Drawing to a close

Hi friends,

You know, I always intend to update more often than I’m able, but I usually find I’m kept busy with work and acting and personal projects, so I neglect to take the time to sit down and blog about my accomplishments. I figure being busy isn’t too bad a thing, but I always want to be sure those of you that check up here have an idea of what in the world is keeping me so busy!

Earlier this month, I performed some excerpts from the shows I’ve been in with Deviated Theatre at their first annual Storyteller’s GALA at the American Dance Institute in Rockville. On the second night of the GALA, we had our first snow of the [fall] season, which may have affected our audiences, but we still had a good amount of attendees who were very responsive! My friends Dean and Sutisa Storm showed up, as well as Mary and Regan Garcia. They drove all the way from Baltimore in the hazardous weather, which I appreciated tremendously!! The two-night GALA was great fun, with catered food from the Ambrosia Grille Restaurant and Whole Foods, a wine ring-toss, and silent auction, everyone seemed to enjoy themselves and got to go home with some awesome prizes and presents.

Since then, I’ve been working a lot before winter break- and just recently I’ve worked a few events with Carbone Entertainment. It seems there’s a lot going on this time of year with the holidays, so already I’ve had quite a few gigs in the past three weeks! I’m definitely looking forward to doing more work with her company as it’s really creative and engaging, which two things I enjoy about this business.

I’m still auditioning for shows around the area and I just accepted a role in a staged reading by Miriam Gonzales of Young Playwrights’ Theater that’s going to be happening in January at Sidwell Friends school. I can run more information on that once I’ve had more time to take in the script, but check back here for further details.

On the visual arts side, I’m working on illustrating a children’s book for Joann McKinney of the Greater Homewood Community Corporation in Baltimore. I’m still in the early stages, working on a storyboard of sorts for the book, but perhaps I’ll post some work in progress here later on down the line.

For now though, I think I’ll actually take a break from all this busy-ness and enjoy my [SNOW!] day off with a little bit of retro gaming. 🙂

-Vaness.
http://www.vanessastrickland.net

Trailers Galore!

I’ll be performing in “Aspiro” with Deviated Theatre again this weekend, this time at the American Dance Institute in Rockville, MD (about 0.5 mile from the Twinbrook metro station).

We’ll be holding a silent auction that begins an hour before each show, containing fun things like gift cards to area restaurants, makeup consultations, travelling magicians, and even quirky artwork! Refreshments will also be available. Following the show, there will be a short preview dance from Deviated Theatre’s second original work, “LORE: A Mystery Awaits,” with which I am also involved, and is world-premiering in late April at Dance Place.

For those of you that missed it in January, it returns this weekend only and will then be touring out of the DC/MD/VA area until… who knows!

Saturday, 3/7:
Silent auction reception @ 7pm
“Aspiro” performance @ 8pm
“LORE” preview @ 10pm

Sunday, 3/8:
Silent auction reception @ 2pm
“Aspiro” performance @ 3pm
“LORE” preview @ 5pm

For directions and parking, please visit:
http://americandance.org/new/html/directions.htm

Tickets: $25/gen. admission – $15/students

For tickets by phone call: 301-984-3003
For tickets online go to:
http://americandance.org/new/html/onstage.htm
Tickets will also be available at the door on the day of the event.

Check out the YouTube trailer here:

In addition, the run of Ma Lien and the Magic Paintbrush continues Saturdays at 2pm at the Maryland Ensemble Theatre
in Frederick. This past weekend, Reiner Prochaska filmed the show and some extra footage and whipped up a nice little trailer! Watch it below:

Aside from performing, I am currently enrolled in Dody DiSanto’s Neutral Mask Comprehensive classes at The Center in Tenleytown.
I’m only on class #2, but I highly recommend it to any actor who wants to focus on communicating with and becoming more aware of with their bodies.

-Vaness.
www.vanessastrickland.net

Deviated Theatre: Fundraising

Photography by Enoch Chan, 2008

Previously, I mentioned an internet fundraising campaign for Deviated Theatre. Well now I can regale you with the specific details.

