D.I.D. Card - Never leave home without it.

American Express be damned... a new rival card is being used regularly - the D.I.D. (Damsel in Distress) Card - Recognised Worldwide. I have certainly flexed it more than my Credit Card this trip. Fortunately I have heaps of good deeds previously banked so that I feel I can withdraw liberally.

Part of the reason for the distress involves the movement of giant flight cases filled with foam bodies and talking dentures. Next show will be called "Lana Schwarcz: No Puppet". Or at least: "Lana Schwarcz: Sock Puppet." Roll-able into small balls and stuff-able into shoes thrown into a suitcase. But the reason for distress also partly involves some negotiating with less than ideal billeting situations.

The movement of giant cases without previously relied upon van has been my greatest pain, but I hope I am getting better at it. I have truly had some amazing angels smiling down on me this trip and I am grateful for the massive kindnesses thrown my way - kindnesses that went well and truly above and beyond the call of duty. After super lovely Ottawa Fringe and subsequent Wakefield Fringe seasons (OMG - Gorgeous town, lovely people, and fab fringe!) I had booked a van to shift the set from my last show in Wakefield to drive early on Canada day to Toronto, a 5 hour drive from Ottawa. Now, a few things to note here:
1. Everyone in Quebec moves house on Canada Day, some throwback to a weird unified lease ending date, so there are literally no vans to ever be hired on the 1st July.
2. Everything is closed on Canada Day.
3. Australians clearly don't give a f%*k about Canada Day

I'm gonna try to make this kind of short as possible as it's a bit convoluted, but short story is I got dropped at the airport at 10pm to find that there was no van. At all. Even after confirming the booking in the afternoon. Thank you National/Alamo Car Hire (I am adding them to my list of people never to give money to again). After unsuccessfully testing the theory that those that shout loudest get the most, I realised that looking the "mad-woman" probably looked worse than the "desperate-small-woman-bawling" cos she was stranded at Ottawa airport on Canada Day Eve with no way to get back to the tiny, no-public-transport-after-4pm town of Wakefield. How the hell was I gonna bump my stuff out of the Black Sheep venue in time to get to my 2.30 tech in Toronto THE NEXT DAY??? I only had one Ottawa phone number in my phone. So I called it. Enter my hero, Old Man Kevin Waghorn, Ottawa Fringe Festival Director. Better than shining a bat symbol into the sky. Delightful, honorary Aussie/Kiwi, Kevin Waghorn. He arrived at the airport having cleared his minivan. I climbed in, wiped away some remaining tears and snot, and we rode away back to Wakefield, the sun already having set long ago. At least we could load my stuff and I could stay in Ottawa. Still no idea how I'd get to Toronto in time, I had finally accepted that I would never actually make my tech. Enter my other Heroes: Aussie expats and regular fringe billets, Charlie and Bridget. Holy batmobile, wouldn't you know it... they ended up driving me IN KEVIN'S VAN TO TORONTO AND THEN DROVE ALL THE WAY BACK!!!! I made my tech just in time. And would you believe that's just the SHORT version of the story?

That was amazing to me. Still is. So many people going so out of their way to make things happen. I owe them. I definitely want to come back here, with a new show, even just as some kind of weird thanks for the generosity I have experienced.

So Ottawa was heaps of fun, stayed with lovely billets Emma and Guy, walking distance to the fringe site, played impro with the local impro group there, ate multiple delicious hippy pancake breakfasts, had picnic lunch at the lake (with Jonno, Bridget, Charlie, Jem and Hamish the labrador), saw inspiring shows, got great review in Ottawa Citizen, and won a Catriona's Top Ten Fringe Crush Award for being... well... a fringe love crush! Sweet!

