Mariel K. Hunter

Mariel Kathryn Hunter hails from Saint John, New Brunswick and moved across the country to pursue her acting career in 2012. She has since appeared in a number of independent films and web series, as well as on stage. Most recently she has performed her one woman show on both coasts to tremendous reviews and oversold houses.

Recent credits include Sarah in Donald Margulies’ Time Stands Still. She has also founded Fort Heart Productions and directed under their banner a number of shows including Two Rooms by Lee Blessing and Lepers by Robert G Barone. In the weeks prior to flying East for the Halifax Fringe Festival Hunter produced a sold out run of Welcome to the Moon & Other Plays by John Patrick Shanley.

Mariel’s solo play, I Want to Come Home is currently playing at the 2018 edition of the Halifax Fringe Festival.

Twitter: @marielkhunter
Instagram:@unknownmariel

I Want to Come Home

The Old Pool Hall Theatre, 6050-6070 Almon Street
Thursday August 30th 6pm
Friday August 31st 9pm
Saturday September 1st 3:30pm
Sunday September 2nd 8pm
Tuesday September 4th 7:30pm
Thursday September 6th 8:30pm
Saturday September 8th 1:30pm
Sunday September 9th 3:30pm

Instagram:@comehomeplay
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/comehomeplay
Tickets:https://halifaxfringe.ca/2018/07/26/i-want-to-come-home/

Transcript

Welcome to episode 146 of Stageworthy. I’m your host, Phil Rickaby. Stageworthy is a podcast about people in Canadian theatre featuring conversations with actors, directors, playwrights, and more.

I’m currently in Halifax presenting my solo play The Commandment at the Halifax Fringe. I’ve gotten some great reviews and The Commandment was named the outstanding solo show at the Fundy Fringe. So if you’re in the Halifax area and want to come check me out, you can find all the details at homebodyproductions.ca or at the Halifax Fringe website.

You know, as I’ve been travelling, I’ve had the opportunity to meet some people who told me that they were longtime listeners and to be honest, I was thrilled. It’s always great to be contacted by people who like what you do and getting to meet some of these listeners was just amazing. So if you feel like dropping me a line to say hi, remember that you can find Stageworthy on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram at StageworthyPod and you can find the website at stageworthypodcast.com. If you want to drop me a line, you can find me on Twitter and Instagram at Phil Rickaby and my website is philrickaby.com. My guest this week is Mariel K. Hunter.

Mariel is a Vancouver-based actor currently presenting her beautiful, touching show I Want to Come Home at the Halifax Fringe Festival. We recorded our conversation at a cafe in St. John, New Brunswick, and our conversation started on the topic of the way that uptown St. John had been coming alive in recent years. It’s beautiful.

Yeah, it’s really, it’s really nice and it’s like all the youth are moving uptown right now, which is really nice. It feels like a place where there’s hope now, which is just great. It didn’t really feel that way for a while.

It really didn’t. No, it made it, this is horrible, but it made it easier to leave and go to a place like Vancouver because there was just nothing going on and no one I know here is working in their field. I have two friends who are paramedics here and they’re the only two people I know who are working in the field they trained in.

Yeah, it’s crazy. So, I mean, you grew up here and moved to Vancouver. Yeah.

Was it the lack of theatrical opportunities that took you away? Yeah, it really was. I love St. John so much. It’ll always be my home and like we were saying, the uptown is so gorgeous and vibrant now and it does draw me back, but there’s St. John Theatre Company and they’re doing great work.

I’m very happy to be associated with them through the fringe and all those things, but that’s really all that’s going on here in terms of professional status art. And so going away to kind of get trained and that was very important to me. I wanted to be someone who had a solid foundation of education going into acting.

So going away to get trained and then sort of staying away to build up my name into something that had some clout behind it has been a huge asset and has allowed me to come back on both feet solid and say like, here I am, I did the thing and now I want to do the thing here where my heart is. So it’s been really exciting that way. Do you remember when you first knew that you wanted to do theatre? I very much do.