Here is the low-down:

— The product is Magazine subscriptions/renewals sponsored by Reader’s Digest
— Over 650 different popular magazine titles, available at up to 85% off newsstand prices
— 40% of sales go right to Deviated Theatre
— A good idea for those of you who have yet to get someone a gift for the holidays! But worry not, the fundraiser won’t disappear after the new year, so you can still make purchases past Dec. 31st, 2008
— For further questions or if you would rather donate to Deviated Theatre directly, check out Deviated’s “support” page or contact choreographer Kimmie Dobbs at kimmie[@]deviatedart[dot]com.

If you own or are a part of a company or business that may be interested in purchasing a program ad for our January or March shows or donating an item toward our silent auction at American Dance Institute in March, please download the appropriate paperwork below:

Program Ad Form

Paperwork and ad image due to Kimmie Dobbs by Jan. 10th, 2009 (for Jan. ad), Feb. 22nd, 2009 (for March ad)

Silent Auction Form

Paperwork and auction item(s) due to Vanessa Strickland by Feb. 22nd, 2009

After you have filled these out please snail-mail or e-mail them to Kimmie Dobbs and CC me as well (strickland[dot]vanessa[@]gmail[dot]com). Address information is indicated on the forms.
Please indicate in your mail that you found out about donating through me.

Thanks everyone, and have an awesome holiday!

-Vaness.
www.vanessastrickland.net

Anticipation

The first six months of 2009 are all lined up for me and I’m happy to say that my hard work is really paying off!

As I previously posted, my next show is “Aspiro” with Deviated Theatre. We have been rehearsing for the past month and I also accepted an offer from them for their brand-new original show in April: “LORE,” which is playing at Dance Place in DC. Working in shows without dialogue have pushed me to be more specific not only in my character body, but with the actions I take as the character. I’m also working at keeping the physicality of my character in each show dissimilar, so I’m not playing the same character.

Rehearsals for Ma Lien and the Magic Paintbrush with Maryland Ensemble Theatre is fast approaching. We don’t begin until January, but I have been anticipating this show since I was cast back in September. I just heard from the director today and am eager about getting started.

My most recent casting has been for the Maryland Shakespeare Festival’s “Shakespeare Alive!” tour. The cast gets to tour middle schools in Maryland, performing a short “Best Of” Shakespeare presentation to get the kids interested, followed up by workshops dealing with Shakespearian monologues and scenework. I begin in February and wrap in June.

So visually:

Jan 12 – Ma Lien at MET begins rehearsals
Jan 23 – Aspiro runs for a weekend at Clarice Smith
Feb – Shakespeare Alive! begins rehearsals and training
Feb 14 – Ma Lien opens at MET in Frederick
March – Shakespeare Alive! begins touring
March 7 – Aspiro runs for a weekend at American Dance Institute
April 4 – Ma Lien closes at MET in Frederick
April 25 – LORE runs for a weekend at Dance Place
June 2 – Shakespeare Alive! tour wraps up

…Frankly, I’ll probably reward myself in the summer by taking a week’s vacation out of town, as I’ll be just too busy to skip town until then!

Also, Deviated Theatre has created a new way to fundraise via the internet. I’ll post more information about that on here once I set up the system for myself.

-Vaness.
www.vanessastrickland.net

November rolls in…

Greetings, all!

I hope everyone had a wonderful Halloween and productive election day. During Halloween day I spent some time doing some makeup work for Roger Riggle of Roger Riggle Makeup, LLC. When I got home, however, I dove headfirst into my makeup for the night. I spent the week prior working on my costume: “Viscera Lace” (as seen below):

My initial idea was to create a full-head mask to conceal all of my facial features, my ears, and hair, just like with the Silent Hill nurse I did last year. Time constraints, experimentation and overall ease-of-application caused me to resort to constructing hair pieces and painting my face instead. Perhaps another time you’ll see me with a latex heart for a head. 🙂 You expect to see this original idea in my concept drawings that are in the makeup section of the site.

Photo by Enoch Chan, 2008

I was recently cast in Deviated Theatre‘s production of “Aspiro,” which is going up at the Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center at University of Maryland, College Park in January, and then at the American Dance Institute in Rockville in March. I was fortunate enough to catch the show when it premiered at Dance Place in DC back in July and was blown away. I feel lucky to be joining such a great ensemble of dancers, some of which are old friends of mine from college. I’ll be sure to give more information closer to opening, but whatever you do, you do not want to miss this show. It is a truly beautiful original creation by an up-and-coming, edgy professional company.

-Vaness.
www.vanessastrickland.net