cabaret dreams
Sunday, March 29, 2009 at 5:56PM I’m in Hollywood. The year is 1988. My friends tell me there’s a perfect role for me in a new show called Les Miserables, so I head to the open call. By 10AM there are 2200 people in line. I help a blind woman across the street (she is disoriented by the huge crowd), and she gives me a lucky quarter. I am 7 months pregnant, and lordy, lordy, a week later I get the job.
This will mean my Equity card and two and a half years of work at the Schubert Theater in LA--then a call to play Cosette for a year at the Curran in San Francisco. I am the only Cosette I know who doesn’t fantasize about being Fantine or Eponine. I love singing the softly shimmering high C every night, glad to be part of the show. I still have that lucky quarter.
I have sung in so many ways and forms over the years. But this story says something about luck and how well it combines with a thousand voice lessons, and singing with your whole heart.
For a while in Hollywood, I hosted a weekly open stage called Maxi’s Cabaret. I could write a novel about this. Or it would make a great reality show: the seedy restaurant, the plucky hopefuls, the bizarre connections. All those characters, loving the work at whatever level. We were not all good, but we were all interesting, for sure.
I tell stories because I’m a little bit Irish and whole lot chatty. I love the way you can reframe an old song with a new story and make it live like it was just written. Or how a new song can tell an age-old tale as if for the first time. And how an operatic aria can sit next to a 70’s hit, if they have the right words between them.
I did a solo concert in November of 2007 that felt like flying. People sang along, they laughed and cried. One month later, I received a breast cancer diagnosis that would take a year of treatment to resolve. (I say hooray for scary chemicals and brilliant doctors).
Now I know more surely than ever that life is sweet, that for me the songs are the thing, and that I want to go wherever they lead. I want to honor them the best way I can. I’m guessing you know exactly what I mean.
Reader Comments (1)
How beautiful. For some reason (maybe it's because you used the word 'operatic'), this reminds me of Rufus Wainwright. Check him out if you get a chance. He's amazing. As is this blog! I am pretttyyy addicted by now.