There was a very iconic moment. A lovely woman who is involved with the St. John Theatre Company and who is also a playwright, award-winning playwright, I believe, Bette O’Toole was my kindergarten teacher and she gave me my very first role in our Christmas pageant. I was Barbie.

Okay. Yeah. And I got to save Christmas with Santa.

Nice. And from that moment on, I remember being on stage with Santa and saving Christmas and looking out at the audience and I just felt at home. Was it when you were on the stage, was it the applause? Was it just like the whole thing? It was just the whole thing.

I remember seeing the other kids around me and there was this feeling of camaraderie. I was a nerdy kid, not in any way one of the popular kids or anything. I remember this feeling of teamwork.

I think that’s something that in these days seems so exclusive to artists. There is competition and that’s part of our industry, that exists. But when you’re putting together a production or you’re putting together a film, all these departments come together to make this dream come alive.

What could possibly be better? Yeah. And when did you figure that it was a thing that you could do for your life? I think the dream was always there. But I think, again, coming from a small town like St. John, New Brunswick, a small city, it doesn’t really feel like that’s something you can do with your life.

It feels like one of those pipe dreams that maybe someone in a movie could dream about doing. And in the movie, they could be an artist. But not really something that seems so real.

And then I was living in St. John and I was in a not great relationship. And I was just kind of that age where everybody gets married and has kids and all those things. And I had this dream one night where this little girl with my eyes ran up to me and said, Mommy, Mommy, what did you want to be when you grew up? And I said, I wanted to be an actor.

And she said, why aren’t you? Yeah. Yeah. And I said, well, because I had you.

And she looked at me and said, but I can be anything I want to be. I said, well, yeah. And she said, well, then why can’t you? And I woke up in a cold sweat.

Yeah. And I messaged my would-be educational institution the next day. And before I knew it, I was out west training to be an actor.

What school did you go to? I went to Vancouver Film School and their acting program, which is a wonderful program with wonderful teachers and coaches who I absolutely adore and so thankful for. Do they do a balance of like theatre film or do they mostly concentrate on film? It’s funny because they do a lot of like film and TV acting classes, but all of their presentation type stuff, a lot of it is theatre based. So you study quite a bit of theatre scenes and different plays.

Yeah. It’s a good mix that way. And it really does give you exposure to sort of both worlds.

Yeah. I think of Vancouver as a film television town rather than a theatre town. It really is.

The few people that I know who work out there in theatre are like, I have to leave to work in theatre. It’s true. Yeah.

Yeah. There are a few renegade few of us who have all started up theatre companies in the past year and a half. And we’re all, you know, we’ve hit the ground running and we’re really trying to make a change on the scene.

The stuff that’s there is great. But it’s kind of like here where it’s the same people are involved and it doesn’t really feel like you can kind of walk into it all that easily. And of course then equity gets involved and that’s a little more difficult to negotiate too.

So as young artists starting out and really trying to get your teeth into the industry, independent theatre is definitely an easier game. I mean, maybe I’m biased because of where I come from, but I really feel like the theatre community isn’t vibrant if it doesn’t have an NBC. Yeah, I think that’s exactly right.

Because once it’s these, you know, semi-professional and professional groups and they’re only employing equity actors, you know, it becomes more exclusive just by nature of that. It has to. It’s people who have already established their careers and their resumes.

Yeah. And also when it’s like, if it’s in a small place and it’s like an exclusive group, you know, there’s only one group doing the work, then it can be very difficult. It can be.

And even if it is a more inclusive group, it still feels from the outside looking in like it’s not. And so there’s a barrier to approaching. And I’ve heard that countless times about St. John.

St. John theatre people are lovely people and, you know, are welcoming, but it does feel sometimes like you’re on the outside looking in and can’t break through that wall. So whether that holds any veracity or not, it’s not for me to say. I’m not really here, but I know people who are here who want to be more involved and keep going, well, then do it.

