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My mother came to NYC for the first time when I got married in 1998. She was a country woman, not unsophisticated but certainly no urbanite. She’d lived in small towns most of her life. It took her less than an afternoon of our wandering around NYC to figure out its essence.

As we walked down yet another street with tiny plots of flowers and small trees protected by wrought iron mini-fences, she…

Caitlyn Jenner is not a Sex Object

The recent coming out of Bruce Jenner as Caitlyn Jenner is provoking posts on Facebook that reveal a lot about how we see gender. Responses range from supportive to scathing. I was, after my first initial delight, a little sad to see how glamorous the tone of the photo shoot was. Not that Caitlyn doesn’t deserve a chance to be glamorous on the cover of Vanity Fair. If she wants to be a cover…

Memento Drawer from Old Stage Left

            Tonight I dumped my memento drawer into a box

And turned on Nature, to accompany my foraging

Through ten years of precious moments caught on paper

Programs, postcards, thank you notes from actors, writers

Newspaper clippings.

Stage Left this and that. A pile grows at my feet.

There’s the TC folder. “All My Children” schedules.

Estrogenius and Left Out and Women at Work

Festivals. And…

Recommendation: O Adjunct! My Adjunct! BY CARMEN MARIA MACHADO

This is a great article and I think we can draw a parallel between adjunct professors and non-union actors – we work for far less than we are worth, but we find joy in our craft. And we are crucial in modern day theatre.http://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/o-adjunct-my-adjunct

How to Recognize Opportunities

I’m a big fan of Abraham-Hicks quotes of the day http://www.abraham-hicks.com/lawofattractionsource/lawofattractionquotes.php, and of the basic principle behind them– which is that we need to pay attention to what we want, and to allow that to manifest in our lives.

Lately I have seen this principle playing out in my own life. Having made up my mind that I want to quit running a performance space…

Mabel McCoy talks about ISIS

Presence – preparation for an interview

I’m being interviewed tomorrow and my topic will be presence. More specifically, if it can be learned or taught. These are my thoughts on the matter, put forth in a sort of interview-y preparatory style, still a little raw. Forgive me if I rattle on or sound pedantic. I’m still working it out.

What does it mean to be present? It means being aware of and responsive to what is actually going on…

Yesterday I dreamed it was a sunny day in an adobe city. I was walking through the streets in my house shoes.

I had left my place, and left my keys in it.

I wasn’t sure how to get back.

I wasn’t worried.

I thought maybe I should go back, and try to get back in.

I kept walking.

Recommendation: Speaking of Words and Other Undoings, by Tammy Gomez

http://howlround.com/speaking-of-words-and-other-undoings?utm_source=HowlRound.com%27s+Email+Communications&utm_campaign=2c898297f3-DAILY_RSS_EMAIL&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_9ac5709e38-2c898297f3-45172181

I went to Catholic school. It was at mass that I was first drawn to the setting of the ritual. The way the tall white candles were always lit and extinguished with ceremonial drama by the…

Improvisation  – A Director’s Best Friend

I direct a lot of new plays, many of them by fledgling writers, and often various aspects of character development have remained in the head of the writer, and are not yet on the page. Or sometimes the character is on the page, but not yet sufficiently specific.

When this happens, I use improvisation to answer questions like the following:

What happened between these two characters since the end…

The Truth – the most important thing in theater

In my work in theater, I play multiple roles – actor, writer, director, coach, and producer. And they seem to come in waves, the times when I am focusing more on one role than another. Lately, it’s been directing and coaching.

I know–from all my experience in this field–that putting the truth on stage is the goal. As a director, this is often a challenge. For the past two weeks I have been…

The Pioneer Award from AFO Theater – my thank you speech

I received the Pioneer Award from All For One Theater http://allforonetheater.org/ this week, and here’s the acceptance speech I gave.

I have loved being a part of the NYC solo show community since 1996, when I wrote my first solo show. That year I kissed my 13-year standup career goodbye, and started acting. I knew I had found my place, and that theater – solo shows in particular – was my life.

Mabel McCoy re: Honey Boo Boo cancellation

This is a guest posting by Mabel McCoy.

I was reading this article last night in my Google Nexus 7 tablet about the cancellation of Honey Boo Boo. And the writer said, “TV shows that stereotype rural Southern families are ‘hicksploitation.”

So I know what that is – some media person bein clever putting the word hicks with the word exploitation. But puttin’ down hicks is nothin more than plain ol’…

Recommendation – from Entrepreneur – 5 free and effective publicity tools to boost your crowdfunding campaign

http://thenextweb.com/entrepreneur/2014/10/27/5-free-effective-publicity-tools-boost-crowdfunding-campaign/

If you want your crowdfunding campaign to really succeed, it’s not enough to raise funds from your family and friends – you’ll want to have wider coverage in the media. Almost every campaign that’s raised over $100,000 needed some sort of PR to get to that level of funds.

You could go the…

Recommendation: The Trans Artistic Body

http://howlround.com/the-trans-artistic-body?utm_source=HowlRound.com%27s+Email+Communications&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=049fd5dc86-DAILY_RSS_EMAIL&utm_term=0_9ac5709e38-049fd5dc86-45172181

Trans—moving across, beyond, through, changing thoroughly.

Isn’t this the life of the artist?

Moving across the country for that writing gig, or that acting job. Telling stories beyond what we had…

Become the Horizon – thanks to John Patrick Shanley

A few weeks ago, I hosted a show whose director is a colleague of John Patrick Shanley. He came to the show, and the next day accepted my friend invite on Facebook. I’m so glad he did that. His posts are often short, and always speak to my heart. This is what he wrote today – “Walk away. Leave it all. Leave your name, your body, your voice. Become the horizon.”

I know he doesn’t write these…