I wanted to lead with that..because no matter what happened on that stage (that I will talk about soon....) being able to raise money for a cause I feel passionate about is a huge thing. It's important in this day and age to stand up and fight for the marginalized..to fight for those who can't fight for themselves. Art is a great way to do that!
The performance itself was tons of fun! I got a chance to perform with Kate E. Gaga again. We did our Gaston and Belle duet. We also have so much fun performing this together. We laugh so hard and it is always followed up with huge hugs and "I love yous". It's fun to see and hear the audience laugh with us. It's fun to elicit emotional responses from the audience. When Belle gets constantly rejected by Gaston, the audience feels badly for her and gets excited when she starts stripping to try and seduce Gaston away from his video games. It's just a hoot. And I love that performance!
The next performance I did was dedicated to my amazing hubby. I created a performance to the song Code Monkey. Tracy has no idea what my second performance was going to be about or even to what song I was doing it too, so he was nice and surprised. I LOVE that!
When I had the brain storm of an idea to create this piece, I immediately thought, "This will be easy. Just buy a nerdy shirt, some glasses, wear some jeans and use what you have at home already." It wasn't quite as easy as that, but yet it was easy enough. Then all of a sudden, I found myself having difficulty finding the character. My nerdy self just was not coming across. I felt stuck. My choreo was not coming along. Everything felt forced. I was getting very frustrated.
I had all the costuming done, complete with fuzzy heart pasties and a fuzzy heart for my tush. I had props made, complete with a pyramid of glued Mountain Dew cans. But why couldn't I get he feeling right? Where was my inner nerd?
Then while going through chroeo, I took a long deep look in the mirror and pushed up my fake glasses and found her. Right there before my eyes, with the push up of my glasses, she came screaming out! "Here I am!!!!!" And "just like that" I found my inner nerd! She was goofy, funny, sassy, angry, bored, frustrated, and sexy! She conveyed all of the emotions with all of the facial expressions she needed. Whew!
Facial expressions are a big one for me. I have been working on my acting skills. It used to be that I was just happy to be on stage and I would smile this big huge smile just because I was performing. But I lost my character in that smile. Part of burlesque is being able to tell a story, not just strip off clothes. Part of burlesque is being able to take on a character and use that character to help people connect and feel during a performance. I feel like my Teddy Bear performance from a few months back had the facial expressions right. I feel like I have been getting better at this. And as it turns out, the feed back I got after my Code Monkey performance confirmed that. I was thrilled when one of my favorite performers came back stage after the show to give me some amazing feedback regarding my facial expressions and how they were dead on and how much I have improved since she first started watching me perform. So yay!!! That meant the world to me!
I got ahead of myself.....
When Frankie was introducing me, I could feel my heart beat faster. I heard her talk about my socially awkward software engineer with a crush on the secretary. I knew in that moment that Tracy knew what song I was performing. When they pulled the curtain to show my stack of Mountain Dew Cans and my bag of Frito's that other people knew what was coming. I could hear their excitement. And once the music started and I made my entrance, complete with back pack slung over my shoulders and toilet paper trailing from my shoes, the audience was hooked and cheering.
It's funny, there was a move in the performance that I got to do for the first time......it was to strangle the soda can and then throw it out of frustration. At home, I strangled one can and kept reusing that can, but I never threw it. I didnt' want to use all of my cans in rehearsals at home, and I didn't want to throw the can for fear of breaking something in my house. So on stage, when it came time to strangle the can, I wondered if I would throw it or not, and I felt all of the frustration of my nerdy software engineer well up inside of me and I threw that can across the stage.
The audience was eating it up! Everything was going right until........
It was time for me to unzip my pants and take them off to expose the red fuzzy heart on my tush. The actual removal of my jeggings was meant to be awkward...cause well.. I'm a nerd on stage. However, my zipper was NOT suppose to get stuck and in the process unsnap my shirt that was suppose to come off later as a reveal! LOL. So there I was with a stuck zipper. I didnt' know why it was stuck. In all of the rehearsals, it had never gotten stuck. But even with a stuck zipper, I knew I could pull off the pants. So I started to pull off the pants, but in doing so, it also unsnapped the shirt I was wearing (too soon). I managed to awkwardly get the pants off and do my best to keep my shirt closed. It looked awkward..but it worked..cause awkward was my character's main thing. Instead of teasing the audience with a slow unsnapping of a shirt, she ended up joyfully taking turns flashing difference sides of the audience. They were eating that up and laughing.
The shirt came off easily and without a hitch. Then it was time to take off the bra. I really have no clue what was happening on stage at this point. I was way into the performance and having entirely too much fun to even know what was gong on. I knew I was hitting my marks. I knew the audience was having fun. I knew I was playing awkward nerd well. And that was all that mattered...until..........
I took off my bra, covered my breasts (at least I hope I did) with one arm while I proceeded to twirl my bra in circles above my head. The hook in my bra caught my wig and pulled it off! Yup.. and underneath my wig was my natural hair pulled back and pinned awkwardly. I decided to go with it! Wooooo!!!!!! My bra and my wig spinning over my head until I dropped my bra and found my wig on the floor. I picked it back up and just put it on top of my head (not the way it was suppose to). I held the wig with one hand and did the "rock on symbol" with the other as I revealed my heart pasties. It was a crazy silly awkward ending to a performance that had the audience laughing and cheering. It was entirely too much fun.
It was so much fun, and I was so "high" from performing, that one my exit (behind the curtain) I tripped off of the stage and landed on my right knee. I have a beautiful fishnet shaped rug burn. And my left knee and ankle are unhappy. But that is okay, I left my audience smiling!
That's the thing about performance art, and in real life...things don't always go the way you want them to go. But if you can smile your way through the unexpected glitches, you will find joy in even the "wrongest" of moments. It's all about how you decide to show up in life. Are you going to laugh and play along or are you going to fret and worry? I choose to laugh and play along; its much more enjoyable that way.
PS... the other amazing thing about the audience was that my 79 1/2 year old mom was in the audience with 4 of her friends from her previous senior living apartment complex. One of the men was 87 years old. They sat right in the center and had the best time! They are still calling my mom and telling her how much fun they had! My friends in the audience had fun watching them enjoy themselves. Never underestimate the "elderly". They can be party animals!
