Diary of a Midlife Crisis

I am firmly entrenched in my mid-life - no longer a crisis but still an on-going exploration of what it's like to be 45, single after 16 years of marriage, and finding my creative life with maybe a personal life to go along with that.

WARNING: Contains adult language, adult themes, openly sentimental feelings, and a way too honest depiction of my life. If you know me, if you're a friend, lover (eventually is the goal), colleague, companion, you'll show up in here eventually.

Thursday, July 09, 2009

"Mastermind" opens this weekend!

My new directorial endeavor, "Mastermind", opens this weekend.

Part of Hurricane Season, the annual one act playwrighting festival and competition, "Mastermind" by Michael Patrick Sullivan, is a comic book style love story about a female reporter, Liz, trying to help her amnesiac boyfriend, J.D., find out who he really is. Of course, he could be a supervillain so that complicates things.

Featuring outstanding performances by Beth Ricketson and Brad Wilcox, this show will surprise you and touch your heart.





Also features new graphic novel artwork created by yours chumly.



Six performances only!

Friday, Saturday, July 10 and 11th at 8 PM and Sunday, July 12 at 2 PM.
Friday, Saturday, July 17 and 18th at 8 PM and Sunday, July 19 at 2 PM.

Eclectic Company Theatre
5312 Laurel Canyon Blvd., Noho
Tickets $15
Reservations (818) 508-3003
Tickets available at https://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/71273

Also playing with "Mastermind", "Lovely Day", an adorable children's fable, and "Master of None", directed by my dear friend, Kerr Seth Lordygan.

Join me, won't you?

Tuesday, June 09, 2009

Get "Gross & Indecent" with me this Saturday!



If you're in LA and you have $10 to spare, come by and check out this event!

"Gross & Indecent" - a 24 hour theater event
See what happens when writers and directors only have 24 hours to create theater!

What happens when writers have no time to write and directors and actors have no time to rehearse? Why, 24 hour theater is what happens!

Friday night, June 12, the writers get assigned a line of dialog and draw a cast out of a hat. They then scurry off to their local coffee house and tap away at their keyboards until early morning.

Saturday, June 13, the directors and actors arrive early in the morning, get together and go off and rehearse.

At 8 PM and 10 PM that night, the show goes on, ready or not. It's a fine line between train wreck and brilliance.

Admission - $10

TWO, COUNT 'EM, TWO SHOWS AT 8 PM AND 10PM.

C'mon, you know you want to see how it all turns out!

Make your reservation today at (818) 508-3003.

This event is a fundraiser for "Gross Indecency, the Three Trials of Oscar Wilde", which opens September 4th at Eclectic Company Theatre.

Saturday, June 13, 2009
8:00 pm and 10:00 pm
Eclectic Company Theatre
5312 Laurel Cyn Blvd.
North Hollywood, CA

Friday, June 05, 2009

Just needed to know

I just needed to know that you loved me. Not that you loved me because I behaved or because I did what you wanted me to do. Not that you loved me because I met your expectations or your unintelligible requirements. Not that you loved me because you had to or because we were married.

I just needed to know that you loved me.

Loved me.

Flawed. Failed. Floundering. Depressed. Ambitious. Determined. Fragile. Strong. Defeated. Difficult. Successful. Powerful. Weak.

Loved me.

It’s pretty simple, actually. Just love me.

I tried to love you that way. No matter how damaged you were, no matter how much you made me tremble in fear, no matter how much you hurt me and wounded me. Loved you.

Loved you.

Maybe that wasn’t obvious to you in the last few years of us but I did my best to just simply love you. As much as I could.

Maybe that’s what you did - loved me as much as you could.

But for all the times you said it, all the times you wrote it down, all the times you told other people, there were so very few times when I felt it. That you just simply loved me.

And in the end, I had hoped that that simple fact would win out - that you loved me. You told me over and over you would never let me go. You’d hunt me down, you’d bring me back. Because you loved me. Loved me that much.