I also changed my show after discussions with many artists in Ottawa about the headphones. I have ditched technique I worked so hard on for so long, in favour of winning over more of the audience. I had taken a bit of a poll - about half the audience LOVED the style, as they were assured absolute documentary, but half the audience HATED it. I figured that even though it was compromising my original artistic intentions, essentially I still wanted to entertain and educate, and I couldn't do that by alienating half the audience. So I haven't used the recorded voice technique now for a week and a half, and although the show is more entertaining - it has definitely lost the authenticity. I find that try as I might, I will always pause for laughs, where the recording never allowed me to. So where it has gained, it has also lost, and where it has lost, it has also gained. I enjoy performing the show more, but I have to admit feeling sad that the documentary element is gone. 6 of one or half-dozen of the other, etc. It has in any case been a most interesting debate, but people end up concentrating more on whether they liked the style or not as opposed to concentrating on the story, and the story is more important.

In Wakefield I played in the delightful Black Sheep, well known as a band venue, and I felt so genuinely honoured to be there. Great place. Great great venue. Audience was brilliant even though the first night was a tech disaster! I stayed at a stunning place overlooking the river where my billet had built his entire house from scratch. If I hadn't been so distressed at being airport stranded I would have been devastated to leave this gorgeous place, but I had no room in my veins for extra emotion and we left so quickly I barely had time to say goodbye to these divine people. When we first arrived in Wakefield, I compared billet notes with Jem Rolls: his billet had horses, mine had a deck... we were both pretty darn stoked to be honest. I am belatedly sad I had to leave.

Toronto as a festival has actually been quite hard - getting audiences is difficult... but that may have had something to do with the fact that I opened at 11pm, with no buzz about my show being built up through earlier shows. Each time you get to a new fringe, you have to start from the beginning, and though I will get a bigger audience by my last show, Toronto doesn't get the buzz from the previous festivals like Ottawa and Wakefield did, so I had 4 paying people on my first night. However, I did give away loads of freebies and had accidentally and quite randomly given 2 comps to the director of the National Ballet School (what are the odds right?), who loved the show and has invited me to tour the Ballet School here, which I am doing tomorrow morning. Apparently they are doing the auditions for the school tomorrow, so I am practicing my scowl, to fit in with some of the intimidating looks that might be prevalent at the school tomorrow.

Also I have moved a lot closer into town than I was when I first arrived at my original billet's. I am pretty much staying in Little Italy which is much more convenient than where I was, but only because I have finally given into my princess-type tendencies and started demanding better conditions. Proximity to excellent gelato is a must. I head to Winnipeg soon after Toronto, but before that, will be doing comedy spots at a "secret show" at Comedy Bar tomorrow night and another spot at Paul Hutchison's Summer Comedy Porn Night on Saturday night: a stand up comedy night held in the basement of a sex shop. Should be interesting.... lucky I brought my fake Dildo Baggins with me as a prop! I might even be able to actually really turn it into a business....? Otherwise, Grandpa shows going well, with good buzz.. audiences are just a little low. But a few of us gals have put together a media pitch for "Femmes Fatales at Winnipeg Fringe" (well, not really me, more Candy and Gemma Wilcox doing the actual WORK - I just posed for the photos), so hopefully audience numbers will be bigger if the media decide to run with it (great photos by Jonno, but we're keeping them offline until media get it, but will post when i can). And i just got back from Buffalo where I shvitzed with cousin Jordana in a Bikram Yoga class, ate Stu's Gazpacho, and shopped with Agi in Wegman's - which has to be the world's largest supermarket. I also bought new runners to replace the one runner I lost in Ottawa (how do you lose only one shoe?). I am truly getting old - I keep bloody well forgetting things everywhere! Oh yeah, speaking of which, my birthday day was sweet, including a lovely Italian meal with Celeste, Blake and Sean.

Sigh. New friends. New towns. New promo. Delightful.

I know, I know...

It's been a "super long" time coming, but I have been busy - busy deciding whether I should buy a shitty van or spend loads of money hiring vans from city to city on this tour. I have decided on the latter! Eric's van died recently, so the wheels we thought we had for the whole tour are no longer, and the tour I planned on has suddenly become a lot more expensive. Never mind... not when you find Fringe Buzz that says the following, right?:

"That Girl" approached us on Sunday afternoon to promote her show like most artists do... but she had that special kind of charisma, sweet, witty and simply adorable.

