You may remember me from High School Musical (twice), She Loves Me, or the Time Warner Cable commercials.
Roderick and I moved to the city at the same time, then got cast in the same show, so I feel as though my blog might very closely resemble his, as we are living parallel lives.
I feel like I'm not really fit to give advice, as I'm really new to this and still figuring it out, but one thing I did that I can definitely recommend is to save money up first. It completely saved me. I saved up enough to where I don't have to get a day job and I can completely focus on auditioning, which probably helped me in landing an acting job so soon. I know a lot of people who came with just the clothes on their back, and they got so caught up in making money, they lost focus on what they really came here to do.
One thing I have really learned is that comfortable shoes are important. Shin splints and blisters are no fun.
If you are thinking of moving to New York, get good headshots before you do. They are really expensive here. I used Paul Ludwig, he's great. Also, get them in color. No one uses black and white anymore.
As Roderick said, contact anyone you know, even a little. It can be really overwhelming here, and all people who aren't born New Yorkers love to help one of their kind.
Natalie Bird
thanks jackie for the heads up on the blog invite ;)
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Whoa... my first blog! Even to this day, I don't know what why its called 'blogging'. I guess that's why there is wikipedia. So, long blog short...
I'm Aaron LaVigne. I graduated from NKU with a BFA in 2005. My only professional theatre I did in Cincinnati was @ the Know Theatre with Bruffy, in 'tick, tick... BOOM!' ahhh Jonathan Larson; this guy had a message... an amazing message. I was fortunate to come into that show last minute the way I did. What a blast and a great group to work with. I would recommend everyone to work with this theatre if you get the chance. go know!! The show was an awesome experience for me, especially being so young and poor ha!. Here's what I've been up to since leaving Cincy in January '06.
I was pretty naive moving to NYC. I sold my car for my first month's rent. really... i did. It took me a few weeks to get in the groove but got a serving job (of course) and started auditioning. I ended up getting a couple cruise ship offers off the bat. I felt REALLY lucky but it wasn't for me. I ended taking a regional show in Gettysburg, PA. The show was called 'For The Glory'. In a nutshell it was a re'worked version of Frank Wildhorn's 'The Civil War'. It was such a great time! A lot of the original B'way cast was involved so there was a plethora of talent to surround myself with. The writers were there, and ended up giving me 'tell my father solo. I even worked with a couple of CCM guys who had just graduated that spring who I'm still good friends with. overall good times and good friends made.
I jumped on the RENT tour right after that; literally 2 days later. It was pretty crazy. I was the Mark/Roger swing. I'm not gonna lie... being a swing was tough and, at times, sucked. I'll admit I didn't know what to expect besides the amount of work I would need to keep up on. So I got a storage bin, rehearsed, flew to Florida, and opened the show with the new cast. I learned even more about Jonathan Larson during this whole process. It was special thing to have come from doing tick tick boom and to now learn everything else about his life. ie Meeting his parents, seeing the faces of the 'real life' life support group from the show; these AIDS victims were his friends; watching home video of him sing 'Why' from tick boom. It was very moving. and incredibly humbling.
It was amazing to see this country and canada through airports and on a bus. From big cities, to the beautiful northeast, old civil war towns like Savannah, GA, southern cali, and smaller charming towns. Playing the 'nati was one of the highlights as well. I ended up playing Roger for a few shows while at the aronoff. We got one of the penthouse suites at the Garfield and threw a real nice party.... well, more like a few parties. no reason to lie about that ;) Not to mention we (some cast mates and I) decorated the xmas tree at my moms. real nice. I felt the love in cincy. Growing up here, going to LaSalle High School, and then going through the theatre program at NKU brought out so many old friends and family. I felt like a rockstar. It was an amazing homecoming.
I turned down my contract extension for tour. It was time to be back in NYC (though I did jump back into the show last week in Chicago and will do another week starting March 4... due to injuries). It had been over a year since I left and I wanted to continue the journey. I did a regional production of 'Hair' with my friend Kaitlin Becker from NKU (small world right). Most recently I just finished a production of 'The Thing About Men' as well.
My biggest news at the moment.... I decided I wanted to start writing music to play... like, singer/songwriter indie stuff. I produced and released my first EP 'Breathing Room' while on tour. It was a great way to promote myself while on the road. RENT fans are great about supporting the cast members so I sold my cd on the road and on i- TUNES. blah blah blah.. so
Now I'm in an online music contest where I'm doing REALLY well, like i could win this thing well. I'm ranked in top tier in the popular votes in two categories; Pop and Singer/Songwriter. the webite is www.famecast.com/aaronlavigne - If I win the poplular vote it is a 10k prize! holla! they also fly you to Austin, TX for a showcase with record industry peeps. So far my friends, fans, and family have helped keep me in the top of the charts on there. You just sign up on the site with your email and then you can vote. the more votes, the more of an absolute chance I can win. I would love your support.