But your pride won out over your love. And it showed me just how difficult that one simple request was. You couldn’t just love me. It had to have limits, it had to have rules, it had to have your mother’s approval.

It makes me wonder if that simple request is even possible.

Just love me.

Just me.

Just love.

Just love me.

Wednesday, June 03, 2009

Fundraisers in LA for "Gross Indecency"

If you're in LA and want to support my fall production of "Gross Indecency, the Three Trials of Oscar Wilde", check out one of the fundraisers below. Or go to my Paypal account and drop in your $10! susan@lifeonitsside.

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"GROSS AND INDECENT - A 24 HOUR THEATER EVENT"

What happens when writers have no time to write and directors and actors have no time to rehearse? Why, 24 hour theater is what happens!

Friday night, June 12, the writers get assigned a line of dialog and draw a cast out of a hat. They then scurry off to their local coffee house and tap away at their keyboards until early morning.

Saturday, June 13
, the directors and actors arrive early in the morning, get together and go off and rehearse.

On June 13th, at 8 PM and 10 PM
, the show goes on, ready or not. It's a fine line between train wreck and brilliance.

Admission - $10


TWO, COUNT 'EM, TWO SHOWS AT 8 PM AND 10PM.

C'mon, you know you want to see how it all turns out!

Eclectic Company Theatre
5312 Laurel Canyon Blvd., Noho

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Join me for an incredibly fun evening of bingo and drag queens and help me raise money for "Gross Indecency, the Three Trials of Oscar Wilde".

Legendary Bingo in West Hollywood
will be hosting the event, featuring one of their fabulous drag queen bingo callers. My special guest caller is Apollonia Kotero, an amazing and generous lady!

$20 buys you your cards for all 10 games. Fabulous prizes will be given away including an evening of wine tasting, free sword fighting lesson, tickets to Disney and Universal as well as a whole bunch o'cheesy crap.

Hamburger Mary's
8288 Santa Monica Blvd., West Hollywood

Wednesday, June 17 at 9 PM

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Thanks for all your support!

Monday, June 01, 2009

You can't take that away...

I have spent my life trying to do/be what others want me to do/be. Well, I’m done.

I’m done trying to impress you all with my dazzling skills and all my accomplishments because you just don’t care. You don’t see it. You think I’m wasting my time with all this “stuff”. You think I’m being indulgent and ridiculous. You think I’m playing at my life because it’s not the life you chose for yourself. And you resent me because I chose to live the life I want, and not to live a life that is ordinary.

You can’t take anything away from me that hasn’t already been taken. You can’t possible undermine me anymore than you already have. You can’t make me stop and do things your way because, frankly, your way is as ridiculous to me as my way is to you.

If I were an athlete, a position that is acceptable in your eyes, then you would appreciate and understand all the work I am doing and that I have done. If I were an athlete, the hours of rehearsal and study and practice would be worthwhile because it would lead to me being a better athlete and maybe to something more. If I were an athlete, you’d leave me alone.

Or if I were 20, you’d roll your eyes and tolerate what I’m doing because I’m young and I’m exploring. If I were 20, you’d pat me on the head and say, go, explore, but you’d always end it with, but make sure you can get a job when you’re done. If I were 20, you would just pretend I had a future doing something useful once I got done with this silliness.

But I am an Artist. I have always been an Artist. And an Artist is an athlete in many ways. I have muscles I have to train, I have strategies I need to learn. I have game plans and goals and injuries, just the way an athlete does. My end goal requires just as much time and dedication and sacrifice as any professional athletic endeavor requires.

And, no, I’m not 20 but I am starting my life over again. And I’m only four years into it. But one thing I have learned in those four years is that I will not give up being an Artist for anyone. It is my life, it is my soul. It is what I excel at, whether you can see it or not. It is what makes my heart beat and my lungs breathe. It is what drives me and keeps me awake in the middle of the night It is what I wish I had embraced when I was 20 and was listening to too many other voices that told me to deny that Artist, to be something ordinary.