We fell for it and just went to the show. It's been the best we've seen so far (out of 6).

Rich, poignant story, full of jokes, funny props and such a performance at all the accents.

Puppets, shadows, talking dentures and more... seems a weird combination? Well, not so much when so artfully and appropriately done.

What do you like in geriatric?... the answer might be long to come, but the answer is worth waiting.

Thank you for having come to us, that was the best surprise of the weekend!


So, that was nice! The show sits so much better in a fringe or arts festival, and has some really nice buzz about it (2 standing ovations with several delightfully French "Bravo"s thrown in), but no reviews as yet. I have found my touring family, too. Or rather, they found me. Thank you Penny Ashton, for making everyone look out for me (I believe they said "trouble"?)! First day I ran around like a mad woman trying to set up a phone (OMG - RIP OFF!!!! No one is allowed to call me between the hours of 8am and 6pm weekdays), a bank account, and checking the state of the puppets and set before packing them into a van-taxi to the theatre. I met my most wondrous tech, Caisy, who is working with old equipment, but is generally being fairly flawless in her tech abilities. We teched in the requisite 3 hours, then I headed down the street to the beer tent where I saw the most bizarre sight of a bunch of performers manically taping hundreds of posters together in preparation for the running of the bullish posterthon. Unlike festivals in Oz, Artists here aren't allowed to poster before a specified time, that is, 6pm on opening night! So I took some photos of the bloody scene that followed once the gates opened at 6pm, mainly because I thought it hilarious, and I knew, being a solo artist that there was no way I could compete with the army of posterers I saw before me, while I casually stuck tape up here and there where I saw a square centimetre available. They postered EVERYWHERE!!! On the tables, on the chairs, on THE GROUND!!! There are even posters hanging on the trees in the garden!!! The noise from all the tape being pulled was almost deafening and I overheard several people complaining of "tape mouth" after they swallowed tape during the session. I know I should be going poster crazy too, but I hate postering, and I personally think there should be a limit to it all! So while I was postering in my casual way, I found some of the other solo acts - Jonno saw me straight away and I enjoyed a lovely and mighty hug from the other Melbournite on our tour, then Candy saw me, squinted her eyes and cautiously enquired whether I might be Lana, Penny's naughty friend. From then on, I kept finding people that Penny had told about me, and I discovered my family here: Jonno, Candy, Sharon, Jimmy, and my new and funniest, most delightful friend and billet sister, Tamara. I feel so lucky and blessed actually. My billet, Julie, is also a delight, having found me a bike to ride here, (which I guiltily have never used, cos I always have to carry around a puppet or two) but we live in Verdun, which is a 40 min bike ride from Rue St Laurent, where we need to be, and it is what I like to call the the "Frankston of Montreal" - the suburb that all the comics make fun of! Which I personally think is hilarious. Considering I might have to use the reference myself - except that I live there. Sigh.

So the shows have been going well, small but appreciative audiences, and I have to admit to really loving this crazy bilingual city (even though most of it has been spent in theatres, internet cafes and VERDUN!). Moi, j'adore parler en Francais and English as well. The people are cool, very friendly (except for when they are swearing at you for not buying a lemon of a van that you got inspected) and respectful in general. Also, ummm... did I mention the men have a particular love of redheads? I am getting a lot of attention here. The other night was a bit of a joke actually, when I was surrounded by no less than 4 men at The 13th Hour, the late night fringe talk show at "Juste Pour Rire" that we head to every night. I MAY just have to move here... I even actually ate Poutine, the national dish of chips, gravy and curd (ughhhh). Martin, from the delayed airplane took me for Poutine, le vrai Poutine, not the fake grated cheese poutine, and I curse the extra curd that must now be lying on my thighs. It's been lovely to see some of the people on my delayed flight attend the show. I must remember to thank American Airlines for the tickets they unwittingly sold for my show while we were all unhelpfully delayed for hours. Best publicity ever!

