Two Reviews: A Letter to Three Wives & The Violet Hour

Last night I read Richard Greenberg's The Violet Hour which was, much to my surprise, a very good play. I don't know why I have been doubting Greenberg. I lie: of course I know, and I'm going to tell you in the next paragraph. I wonder why I say things like that.
Anyway, the thing that kind of irks me about Greenberg (Take Me Out, Three Days of Rain, The Dazzle, Everett Beekin, The America Plan, etc.) is that he writes these hilarious characters with witty banter and obvious gay overtones and then all of the characters in the play turn out to be straight. Perhaps I'm exaggerating. Obviously, the gay characters are front and center in The America Plan, and they ostensibly are in Take Me Out, too, though they are sold somewhat short, to my mind. I first noticed this pattern with a reading of his I went to see at South Coast Rep two or so years ago. It was a new Greenberg play: the title was something about House--I can't remember--there was a lot of fun dialogue but no plot to speak of, strangely enough. I seem to remember that one of the two young male students in the play dies during intermission or something tragic like that. Here's the rub: at intermission it's totally obvious that the two students are in a tentative love-relationship, though it has yet to be fully acknowledged by everyone. Then in Act Two after the boy dies someone asks the other one (years later, I think) if he's gay and he says "no, I wish I were" or some such nonsense. Greenberg was communicating to the audience that the characters were gay and then he turned the tables--and for what? This play wasn't really of consequence, but I feel like Greenberg is rather constantly doing this. Three Days of Rain is similar in this regard, and The Violet Hour follows the same pattern. We think that homosexuality is the "big secret" onstage and it just turns out that it isn't.
I'm not sure what the point of it is: perhaps that homosexuality is just a thing people do and not necessarily a lifestyle. I am contrasting Greenberg in my head to a guy like Jon Robin Baitz who writes witty dialogue worthy of Joseph L. Mankiewicz and boldly writes gay characters, flamboyant and subdued, tortured and put-together. So why does Greenberg feel the need to make his lovely gay characters lovers of women? Whatever it is, it irks me. It would irk me more if Greenberg didn't write so well. The Violet Hour is a fascinating meditation on the future and the past and the choices we make in our lives. It's peppered with witty dialogue and at least three really good roles. There are parts in it for Elizabeth, Kevin, Wahima and me. It's not really my kind of play, but it is interesting and the end is excellent.
*
Tonight after the laundry, I saw Joseph L. Mankiewicz' A Letter to Three Wives. It's a first-rate bitch-fest with Linda Darnell, Ann Sothern, Jeanne Crain, Kirk Douglas and Thelma Ritter. It's no All About Eve, but then few films are. It does have Mankiewicz' trademark witty dialogue and an excellent performance by Linda Darnell. My main problem with the film is the insistence of the writer-director that what a woman needs most in life is the love of a good man. It's not so clear if this need works both ways, but the women bitch at each other and trade snarky comments, and then go home and make up with the husbands with whom they've fought hours earlier. 'Cause that's what's important ladies: having someone to wake up next to. (This theme resounds in All About Eve, too, if I recall correctly.) It was still fun: I dig all of that bitchy dialogue and that Linda Darnell is a knockout.
I may start to really like Kirk Douglas, too. I don't know why I disliked him for so long. He's growing on me.

Hit Me, Baby

I think somebody called me today from The Guardian. It was the most random thing ever.

A while back I wrote a quick (negative) review of Steven Zaillian's new adaptation of Robert Penn Warren's All the King's Men. You can read the original piece here if you are so inclined. About a month later or so, after All the King's Men was pulled from Sony's fall lineup, I got an email from the moderator of a Jude Law newsgroup. She wanted to link my review from her page. I very rarely, or so I think, have people with whom I am unacquainted reading my blog, so it's more than I'm used to, but fine.

Today, I got a call at work asking me about my weblog and my opinion on All the King's Men. This guy interviewed me as to my why I disliked the movie: what worked, what didn't, what my favorite film of the year was so far (he and his wife loved Brokeback Mountain). It was one of the weirdest experiences I have ever had. I wasn't really probing into who this guy actually was--for all I know he could've been from any paper anywhere or he could have been the top film writer for The Guardian. I really can't remember. I was just so, well, stunned. So much hullabaloo: such a bad film. My interviewer said the Jude Law had been raising a bit of a ruckus over something negative they said about the film and they needed to substantiate things a bit more. So weird.