So do your best. Take away everything you can from me because you can’t take away the one thing that I live for - my art. You can’t take away my writing because, as long as I have a pen and a piece of paper, I can write. As long as there is one actor willing to stand in front of me and let me tell them what to do, I can direct. As long as I can find a crayon and an surface, I can draw. And you will never, ever be able to take that away from me.

Thursday, May 07, 2009

Virtual fridge - new oil painting


Finished this the other day:

Tuesday, May 05, 2009

The Ugly Part

I teach fine art to children at Mission Renaissance (http://www.fineartclasses.com). I love my job because it allows me to teach, which is something I’ve wanted to do since I can remember. But, occasionally, I find that these kids teach me.

I have an eight-year-old girl I teach, I’ll call her “F” to protect her (that’s why I also won’t put up a picture of her here - too many freaky people out there). F is a funny, shy, smart little girl. She’s just moved into “master duplication” at my studio, which means she is learning not only how to reproduce master painters like Manet and Monet, but she’s also learning why they painted the way they do. Teach them how the painter painted so they can learn techniques they can apply to any other kind of painting as they grow older and figure out what they want to paint.

So, the struggle with F has been the struggle most of us have. She would get to a certain point in the drawing/painting where it was just ugly. There’s always that point, where what we’re creating is just plain ugly. It’s usually about the middle point, before the fine tuning has happened and while the whole thing is funky-looking. F would always break down at that point, crying, frustrated because her art wasn’t perfect yet. In the end, she always ended up liking what she drew/painted, once she got through the ugly part to the polished, pretty final part.

Working with her during spring camp, I finally got her to stop breaking down at the point where she usually did. We talked about how the artwork always hits the “ugly” part. I made her laugh while we talked about the ugly part and she ended up letting me take a picture of her making an ugly face when her painting hit that ugly part. She has, in fact, kind of embraced the ugly part. Today, as she was working on a Manet duplication (eight years old, remember), she hit the ugly part. She had a moment of starting to choke up but I saw her catch herself. Then she kept painting. When I came up to her a few minutes later to check on her, she smiled up at me. “I’m at the ugly part,” she said, “and that’s okay.” She continued her painting, not noticing how much it touched me to hear that. Then, when her mom came to pick her up, she told her mom, “Look, it’s at the ugly part. But it’ll be all right next week when I get past the ugly part.”

I’ve been struggling today with nothing big. Just the usual. Money is beyond tight, as in, I have about $6 until next payday which is a week from Friday. I’m overwhelmed with projects, which will sort themselves out shortly but a bunch of things are happening with all of them right now and it’s challenging keeping everything straight. I’m alone. I’m overweight. I’m (fill in the blank). So today has been a tough mental health day.

But as I was driving home, I was relishing the revelation of F and the fact that she’s embraced the ugly part of her art. Then I realized something.

I’m at the ugly part.

I’ve begun the work of art that my life will be. I’ve spent the last few years getting the sketch in, making sure the lines are correct and that everything relates the way it’s supposed to relate. I’ve laid down the tones, making sure that it all fits together. I’ve even done the scrub (the paint under everything that tints the canvas to the right tone) in preparation for the painting. I’ve started laying down the colors and starting to flesh out the painting.

And now I’m at the ugly part. The colors aren’t quite right, the tones are a bit too bright, the shape of my original drawing is getting wonky and out of proportion. When I step back to look at it, all I can see are the things that aren’t right, that need work. The edges are harsh and rough, nothing blends together, everything crashes together in a riot of colors and angles and brushstrokes without making anything recognizable.

But beneath the ugly part, there is a masterpiece. The foundation is solid and it just needs some adjusting and cleaning up. I need to remember to step back to take in the whole thing and appreciate the elements that are right and correct. Find the lines that are clear and clean and the tones that make the shape of the painting itself. Know that, eventually, the ugly will yield a masterpiece, if I can just keep going.

So, for right now, I will accept the ugly part, as much as I don’t like it. I’ll let you know when the masterpiece starts to emerge.