From Broadway World, and it is a rave...enjoy!

Here are the first shots of what we've been working so hard on. Audiences were very healthy this first weekend, and we feel cautiously optimistic about next week's reviews. So if you're planning to come see it, book your seats now. As you can see, it's not an enormous theatre, and it fills up quickly.

Although the New York team is back in our respective burbs of Manhattan, Brooklyn, and Connecticut, we'll all be returning to Baltimore for the weekend of October 28th, if you'd like to join us for the after-parties and such. And by popular request (again), here's a reprint of one of the projections we use in the show to introduce the character of Belize, played to the hilt by David Gregory. The truly fab makeup design is by Eddie.

There are now confirmed, definite sightings of angels in America, right now as I report to you live from Baltimore, Maryland...eight of them, to be precise, who did marvelous performances in incredibly difficult roles last night. Or maybe there are ten, because Shannon Hunt and Andrew Syropoulos, our intrepid stage managers, worked themselves into a frenzy to make the complex video, set, light, and sound elements coalesce.

Last night was the official end of my journey with Angels in America: Millennium Approaches...as the director, my job finishes the moment the play opens. So as I made the metaphoric journey from being a private member of the backstage crew to being a public member of the enthusiastic audience, I was able to sit back and really look at the play for the first time in days, to really SEE it the way an audience does. And I was one incredibly proud papa. There are moments so funny that the audience stopped the show with laughter or applause; other tiny bits where my heart smashed to bits; others, where I was simply in awe of Kushner and the actors and my incredible designers (Allen, Chris, Shannon...beautiful art, you three) the talent assembled. It was a special moment in my career, one I'll treasure for a very long time.

I'm off on a train back to New York this weekend, to start preparing for Angels in America, Part Two: Perestroika, which will continue this journey next spring. It's a very different play, with a very different look and a very different sensibility. And if I learned anything this week, it's this: pre-production preparation is the key.

But for now...thank you, Angels. I miss you already.

[Photo: Richard Goldberg as Louis Ironson, under the angels' wings. Credit: Robbie Heacock]

I just wanted to write a short note to say how much I am truely grateful for everyone in this process. From the start there were problems but that's to be expected. Standard stuff...rehearsal time and space, money, casting, tech...problems we all expect. But it's the way that we have all come together to make this happen that makes me so proud to be working with these people on this project. I have always thought I was a lucky girl because I've been able to keep theater so present in my life, but now I feel like I've been given too much. Again I say thank you to the cast and crew for being the most incredible and supportive group of friends. I pray that you all have gotten as much out of this as I have. See you tonight, x.

OH MY GOD IM SO TIRED!!
This entire week, this thing we call TECH WEEK - has been eternal!
I don't know if I'm coming or going.

As I listen to our director give notes, and hear his praise and grumbles
it makes one (well, me ) pause to think.
I am so blessed to have this... this.. Opportunity, this
piece of work to bring to life, the honor to share the stage with these
actors. It also makes me think, HOW POWERFUL THEATRE IS. How something as tragic and heroic and funny as life, can become thoughtful pieces of art.
So, I ask all who read this post - think about your own gifts and marvel in their
glory -

Also on this day October 12 - pause to think about a young man MATTHEW SHEPARD, who was beaten and left for dead on a fence in Laramie Wyoming, for being different.
(The year was 1998)BE DIFFERENT!!!

To quote the man I'm playing "DON'T BE AFRAID! People are so afraid, don't be afraid, to live in the raw wind, naked and alone. Learn this at least - What you are capable of - let NOTHING stand in your way!"

Know this folks - the Messenger is on her way.....

3 Days until opening...one learns a lot about your castmates in the pressure cooker of TECH Rehearsals.
The smooth parafin of our public personas is tested under the "heat" of lights, stopping & starting, adding in costumes and props.
I grow more appreciative of those who have the ability to produce consistent performances ( and cover my flubs ) even when tired and nerves are rattled.
And looking up at this post, I find myself talking more and more like Prior everyday. "smooth parafin" indeed.

Oh for Christ's sake! I have about 20 minutes before the day before the day before tech starts and I would just like to note that I am spending them with you instead of finishing off a nap that included Johnny Depp, chocolate cake and a pair of roller skates. Heh! Anyway, so my partner in crime has been away and I've been here just trying to get caught up, so that we can be on schedule to fall behind later...But I digress...I don't think I've ever worked on a play when over half the scenes are in danger of being over rehearsed this early in the game. I was watching the "Prior 1 and 2" scenes last night and I really had nothing to say. They had energy, timing, the actors knew there blocking it was clear...I mean really folks, I'm trying to get in some directing time here and you're really making it hard for me. I guess what I'm trying to say is that the actors have clearly been working very hard to make our limited rehearsal time work and deserve all the credit in the work when this show crushes. PS as a side note...I was talking with the EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR (inside joke) of the theater last night and he was spreading a rumor that we already have several group reservations on the books...groups?...groups!...groups of people. I'm tellin' ya make your reservation now or you may just miss the greatest thing to hit Baltimore since...Cal Ripkin! x.