Almost to busy to blog

Seriously.

Usually when I’m not blogging it’s because there is nothing particularly interesting in my life at that point. But this week has been so busy that I WANTED desperately to blog about things and I was WAY too busy.

As an actor, this is GOOD. But as a blogger it poses difficulties. So here is, in a nutshell, my last 2 weeks. Readers Digest Version:

I booked a commercial. This is a good thing. It was a SAG job, meaning decent pay and a great treatment on set. And the people were awesome. The director was Patrick Daughters who may be best known for Feist’s 1234 video (which is AMAZING, btw). It was incredible to work with him and with the DP who also shot that brilliant video. He was a joy and made the work easy. Our choreographer was the fabulous Michael Rooney who may be best known for his work on the video It’s Oh So Quiet featuring Bjork. But the thing that thrills me to no end about Michael (besides the fact that he was super fun to work with) is that he cohreographed GO FOR IT BY HOT SUNDAE!!!!!!! Seriously! I got to work with the man who made Kelly, Jessie, and Lisa the pop idols of Bayside High in the episode “Jessie’s Song” of Saved By The Bell. That may be the coolest thing ever. And there are a lot of cool things.

Also, my cancelled vignette has become un-cancelled and can be viewed through stphoenix.com or on YouTube or roght here:

YAY!!!

After that the awesomest news is in the film premiere realm. Tomorrow night I will be in the Pacific Place cinema (my 1st venture into a non-Imax thestre to see a film since I left my previous career in cinema management/promotions/projection) to watch the premiere of The Whole Truth. The premiere is sold out and should be a great time; I will report back honestly on the quality of the film, but if shooting it was any indication, the finished product should be HILARIOUS! Director Colleen Patrick has already been approached by distributors, so hopefully all the world will be able to see the movie very very soon.

More info when available 🙂

Stuff to Watch and Listen To

Much media is the post today.

First: watch the trailer for Dear Lemon Lima, that’s me on the far left hand side of the bench full of girls in pink t-shirts at 1:03.

Then watch the trailer for The Whole Truth. I’m not in the trailer, but I am in the film.

Then tune in to Blog Talk Radio this afternoon at 3:00 to listen to ST:P Executive Producer Leo Roberts and Phoenix star Ben Andrews (their segment begins at 3:30). Our people will be following the editor of STAR TREK Magazine as guests on the show, so it should be really interesting.

And then tune in on the 31st to our first live call-in podcast. It will begin at 11:00 PDT and will also be on Blog Talk Radio but on a different channel- our OWN!

Looking forward to hearing the radio interviews and to seeing DLL on the 23rd of June at the LA film fest.

When it Rains, it Pours, and I mean that in a good way.

So here I am, sitting in my room on an unfairly cold and rainy afternoon in May, thinking about these 20 tickets to JJ Abrams STAR TREK I need to give away before Sunday (REG deja-vu much?). And as I contemplate movie tickets on this cold day my heart is warmed by the thought of my first network television appearance as an adult. Which, incidentally, can be seen HERE in case you’re not friended to me on Facebook (why?) nor on the very long list of people I emailed that link to this morning.

And as though the glory of my brilliant performance on the local NBC affiliate wasn’t enough to keep my little publicity-hounding heart happy for a good long while (which, incidentally, it TOTALLY could have been) I got to see today the first glimpse of the film I love, the film I worked on, the film I am planning a pilgrimage to Los Angeles to see, Dear Lemon Lima. The trailer is adorable and gives a great overall feel for the tone of the finished film. And did I mention that it will premiere on June 20th at 5:00 PM at the Los Angeles Film Festival? Well, it will. And it will play again on the 23rd of June at the same venue. I will be at Chris and Sora’s wedding on the 20th, but folks in the audience on the 23rd should watch for me, because I’m doing everything I can to find the time and the money to go see it.

And about that trailer: I’m in it. Really. Are you excited? I am. Suddenly it’s not only the three plus minutes of local television, but also the first teaser for a brilliant feature film. LOVE IT! You can watch it through the director’s (Suzi Yoonessi is amazing, btw) Facebook page HERE.