For the record, Jude, I thought you were great in the film. I just hated everything else about it.
*

I still have so many films to see for 2005. (I know it's still November, but I feel behind. All the journalists have seen everything already.) I'm figuring that my favorite film of the year will be among the following four: Brokeback Mountain (gay story, probably depressing, very hot guys, getting good word of mouth), Match Point (Woody Allen returns! and I love me some Woody), or The New World (I think Terrence Malick is a genius; The Thin Red Line is one of my all time favorite movies, or The White Countess (you all know I'm crazy over Merchant-Ivory). Or it may just stay the same with Good Night, and Good Luck. remaining my favorite of the year's movies. OR... and this would make me happier still: there is still a film out there that I haven't seen just waiting to surprise me with its fabulousness.
*

Um, so I deleted all references on this weblog as to where I work. The call at my place of employment was a tad unnerving. I forget just how public this is.

Films of 2005

1. Good Night, and Good Luck.
2. Pride & Prejudice
3. Me and You and Everyone We Know
4. A History of Violence
5. Junebug
6. The Constant Gardener
7. Capote
8. Kingdom of Heaven
9. Thumbsucker
10. Jarhead
11. Downfall
12. The Beat That My Heart Skipped
13. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang
14. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
15. Batman Begins
16. Millions
17. The Upside of Anger
18. Cinderella Man
19. Walk the Line
20. In Her Shoes
21. 3-iron
22. Wallace & Gromit in The Curse of the Were-Rabbit
23. Bee Season
24. Shopgirl
25. Kung Fu Hustle
26. Wedding Crashers
27. Melinda and Melinda
28. 2046
29. Walk on Water
30. The Dying Gaul
31. Mysterious Skin
32. Tim Burton's Corpse Bride
33. Broken Flowers
34. Last Days
35. Heights
36. Proof
37. Prime
38. Monster-in-law
39. Sin City
----------------------------------------
40. Ladies in Lavender.
41. Steamboy
42. Chicken Little
43. Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith

*
I saw Pride & Prejudice just this evening and I have to say that though I have never been a fan of Ms. Knightley and do not consider myself sold on her charms just yet, I am pleased to report that the film is indeed--as was reported in The Los Angeles Times--a joy from start to finish. I say this with complete sincerity. I loved the film. It is one of the most romantic things I've seen in ages and I found myself positively bursting with joy by the end.

Sunday Sucks

I've been applying to grad schools and organizing application materials all day.
BOOORRRIIIINNNNGGG.

I will post my current movie list for '05 later tonight after I get home from whatever I go see.

Jarhead

Umm... did I see a completely different movie than everyone else did? I loved Jarhead. I mean, not only did I completely dig the photography (one visual stunner after another, to my mind) but I thought the acting was really great, too. Peter Sarsgaard is always amazing but I think he found even further depths of desperation and sadness with this film, and I thought Jake Gyllenhaal was great. Why is everyone saying that nothing happens in this movie? Why am I hearing noises about it being an empty tale? Why has everyone wiped this off of their year-end best lists?

Jarhead is excellent. Excellent, I tell you. It's poetic and beautiful and utterly fascinating. It's frequently funny and occasionally frustrating, but for me it was always riveting and I really connected with the soldiers out there.
And the story is so important. I loved it. Really. I moved it to #9 for the year. Highly recommended.

Current Lyric That's Cutting Me to Ribbons

I got soul but I'm not a soldier.

Employee of the Month

Human Resources sent the following memo to the entire company:

We are pleased to announce the ***** Corporation Employee of the Month for October 2005 is Aaron Thomas!!

Aaron works in the Accounting Department and has been with ***** since October 2004. He is a talented, conscientious, and dedicated worker and has proven to be a wonderful addition to the ***** team. His sense of humor lightens the day for all of us and helps make ***** a better place to work. All this, in addition to being cute and brilliant!

Please join us in congratulating Aaron on this well deserved award and a job well done!

My favorite part is the part about how cute I am.

Weekend on Drugs

Oh to be young and strung out on drugs.

