Kelly Preeper

So, I got this crazy new Android phone when I juiced my old phone in Buffalo. And I hated it. It loves to auto correct all my texts into words that aren’t even words, and while I knew I could probably do a ton of stuff with it, i couldn’t figure out how. I’ve mentioned before, I am not a gadget girl! But last night my friend Phil (of the New Year’s post) showed me how the app store works, and installed WordPress IN MY PHONE. So hopefully this will be one more thing to make me more likely to blog things a bit more often.

In addition, I now have apps to log my exercise and calorie intake, make my phone into a flashlight, a playable piano (now that’s handy for a singer!), and it’ll even tell me when to expect shark week*… I decided to pass on the app that turns your phone into a vibrator, though. That’s just a bit weird for me.

*really weird euphemism for my period.

I love this picture, it's ballerinas training for ABT in about 1937.

Two days into the new year, and I’m actually getting things accomplished already. One of my more specific goals was the apply for the work/study program at one of the dance schools I take classes at, to help offset costs as I haven’t got a lot of cash coming in at the moment. So I filled out all the application stuff today while I was there for my first class of the year. Which is also a good start on a few other things: getting some exercise every day, and dancing at least three times a week.

It’s a bit funny to me that I dance so much now. I never really took a dance class until i was 20, and I think I’ve done really well so far for taking it up so late, but it does make me wonder: if I’d started doing this when I was six, might I have ended up doing ballet instead of what I’m doing now? I was always really physically adept as a child, so I’m curious. Anyhow, I really love dancing. It’s loads of fun, great exercise, and something I can totally use as a performer, as well as being a great artistic outlet. Plus, I’m really excited that I just started doing pointe work, which, you know, totally makes me sound hard core.

Please note: Second blog post in two days. Clearly I’m making an effort here!

Nothing like a good ball drop to start things off right!

Or, as my good buddy, Phil Rickaby likes to call it, the”Annual New Year Navel Gaze”.

I’ll be frank. In a lot of ways, my 2011 really sucked. Mostly in all those deeply personal ways one tries to avoid talking about online, because, as my Mum says, it is not the place for “airing your dirty laundry”. In other ways though, it was all kinds of good. I finally Fringed. I got to see dead saints on the big screen, at a film festival. I made a lot of progress on some little pet projects of mine…for instance, I’m finally learning to dance en pointe. I auditioned a lot more…although, in the majority of cases, for things that were absolutely not worth bothering to audition for. I have some great material to audition with, for the first time in ages. And yet…and yet. Still so much I want to get accomplished.

So, in the spirit of those who so often start the New Year off with resolutions, I’m setting myself some goals for 2012. Not resolutions. I’ve only ever had one resolution*, and it took me so long to finally accomplish it that i refuse to set another. I’m taking a bit of inspiration from this quote, which i do not know the originator of: “Nobody can go back and start a new beginning, but anyone can start today and make a new ending.”. And here we go:

Kelly’s Little List of Big Goals For 2012

1) Stop trying to make things perfect. The most nebulous of the bunch, but also the one most likely to have a huge effect on my life. If I have one stumbling block as a person, and a performer, it’s the whole notion of doing things perfectly. It’s as paralyzing as it is impossible…I could be doing things that are amazing, but the idea of not being “perfect” can sometimes hold me back from even getting started! So I’m going to work on learning a way of getting things done as opposed to getting things perfect.

2) Get an Agent. Like, seriously. I need one. I do a lot of work to get myself out there, but I need to have a good agent in my corner if I want to have any hope of auditioning for more professional projects. You know, the sort that occasionally give you a paycheque. And on that note:

3) Get paid for performing. Yes, there’s more to life than the almighty dollar. And I’m still happy to work on anything that feels truly worthwhile. I don’t measure success by how much money I make…but I would like to continue to eat and pay my rent whilst being an actor. I’m just sayin’.

4) Read more plays, see more shows. This also includes listening to more scores. No one ever suffered any harm through broadening their horizons. Although given the current state of my finances (see goal 3, above), seeing more theatre may have to involve some awfully sneaky work on my part. Or flirting egregiously with various people. Love will find a way, as they say…and I do love theatre.