I think you should watch the trailer. And I think you should see the film when it hits theatres. Hooray!

Big Weeks Ahead!

Everyone here in the Northwest will have a chance to see me in person, on screen, online, and on TV in the next four weeks. REALLY.

ON TV: Tuesday, May 5th our much lauded and much postponed Evening Magazine segment is scheduled to air finally. We will be meeting in the lounge of the Seattle Hilton on 5th Ave in down town and we’d love to see fans there to celebrate our debut into the local news arena.

IN PERSON: Aside from the party on the 5th, I will be with a contingent of 25th Century Starfleet Officers and very dedicated ST:P Production staffers at PGE Park in Portland on Wednesday night, May 6th. We will be there helping the Federation battle the Klingons in the age old battle of smooth foreheads vs. bumpy foreheads. It’s in honor of the Portland Beavers’ annual Star Trek night and we are looking forward to meeing Oregonian Trekkies for the very first time.

We will then be present at the Boeing Imax Theatre for the premiere of JJ Abrams STAR TREK. There will be a large group of cast, crew, and production members present for the 7:00 PM IMAX experience and we’d love to meet fans and hear what you all have to say about this new vision of the old future.

ONLINE: And this is new good news. THIRD DEGREE, my vignette filmed back in October, has been rescued from post production limbo thanks to Leo Roberts (who rocks), Our amazing post-production supervisors at Sonnet Realm FIlms and our super talented VFX Supervisor, Zach Paul. The scene, which was shown in its current, unfinished state at Norwescon, should be ready to launch via the website this month.

ON FILM: I am pleased to announce that The Whole Truth, the hilarious screwball comedy I had the honor of working on last year, will be premiering at The Seattle International Film Festival . Director Colleen Patrick has full details at her blog, Wassup! Be sure to check out the SIFF schedule and get out to see TWT and other remarkable films this summer!

Such is life these days. Hectic and loving it. More movies hopefully happening this summer as well as much Trekkin’ Cheers!

And now for a Quiz

What part of speech is “Geekly”?

You were thinking adverb, weren’t you? It’s ok, after all that “Lolly Lolly Lolly” business we were subjected to as children we always start with adverb when the word ends in ‘ly’. But that’s not the answer. In fact “geek” as a noun and “geeky” as an adjective are the only relevant entries at dictionary.com. I would at least have thought there might be a “geekishly” or even a “geekily”, but alas no.

Anyway, that was a trick question. But if I were to give you an answer I could either tell you that “Geekly” (notice the capitalization- that’s a hint) is a proper noun which is an intentional pun on the word “weekly” that speaks of something relevant to the geek population OR I could tell you it’s all the parts of speech due to its content.

Seattle Geekly. It’s a podcast. It’s a podcast run by two very interesting people who give a great and amusing interview. And I should know. I was there for their 2009 Norwescon episode. And now you can listen!

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN

The hosts interviewed “The Benz” (that would be both Ben Andrews who plays Captain Avari, and Ben Johnson who plays Commander Jaryn) and we can be found about 1/4 of the way through the Norwescon 32 recap episode of the uber-popular “Seattle Geekly” podcast.

It’s a fun few minutes of listening if you’ve got the few minutes.

And just looking into the future: all Trek fans in the Portland, OR area should put it on their calendars that the ST:P cast will be represented on May 6th at PGE Park in Portland as part of the Klingons vs. Federation Promotion . Anyone in the Portland area should look into joining us for a fun night of geekly-ness and great baseball.

More news coming soon. We’re on a roll.

Oh. Em. Eff. Gee!

Really.

This is late in coming because I have been asleep for two days. Really. But I have just awoken from the madness that was Norwescon 32 and boy am I still on cloud 9!!!

Here’s the quick and dirty breakdown…

Thusday was my first panel: it was on how to make hard science “sexy”. I was on this panel with a pair of scientists and we were ALL female: which ROCKED! I loved that I was on a hard science panel with two other women. It wasn’t the best attended panel ever, but apparently Thrusday afternoon at 5:00 isn’t prime time. But then again, Thursday at 11:00PM was our screening, and I had been given an apology by the organizers as to the time they had available for us.