On Thursday, I came home from work and tried to take a little nap. It didn't really work out. I slept for about an hour and a half: probably just enough to get me energized and ready for the 12:30a screening of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire at Universal Citywalk. I know I'm crazy, but my friends were all doing it and I'm just all about that Harry Potter. Anyway, the movie (which is great, by the way) got out around 3:00a or so and I got to sleep around 4:30a (I don't know why I felt compelled to check emails and such when I got home.)

So on Friday when I got up at 7:00a I wasn't really doing so well. (2 1/2 hours of sleep isn't exactly an ideal situation). Work was fine, though, and much to my surprise I was named Employee of the Month. There's, like, a whole nomination process and shit, too, so I don't know how it happened. Anyway, it was really cool.

After work I drove out to Brea to meet my friends and then we drove down to La Jolla to stay with another friend and hear the Limbeck Band play. FOR FREE. And they were so fucking awesome.

We tooled around San Diego on Saturday. I bought shoes. I bought shirts. I bought underwear. We went to Dick's Last Resort for dinner. The waiter was hot. I drank waaaay to much. And then I did the not-as-embarassing-but-equally-as-silly equivalent of drunk-dialing: drunk-text-messaging.

I'm home now, though, and I'm looking forward to a short week with lots of food and some good movies.

Now if only I could get my university applications underway...

3 Hommes / Ultimo Tango / Goblet o' Fire

Do I complain a lot in this space? I probably do. OK, movie reviews first and then complaining:

Last night I caught 3 Hommes et un Couffin, that is, Three Men and a Cradle, that is, the original film on which the Leonard Nimoy-directed American farce Three Men and a Baby is based. Coline Serreau's original 1985 film (she wrote the screenplay in addition to directing) is just as funny if not funnier than the 1987 film (quick remake: those folks at Touchstone were on top of things in the late Eighties), and the plot is nearly identical. I understand the reasons for remaking a very charming French farce into a slightly-more-saccharine-but-still-charming American farce with big American stars, but it seems a shame to me. The original film is artistically a superior work and hasn't a false note in it. I didn't recognize the three guys in the movie, but all are fun and funny and the movie doesn't have a big American Romantic Comedy finish the way Nimoy's version does, a flourish I didn't miss one bit. Anyway: 3 Hommes et un Couffin is highly recommended.

I said The Killers was awesome, right? It is. Rent it. I also finally (after many months) watched Bertolucci's much touted Last Tango in Paris. I half liked it and half didn't like it.
It wasn't boring so much as there just isn't anyone to root for. Brando is this asshole for the entire film, never changing. And you want to love him and you understand why Maria Schneider does, but he's just a creep and he proves to us (and Maria) again and again what a creep he is and just how wrong he is for her. It's shot nicely, and I suppose it's interesting in its way, but I felt frustrated. Plus Maria already has this very nice boyfriend who, while a little slow, and perhaps a tad selfish, really loves Maria, is smitten by her (whereas Brando is so clearly using, abusing and dependent on her.) For me this is the main problem with the movie, I guess, because it's not like Maria Schneider is cheating on her creeped out boyfriend who also has a mistress. She's cheating on a sweet, adorable young man: the same young man who plays Antoine Doinel, for chrissakes. It's Jean-Pierre Léaud and she's screwing him over for creepy (old) Brando. Maybe I'm too young to get it. I think that happens sometimes.

*
So I have a (long) list of schools to which I will apply in the next month and a half. I hate doing this, though, and so I am rebelling against it. I just hate all of the applications and I hate the questions and I re-read my Statement of Purpose from last year and I hate that too. I feel like I'm not good enough and I hate having to click "Caucasian" (I'm not even from the Caucasus.) Plus I'm going to have to ask people for letters of recommendation again and it's just such an imposition for them that I just hate to ask.
I don't know. Doing this depresses me and I don't really have anyone to push me but myself and we all know just how well I do with self-motivation because I do yoga so often nowadays.

Thank goodness. Ashley just called and I just bought a ticket to the 12:20a showing of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire on Thursday night/Friday morning. Cheers. Now if only I could get this grad school shit together...