On the first night, too, there was a "fringe for all" where the artists come on and do 1 minute of their shows (1 MINUTE!!!!!!) to promote it. I danced with Hershy, of course, but it was hard to do only 1 minute. Then on the 13th Hour a couple nights back, the hosts interviewed m and hershel on the couch which was quite the success, and tonight, there are 2 minute sets for people to do, so I MIGHT try doing a tight 2 of standup. But I've never done such a short time before so we'll see how it goes.

Saturday, I do a show a 7pm, then have to bump out, load the hire van, and drive to Ottawa (only 2 hours) for an early tech on sunday morning. But Tamara has been making me drive her car, so once again, I am getting used to driving on the wrong side of the road, even though the windscreen wipers get more of a workout than the indicators. Family, take note, I am getting up very late in the day, so am wide awake for night time driving! PLEASE don't stress!!! I am also taking Jem Rolls, poet extraordinaire, with me for the ride, so he can remind me about driving on the right. In rhyme.

xxBanana

Canadians are the nicest angry people in the world.

So I KNOW I am lagging desperately behind on my blog. I apologise. It's been a crazy week, but I have finally opened my show in Montreal.
To quickly recap, last days in New York included - catching up briefly with my old old schoolmate Vallejo for brunch in the village, seeing Mike Amato do his schtick at a Slipper Room burlesque show (I have to admit, I was surprised he wasn't wearing a dress), hanging with Joey Gay in the west village, meeting new comedy friends through the divinely talented Ann Carr after her show, Seeing Ann Carr's show at UCB, watching Victor and others compete in a comedy Rap comp at UCB (and deciding that being thrown into something like that would throw me into a complete early heart attack), deciding who was the liar in a Liar storytelling show (with new friend Caroline) and getting it COMPLETELY wrong but adoring the experience nevertheless, building a puppet peep box with Ceili, destroying my left knee after power walking all over manhattan in a single day, watching my film screen in Tribeca (no, not THE Tribeca Film Fest, but the Iron Mule Comedy Film Fest), hijacking Matt Brooks for an entire evening after he returned from Germany for a night of laughter and catch ups, eating Indian with Mikey Shupbach, seeing an inspiring solo show at Vallejo's PS 122 - Marie Brassard (awesome), deciding that a return to the city was imperative to everyone's general sense of wellbeing, oh yeah, and I almost forgot, wasting an ENTIRE DAY getting from New York to Montreal, all thanks to the entirely unhelpful staff at American Airlines. I was due to be on a flight at 12.20pm. Cancelled. Then waited for the 2.50pm flight. Also cancelled. Thing is, they never announced the cancellation even though we were already put through, including all our luggage! Finally realising there was another cancellation we were told at the desk that we could be booked on a flight form La Guardia, to which we had to make our own way. We were then told we had to wait for our bags on a carousel. 45 minutes later, even after 4 attempts at contact through baggage services, we discover that our bags had been in another room the entire time. Luckily I met a gorgeous French Canadian man, Martin, who I then shared the flight experience with. He paid for the taxi to the airport (I had spent all my US$$!!) and we made it through security and all that airport stuff all over again, but at La Guardia. So ridiculous, really. Finally, after the 3rd flight being delayed, we board the plane, to discover we would sit on the tarmac for another 2 hours as we were now number 72 in the take off queue!!! OMG!!! It was at that point that I started to invite the entire plane to come and see my show in Montreal. I also got invited to two Shabbos dinners in that time. Lord. At least we all bonded. So, I left Matty's apartment at 8am and didn't arrive at my billet's place in Montreal until 11pm that night. You know, the train takes 7 hours, midtown to midtown. But even though everyone was REALLY ANGRY, they were the nicest bunch of people ever. Ahh... Canadians. So happy to be here.

Just a wee catchup for now, more later.
MWA!!!

Organic everything.

There is an obsession here with being "organic". Today I saw an "organic laundromat". I don't know what this means.

Oh New York... how thou hast changed....

