PianoFighter Nina Harada chronicles her journey of pursuing a career as an actor in Los Angeles. Follow her journey on her blog The Scene Partner.

These first two months of the year have simultaneously brought two things: opportunities & doubt. Seems a little contradictory, I know. I’ve seen the seedlings sprouting (this career is all about planting the seeds), and I’m trying really hard to ride the momentum and not get lazy now (i.e. let the fear kick in). However, on the same token I’ve been in a slump– an emotional one. I’ve been having a really rough time. I’ve had enough therapy to know that these two things could very well be connected. Fear of success, anyone? But it doesn’t make the feelings go away. It’s the usual actor-slump stuff (and probably the usual twenty-something slump stuff, too!): feeling lost, directionless, penniless, careerless, scared of my debt and no health insurance and the DWP bill that refuses to go away, afraid I’ll never be able to afford a home/puppy/wedding/family/ life! Sometimes I just want to say FORGET IT! I’m moving to the mountains, work at a cafe and make art. The end. But that isn’t my dream. Not now, anyway. That would be me running away.

And, the funny thing is, I am making progress! Things are happening. I’ve had all these opportunities and I’m taking all these steps. So, I wanted to write out all that is happening and why I should be grateful. Kind of like an exercise for myself to keep things in perspective. Perhaps this will help ease the pain of the slump while, in fact, I’m not in a slump at all…. I’m moving forward.

1. I’m grateful for getting to be a part of important projects at the start of the year, sharing voices that don’t always get heard and telling stories that need to be told. Last weekend I closed Occupy the Heart at Casa0101 with an incredible cast, telling stories of the “99%” through plays and poetry, and without skipping a beat, next weekend I open the Vagina Monologues and a new ensemble piece, “Voiced“, for Silverlake’s Women’s Festival at the Lyric-Hyperion Theater, also with an incredible cast, telling women’s stories through monologues (duh), poetry, and song.
2. I’m grateful for getting into a casting director workshop studio. I finally scheduled an audition and got in, and now I’ve been signing up for agency and CD workshops to get myself out there more. I’m grateful that I finally feel ready to do this.
3. I’m grateful for an incredible and almost serendipitous opportunity to work with the director of my favorite movie of ALL-TIME on a new project he is developing. I’m also grateful for the insanely kind words he shared with me at the end of that day, which was exactly what I needed to hear. I’m grateful he gave me the words I can hold on to now when I need to hear them again.
4. I’m grateful for having day job(s) even if they drive me crazy and don’t necessarily pay all the bills. And I’m grateful that one of them actually relates to the work I want to do, working with young adults and helping them also create and tell stories. To teach them and encourage them to use theater, writing and poetry to express themselves and to change others.
5. I’m grateful for having an awesome apartment, that I get to share with a loving partner and two crazy kitties.
6. Finally, I’m grateful I have a dream I get to follow in the first place!

There are few styles of live entertainment that can draw tens of thousands of people on any given night. Sports, obviously. And live music. A Brecht play? Any type of theater? Not so much. Unless of course, you consider sports entertainment, more commonly known as professional wrestling, to be theater.

And you damn well should! Pro wrestling is theater at its heart, but sports entertainment sounded better. Think about it: you’ve got a good guy, the baby face; you’ve got a bad guy, the heel; and you’ve got backstage and on stage drama whose story culminates in highly stylized stage combat. According to Bay One Acts Festival Artistic Director Jessica Holt, “Actors. Audience. Space. Theatre and performance scholars suggest these are the three essential ingredients needed to make theatre, broadly defined, happen.” Check, check and check. By that definition, pro wrestling is theater.

And the best part? We’ve got some of the most creative, bizarre, high-flying pro-wrestling right here in our own backyard. Oakland’s Hoodslam happens the first Friday of every month (I will be in attendance in tonight) at the Oakland Metro Opera House – the same venue that hosts Tourettes Without Regrets where PianoFight played last night to a crowd of 500 plus. A bunch of us caught the first-ever Hoodslam back when it premiered at the “Oakland famous” Victory Warehouse at 25th and San Pablo, and in honor of what promises to be a kick-ass show tonight, please enjoy this video of Juiced Lee taking care of business, recorded at the World Premiere of Hoodslam, April 11, 2010.

-Rob

-DL

-Andy

The just-announced program line-up for the Bay One Acts Festival 2012 features some pretty awesome local writers, directors and theater companies in the mix. And for some reason, PianoFight was included! Check out a blurb from the BOA press release and a couple photos taken by Clay Robeson from last year’s fest below.