Homework for the Non-student

Last Tango in Paris has been sitting at my house since July the 6th. It's been holding up the Netflix queue, really. The reason it's been at my house is because I ordered it even though I didn't really want to watch it. I was talking about this with a friend just this week. We set ourselves these assignments that we don't really want to complete. I hear myself saying "I don't feel like reading" and the reason I don't want to read is that I'm staring at the complete works of Tennessee Williams. I mean no wonder I don't want to read. It all seems so huge and unachievable. And I've set this task for myself. It's not like it's an assignment for school; it's an assignment for myself. I ought to read the complete works of Tennesse Williams. I ought to watch Bernardo Bertolucci's Last Tango in Paris. We forget--I forget--that there isn't anything that I necessarily ought to do. I don't have to do anything I don't want to do. I'm an adult for chrissakes and if I don't feel like reading Jerzy Grotowski's Towards a Poor Theatre, I really don't have any obligation to do so.
I have to teach myself to stop setting enormous, impossible goals for myself. The small goals are hard enough, and my life can be full and rich even if I never see Jack Lemmon's performance in Mister Roberts. It won't kill me to do something I actually want to do.

Who knows? I may even want to go back to reading if I start on a fun book instead of my usual choice of a highbrow monstrosity.
This week: Richard Greeberg's The Dazzle.

Things Learned This Weekend

1. There is room for discussion at my parents' house about equality for women. My sister still says things like, "It's my opinion; I don't need anything to back it up." There's just no response to that, but I think I got through to my mom just a little. (Why we were talking about North Country, a film none of us has seen, I do not know.)

2. If he consumes large quantities of carbohydrate, Aaron can drink many glasses of wine (both red and white) and not get drunk.

3. Holiday parties can be a heck of a lot of fun: even for atheists. (Is "atheist" supposed to be capitalized? I'm gonna go with no.)

4. If you want to make Aaron talk vehemently for an hour and a half, just bring up the Intelligent Design theory.

5. I still don't understand Constance Congden's The Tales of the Lost Formicans, but I enjoyed it thoroughly.

6. Robert Siodmak's The Killers from 1946 is an awesome piece of film noir. The Criterion Collection DVD, which I recently Netflixed, also contains all kinds of articles and interviews about the film noir movement, which really enhanced my knowledge on the subject. It also contains an early short film by Andrei Tarkovsky of Ernest Hemingway's story. Really cool.
It also firmly proved the point in my head that that history teacher in university all those years ago who said that film noir was a movement of the 1950's was off his rocker. I thought so at the time (and questioned him in class) but I never really got an answer until yesterday. I still don't know what that guy was talking about.

I still haven't been to the movies yet this weekend. Bee Season, anyone?

The Long Christmas Ride Home

I've never read any of Paula Vogel's work, which is surprising because seemingly everyone has read her Pulitzer-winning How I Learned to Drive. Everyone, that is, except for me. My friend even worked on that play in a scene study class we took together, I think. Anyway, I never read it. But tonight I read her play The Long Christmas Ride Home (that's two plays so far this week: geez).
The reason I decided to read The Long Christmas Ride Home is because I'm feeling like I haven't directed a play in forever (it's really only been a week and a half, if you're counting) and it's nearing Christmas and I was thinking how nice it was when I directed a one-night-only performance of Thornton Wilder's very sad play The Long Christmas Dinner. So in my little head I was thinking maybe I would hit upon another play I could do super-quick in perhaps a reading-only format. I don't know. Crazy, I guess.
The thing is, The Long Christmas Ride Home really is a throwback to Thornton Wilder: a nod in his direction, if you will. It clearly takes a lot of its cues from Wilder's short plays The Long Christmas Dinner, Pullman Car Hiawatha and The Happy Journey from to Trenton and Camden. I mean, it's title is itself a not-so-subtle reference to Wilder. For me, though, Vogel's play, while cutting close to the bone and somewhat autobiographical and certainly heartfelt, seemed to lack scope... or maybe depth. I'm not sure, really, but by tying herself to the three Thornton Wilder plays from the start (she mentions him and the plays explicitly in the notes at the beginning) she set the bar a little high. I like her flair though, and perhaps the play is meant to be seen (it was originally staged with puppets in the bun raku style) and not read.
Anyway, it makes me want to read some of her other work. Anyone have anything to say about Paula Vogel? I know hardly anything, so input is welcome.