So I have had a blast being here again. The first day I arrived (finally) I spotted not one, but two Melbourne doppelgangers:

- a 60 year old Nick Cadday
- a shaggy Geoff Ring (yes I know Geoff is shaggy anyway, but even shaggier)

The even stranger thing was that these doppelgangers looked twice at me too, as if I was also a doppelganger for them. We circled each other with dark looks of suspicion, and then moved on. I decided that I should try to get photos of myself with any other doppelgangers I see from now on. I was at the airport with my hands full and camera shoved deep into my bag though, so couldn't complete the task, plus, it would have been awkward after the weird dark circling business.

I DID manage to catch Matt (whose apartment I am staying in while he is in Germany) at the airport though. It was so crazy cos JFK is a massive airport and my mobile doesn't work here, yet I managed to spot him just as he was about to head into security! It was mental! The odds were just so slim - I touched down at 5pm and he took off at 7pm - and it was a pain in the arse (or should I say "ass" now that I am speaking american again) cos it was a different terminal, but we managed it. I took that as a sign that luck was gonna be with me for the entire of my trip. And it has, so far, been great.

So I grabbed the A train back into the city that I called my home 6 years ago and lugged my crazy suitcases up 5 flights of stairs to the apartment. I almost cried when I got here. I mean, 5 flights!!! With 2 pieces of luggage! But mainly I cried because I forgot how much I had missed New York. I was SO jetlagged when I arrived, but I went down to Bowery Poetry Club anyway to see which of the old crew were still hanging out there. To be precise, one person recognised me, and that was my ex-boyfriend, Victor, so it would have been weird if he hadn't. But, to be fair, I hadn't been there for 6 years, I had lopped the dreadlocks, and they weren't expecting me at all. I still ended up having a great catch up once they DID remember, and 4 pints later fell into a heap at 5am.

So much has changed here.. the east village where I am now and where I used to live is incredibly up market. Loads of new buildings and posh people with posh dogs. I swear to god these dogs have their own trust funds, although I probably shouldn't talk - I left Tyson a bit of mad money to spend while I was away.
Plus, believe it or not, New Yorkers have replaced the prices on the menus with .... CALORIES!!!???? I only noticed when I was choosing a bread roll, and thought that $230 was a bit much for a bit of baked wheat flour and yeast. Not joking people, it's true. Bread roll = 230 calories = priceless. At this point I am more worried about my hip pocket than my hips, so I am finding it difficult to choose my meals, although today I had two wonderful ones with friends. Magic Brian and Amy took me to Ethiopian where we gladly ate with our hands and discussed the merits of service staff actually being paid a wage instead of relying on tips (20% it is!). And I had a lovely Japanese lunch with gorgeous Ceili who I have so missed and who showed me around Basil Twist's puppet studio where she is working. She has made these fabulous tentacles which will look incredible once they're done. I have also offered to help her out a bit with her shadows which she needs to finish quickly.

Coming back here, I feel like I have so much to learn from my puppet friends. They are amazingly talented builders and puppeteers and I want so much to be here to learn from them, but then I think of my dog Tyson and how much I love him and I know that I can't be in two places at once. But I am staying at matt's and every day I am in a room full of intricate and perfectly finished puppets that he has made, and it makes me inspired to learn from him again.

So yesterday, I visited Victor and saw promo for his new film which will be out soon: The Awkward Kings of Comedy, and I am so proud. And jealous of course, but mainly, really damn proud. It's fantastic. And I believe they may be getting some Australian distribution, so look out for it cos it looks great. Plus I visited my old apartment and my old flatmate, Master Lee, and I almost died. You could see the floor, there was a door on the toilet and shock horror, actual toilet paper in there as opposed to a collection of napkins supplied with the steady string of take away. New York has changed and so has Master Lee! Yes, there was no door on the bathroom while I lived there. Well, there were doors, but they were kind of useless - they were saloon doors that swung open, and they only covered the middle of the door, so that if you were standing, the door just barely covered the important bits, but if you were SITTING you saw everything. It was a true joy living there and planning when my daily poo should occur ... generally before people woke up, or after they left, which sometimes could be ages. And when I arrived there 7 years earlier, I spent 3 days cleaning the kitchen and didn't even bother trying to clean the shower curtain. I just threw it away and invested in a new one. But he has cleaned himself up and the apartment and cooked me burritos. It was such a shock, but an great one. Oh, and he invested in sheets and a bed, and was so proud that he had done so, he made me try the bed. His fiance told him to stop doing that cos it as was creeping people out, so I assume I am not the first guest he has made lie down on the bed to try it. I think he stopped himself just short of making me crawl under the doona.