I currently have a couple offers I'm trying work out (business wise and whatnot). I'm just waiting to see if those pan well. well, those might be in the next blog! so... that's it for now... My first "blog". what an ugly word - blawwwwg. I feel like a nerd but anyway, GO NATI! Support local theatre! I know there's an abundance of talent and art out there. I see it everyday around me no matter where I am!
Peace out and Who Dey
a-ron
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Well, my precious time in NYC has ended, and I am now back to the grind at New Stage, building showers for our current production of Take Me Out (I never thought I would ever be so involved in plumbing!). Anyway, here is my bittersweet recaps for my final shows.
I decided to end my trip with three comedies, because, well, why not? And yet again, I discovered similar themes among all 3 shows: that they were all parodies of infamous titles on screen, either movies or television.
JERRY SPRINGER: THE OPERA in Concert
music by Richard Thomas, book and lyrics by Stewart Lee and Richard Thomas
directed by Jason Moore
featuring Harvey Keitel
Carnegie Hall
My NYC pilgrimage's raison d'etre was to see the highly anticipated concert production of Jerry Springer: The Opera. Thanks to David Herriman, I was able to get incredible seats to this blockbuster event, sitting one row away from Robert De Niro, among others!
After funneling through the 200 protestors outside Carnegie Hall, who are none too happy with the show's second act religious content, the sold-out starry crowd got treated to an incredible array of Broadway and Opera's best spouting an arsenal of profanity to some of the most beautifully written music this decade.
In Ben Brantley's love letter review of this concert the next morning, practically begging that the show makes a Broadway bow, he called it the Great American Musical of the 21st Century, even though it comes from London.
The cast, with it's incredibly limited rehearsal time, acquitted to the fiendishly difficult material with aplomb, guided by one of my favorite musical directors, Stephen Oremus. Jason Moore's concert staging gave the complicated evening simple clarity, and let the material speak for itself.
I was especially proud to see a very good friend of mine from college, Katrina Rose Dideriksen, tear the roof off of the house with her rendition of the show's most popular song, I Just Wanna F***ing Dance.
It was a great evening at one of NYC's finest venues, and it made me even more excited to tackle this monster of a show here in Cincinnati this year!
XANADU
book by Douglas Carter Beane, music and lyrics by the Electric Light Orchestra
directed by Christopher Ashley
featuring Cheyenne Jackson and Kerry Butler
Helen Hayes Theatre
One of the most surprising sleeper hits of the season is the Broadway musical version of the infamous 80's film Xanadu, which boasted a multiplatinum soundtrack by the Electric Light Orchestra paired with one of the worst cult movies ever, and featured Olivia Newton John in a truly unintelligible performance.
Playwright Douglas Carter Beane, who wrote As Bees in Honey Drown and more recently The Little Dog Laughed took the hit score and loosely adapted the movie screenplay, adding a) some dramatic coherence and b) a plethora of jokes making fun of it in the process.
I mean, come on! If you're adapting a work where the main action thrust is to build a sacred place for all of the arts to find inspiration and life, and it's a ROLLER DISCO...you probably shouldn't take it very seriously.
Due to some killer performances from Cheyenne Jackson as the dumb surfer-jock painter, Kerry Butler playing Olivia Newton John playing Clio the muse (complete with her inconsistent and odd Australian accent), and complemented by Mary Testa and Jackie Hoffman as vengeful sister-muses and Tony Roberts in the Gene Kelly role, this 90 minute roller romp is a heck of a lot of fun. And who doesn't love roller skating and killer 80's music?
Alfred Hitchcock's THE 39 STEPS
adapted by Patrick Barlow
directed by Maria Aitken
featuring Charles Edwards
Roundabout Theatre Company
American Airlines Theatre
My final show on my trip was a piece that I knew almost nothing about, and it was still loads of fun. The 39 Steps is a transfer from the recent hit London production, with it's lead actor and director in tow. Although very much under the radar, the critics were rapturous about this one, and I'm glad I got to see it.
Patrick Barlow, a London actor/comedian who is most known for his skewering 2 person shows with his group "The National Theatre of Brent", decided to adapt Hitchcock's famous film The 39 Steps, which at first glance would seem to be unstagable, with multiple locations, huge crowd scenes, railroad chases and more.
Barlow and his director, Maria Aitken, fashioned the show for only 4 actors, and used very basic old school simple theatrical tricks and set pieces to create each scene of the movie, and then cranked up the speed. The show is a true tour de force for 4 performers, playing multitudes of roles in a very heighted, almost vaudeville style.
However, while the show does feature several winking references to other Hitchcock films (a running gag is how many other film titles can the actors name-drop into the dialogue), the show doesn't have any of the mean spirit usually associated with satire. Rather, it's a lighthearted spoof that honestly tries to put the entire movie on stage. And that in itself is a ton of fun to watch.