Free Wallets

Judith Miller "retires" from The New York Times. Whatever. I mean, this woman has been kowtowing to the Bush administration for so long, who even cares? And then she went to county lock-up like she was some kind of saint or martyr, when in reality she was covering up for a man who has now been indicted on felony perjury charges and perhaps worse.

I went shopping tonight. ExpressMen sent me a coupon for a free wallet (it's not much: a small thing that will only hold my license and two or three credit cards, but cute) and $25 off anything in the store. Heck yeah. I bought a pair of citron-washed distressed jeans that I had been admiring. Oh yeah, and in the free wallet: another $25 off coupon.
Anyway, I've been working so much overtime at ***** now that Hard Times has closed, so I guess I deserve a little time out shopping.

Applications Shmaplications

Why am I such a slacker?
The thing I want most in life is to be in school again next fall (2006), but do I feel like doing any writing so that I can prove I have the ability to research and write about it?
Nope. Nope. Nope. I'd much rather sit on the computer listening to Regina Spektor, drinking Czech beer and reading Oscar chatter on the web. Grrr. I frustrate even myself. I can't imagine how my friends cope.

Martin McDonagh's The Pillowman / Kinski, Aguirre, Herzog

I think I'm getting soft in my old age. I finished The Pillowman today. A play that is mostly about unforgiveable child murders (but is also about totalitarianism and childhood and moral quandaries where brutal art is concerned). said he loved The Pillowman and it is definitely poetic and lovely at times, as well as incredibly--almost impossibly--sad in places. But...

I guess I just don't deal too well with the brutality involved in the show. I am not having a reaction similar to my reaction to Sarah Kane's Cleansed, but a quieter, more ambivalent one. I think The Pillowman is, in some ways, necessary. It is certainly well-crafted and often moving. I think parts are hasty or strangely-phrased, but I mostly think it's a good play. I'm just not sure I'm glad that I've read. I'm not sure who would benefit from reading it. And my intestines squirm a little when I think about the images The Pillowman provided me.

Like I said: getting soft. I never used to have such difficult reactions to brutality and horror.

*

All that talk about Werner Herzog's 1972 film Aguirre, the Wrath of God being one of the best movies ever made is on the money. I finally watched it this morning. It's fascinating, totally crazy and beautiful to watch. Klaus Kinski looks absolutely insane and the shots of the Amazonian jungle are fabulous.

Detective Story by Sidney Kingsley

Why aren't there any anthologies of the plays of Sidney Kingsley out there?

Someone needs to get on this A.S.A.P.--like, the Library of America or something. He would be perfect for the Library of America, actually. They could publish his complete works in one of their beautiful anthologies. I don't know why no one is doing this.
Anyway, I am excited about the playwright again, and I assume a lot of other people are as well, what with the revival of Kingsley's Dead End this year at the Ahmanson Theatre. I have a renewed interest because this morning I watched William Wyler's film of Kingsley's play Detective Story. It's a hard-nosed look at a day in the life of a detective who only sees things black and white. It's such an interesting portrait of a "good" man. Kirk Douglas plays the main detective, Jim McLeod and Eleanor Parker plays his wife. The whole thing takes place in the office of the 21st precinct in New York. It's all very familiar territory for Kingsley, it felt like to me. Kingsley's brushstroke is wide: he is concerned with people of all classes and all walks of life and so there are far more characters than there ever ought to be in a play and yet it works. There are also very small cameos by people who are really very influential characters. You know what I mean if you saw or if you've read Dead End. Characters who are all-important in the drama or the story appear on stage only for a single seven- or eight-minute scene. Other characters, often characters not totally essential to the story itself, remain on stage the entire length of the show: in Dead End it's the street boys, who act as makeshift narrators to the drama. Because of this, there are a lot of great roles in the show. Detective Story is the same, with the location remaining the same, but the people and stories moving in and out of the container with seamless fluidity.