And they’re like, oh, I don’t know. You know, they all seem to know each other. And an independent theatre seems to open that up a little bit more, you know? It’s funny because in any theatre, we all kind of really need each other.

Yes, you really do. Yeah. You cannot exist in a vacuum in any theatre.

You’ve got to cross and pollinate and work with each other. Yeah. Yeah.

You’ve really got to reach across and build those roads. Yeah. And it only comes like, you know, if you build it, they will come, but someone’s got to build it.

And you have that sense, right? Yeah. In indie theatre, it really feels like we have to come together and make this. Yeah.

So in Vancouver, it’s really only in the last year or so? Certainly that I’ve been exposed to. And I think that was just because I hit a point in my career where, you know, I wasn’t getting picked up by agents and most of my acting was being done in front of like taupe walls opposite a camera and one reader. And I was like, this is not why I wanted to do this.

This is not what I wanted. I was just sick of it. And I did a really amazing film.

I was on the crew side. I was props master on a film called Crypto, which just changed its name to Woodlands. And I was watching these two actors just like do incredible work.

And I was just like, oh, right. That’s why I’m here. That’s what I’m supposed to be doing.

And so I got back from that shoot and just hit the ground running. I was like, if nobody’s going to give me, you know, a platform on which to act with the stories I want to tell and the things I want to do, then I guess I have to do it myself. Yeah, absolutely.

Yeah. And it’s been great because there’s so many other people that feel the same way. Yeah.

Who kind of jumped in and said, well, I want to tell this story or I want to investigate this or I really want to try out producing or directing or dah, dah, dah, dah, dah, what have you. And there’s so much interest. It’s just one person has to stand up and go, we’re doing the thing.

Let’s do it. Right. So, yeah.

It’s interesting because in Toronto, where I’m from, like the indie scene is pretty healthy and pretty vibrant. And we’re seeing it get noticed by mainstream. So people who start indie, I’m thinking of like, playwrights like Kat Sandler.

Like she’s pretty indie, like really, like she was like producing stuff out of pocket and all this stuff. And now she’s, she was like the playwright in residence at the Pterodactyl Theatre and plays at the, at the factory theatre. So it’s a great, and I actually have been seeing it more as a way to, to legitimately start a career rather than like waiting for somebody to give you the, to give you a permission to start working.

Yeah. Yeah. And that’s exactly the thing is it’s about not waiting anymore.

And like, it’s 2018, we all have phones on which we can do these amazing things. Hello podcast. Yeah.

And there’s no excuses anymore for not taking the impetus to get up and go. You know, if there’s something you want to do, you have all the power literally in your hands to go and do it. And so I have these, I have artists friends who, you know, they have these big dreams and they’ve left their families behind and they’ve gone to go and do the thing.

And then they’re working three-day jobs to support themselves in Vancouver. And I get that, but then they’re so artistically just numb and so stifled. Yes.

Thank you. And, and so they move back home and then I get messages from them like, you’re doing this or you’re doing that. Or I really wish I could be doing this or doing that.

It’s like, it can be available. You know, like we’re in an age of no excuses, right? Well, we really are in an age of no excuses. And yet there are so many ways to find excuses.

Yeah. Tell me about your solo play. Oh, I would love to.

Thank you. Um, my show is called, I want to come home. So, uh, being from St. John New Brunswick, uh, and moving so far away, you know, you miss weddings and you miss funerals and you miss engagements and children being born and growing up and all of these things.

And I hit that point in my career where I wasn’t, I wasn’t getting anything. And, you know, like I went and I did the training and why has no one discovered me yet? And this is the third tope wall this week. So like something’s got to give.

Um, and I called home as I always do when I’m discouraged in any way, shape or form. And, dad got on the phone and he said, you know, there’s this fringe festival. They’re starting here in St. John.

I said, okay, theatre festival in St. John, New Brunswick. Sure. Um, and he goes, no, like legitimately, like this is going to be a thing.

