is in a rehab unit, her Type-A daughter...who has many issues with her mother and Wally, her flamboyant gay best friend of many years who adds some levity to the character's story. Maida has fleshed out these characters and offers a stunning intimacy into the world of a human being who has always been "in control" losing control of her body and the life she knew.

Kathleen Fonatin: Kathleen is unlike any other student I have ever worked with. I told her the other day she is a superstar and I meant it....Kathleen has energy the way John Leguzamo has energy...the way Whoopie Goldberg at her best has energy...she is completly embodied and alive in her work. She has a background in stand up comedy...but in the show she is doing.....she is offering depth, vulnerability and dare I say genius. This piece starts out as a wired, searching, questioning performance art piece and evolves into the most intimate personal story of her bottoming out as an addict (all the while, living in L.A. and performing) and her rise into wholeness.

Uma Jill Marcus is a dreamweaver, dream retrever and a visual artist who draws her dreams. In her show, the story of a four year period of her life, she literally draws her dreams to retrive memories that have lived in her body and soul. She dives into the deep end of the ocean. The piece, at once psycologically revealing is ultimatly the story of personal transendence. To boot, we are gifted with a slide show of her drawings from this time period, that take this multi-media performance piece to a whole new realm.

More on the other shows tomorrow.....I'm off to direct and rehearse.

To contact me about solo performance coaching in and out of state, e-mail me at tanya@projectlifestories.org

Most of you reading this blog, I am assuming,are either dreaming of or working on your one person show. I have seen lives changed, both the performer's and the audience's by solo shows.

I remember my first one woman show, "Honeymoon in India". In it, I told the story of going to see a famous guru on my honeymoon who turned out to be the exact opposite of what I expected. I revealed vulnerabilities about my relationships with my husband and mother. I portrayed my own "spoiled Amercian self "who freaked out and lost it when pushed to the limit in a foreign and unfamiler culture. I took risks. It was funny and poignant and to this day, I stand behind the work.  It changed my life forever.

People came up to afterwards and began sharing thir stories with me. One woman told me that she had a similar painful issue with her mother as I did with mine and she had never heard it spoken of before. Hearing it onstage had been healing for her.

Before this experience, I was in many plays that didn't inspire me.Not because some of these plays were't well written or "good"(one won a Pulitzer Prize) But I needed more than acting out somebody elses story or vision.

I was so interested in my own stories as well as characters whose stories weren't being represented in our culture. In truth, although a solo show can be the most terrifying thing a person can embark upon (onstage, alone, no other actors, exposing your life, your concerns, characters that you have created), it is also an actors dream. You are, for once in your acting life, completly empowered in your material. The show you write, perform and offer comes from your deepest longings, passions and desires of what YOU want to express to others, onstage. You also are able to showcase your acting abilities in a way that in unavailable in any traditionl theater.Do you do one charatcer or fifty? That will depend on you and your range but there is infinite creativity in a way a solo show can be written. And it can and should be written around your strengths.

I gurantee you that if you have the guts to stand onstage and express your deepest soul,and fully claim yourself in this way,you will never be the same. And neither will your career. Unexpected miracles come for those of us who have the courage to SOAR.

FOR INFORMATION ABOUT MY COACHING SERVICES VISIT: www.ProjectLifeStories.org. I teach on going solo performance and memoir classes in Santa Fe,New Mexico and work one on one with clients from out of state who come to work with me for 2-4 days. (ongoing online support availble before and after)

One of my mantras in the solo classes I teach is "your presence is enough". In fact it's everything.

 

But what does this exactly mean? It means that you are fully onstage, in the moment with your breath, with your eye contact, with a full connection to your emotions, with your body alive, connected to the ground beneath you, with your full vibrancy and excitement in the stories you're about to tell or charctaers you're about to portray. It means showing up fully, with ALL of you. That is the greatest gift you can give yourself and your audience. That is your presence.