The amazing thing about Kingsley, though, is his understanding of character. The Ahmanson revival of Dead End was all about production, so it does me no good to cite it as an example of Kingsley's understanding of human nature, but if you've ever seen the film with Humphrey Bogart and Joel McRea, you know that the play itself is all about character. Kingsley pushes his characters to the brink and then asks them to pick up and go on with their lives. His portrait of Detective McLeod is masterful and tragic and Kirk Douglas's portrayal so intense that I find it simply unbelievable that the Academy didn't nominate him in 1952. He would get nominated in 1953 for The Bad and the Beautiful, but these folks should have been paying better attention to Detective Story. What Kingsley does here with character is simply astounding. He takes a man and builds him up before our eyes: makes us respect him, like him a great deal, and show us all the great noble things about him. Then he turns on his character ever so slightly and turns on us as well: slowly we realize, not that our hero doesn't belong on a pedestal, but that we've put him there because of our own rigidity. It is we, the audience, who is prejudiced, and we never knew it. But Mr. Kingsley isn't done. After our hero falls and we know it, he mercifully lets McLeod realize his own folly and the floodgates open. McLeod has failed and after we've judged him and ourselves, Kingsley asks us to pity him, as we ought to have done all along.
It is a beautiful, clever American play that has a profound understanding of human nature.

*

Oh yeah, and I saw Chicken Little last night. It's fucking horrible. I put it at the bottom of my list for '05: barely above Revenge of the Sith. Spare yourselves and avoid this Disney piece of shit.

In Dreams

My nightly dreams lately have been all about frustration: Not being able to find what I want at the grocery, using the wrong keys at work, etc. This is a trend and has been for a week or two now. As I go through my day, vague snatches of images or thoughts about these dreams will come back to me, and while I don't remember the dreams in the morning, they come to me vague but vivid in the middle of the day at the airport or at a sushi bar in Hollywood. It's so strange.
And my theory about dreams in general is that the mind wants to remind us about things we're suppressing in our waking lives. Now, I don't know what opinions you all out there have formed of me, but I doubt any of you would say that I'm suppressing my frustration. "Frustrated" is probably the first word that comes to your mind when you think of me (after "gay.")

Who knows.

Okay, off to an HOA meeting. Maybe I'll get voted off the board.


I can only hope I do.

Résumé

Directing
Crave by Sarah Kane (Gold Lamé Entertainment, 2009)
A Midsummer Night's Dream by William Shakespeare (Gold Lamé Entertainment, 2008)
The New Musical Project (Little Egg Productions, 2007)

The Birthday Present — music by Eric Day; book and lyrics by Kirsten A. Guenther
The Adventures of Gilda — music by Eric Day; book and lyrics by Dan Collins
Soon Never — music by Julia Meinwald; book and lyrics by Shoshana Greenberg & Kirsten A. Guenther
What Happens Here — music by Julia Meinwald; book and lyrics by Dan Collins

The Voice My Mother Gave Me Set Me Free by Brittney Kalmbach (CSU Pomona Theatre, 2006)
In Between Lines by Joseph Ngo (Stages Theater, 2006)
Boys' Life by Howard Korder (Ultimate Improv, 2006)
Charles Dickens' Hard Times by Stephen Jeffreys (CSU Pomona Theatre, 2005)
The Two Gentlemen of Verona by William Shakespeare (Southern California Shakespeare Festival, 2005)
Voices from the Y Generation (CSU Pomona Theatre, 2005)

PaperClip Romance — by Joseph Ngo
Power Trip — by Rick Lacuesta
Pluck the Day — by Matthew Guerra
Call Me Tomorrow — by Wahima Lino

Valparaiso by Don DeLillo (CSU Pomona Theatre, 2004)
Taming of the Shrew by William Shakespeare (Prizm Productions, 2004)
The Sin Project: Four Short Plays by Thornton Wilder (CSU Pomona Theatre, 2004)

The Drunken Sisters
The Wreck on the Five-Twenty-Five
Someone from Assissi
Bernice

The Long Christmas Dinner by Thornton Wilder (CSUP Downtown Center, 2003)
Closer by Patrick Marber (CSU Pomona Theatre, 2003)
Gross Indecency: the Three Trials of Oscar Wilde by Moisés Kaufman (Alpha Psi Omega Presents, 2003)
Terminating or Sonnet LXXV or “Lass meine Schmerzen nicht verloren sein” or Ambivalence by Tony Kushner (CSU Pomona Theatre, 2002)
The Odd Couple by Neil Simon (Faith Lutheran High School, 2001)