You should, you should check this out. And, uh, my parents are, you know, getting a little older and I miss them dearly all the time. And, uh, so one very lonely night I, uh, I had hit a bottom and, uh, I went online and looked at this fun new fringe festival and, uh, like 3.00 AM I think submitted an application and it asked for a title and I was like, I want to come home.

Yeah. And so I submitted that. And I think I wrote some sort of log line, like an East coast artist dying to get back to her family and friends, you know, submits to a fringe festival and lo and behold, I got drawn.

Um, so did you, when you got drawn, did you have a moment of like, Oh shit, I absolutely had that moment and I recorded it and it’s, it’s yeah. Come to the show and you’ll, you’ll see exactly what went down. It was an absolute panic of like, great.

Now what? Yeah, it was a, it was an adventure from beginning to end. So what was your, like, what was your process of writing it and what did it become? So, um, my very first writing day, I have an Instagram account for my play called at come home play. Uh, and I think that pretty much documents the journey as well.

Uh, but my very first rehearsal, there’s a picture of like an empty room in my iPad and like a mat on the floor. I was like, okay, I can do this. I can figure this out.

Um, and I really just sat in that room for a day and nothing happened. And then my mom came out to visit and she has a cousin up in Bella Coola, which is this tiny place in the middle of the middle of nowhere in BC. And they fly you in between mountains, like there’s no road.

So the plane just kind of wobbles at you and you’re like, I could reach out there and just pick up the snow. Um, so it was a little scary and we were up there, no reception, no nothing. It was wonderful.

We were there the first night and I sat down with my iPad, just looking at this beautiful river in his backyard and the play just happened. Yeah. It was the closest thing to divine inspiration I’ve ever, I’ve ever really felt.

I don’t know where it came from, but it just, it wrote itself. And, um, this year’s version is kind of an updated version. So it incorporates all the things that have happened in the last year and, uh, things that have happened since the fringe.

And it’s, uh, it’s become something I’m really proud of and I’m really excited to share with Halifax. Yeah. It’s interesting about, you know, you were away from your home and I’ve had a lot of success when I’m stuck of like leaving the familiar and going to another place for a few days.

Um, I’ve had great success, like going away to Montreal for like a week or a long weekend, or even going to, uh, uh, this place Artscape on Toronto Island, staying there for a long weekend and just sort of like being away and the change of scenery just sort of like takes you away from all of the excuses and all of the mundane things that run through your brain and shakes things up in a really wonderful way. Yeah. I’ve noticed the same thing in rehearsal spaces.

I’ve noticed that casts can get complacent in the same rehearsal space. And if I switch it up, like as a producer or a director, I switch up the rehearsal space. I noticed that thing comes back to life.

I think there’s something about these like artistic boundaries we put around ourselves as actors. Like we always talk about not having limitations and not having like these things that like confine us and we talk and we talk about it. And I think while we’re talking, we confine ourselves.

Yeah. And then once we get away from whatever our norm is, we again, feel that like actual liberation, that actual freedom, and we make enough space for something to come out of it. Yeah.

Yeah. It’s kind of like that excitement of like moving from the rehearsal space into the performance space. It’s like, oh, this is new now.

Yeah. And it’s like totally real now. Yeah.

Which is another exciting thing about fringe festivals in general, because you land and basically hit the space as you’re about to open. You hit the ground running. Yeah.

And it’s a whole different creature again. You know, like my dad came to the show way too many nights last time. He was not supposed to come until closing and he came on the second night.

I know. That’s what I said. I heard him laugh and I was like, where are you? You’re not supposed to be here.

Yeah. Yeah. But he came and he would watch the show and we will go out afterwards.

And near the end of the run, he said, you know, it’s different every time. I said, of course it is. It’s a different audience.

It’s a different night. I feel different in that day. I feel differently with whatever’s happened.

