promotion

Since the next D20 Burlesque show is fairly soon (Saturday, August 24th) I spent today walking around NY putting out postcards for the show.
Although this is a tedious task, it is fun because it gives me a chance to really walk around the city, find new stores, and get to eat delicious vegan food noms I don’t usually get to eat! Today consisted of checking up on the raffle prizes from the Compleat Strategist near Herald Square and then heading down to Union square/Bowery area and walking to various areas to drop off the postcards.  

The exciting part of the trip today was a stop at Atlas Cafe (on Bowery Between 4th and 5th ave) where I finally got to try Vegan Treats’ canollis! Danielle Konya, the head of the Vegan Treats Bakery , posted about this new addition to their list of delicious baked goods about a month ago, but since they are located in PA, and only have limited runs to NYC for certain  treats, I wasn’t sure when I would get a chance to try them.

Well, it was today.  Sitting in Atlas Cafe while reading, having just finished a vegan philly steak sandwich, sipping a Boylans root beer and then biting into one of these was definitely the pick me up I needed to finish the postcard placing!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Next D20 show flyer!

Sorry I have been MIA for awhile.  Having a job plus doing burlesque is making blogging a hard priority to put first.  But, in happier news, here is the flyer, featuring Luna Chase, for the next D20 Burlesque show!

next D20 burlesque show flyer

 

my first burlesque play

This has been a very hectic burlesque  couple of weeks.  Besides gearing up for D20 Burlesque this Friday and a double performance at last night at Franny’s FLICKS/The Pink Room – Wild At Heart (this one I’ll post about in the future!), I have been in a burlesque play.

the burlesque act I'm in during the show

It’s true, I have already done half the performances. I wanted to update about this earlier but I lost track of time and now I only have tonight, friday and Saturday left,  but oh well, now I have some production photos to show!

This is my first burlesque play and it has been an interesting experience.  The show consists of two parts, a full on play with a few burlesque acts mixed in and then the second part (after intermission) is a short burlesque show.

The show is a modern take on Hansel and Gretel and includes things like sex trafficking and sweatshops.  In the show I play the character of “Mom” which is pretty funny since a good amount of my lines have to do with disliking vegetarians! This becomes especially funny when I discovered that I am the only veg*n in the cast!

The show has been a lot of work, but not in a bad way.  Between practices and the amount of time it takes to do hair and makeup so many times over, it really adds up to a lot of time.  I’m really proud of the show though, and hope the remaining 3 productions go well.  And for fun, here is a picture of what I look like when I get home from the shows at night, usually around midnight!

If you are interested in coming to see the play, here is the information:

Location	WOW Cafe Theatre 59-61 East 4th Street New York, NY
Created By	Jasmina Jz Sinanovic
More Info	Ticketing link http://fabnyc.org/calendar.php?month=5&year=2011&ctype=month&type=event&mids[0]=17 A light and exciting new comedy that lampoons the politics, questions our complacency and brings this old tale to life. A night of laughter and bawdiness! Who said adults couldn’t enjoy fairy tales? Starring: Anja Keister, Jessica Cermak, , Lorraine La Prade, Nicolette Dixon, Sir Real, Sweet Lorraine

talk nerdy to me…….plus another burlesque legend

My burlesque show, that had it’s first show in March (A Night of Role Playing Games)  has ballooned on the internet, catching the attention of many blog, geek websites, and even more mainstream sites.

I am of course delighted, though this constant promotional work I am doing has become my life.  I can’t complain too much though as it allows me to spend days on the internet looking for new websites that match the theme, that are also my own interests,  that I can promote the show on.  In this process I have found many new sites that I love, especially NerdNYC, a forum based site for self proclaimed nerds to get together and discuss news, but also organize game nights and RPG campaigns! It is like a dream come true for me and some members of the NerdNYC group have really helped me and D20 Burlesque out! This past weekend I unfortunately missed the NerdNYC picnic but I look forward to more events in the summer, though I’m finding many gigs are conflicting.

An example of this is happening tonight, where I am missing NerdNYC’s game night at Think Coffee  (at 248 Mercer street) because of my participation in the Rhinestone Follies’ Benefit for April March. Of course I would love to see you at this benefit, but if games, coffee, and delicious vegan desserts are your thing, the game night is a great evening as well.

This Benefit, put together by the Rhinestone Follies, is to help raise funds for April March, the First lady of Burlesque,  to attend the Burlesque Hall of Fame weekend where she can perform in the legends show.  This is a similar sort of thing to the evening I went to with Bambi Jones at Coney Island.  I am extremely lucky to get to perform in this benefit which includes many of NY’s top burlesque performers.  This show is tonight from 8pm-10pm at the R Bar (218 Bowery, LES, NY), $15.

wow, okay, a lot is going on….

So, yeah, I have been slacking a lot when it comes to blogging. In my defense, I have been super busy.  Just last week I had 5 gigs in one week, one of which was the second installment of D20 Burlesque. I even got to perform twice out of state last week, once at Hell’s Kitchen Lounge in Newark, NJ and another time down in New Hope, PA at John & Peter’s, a wonderful little bar right near where my partner grew up.  This gig allowed me the cash flow to go visit my family for Easter where my mother had made me vegan peanut butter eggs, chocolate covered pretzels and chocolate dipped strawberries!

But back to D20 Burlesque.  The second show, which is a ‘curse’ in the burlesque world via sophomore slump, but we did really well and pulled off another great show.  This show also allowed me to work out fun new vegan friendly versions of burlesque staples: the feather fan and the feather headdress.

James Koroni, a talented dancer, vegan, and all around sweetie pie, came out to the show to help support my vegan burlesque work!

Check out James’ coverage of my event and check out the rest of his site to learn more about vegan friendly dancers!

D20 rpg video recap

Amazing video by Mister Khon!

OMG RPG!

 

That’s right, that is me in that large D20 (well, D18 because I needed to remove two sides to get in and out of it)!

The show was a smashing success, we had a standing room only crowd, might have sold out the space, got rave reviews, and were able to book a May show!  Woo-hoo.  Besides the amazing-ness that was the performers, the audience was fantastic! That crowd was supportive, cheered in all the right places! This fantastic audience consisted of many different facets of people – typical burlesque people, a handful of people from the Nerd NYC group, people who just wondered in because they saw it advertised on various media and then there were the celebrities.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Celebrities you say? Yes, in fact I did say that! In that ever so wonderful audience was: Luke Crane, one of the creators of the Burning Wheel RPG and Terry Hope Romero. Yes, the Terry Hope Romero as in co-author of Veganomican, Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World and Viva Vegan. OMG, one of the co-hosts of Post Punk Kitchen came to my show! How she found out about it, I don’t know, but finding this out made my vegan heart leap with joy! You should definitely check out her site Vegan Latina for all kinds of vegan goodies, hints and tips!

 

D20 burlesque ad!

D20 burlesque!

Now that I am doing burlesque as my main source of income, I have been trying to step up the amount of gigs I do to help keep myself going.   One of the ways I’ve been trying to do this is find new venues or produce my own shows.

Inspired by the production power houses that are Calamity Chang and Lefty Lucy, and the recent success of Franny Fluffer with her David Lynch Burlesque, I decided to try my hand at producing my own show.

I have been looking at venues for awhile and eventually contacted the Parkside Lounge about doing a gaming themed show, a form of the current nerdlesque (nerd burlesque) that I am yet to see in NYC.  Well, they were fine with the idea and we’ve booked two shows: a RPG (role playing game) based show this month on March 25th and a board game themed show in April. In order to keep it a unified thing, I dubbed the show D20 Burlesque which will become a group of different performers coming together to celebrate gaming culture.

The whole thing is an interesting experience as I have never produced a show myself, burlesque or otherwise.

I have already gotten a sponsor to donate raffle prizes, which I am excited about because it is my favorite gaming store in New York! Check out the Compleat Strategist to see what I mean!

In the mean time, I am trying to work on acts for the show, making promotional advertisements, and reaching out to different nerd groups in NYC.

I will give fair warning that I might not be updating that much due to the amount of work I need to do, but if you are facebook friends, you’ll be getting much more information and updates.