So we fast forward to 10:30PM and I was already doing stand-up for a full house. Seriously. By the time we hit the switch and turned on the DVD, we had run out of standing room. There were folks laying on the floor looking straight up at the screen and people on each others’ shoulders against the back wall. And there was laughter and applause; and it was INTENSE. It was marvlous, really.

Friday our whole cast got together for a panel appearance and we packed that room, too. Most of the folks there hadn’t seen the preview, so Leo got up and said a few things about the pilot and the premise and we had a great discussion with more than 100 fans about the direction of the series and just how much fun we were having. Roy was there in his full Romulan glory and he spent a few hours at our table in the lobby in his uniform after the panel, much to the delight of the fans. Our Captain was a big hit, too. More panel appearances and wonderful parties led me into Saturday.

And Saturday got even better! As I stood there in my uniform for my incharacter shift, we were approached early in the morning by the convention to let us know that they’d had a band cancel and they wanted us to show our preview AGAIN!!! I changed hats from in-character to PR director in a heartbeat and dashed off to the business center to print out some flyers. And I was stopped no less than fifteen times by fans who wanted a photo or an autograph while I was running around in uniform.

They gave us a double room this time and I was actually able to count the people who came. There were 254!! I was stoked. We had also had a request for the whole cast to be in uniform, so we decked ourselves out in our Starfleet best and attended. We were able to answer fan questions afterward and met even more people down at the booth once the Joss Whedon sing along took over the space.

I had another panel after that and then it was a night of serious fun. The Merchants of Deva and the Shockwave folks throw some serious parties!

All in all I had a blast and I can’t wait to do it again. Next year we’ll have more footage, more people on more panels, and more fun for all. Make plans now for Norwescon 33!

The Chief Conventioneer

Just a reminder to everyone who reads this (all ten of you, really) that this weekend is NORWESCON 32!

We Phoenix-bound Trekkers will be appearing all weekend in the lobby; so if you’re going be sure to come by and check out our booth, meet our cast and crew, and enter to win cool prizes!

I will be appearing on Pro panels all weekend; check your convention schedule to track me down. Also, the ENTIRE CAST of Phoenix will be on stage on Friday at 2:00 PM for a Q&A.

Thursday night at 11:00 PM we will be having a preview showing of several works in progress, previously unreleased behind the scenes documentary footage, and the world’s first look at the new USS PHOENIX!!

I’d love to see everyone there!!!!!!!

Television Killed the Internet Star?

Ok, so it’s a silly title, but whatever.

I am about to be on TV, and I think I like that.

Next Thursday, March 19th at 7:00 PM those of you in Seattle can see the King 5 Evening Magazine segment about our series and hopefully at least some of the interview they did with Ben Andrews and myself. Everyone not in the Seattle area will be able to see the segment on the King 5/Evening Magazine website beginning on Friday March 20th.

And one month later: April 19th at 9:00 PM ET/PT on Comedy Central Ron White’s new comedy special Behavioral Problems will debut on Comedy Central. That’s right, folks. That’s me on national television. Cool huh?

In TREK news, we have two more character vignettes in the pipeline and a rehearsal for both tomorrow will tell me more about just how awesome they are going to be. But I know that the actors involved are solid and that the scripts are solid as well. All should be great. And more scenes from the Pilot are slated to shoot the end of this month. All will be revealed at Norwescon.

In personal news, I had the amazing opportunity to see The Lion King here in Seattle with my friend Maurica in the role of Nala. If you have a chance to go see this tour: GO. It was great. I won’t spoil anything for you, but get there early because the opening number is worth the entire ticket price.

And this week I auditioned for a musical and a film and am currently driving myself mad wondering if the phone is going to ring. Call backs for said musical are Sunday and Monday and so there is still time for a call to come (please?) and the film should be cast by tomorrow night. So I’ll be squirming for only a couple more days.

More when there’s more news!

Which do you want first…?

The good news or the bad news?