So, and you’re feeding off of what you’re given at any given, any given thing. Yeah. So it, I love that, like that freedom as well really helps to rediscover everything and to make it new and to make it better.

I like to think. As one solo performer to another. Yeah.

Had you thought about performing solo before you had submitted this? Absolutely not. No. I never would have either.

I would have been like one person show. Are you out of your mind? But if I wanted to perform in the funny fringe, which is across the country from where I live, then that costs money, a considerable amount to fly back and forth. And to the idea of trying to fly somebody else with me as an artist.

Right. Yeah. So, um, I think it was kind of born of just necessity.

And now I love it. Now I absolutely adore it. It’s nothing I would have ever thought would have been my comfort zone, but now I just did this show in Vancouver for the first time.

Um, we oversold. It was a wonderful audience. It was so great.

Oh, joy of my life. But there’s this switch. Maybe you can speak to this.

Like there’s this switch that kind of flipped for me. I was, I’m hiding in plain sight at the top of my show and I’m hiding there. And there was like this weird nervousness.

That’s like, not, not like I can’t do it nervousness, but like we’re about to go nervousness. And when my cue came up, I just like snapped, like it was, it was honestly another creature. And it was this moment of, you know, as an actor, you have these moments where you’re, you start watching yourself and then it gets really terrible.

Cause you’re watching yourself and you’re trying for something. It was like the exact opposite of that, where all of a sudden it was like actor, Mary was just kind of sitting up in my brain going, okay, not bad. Continue.

What was it like the first time you performed it? Oh my gosh. So the first time I performed it, performed it was here. Um, and it was such a blur that I don’t, I don’t totally remember it, but I remember the feeling before.

And I remember the feeling after. And so before I was just like, I was a wasted mess of like, what am I doing here? This is insane. Right.

And like a hometown thing as well of like people I’ve grown up with and people that have loved me and people that have been really skeptical about like, you’re going to be an actor and then bringing home a show that I’ve written for them. Like, ah, um, and again, hiding in plain sight. So I hear this, the tech yell out, we need to add more chairs.

And I’m like, Oh, why, why? No, like, no. Um, and then again, like, you know, your cue comes up. And I remember I stood up into the light and I was just like, and then it just happened.

The show just happened. And afterwards I’ve never felt so exuberant. Like it just, it was a whole new world of like, man, I’m competent.

I can do this. I have not made like a complete stupid decision in pursuing this line of work. Yeah.

It was, it was freedom. Yeah. I had, I had, so the first time I performed this was at the Hamilton fringe festival.

And, um, I had this plan that I’d made in advance that I was going to go and see a bunch of shows that day before mine. And it’d be really chill. And I’d, you know, take an hour before my show.

So I’d sort of chill and focus. And then I woke up that day. I was like, I think I’m going to vomit.

So I didn’t go and see anything. Cause I was just like, I had never performed in front of an audience. So I was like really freaked out by it.

And my director had said, so since the audience that you’re seeing partner, when you make eye contact with them, it was like, Whoa, Whoa, Whoa, back up. I have to talk to them. What? I’m sorry.

And so I was freaked out by that. I was freaked out by performing it for the first time and I did it. And it was, it was great to perform.

It wasn’t my best performance because I was still freaked out by it because I couldn’t quite make eye contact with people. I sort of did the cheat where I looked sort of between people. That’s a great cheat.

Don’t tell everybody. No, no, no. It’s a great cheat.

But also like when I do it, I know it’s a cheat. Like I need to find their eyes. I need to find eyes now.

But after that, once I’d done it, like I, like I literally have to do it. Like I have to make eye contact. And once I finished that run, I was like, okay, I like this solo performing thing.

It’s really addictive. It’s really addictive. And it’s like, I don’t know.

It’s certainly not about being like the only one in front of an audience, but it is in that it’s, there’s so much freedom, you know, it’s just like, it’s your time. And these people have already bought in. They’ve, they’ve literally paid their money to come to you.

So I’ve decided that they’re already on my side. