This past Saturday I had the wonderful opportunity to take on the lead role of Rebecca in Cyndy Marion's new play Thistles. We did a virtual reading as part of a benefit for Marion's theatre company White Horse Theatre. Such a great cast to play with in this family drama, directed by the inimitable Dev Bondarin. Hopefully, we'll be able to do it again some time.
Next up, I'll be shooting a short film called Third Week. (In about three weeks!) And keep a listen out for the sci-fi podcast Expired. I play Veronica, the mom of the lead, Jane, in this surprising story. In the meantime, it may actually be getting warm again, so head out and get some fresh Spring air when you can! Peace ✌🏽☮️
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Happy Monday, all!
We don't get to say that very often, but I have to say that last Monday was a pleasure working on the set of the short film "Blindsight" written and directed by Amy Guggenheim. Not only was playing Opal, a restaurant owner trying to keep things together, a great challenge, but we had an excellent cast rounded out by Miguel Coias and Stephanie Mendez, as well as a killer crew, which was early all female, queer and non-binary. When working with an emotionally heightened script, it is so helpful to have a professional AND pleasant and fun atmosphere on set. This Monday, I'll be back on Zoom tonight with The Playground Experiment. Support new work and catch us all at 7pm HERE. I'm thrilled to be with this cast tonight, reading the work of Erin Moughan, dealing with a rather sticky subject for women. Come check us out and seeeeeee! In the meantime, I have been busy with New York Medical College doing Standardized Patient work, have another short film lined up for April and may 🤞🏽 have a reading in March. And yes, I've been playing Wordle. If YOU would like to hire this merry mezzo mama, go on the last page and click that CONTACT button! I am AEA, Non-SAG, and fully vaxxed AND boosted! Til next time, PEACE ✌🏽 I finished out 2021 getting cast in this fab mystery podcast and can finally post about it! Head over to WHAT HAPPENED IN SKINNER and give it a listen.
TOMORROW, I start rehearsals for a short film called Blindsight which will shoot in a couple of weeks. So excited to get back into rehearsal and back on set. My church gig is still virtual (we're so close to reopening for in person services - keep your fingers crossed for March, people), and I've been having a blast with my Shakespeare workout group, The Upstart Crows. We've been going through all the Bard's plays, doing one a week, starting last year. Tuesday, we close them out with Hamlet. While I indeed miss in person performing and reading, it's groups like the crows and The Playground Experiment that have helped me keep my chops up as well as keep me sane during this fraught time. These people are not only stupidly talented but a shear joy to read/work with. In the meantime, I hope you are all finding some joy and if you need this Merry Mixed Mezzo, just hit that contact button! Peace ✌🏽 It's already starting to look busy! Woo hoo! I finished 2021 by booking a role in an audio drama (soon to be announced)! And now, while "Audition Madness" may be virtual, it is still happening. It's aaaaaall about the self-tapes right now. [Though I do have a live audition, (I was recommended by a colleague) this week!]
In the meantime, I was back with The Playground Experiment last night for the first Volume of 2022. So much good writing and so many good performances; you should totally check it out right HERE. Tonight, I'm back with my Shakespeare workout group The Upstart Crows, and Sunday, I'll be working through Les Miserables, living my teenage dream of play Eponine. (If you hear 16-year-old type squee coming from Manhattan that night, that's why.) No Name...And A Bag O' Chips sadly has yet to return, so no drumming or singing with The Summer Replacements for the time being, but hopefully that will happen by late winter/early Spring. In the meantime, here's a clip of a song I used to sing with the band, and, just before everything got shut down, I started using as a pop number for auditions. Here's a taste of me doing Aretha Franklin's Dr. Feelgood, which hopefully will warm you up a bit of this cooooooold day. In the meantime, I hope you all are safe and well, and...that you stay that way. Peace Love and Masks 🧡✌🏽 which means it's time to make holiday videos! The ever fabulous Blair Brown has a series on the socials called Mistletoe Mondays. She had me join her as a special guest in order to make "Little Drummer Boy" cool again, You can check it out. HERE.