It's also called commitment. Total committment to the monologue you're sharing. Total committment to being,moment by moment with your material. It is also a matter of trust. You must learn to control your mind. Do not ever give in to self doubt onstage. Trust your gift. You are being intimate, you are exposing human truth. Some people will weep for joy. Some may storm out of the theater because you've pushed their buttons. They weren't ready for that much authenticity. Doesn't matter. The only way to do a solo show without it dissolving into a sloppy mess is to stand fully in yourself, in your life, your creativity and presence.

To be present, one has to learn to conquer one's fear. Work with it, sit with it, move it. One has to master the fear or it will pull one out of the moment. Out of presence. And when you're flying by the seat of your pants, in this riskiest and most thrilling form of theater, your true presence is the only ground beneath your feet.

When you are creating solo material, it is very important that you give yourself total permission to be free in your exploration.........this means that you do not edit yourself at the beginning stages of this process.

It means.....begin with stories. It means be as specific as you can but give yourself permission to "speak the unspeakable", if only to yourself. To be emotionally honest,onstage one has to begin by being honest with oneself. About what? My experience has been, about everything.........Does this mean that every moment in your life will show up in your show? Of course not.........Later in the process, it will be very important to focus on themes and create a monologue that reaches OUT to your audience. Not one that only reaches IN.

But, in your creative process, one must often go all the way IN to oneself, to bring something of value OUT to others.

Here are a few excersises to open your FLOW:

Write without stopping on any of the following topics:

(15 minutes each.....do not pick pen up from paper.....do not stop to edit...follow your first thoughts....write into the emotion rather than around it......just don't stop for 15 minutes no matter what unless the house is on fire!)

The first time......at 2:00 in the morning....my best day.......saying goodbye........first kiss.......the kitchen table..........my father.............my mother.........the last time...........side effects..........virginity................NYC.............Christmas morning........I can't remember...........stolen moments..........morning light........

Next: Walk around your room slowly and speak on a topic first as yourself, then as your 5 year old self, then as your 16 year old self, then as your mother, then as your father, then as your first love.

Embody the character. How do you walk at 5 or 16? How do you talk? Embody your mother......How does she walk and talk? Does she have any mannerisms. Allow each character to tell a story through you....start with any topic like: home or chocolate....or .......by the sea......or...... the first time........or ......my teacher..... or..... the hospital.

Choose a moment in life and tell us the story......speak the story.......feel the story........smell and taste the story.....become the story....embody the story.

Begin here...........with the story.

Feel free.....do not judge.....speak through it..........move your body as you tell it...write through it........swim to the other side.

o.k....so I said I would continue this five days or so ago...I lied...sorry!

Containers about solo performance other than first person storytelling:

Original character monologues centered around a particular theme: I love this format. It is great for an accomplished actor to work in this format. This is John Leguizamo in "Mambo Mouth".....this is Danny Hoch in "Jails, Hospitals and Hip Hop", this is Sarah Jones in "Bridge and Tunnel"........

I remember seeing "Mambo Mouth" when it came to the Greer Garson Theater at the College of Santa Fe many years back. There was a scrim in the center of the stage. John used this to go behind to transform from one character to the next. He used lighting and music so that we were "in" on the transformation. And he was going from "little boy in the tenement" to "transvestite hooker" in about 30 seconds.....sneakers off...stilettos and wig on....all in front of our eyes.

All his charaters were loosly related through connections that he would refer to in the monologues and by place (a neighborhood in New York). He gave himself a tremendous amount of freedom in this simple structure and could showcase characters that were quite obviously inspired by people he knew (and himself as a child) in his predominantly Puerto Rican neighborhood.

When you are creating original charaters for the first time, work close to home. That means begin with the characters that already "live inside" so to speak. That means your grandmother, your father, your crazy Aunt Daisy, your neurotic first cousin Marge........Play with them through improvisation....walk around your room...assume their walk or posture or all three. Tell a story out loud from their point of view. Repeat a phrase that they repeated over and over until it jumpstarts your imagination and leads you into a story.