Assistant Directing
It Came from Beyond (The Colony Theatre, 2003) Director: Jeff Calhoun
The Crucible (CSU Pomona Theatre, 2003) Director: Linda Bisesti
The Myth of Pomona (CSU Pomona Theatre, 2002) Directors: Annie Dennis, Robert Gilbert

Coaching, Etc.
She Stoops to Conquer, or The Mistakes of a Night Dramaturg (Florida State University School of Theatre, 2009)
The Tamer Tamed, or The Woman's Prize Dramaturg (Florida State University School of Theatre, 2008)
Just Cause Dramaturg (Florida State University School of Theatre, 2006)
Charles Dickens' Hard Times British Dialect Coach (CSU Pomona Theatre, 2005)
The Foreigner British Dialect/Vocal Coach (CSU Pomona Theatre, 2004)
Cloud 9 British Dialect Coach (Alpha Psi Omega Presents, 2004)
Love’s Labour’s Lost Dramaturg (Southern California Shakespeare Festival, 2004)
The Crucible Vocal Coach (CSU Pomona Theatre, 2003)
Gross Indecency: the Three Trials of Oscar Wilde British Dialect Coach (Alpha Psi Omega Presents, 2003)
Othello Vocal Coach (CSU Pomona Theatre, 2002)
The Myth of Pomona Production Stage Manager (CSU Pomona Theatre, 2002)
Tartuffe Assistant Vocal Coach (CSU Pomona Theatre, 2001)
Picasso at the Lapin Agile Voice Warm-up Leader (CSU Pomona Theatre, 2001)
Second Street Project Company Member (CSUP Downtown Center, 2000-2002)

Acting
Hamlet, Laertes (CSU Pomona Theatre, 2001)
The Bakkhai, Dionysus (Second Street Project, 2000)
Othello, Roderigo (CSU Pomona Theatre, 2002)
Hamlet, Rosencrantz (CSU Long Beach Summer Festival, 2003)
Halcyon’s Days: an Adaptation of Henry VI, Winchester (CSU Pomona Summer Festival, 2002)
Picasso at the Lapin Agile, Visitor/Elvis Presley (CSU Pomona Theatre, 2001)
Arcadia, Noakes (CSU Pomona Theatre, 2000)
Lynette at 3 AM, Bobby (CSU Pomona Theatre, 2002)
Tartuffe, Loyal (CSU Pomona Theatre, 2001)

Training
M.A. Theatre Studies - 2008, Florida State University
Thesis: Violence and the Queer Subject in the Plays of David Rudkin and Mark Ravenhill

Faculty: Cameron Jackson (Director), T. Lynn Hogan (Dean), Mary Karen Dahl,
Natalya Baldyga, Carrie Sandahl, Elizabeth Osborne

B.A. Theatre Arts - 2003, California State Polytechnic University, Pomona

Faculty: Linda Bisesti, Jeanine Lambeth Eastham, Dr. Robert L. Gilbert, Josh Machamer,
Christine Menzies, William Morse II, Leslie Rivers, Bernardo Solano, Kathleen Waln

Theatre of the Oppressed Workshop - 2003, University of Southern California

Instructor: Augusto Boal

Canada's National Voice Intensive Participant - 2002, University of British Columbia

Faculty: David Smukler, Judith Koltai, Dale Genge, Ian Raffel, Gail Murphy, Gerry Trentham, Gary Logan

Distinctions
Florida State University School of Theatre College Teaching Fellow: 2006–2007
Cal Poly Pomona Alpha Psi Omega Annual Excellence Award Nominee: 2005-2006 (Hard Times)
Cal Poly Pomona Alpha Psi Omega Annual Excellence Award Nominee: 2004-2005 (Valparaiso)
Cal Poly Pomona Alpha Psi Omega Annual Excellence Award Nominee: 2003-2004 (The Sin Project)
Cal Poly Pomona Alpha Psi Omega Annual Excellence Award Nominee: 2002-2003 (Closer)
Cal Poly Pomona Alpha Psi Omega Annual Excellence Award Nominee: 2002-2003 (Gross Indecency: the Three Trials of Oscar Wilde)