In the meantime, many blessings, much love, all the laughter and joy to you this holiday season. Peace ✌🏽 It is not every day that you get to the play the role of Rational Feminist Thinking, but I got to do just that in the fab short musical "#doingitforme: an after school special" by Laura Barati and Danny Ursetti for the Prospect Theatre 2021 Musical Theatre Lab in Concert at Symphony Space this past Wednesday. 10, 9 minute musicals, 30 performers, live, onstage, with a live audience, all safely done and experienced and SO FUN. Stupidly talented performers singing some wonderful new work. I'm still feeling that joy. With me in this photo, castmates and new friends, Shannon Amiry and Allison Posner.
So. Thankful. Cheers to the Wampanoag Tribe, and have a wonderful day of thanks with the people you love. Peace ✌🏽 How has it been a week already since the first staged reading of Insert Name: A DNA Journey? It does not seem possible. We had a full house and got excellent feedback and, yes, this show shall return. In the meantime, I was chosen to be part of The Playground Experiment's Volume 152 this past Monday, playing Claudia in David Ceci's musical in progress, Fur Pajamas. Last night, was all about Henry V with my weekly Shakespeare group and then Sunday, IT'S HALLOWEEN, where I'll be carrying a very tall puppet of a children's drawing. We rehearsed this past Sunday and it is going to look GREAT. AND, the Nor"Easter hitting us will be done by Saturday...we hope. Go ahead, storm, mess with my birthday plans, but NOT MY HALLOWEEN PARADE. Peace ✌🏽 It's been a busy time and it's been GOOD. *A couple of weeks ago I scored an industrial print shoot for Verizon playing a consulting surgeon for one their latest communication products for hospitals. *I recently completed an Advanced Scene Study class with Karen Kolhaas from the Atlantic Theatre. This is my third class with her and I plan on continuing. She is aMAzing and so were my classmates. *Last year my friend Nicole Jesson, fab actress and fellow Emerson alum, invited a me and two friends from grad school, Malini Singh MacDonald and Elizabeth June, to work on a project about family history. What started as doing DNA tests and talking about family trees, has lead to Insert Name. I am so excited to bring this piece to life in a staged reading TOMORROW night. Yes, in person, in a theatre. I am squealing as I type. We had our first rehearsal last night, and already felt pretty good about it. (yes, that was me squealing again.) If you are in NYC and are available to check it out, come on out to the New Perspectives Theatre. 7pm show! Insert Name: A DNA Journey. *Last week I was chosen to be part of Volume 151 with The Playground Experiment and I'll be back Monday 10/25 Volume 152. Check out The PGE on their YouTube Channel. *The Village Halloween Parade will be BACK this year! Woo hoo! The theme this year is "All Together Now" and includes puppets designed from children's drawings. It's been a rough time, as we all know, so as things start opening up, we're looking at ways to get back into life and PLAY. I can't wait to get back out there with a 10-12 foot high puppet (perhaps even the one drawn by my son!) and play with the crowd again. *Lastly, if you are a performer looking for a specialized workout, I highly recommend Powerful Performer created by dancer and physical therapist Jenna Kantor. Depending on what you need, flexibility, core, lower back, etc, she will have a fab program for you, accountability buddies and group sessions, and plenty of stories. You will have a good time AND gain flexibility, core strength, and be motivated to keep moving even after the program is done. Also, I got 9 self-tapes done in like, two days, can I get an AMEN? Send some love out with them, won't you? In the meantime, wear your mask indoors, stay safe and here's to seeing you at the next show! Peace ✌🏽 So here I am in skull pajamas for a scene in which I have been sipping magic mushroom tea with some fab ladies. Thank you ladies of Sugar Baby - Dir. Rebecca Dearden and Writer Sophia Conger; and Lavora Perry for the heads up about them - for having me as part of the fun and the journey of this impending series.
Before that, I was camping, CAMPING, on the Cape (thanks to my Bronx Mom Crew) but still managed to be part of Volume 148 of The Playground Experiment's play reading series. I love the work The PGE does and the actors who are part of it. And luckily they were not distracted by the rain pummeling my tent just as our scene started. Speaking of The PGE, I will be part of their FUN-raiser this evening! Contact them to check it out starting at 6pm, but even if you can't watch, please donate if you can as they do such great work for playwrights and actors. Time to go work my script for today! Peace ✌🏽 I came back here and was like, "What? I have not updated since MAY?!" That's crazy! But only because I have indeed been busy, with many things!