Or, interview someone. can be anybody. A store clerk, a housekeeper, your child's teacher, your child.......ask them to tell you about their life, family, where they came from...doesn't matter. Then, go back and write a monologue based on your interview. See what it feels like to become them.

This technique is how my former student, Michelle Vest created her show "Sole Surviver's" about immigrants stories. It all began when she asked her Mexican housekeeper to tell her story.

This technique of interviewing served Anna Devere Smith well. It's how she created her Pulitzer Prize winning script "Fires in the Mirror" as well as"Twilight:Los Angeles" I saw her perform "Fires in the Mirror" back in '96 when she was touring with it. She chose, in both cases, a provocative, racially divisive event (Rodney King and LA Riots) and interviewed people from all sides of the issues. She played African Americans, Caucasiens, Asians, old, young,in-between with varying levels of success (in my humble opinion)..regardless...she creates theater thatreminded me more of a documentary film than anything else.....but I digress....

If you are an actor, this is certainly a bold choice. Basically, the idea is to create either short (Ms Devere-Smith did about 50 or 60 short monologues in each show) or longer (Michelle did four, fifteen minute monolgues), John Leguizamo probably did 8-10 monologues that are cenetered around a general or more specific theme. through each monologue, you contribute to the over-riding theme of your show.

Oh and I have omitted what began as a one woman show but is now usually performed by several actresses at once and that is "The Vagina Monologues" o.k. well this is a teaser........I will devote an entire blog to my mixed feelings about "The Vagina Monologues" at a later date...ok, let me throw in one phrase right now "The Emperer (or should I say Vagina) has no clothes." But technically, this world-wide phenomenan (good title, Eve!...even better P.R!) is in the same category as the other shows mentioned. Rent them if you can find them or look for excepts on youtube or online. Also, order the scripts. They are excellent models.

When I am teaching my solo performance classes, I like my students to watch a variety of shows to get them familier with certain "forms' or "containers' that are commonly and successfully used regardless of the content of the piece.

The first is the autobiographical monologue. Usually, this form is a compelling, lifechanging story where the performer is the protagonist. This form of embodied storytelling has been used by many famous monologuests, from Mark Twain to Spalding Gray to Julia Sweeney ("God Said Ha!"- pure genius...you can rent the DVD) The key to this type of show being a success, in my experience, is the storyteller really having an interesting personal story to share that has hurdles and obstacles to overcome. This is the classic "Hero's Journey" type structure and is ultimatly about transformation. We, as the audeince should feel that we have personally engaged in this journey with our hero and come out changed (as is she or he) on the other side. There must be a compelling reason for the performer to share their story. If it has humor, interesting characters that we meet thru our protaganist along the way, high dramatic stakes,high personal stakes and a really committed storyteller, then chances of having a successful show go up.

I must put a word of caution out here. Autobiographical Solo Perfomance can be funny, brilliant, intimate and fulfilling at it's best.

At it's worst, it can be narcissitic, self absorbed, sloppy and even embarrassing for the audience to watch.

This is the crux of the issue for professional solo performance artists and this is the most important work I do with my clients and students. Here's the magic key:

THE STORY MUST BE BIGGER THAT YOU. You may say "But wait...this story is all about me" Wrong-o. The story may be autobiographical but it must reach into universal themes, it must have movement, it must be humble, it must be authentic, it must REACH YOUR AUDIENCE. You are using your life as your artistry but that doesn't make it any less an art.

This is sometimes why some critics have been wary of solo shows.  If you are using your show to aggrandize your ego, play the victim/martyr or hold the audience hostage to validate your childhood dramas, please get therapy. I really don't mean to be glib. Come back to the solo show format when you have something to offer; an adventure to take us on, a journey-either inner or outer, some wisdom to share based on your direct experience (not judgements or opinions-more about that in another blog).

