"It. Is. A. LADLE!"

So I just read on that new fangled invention ,the internet, that the earth is running out of the lightest element on the periodic table and the one that is the most fun: helium. Thats right kiddies, the gas that balloons pass is on its way out to greener pastures. "Why should I give a shit Nick," you ask? Well I don't really know but it got me thinking (or drinking....whichever). If the element that gives millions of kids and adults with mommy issues joy is leaving the planet, does that mean there's just a little less happiness in the world? Stupid pompous fucking question to ask but it just kept going around and around in my head. No more balloons. No more sucking the air out to get your voice to sound like a chipmunk. No more helium. No more fun. Then I realized that no Nick thats just stupid. There will still be the same amount of fun but it will just be in a different form. It will be in ipods and iphones and macbooks and bikes and all sorts of other things. But most of all it will still be in human beings. So I guess the point to this stupid little puddle of thought is that we only got ourselves to keep us nice and happy. So yeah. Sorry you had to read all that. Lets move on.

The Odd Couple by Neil Simon has officially ended its tenure at the Dean College School for the Performing Arts. It was great having friends and even some family come to see me and the rest of the talented cast and crew do what we love to do. I'm already sad to see it go but I'll have Producers filling in that little hole (thats what she fucking said).

Its good to know you have good peeps in your life and baby I got a shit ton.


I've noticed i'm just not good at writing coherently so sorry if this sounds like just a mess.

Tune in next week true believers. Same Nick time. Same Nick channel!

"INCEPTION!!!"

Writing to you now while buried under a veritable mile of snow, nestled deep within my temperature controlled bunker, entrenched in an ocean of blankets, surrounded by a forest of canned food, wrapped up in a gaggle of surplus survival equipment I bring you, the reader, a blog of astounding proportions!!!

Damn right I work in advertising.

Winter refuses to relinquish its deathly grip upon our New England lands and I for one am fed up with seeing nothing but grey and white. Yes, I know I said a few blogs ago how I liked how the snow made everything look cool. But fuck that noise. I was drunk anyway! I'm tired of this shit!

Also Odd Couple is in full swing. We open in two weeks. I will be happy to have a live audience and also grateful when the final curtain goes down. I've never had a character take over my life the way Felix Unger, the neurotic obsessive compulsive depressed news writer, has. My director, Craig, always says that the script works on an actor and eventually starts to creep into their real life. I've always found that to be true to varying levels depending on the role. Its interesting and sometimes alarming to find yourself saying a word the way your character would or even physically moving differently than normal. Usually I can keep these lapses in reality to a tolerable and fun level. Not this show. Felix is one potent character and I've noticed the toll its taken on me this semester. My thoughts are much more manic and melancholy. This probably helps explain why I had a case of the blues during winter break. I've had the script since december and its been burrowing inside my head for two solid months. Just like Inception! The script planted the idea in my head and now its taking hold. Woah snap. In the show, Felix is getting a divorce from his beloved wife, Frances, who he seems to absolutely love and hate all at once. I've been trying to carefully keep that part of him far away from my love life. Its been hit and miss on that front. Rereading all of this makes me sound like some kind of deranged loony who needs happy pills but other actors who perhaps read this will know exactly what I'm talking about. I need to start practicing leaving my work on the stage. Bad bad nicholas!

Thankfully, after this show I'll be playing a smiling happy fun loving homosexual hippie. Wait. Homosexual?! Oh shit.

"Sit yo five dollah ass down before I make change!"

Oh well here we are again. You. And me. Together. Simultaneously. At the same time. Ahem. Awkward turtle.

Well back to the important news at hand. Festival. Thats right kids, its one hell of a Messtival of Festival!! Please do try to contain your enthusiasm. I'm competing in the Irene Ryan acting competition with my amigo Chris O'Reilly after months and months of working on just two scenes and a monologue ad nauseum. I'm not really even all that interested in winning the damn thing I'd just be perfectly happy to move on to the next round or make it to the finals. Anytime I've done the Irene Ryans I'm always struck by a giant "who gives a shit" mood. Acting competitions? Really? Who cares? Its not a goddamn competition. No one can settle on who the best actor is (settle down Marlon Brando fans) because its all so subjective anyway. Oh well I'll have fun either way I just felt like filling up my "yelling at stuff" quota.

Its currently snowing outside. Yay. More snow. Aren't there like starving eskimos right now who don't have any snow because we're taking it all from them? Poor poor eskimos.

Stay tuned for the exciting (and hopefully better written and more coherent) conclusion of the Kennedy Center Theatre Festival 2011! We shall either return as champions or retreat as chumps! Tally ho!!