*I literally just got off the Zoom with The Playground Experiment's Volume 146. They are such a wonderful group and who I can't wait to work with IN PERSON. There is also stellar material and fabulous actors to watch and with whom to work. Rock on, PGE! *This past Sunday I was part of a concert put together by Song A Week host Tamora Wilson. The Songs We Write celebrated original music written primarily by members of the Song A Week community started by James Tristan Redding, who now leads thew group from Nashville where he is finally making his money as a songwriter. BinderSuze was there singing music by James among others *Last weekend was a first IN PERSON read through of a play I've been working on with three other ladies which went really well. Nothing like sitting there and going "We have a SHOW!" Keep checking back for a snazzy title and potential dates. *The ever fabulous Karen Kolhaas, with whom I have taken a couple of classes, asked me to be an actor in one of her directing classes. (And I believe I have a new monologue to work from the play Lynn Nottage's play Sweat because of it.) *Writer Rachel Kunstadt asked me to be part of a first table read of her new musical. It was so great to sit in a room with live people again and test out new material *I got to carry and manipulate a giant butterfly puppet (an Eastern Blue) for The Great Pollinator Ramble up in Catskill with Processional Arts. It was a HOT day, but it was wonderful to see and be one of the many large butterflies and bees around town for this event which was promoting an art exhibit in town. *I will start Standardized Patient work in September! I auditioned and got the gig in mid-June, and will have my second training session this week. Helping doctors communicate with patients better, I'm all in for that. *I will also start business role-play work in September after a training session this week. Getting to dust off my improv skills to help business people communicate with staff and coworkers is yet another thing I am here for. *I continue to "work out" with various groups I met during the pandemic, reading through plays and musicals. I even got to MEET some of them IN PERSON (Gasp!) for a reading of Falsetto's (I read "the doctor") and had a ball. *Fingers crossed for a possible TV role (if I book it, you bet I'll post it here!) In the meantime, between submissions and callbacks, I am also gladly catching up with friends, doing summer family things, and continuing a second round of the #100DaysofDrumming challenge. Oh and watching the Red Sox WIN...a lot. (9 games ahead of the Yanks!) I hope you all are getting out (safely) and seeing friend and family, and enjoying the SUMMAH as they say in my native New England. And if you could use this Merry Mezzo Mama for your project, slide on over to that CONTACT page! Peace ☮️ ✌🏽 |
When not pandemibaking...
I have finally started a website! I just got these beautiful new headshots done by L Morgan Lee of BLUEphotography, and at last have a place to display them. I've also been getting this self-tape thing DOWN. Madison Avenue Baptist Church, with whom I've been the alto for going on twelve years, like most churches, has gone virtual, so we are making videos of solos and hymns for the time being. (Someday, I'll release an outtake reel.) There've been other opportunities, as well, for practicing this process: virtual choir and concert videos. I've been lucky enough to work with Prospect Theatre Company and, thus, was asked to be part of their lovely video featuring Peter Mills' tune "Two Buoys". (I come in with the alto part and drums>) Two Buoys Next, a dear friend - a jazz musician and choir director, presently living in Italy - started up Singers Without Borders and asked me to be part of this uplifting number: How Can I Keep From Singing? Lastly, The Rigano Songbook asked 42(!) of their closest friends to help out with this wonderful song about an all too relevant and growing segment of our lives as we try to communicate with proper social distancing: Screen To Screen The Rigano has a concert planned for 3/13...and then the world shut down. But far be it for them to not have a show. Yes, the Ides of March Extravaganza is now the Ides of APRIL and will be in virtual form. When those videos go up, I'll be sure to share here. In the meantime, contact me here if you would like me to be part of YOUR virtual - and/or, eventually, LIVE - project. Peace ✌️ AuthorAlexandra de Suze is a singer, actor, drummer who also writes a bit and occasionally makes silly videos Archives
April 2024
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