EDNA'S 4ever grateful

Hey all! How's your summer crackin? I totally missed a blog last month to let everyone know about a show run in early August, but I was simply too busy. We sold out all four nights of Stuart Bousel's "Satyricon" though! My gratitude for that show's crew and cast at the end.

But first BIG NEWS!

I've been hired to be the Production Stage Manager for "Forever Grateful!"

It's a Grateful Dead anniversary exhibit at the County Fair Bldg (Hall of Flowers) in Golden Gate Park! This is an adult job, meaning full-time, bitches! I think this is literally the first full-time job I've ever had. WTF. Don't ask, 'and how old are you?' please. Just smile and nod. :)

Here's the info for the show. I hope you can come; we open on September 5th and run through late October. I'll be off on Tuesdays so if you go other days and see me, wave hello!

All this to say, I'll be super f'ing busy through Halloween. Of course, that does not mean I won't be in any shows...because you know me, I can't sit still for a minute. Downtime, what the hell is that? I'm in 4 shows in September, listed below.

I'm in "Spectrum" ONLY on Wednesday, September 2nd at Club Fugazi at 7 PM.

The event run is two nights, but due to my job, I can only do the second night. I'm reinventing one of my characters from my solo show, "Altars for my Alters." It will be a variety show with circus, drag and more. TICKETS HERE!

I'm in "The Monster Show" doing drag at The Edge bar in the Castro on Thursday, September 17th at 10 PM for Latino Heritage Month. I'll be revisiting the story of finding my ancestry and of course, playing with some fun Mexican music from my childhood.

And I'll be opening for Slater & Jaron's amazing mime show, "The Submarine Show" at Mabuhay Gardens on Friday & Saturday, September 25th & 26th at 8 PM.

If you haven't seen this show before, treat yourself. They first performed it in an SF Fringe Festival about 10 years ago and it's never fallen out of my favorites list.

And my friend, Colleen, has been hosting a lot of local and out of town clown shows at the old punk venue, giving it new life.

TICKETS SOON!

Okay, now for my gratitude post."Satyricon" is an adaptation of an ancient Roman text by my longtime friend and theatre colleague, Stuart Bousel. It was based on Petronius' accounts of Rome in 64 AD, shortly before their republic failed. Some of you may have seen Fellini's Satyricon, which plays like a long dream, mainly because the text was missing some huge chunks of story, all the better to adapt! Stuart took the liberty of filling in a ton of blanks and boy, did he, centering the plot around the gay lovers, their complicated relationship and the annoying Roman around them. We traveled, we fucked, we got shipwrecked, there were casualties at sea, a witch led someone to a goddess for the hope of a good hard-on, and on and on. I played four very distinct characters, for which Stuart had added so much historical context. There was so much room for some funny personality choices. Our director, Andrew Calabrese, squeezed the giant, ripe lemon that was this play into lemonade with the right cast, the perfect system for creating sensual choreography and the right instincts to make us all shine in the comedy. 

We had a short run of only 4 dates but we worked on it for 2.5 months so we all established relationships over time and got along swimmingly. Linda, our SM and Cornelius, our tech, were at the helm from the start, making our rehearsals smooth and easy. Our costumer, Manny, made us all look incredible; I would love to wear those outfits again! I already miss our early calls to run scenes and lead warmup exercises. That was the best part of every rehearsal day. On top of being talented, our cast was wonderfully kind, understanding, fun-loving and humorous. Big shoutouts to them: Willow, Carl, David, Jake, Jordan and Raymond, slutty Romans, one and all! If you ever get a chance to catch Stuart's version of Satyricon, I highly recommend it!

That's all for now, y'all. Wish me luck on the new job and I hope to see you soon.

love,

*e