A VERY IMPORTANT NOTE: If you are processing heavy emotional material (a divorce, death, chilhood abuse etc.) you do not want to work with that material in a show until you have gotten some distance from the experience. This is not to be confused with a theraputic monologue process (which I have developed and worked with extensively with trauma survivers). Yours is an artistic process with different goals and higher creative standards. It doesn't mean you can't ever use the experience as material. You just can't use it until you have some emotional distance and perspective. Ho. Amen. Om Shanti.....in spiritual terms that means "Trust me on this one!"

O.K. I have to sleep......more on the other solo show formats tomorrow.

By the way, my first show, "Honeymoon In India" followed this format to the tee. You can watch an excerpt on my youtube page which is connected to this blog. Good night!

 

 

One of the most enjoyable people I've worked with on her solo show is a performing and visual artist named Michelle Vest. I remember that when Michelle initially began working with me, she thought she wanted to do an autobiographical show about her journey into motherhood.

What a surprising twist~ Her art and inspiration took her in an entirely different direction once she began to create. One of the assignements I always give to my students is to create a monologue based on an interview with someone they don't know very well.

Michelle interviewed a woman who helped her out with her child and housekeeping. This woman came across the border from Mexico and told Michelle some of the harrowing stories of her life and what she had to do to come to the States and work. I will never forget when Michelle came to class and performer her monologue of this woman. She completly embodied her. There was a depth and power in the work. This excited Michelle and set her on her path to create "Sole Surviver's"; a show where she plays four immigrants form Mexico and El Salvador, based on personal interviews she had with these people. In this work, she really gives voice to those that are generally "voiceless" in our culture.

Once again, we see the invitation of solo performance to offer us a window of intimacy into people's lives that we might never see or know otherwise. A window that offers us more understanding, more empathy and more power we choose to view each other. How can we stay seperate and experience each other as "stranger's"?....we cannot, once we hear each others authentic and vulnerable stories.We are brought together in our humanity when we really drop into these monologues and just listen.

Michelle is performing her show in Philadelphia this month and in October at Stage Left Studios....I am thrilled that others will see this amazing world she has created. Blessings, Michelle. Your artistry and presence is a blessing. www.MichelleVest.com and www.StageLeftStudios.com

What is solo performance really about?

I was at a wedding in Maine this week and had a wonderful conversation with a professor of art who sat next to me at the reception. He asked me what I did and as always, I got ready to give a rather long explanation. Becuase, although performance art, storytelling and one-person shows have actually been around for a long time, it is still a marginalized art form. Many people don't exactly know what I mean when I say that I'm a director and performer who specializes in solo performance.

But this man got it right off the bat. He said "like Spalding Gray"? I said "yes, I was writing about how he was my first inspiration on my blog last week." Turns out that he had invited him in as a guest lecturer for his students many years ago after seeing him perform on Wooster Street at the Performing Garage in one of his first shows. So, we were off and running......

He asked me what I thought the value of solo performance actually was. What a great question to be asked! I said that I thought it served many purposes culturally; it gives expression to those who may be marginilized in our society, it empowers actors and performers who may be making a living doing commercials or working as bartenders; in their show they reveal their talent and their souls-beyond that they can take personal responsibility for their creatvity in a way that doesn't happen if they're waiting around to be "cast," in somebody elses movie. It is an opportunity to examine our families and personal stories thru the characters we choose to create, it's the opportunity to take a "Hero's Journey" in the Joseph Campbell sense as we reveal our own stuggles and obstacles and utilize them as a path to transformation. It is a way to express the intimacy and connection we all yearn for by "speaking the unspeakable" and exploring the taboo thru our stories. It is a way to "claim oneself" with a depth rarely available onstage or in life. Well, I guess that's some of what it's been about for me...Other's may answer the question similarly or differently. But, in the end I can say one thing for certain. If one has the courage to stand on a stage, alone, and claim their life, their creativity, their characters, their stories and/ or their transformations, their life will never be the same. They will be BIGGER than they previously knew. And, with each performance they will grow in this knowing.

In the end, I would say that solo performance has no less possibility that the awakening of the soul to itself. For the performer and for the audience. Does this mean, it always happens? No. But, this is the invitation!

Wow, what an amazing journey.............