Oh! And I also did a comedy spot last night at Penny's Open Mic. Yup. Went down really well. I had to translate some of my set into America speak, but everything got great laughs, so I was happy. It's a lovely room. A lovely room. Small, intimate, welcoming and kind of truthful.

So it has indeed been a full few days, but I am really having so much fun. The people I loved before are the same people I love now. Which is a glorious thing.

Where is Paris???

So right now, I am sitting in LA, at The Hilton no less, wondering whether Paris herself was responsible for the hotel buffet's lack of carbs on offer. Lovely luscious meats of every variety with salads and fresh fruit - no potatoes or actual dessert to be seen anywhere.

Welcome to LA - the city of bleached white teeth and protein diets, even in international airport hotels.

You're probably wondering why I am in LA, and in The Hilton, eating every last morsel of the expensive buffet food. Well, I personally, am wondering not why I am actually in LA, but why I seem to be AWAKE in LA. I was on a horrendously delayed flight which was meant to take 17 hours from Melbourne to LAX. 22 hours after boarding in Melbourne, the plane finally decides to touch down on LA soil. I almost kissed the tarmac here like I have seen people kissing the tarmac in Israel, but decided that although there are probably more Israelis here than in the Holy Land, (and that most people DO consider LA to be the Holy Land) my teeth were still a part of my face, and I was so jet-lagged that I was likely to misjudge the closeness of tarmac, bending to kiss the floor but rendering me toothless instead, and therefore unable to succumb to a pressure hose of bleach in the future.

So, upshot is, the 5 hour delay (caused by high winds in Auckland meaning a landing in christchurch AND BACK) meant I missed my connection to New York City, so the lovely Qantas team arranged another flight for tomorrow, put me up at the Hilton, and provided me with buffet vouchers which I have been thoroughly enjoying, but might have enjoyed more if I could have finished it off with a nice vanilla slice. Needless to say, I think I ended up costing Qantas more than what I paid for the ticket.

So tomorrow I am on an early flight to New York City. Hoorah! My darling friend Matt will be on a plane to Germany at 7pm and I arrive at 5pm, so with any luck, I might be able to catch him at the gate before he goes through - which would indeed be lucky, as I am staying at his apartment while he is away and it would be nice to share a beer at least after not seeing each other for 6 years. And my other darling friend Victor wants to play my puppet film, The Upper Hand at his NYC comedy film festival at the Tribeca 92ndY on Saturday night, so I will be able to experience an American reaction to the film WHICH I AM SO EXCITED ABOUT! Guess who forgot to pack a bunch of the films though....sigh. Fortunately, the film screened at Coney Island Film Fest this year, so with any luck, I can pick up an NTSC copy from them. Fingers crossed!

I think I have slept in total about 2 hours. So if I'm being honest, I am a little weary, but talking to my New York friends again has made me excited about arriving there tomorrow, whereas I was previously just stressed about it. And staying at Matt's place is great - he is right in the heart of the East Village, plus he has crazy stuffed animals (not toys, real ex-alive things) all over the place and a puppet building workshop right in his apartment. I should find a time to go over my script, but there's a part of me just wanting to leave it for a bit in order to glow in the love of my old friends who I haven't seen for years. I am fairly certain there will be zero time for sightseeing, but much time for beer drinking!

Bed. Love you. Banana.

No 1 Post.

It is currently 1.37am. no... 1.38am. I am full of cake and supposed to be either sending my media releases to montreal, or, indeed, sleeping. I am doing neither. As you can guess, I am setting up my blog for the Canadian tour of Grandpa Sol, for which I shall be leaving in about 30 hours. So welcome to the new blog of Lana. I look forward to seeing you here from the other side of the equator.

For now though, nighty night!