hold fast hope

It was my thirteenth birthday, exactly thirteen years ago today. The height of puberty and girl craziness. I had a party at my house full of junior high boys and girls. My darling mother Lynae spent a good portion of her day making me a delicious Baked Alaska birthday cake, or rather two of them. A Baked Alaska is an ice cream cake covered in meringue  that you pour brandy over and then light on fire just as you serve it. My mother decided to use two very large baking bowls to set the cakes in. When they were finished she put the two domes of cake side by on a pan and covered them with meringue. My innocent mother accidentally brought a gigantic pair of flaming boobs out to a table full of thirteen year olds. It was the best birthday surprise ever.

I believe that theatre is a powerful form of communion between artists and audience. You are with people, experiencing a story together, without the ability to pause or fast forward short of walking out of the theatre. Many facets of the human experience are portrayed raw before your eyes. Actors often say that moments in rehearsal or on stage can somehow feel more truthful than moments in real life. Acting demands vulnerability that we rarely engage with in the day to day. There is an irrefutable exchange of energy, a transaction, something visceral happens. Something that could be arguably described as 'spiritual'. My faith demands that I ask hard questions of myself and so does good art. That is part of the reason both of these things are important to me. They compel me to dig deeper, wrestle with darkness, celebrate goodness and challenge me to become a better person. I'm not saying that one can't exist without the other or anything like that, just that for me the t...

I have found that the passage of time can become a bit of a blur. Things get mixed around and forgotten. In response to this I am going to write annual blog posts to keep track of some of my personal highlights. Here is 2013!  This past spring I finished the B.F.A. Acting program at UBC, a comprehensive three year classical acting program at the beautiful Vancouver campus. I learned so much about the craft of acting, the art of storytelling, and a whole lot about myself. I was insanely busy performing in four overlapping plays (The Duchess, Dancing at Lughnasa, Rhinoceros, and Blood Relations) on top of my final year acting classes and preparation for a showcase at the Artsclub.  Along with significant growth as an actor I developed a work ethic that is going to serve me well.  http://www.theatre.ubc.ca         My family purchased an amazing nine acre mountainside property in Qualicum Beach on Vancouver Island. Talk about a dream c...