Ok, bad news first. After almost 5 months of patience, several days of work, and oodles of man hours; THIRD DEGREE is not going to happen. I have to say that I am disappointed, but not altogether surprised. I know that the quality of the work that has come out from ST:P has been absolutely top notch and the further along we get in the process, the less the scene stood up. I sort of see this as a personal failure seeing as I am the person who both wrote and starred in the scene, but that is the way the cookie sometimes crumbles. And just having shot the scene was a great experience for me and a learning experience for others in the cast and crew.

I will admit also that I saw this coming as we prepared “Holo-Victory” and “No Other Medicine” for release. I am a little less stellar than the gentlemen featured in those scenes and the writing, although very “Trek” isn’t the strongest; just ask any member of the crew. I was excited that the scene might be shown in part on Evening Magazine next month and maybe even a little more excited that it had been entered into SIFF. The entry will be withdrawn.

I have been assured that an effort will be made to complete the scene in some form in time for our appearance at Norwescon 32 in April, but with all of the other work that we have coming up between now and then, I don’t see it happening.

END OF PERSONAL PITY PARTY.

I am so honored to be acting with and writing for and working alongside the people associated with this project that I would be happy as a clam as the third spear chucker from the right in the back. I will remain pleased to have any part in this amazing endeavor (John Curley called us “an ambitious film” remember) with or without my own scene. And hey- it’s not like this doesn’t happen in Hollywood. If you saw STAR TREK: NEMESIS. Dr. Crusher had a lot of lines in that film, and Wesley had a few, too. None of that made it into the movie I saw. So if nothing else, I am in phenomenal company.

And now for the GOOD news. Remember, I mentioned good news. Because of the scrapping of THIRD DEGREE, the production was able to go ahead with the release of HOLO-VICTORY.

Isn’t Ben wonderful? This was a crazy shoot in the cold and the rain and with strange people and little children ruining our shots half the time, but the scene turned out great. Bravo to the boys and girls (you know who you are) who braved those conditions and especially PA’s Garrett and Jason for doing the dirty work. Bravo!

NO OTHER MEDICINE should be out soon. I saw a final edit without CG today and it’s already brilliant. We could release it with the green screen still in there and no one would think that area wasn’t supposed to be green. We’re slated to shoot WOUNDED for which I wrote the dialog, and FRACTURED LOGIC next month and both should be superb.

Shooting on the Pilot is also set for later this month and early next month and the final version of our ship is getting very close to being finished. You’ll all have a chance to see a piece of the Pilot including the first look at our ship this April at NORWESCON 32 so remember to mark your calendars for that.

‘Til next time…

So much cool stuff

First, for those of you who missed it: CLICK HERE TO WATCH Brian Sipe’s segment on Evening Magazine last night. It was great to watch Brian’s work on TV and very cool to see more of the process that makes Roy’s forehead and ears all amazing for STAR TREK. John Curley mentioned our series at the end of the segment and called us an “ambitious film”. Technically we’re an Uber ambitious SERIES, but that’ll do. I watched it on the treadmill at the gym because my ZUMBA class got out just in time for the beginning of the show. I know I was acting like an idiot and smiling and squealing every time I saw Roy or Brian, but I don’t care so much. I think the people at my gym ought to know that they have a ST:P cast member in their midst :). And incindentally, I am loving Zumba and tempted to attend instructor training. Seriously.

The next installment of Evening Magazine that features ST:P is set to air on March 19th (also a Thursday) and it may feature the interview with Ben Andrews and myself as well as the four early vignettes starring me, Ben A, James Lyle, and Rodrigo DeMederios. There will [almost surely] be a new trailer debut that night on EM that shows the principal cast in a whole new way; think BSG….

Two more vignettes are in pre-production and are slated to shoot in March. These two will feature Roy Stanton as Ambassador Tevon and Aaron Key as Lt. Austin Hunt. Both are powerful and further raising the bar of what our series is out to achieve. I can only hope that we can keep up this level of intensity and the quality of the writing as we move into full length episodes.

And for a piece of “Third Degree”, which should be out VERY VERY SOON (hours, maybe… days?) you can watch THIS

Lots of work left to do, but we’re happy to be doing it. Full speed ahead!