5) Some random and more specific professional goals.  The little things that help fill an actor’s tool kit…perfect and polish my (only barely passable at the moment) British accent, revisit my Brooklyn (it’s been a while and I’m rusty), and learn at least one other dialect this year. Take a good Shakespeare class, because it has been TOO long. Visit New York and see old friends there…also do some auditioning, and take some dance classes. Learn an aria (and yes, in a language that is not english). Ask other people for help, and in turn: Help someone else to attain a professional goal.

I hope everyone has a happy and successful and truly joyful new year. May all your goals be attained and wishes come to pass.  Oh! I almost forgot:

6) Blog more. No, I mean it! I’ll make a real effort to suck less at remembering to blog.

*I finally stoppped biting my fingernails in 2011…which is the same thing I have resolved to do every year since I was about 14. Aren’t you proud of me, interweb?

I bet that make you think I’m going to be lassoing huge woolly mammals, doesn’t it?

Well, I’m not. For your bison rodeo needs, look elsewhere.

I’m back from Buffalo! More specifically, back from North Tonawanda, NY, home of the Buffalo Niagara Film Festival and the beautiful Riviera Theatre (which is in turn home to the “Mighty Wurlitzer”, a turn of the century pipe organ). Robin and I had a wonderful time screening dead saints. We ran around and hung up a lot of posters on lampposts in the lead up. And, dead saints recieved an honorable mention at the awards ceremony on the last night! (Just incidentally, we have finally created a facebook page for the movie, and you should go and “like” it, here. There are lots of pictures from the trip there, too.) We met a lot of interesting people (Like Greg Dwyer of Dwyer’s Irish Pub, who once offered us a boat ride back across the river to the hotel. I’m not even kidding.), and even found the time to take in a few local sights–the roller rink and the carousel museum, where i rode a lovely and noble steed built in 1860.

We watched a lot of movies, the majority of them very, very high quality.  There was a short film of Romeo and Juliet performed by actors with down’s syndrome that was enchanting, and a wicked short from Portugal called “Deriva”(Drift) which was one of the highlights of the festival for me…it had the feeling of possibly being the first fifteen minutes of an absolutely brilliant feature film yet to come, and I hope that actually turns out to be the case and not just my wishful thinking.  My favorite people we met were, absolutely and without a doubt, the cast and crew of Tin Can.  I am going to shamelessly plug their film now, just to warn you. For starters, they built a flipping spaceship in a ~garage. then they shot the bulk of the entire feature length movie in said spaceship. The script is great, the actors are great, the movie looks great, it’s all just flat out great. Plus they are all really cool people. In fact, I instantly dorked out and told them I would cheerfully haul arse to Vermont to work with them anytime, and I totally meant it.

On our last morning, i managed to empty an entire bottle of orange juice into my purse leaving the hotel, fried my phone, and made the rest of my stuff a nice sticky mess for the bus trip back across the border. I’m amazed they didn’t have to wring out my passport at customs.  I have taken this as a sign that I need the sleep I did not bother with while we were cavorting about the festival, and have decided to sleep from now until next week to make up for it.

…I’m still here. I’ve seen some great films, and met some really interesting people. And handed out my card. A lot. We had a great screening with just a handful of people: the festival itself is not really advertised locally in advance and the majority of people apparently thought it started ~Friday, but it was a wonderful experience.
Oh, and Robin and I had our picture taken with Evander Holyfield. He is a big man. I’ll post all about BNFF when I get home again. Now we’re off to the Carrousel museum (!) before the next screenings and the closing night party.

Screening Info: dead saints is playing on Thursday, Sept 22, at 9:30p.m, at the Riviera Theatre, which is located at 67 Webster Street, North Tonawanda, NY.  So, y’know, if anyone is actually ~in Buffalo, you should come see it and say hi!

Got to the Palmerston library and discovered our show was very close to being sold out, just in advance tickets–75 5 to 7 year old day campers. Also, my friend Jen from Everybody Dies came to see me.
Little kids are hilarious. At the end, when the shadow man disappears, you could hear all these little voices: “how did they dooooooooOOOOoo that?”, and during the preshow, every time a new bit of music started, one boy would say “whyyyyyy isn’t it started yet? cooome oooooonnnnnnnnnnn!” When adults are in the audience, the verbal jokes get laughed at, with kids, it’s the physical stuff, we have a ruby slippers bit that turns out to be pure gold with children.
I saw another great show last night. My friend Janelle Hanna is the star of a great one-woman show called Virginia Aldridge, Bsc. She is one of those people you can’t help but fall in love with as soon as she starts talking, and has the best sense of humour which always shines through in her work.