Festival highlights include: Glickman Award-winner Anthony Clarvoe’s return to Bay Area theater with his first fully-produced new play, Cello, specifically commissioned for this year’s BOA festival. Ken Slattery’s Death to the Audience directed by M. Graham Smith, who will also premiere Slattery’s Truffaldino Says No this summer with Shotgun Players. Sam Leichter’s In Bed, which is the third installment of The Donna DeSantos Trilogy, and the third play in the series to debut at BOA. Megan Cohen’s Three Little Dumplings Go Bananas, is a companion piece to last year’s A Three Little Dumplings Adventure which was an audience favorite and received high critical praise. This year’s festival also features two devised theater pieces, 11th Hour Ensemble’s The Seagull Project, a take on Chekhov’s The Seagull, and Ragged Wing Ensemble’s Maybe Baby, part of The Fortune Project. This year the festival will also feature post-show spotlights where producing partners, directors, and playwrights will talk about the new work development process.

As stated above, PianoFight is stoked to be producing Sam Leichter’s third installment of the Donna DeSantos Trilogy, In Bed. Featuring Brian Trybom, who starred alongside PF company member Ray Hobbs in the first installment, The Philadelphians, will be joined this time around by PF company member Rachel Ferensowicz.  PF Artistic Director Rob Ready returns to direct.

From left to right: Nicole Hammersla in Twice As Bright, photo by Clay Robeson. Sarah Moser and Megan Trout in A Three Little Dumplings Adventure, phot by Jessica Holt. James Mayagoitia in Cloud Flower, photo by Clay Robeson.

Much like whales, cats are filthy rich. Not like they’re trying to hide it though. Friends, welcome to the final frontier of cat memes. Ca$h cats.

From left to right: Gabi Patacsil, Nandi Drayton and Leah Shesky. Photo by Andy Strong.

SAN FRANCISCO, February 21, 2012 – PianoFight is proud to announce the world premiere of the first full-length play by Scott Herman, Octopus’s Garden, the slice-of-life story of a modern family made up of two moms and an 8-year-old daughter named Anna, living the American dream of domestic normalcy.  This is threatened by the arrival of Anna’s absentee biological father, which forces them — and us — to examine the necessary yet difficult decisions made when starting a family on your own terms.  Octopus’s Garden is showing Saturday nights at 8pm from March 17 – April 7 at the Alcove Theater, 414 Mason Street, then transferring to Stage Werx Theater at 446 Valencia Street from April 12 – 28 where it will become part of PianoFight’s Triple Threat. Tickets for Octopus’s Garden are $25 at the door and $20 online at www.pianofight.com.

Lilly and Claire’s family is unconventional — they are a lesbian couple with an eight year old daughter Anna, living in Boulder, Colorado — but their lives are very conventional.  They take their daughter to school, they argue over money, they tickle fight and they support and love each other.  This version of domestic tranquility is put in jeopardy with the unexpected arrival of Grant, a gay music teacher from New York who is Anna’s biological father.  The story unfolds backwards revealing that Grant has never met his daughter, and that he is the former best friend of Lilly, Anna’s biological mother.  Act I chronicles the evening of Grant’s arrival, and Act II, jumps to nine years earlier and the events that lead to Anna’s conception.

Making her first appearance in a full-length dramatic play, recently-turned 12-year-old Nandi Drayton plays Anna. Nandi, A Bay Area native whose experience thus far is in musical theater, took the role of Anna because, “I read the script and loved the progressive story and was super excited to work with PianoFight.” Nandi also noted a first for PianoFight, “Right from the first audition, I knew that I would enjoy working with this group.  I felt completely welcomed. Getting to be the first young actor cast in a PianoFight production is a great opportunity.”  Nandi, who was just nominated for Best Female Lead in a Musical by the SF Bay Area Critics Circle, is joined on stage by PianoFight company members Gabrielle Patacsil, who plays Anna’s biological mother Lilly, and Andy Strong, as Anna’s father Grant. Leah Shesky as Anna’s other mom, Claire, rounds out the cast.

“At its heart, it’s a story about the ambiguities of the modern family,” says director Devin McNulty. “What does family mean in the year 2012, with increasing societal acceptance for less traditional, non-nuclear families?  On its surface this play is about the unique experience of gay men and women in America trying to find their own sense of normalcy. However, at its heart Octopus’s Garden is a classic American tale of kinship told through a modern lens.”

The full-length and dramatic Octopus’s Garden is a marked departure from PianoFight’s wheelhouse of interactive theater and sketch comedy. However, how the play came about is in typical PianoFight fashion. “We read the script in mid-January,” says Artistic Director Rob Ready, “And we knew immediately this was an excellent play.  Plays can spend years going through workshops and rewrites.  But with Octopus’s Garden, we knew that this was a story that needs to be told now, not after two years of tweaks and readings.”  Herman was equally surprised by the speed with which the production developed, “I know Rob from a surfing trip to Northern Ireland, and I’ve followed PianoFight’s progress in comedy over the years, but seeing how excited everyone is to put up this show and how fast everything has moved since I sent the script is really amazing.”

Octopus’s Garden is showing Saturday nights at 8pm from March 17 – April 7 at the Alcove Theater, 414 Mason Street, then transferring to Stage Werx Theater at 446 Valencia Street from April 12 – 28 where it will become part of PianoFight’s Triple Threat. Tickets for Octopus’s Garden are $25 at the door and $20 online at www.pianofight.com.