A New Beginning in the Windy City!

Living and working in Chicago, IL has been a long-term goal of mine from the beginning, and now I am finally here. I hope that the city can provide me a platform to display my art to welcoming audience members, and I also hope that I can bring my small town ideals, perspective, and creativity along for the ride.

After finally taking the icy plunge in moving into our new apartment at the beginning of November, I began working as the Run Crew for a production of Joe Dipietro's Clever Little Lies with the Russian-English cross-cultural theatre company Bluebird Arts. Subsequently, I am currently the Assistant Stage Manager for a new play at Theatre Wit being produced by the Arkansas based Block St. Theater Co. The play is Flamingo and Decatur by Todd Taylor and focuses on the lives of professional gamblers 'squatting' in a foreclosed home in Las Vegas, Nevada.

I am encouraged by the friendships that are already beginning to develop from these backstage experiences. I crave being in the theatre, and these productions have made the transition to a new city much easier.

Off-Stage, standing at my draftsman's desk in my Ravenswood apartment, I am writing more voluminously than I have in the past. My focus has turned more and more to the Macbre Theatre that I am continually trying to define and develop. I have surgically dug deep into my play, 'Here Lies Joyland,' and am beginning to come out the other end. The new version was featured at a play reading I hosted on February 12th and has been chosen for an stage reading at the University of Central Missouri this spring.

I am meeting new people in this community every day; most of them comedians of some form or another, as Chicago's improv scene is prominent. I am braving the cold weather with icy nostrils and nipped cheeks, but undoubteldy grateful to be here. Stay tuned!