Weekly Gratitude

So I guess there is this thing that some bloggerific people are doing where you write about all the things you're grateful about for the week. I decided to give it a shot to offset the cathartic but irritating bitchiness of the last post.

1. FINALLY beginning rehearsals for our production of The Odd Couple.  I can't say enough how having a character to work on has lifted me out of the depression of winter.

2. Friends. this sort of goes along with the last one. Seeing all my theatre peeps again has been great.  Nobody makes me laugh more than those insane thespians.  My old hometown friends are also still around kicking ass and taking names.  Yeah, friends are definitely the shit. I highly recommend them.

3. Food. Yes food. I have not eaten this much in one week in a looooong time.  Food of all shapes sizes and tastes. Burgers, chinese, tai, pizza, donuts, more chinese, pub food, lots of beer, cake, oranges, bananas, apples and so much more. Yay for having a fast metabolism!

4. A roof over my head.

5. The Ma who is the most insane lady in the world. No one else has a mom that was an honest to God nun, a world traveler, a lunch lady, and a nurse who wears polka dotted raincoats and swears at little children.  Ann Margaret Kennedy indeed.

6. Hair. Yeah I know weird but I noticed a lot of bald people this week who were quite challenged in the follicle department. So yeah go me for having hair!!

7. Actually being excited to go back to school. I don't know why I am but shit its better than hating going back.

8. Getting the chance to FINALLY get to see a certain ginger who I kinda missed. I mean its tough being in an interracial relationship and all but I can deal with the stares I get for attempting to date a "soulless" redhead.  Hopefully all goes well.

9. Blogs. I am really digging this idea of blogging. I like getting all my thoughts down and I can't wait to actually start really writing some good stuff once my new schedule gets underway.



I know I've missed a ton of stuff to be thankful for but it would go on for pages and pages and pages. Be thankful I stopped at nine.

"Mobilus in Mobile"

    Winter break: its the curtain drawn between the autumn before and the spring preceding. I suppose to many its a time to see family and friends and re-center yourself after a semester of pen marked pages and furrowed brows with a liberal dose of alcoholic intake.  For me its always been a somewhat melancholy reminder of things that once were and things that could never be.
    I see many of my high school friends dead, in prison, completely submerged in the haze of addiction or else stuck on a track to absolutely nowhere at 100 miles per hour.  A few of us have managed to make it out of the town unscathed and every break we return to eat, drink and gloat about how us "chosen few" crawled atop the backs of the dregs of Nowhereville.  We laugh while we joke about how Walker went AWOL and now works at a liquor store. How Brendan led police on a high speed chase through three towns before being caught for stealing a black pickup truck. "Stupid fuck," we say, "He was always the dumbest one of the two twins".  Cue laughter. Applause.  We all make fun of these fallen comrades hoping to somehow reassure ourselves that we'll be okay. But I dunno. Neither do the other guys.
   The isolation that occurs over my winter breaks from the lack of friends left always makes me itchy. Itchy to work. To get moving. To keep moving.  My whole life even, I've always had to keep moving on to the next big adventure or joke or character to play or person to meet.. The Ma (my mom for the uninitiated) always said I wasn't born but "blasted out of a fucking canon". I rushed onto the world and I've been rushing around ever since. My next semester will be filled with playing two characters at once (the psychological implications of that are just now beginning to frighten me) planning for a production of Richard III, auditioning, learning lines, schoolwork and on and on and on.  Story of my life.  My body is constantly pacing and moving while my mind within is grinding its gears in a manic fury. Mobilus in Mobile: movement within a moving thing. I just wish that for once I could sit back and relax and just not move but the fear of following former friends into the abyss is too great. Every joke is just a brief jab at the oncoming depression and failure that looms around the corner.  I know one day I'll be able to settle down and who knows perhaps have a FAMILY?! Hell will freeze over and thaw on that day.  And i'll be laughing except the laughter will be full of joy and contentment rather than fear and worry.

I don't even know if what I just wrote makes sense. Bed time. Nighty night!

Fancy meeting you here...

Well this is certainly exciting. Starting a blog of all things? I must say I rather like this blog. Its roomy, comfortable and is just the right temperature. Feel free to make yourself at home. No, really, go ahead. There's my nice comfy couch.  There's drinks in the fridge and a nice fire to warm yourself. My house is yours.

 Its snowing outside and apparently the world is going to end. Death by white crystalized rain. I can think of worse ways to go. There is nothing better than waking up and looking outside the giant window of my house and seeing the world outside look like one big black and white movie. Everything becomes completely still and quiet and you can daydream like its no tomorrow looking outside that window.

I'm not quite sure what prompted me to start writing in this but I'm sure it will soon be filled with the ravings of your friendly neighborhood Nicholas.

Until next time true believers this is Wakely signing off and riding into the sunset.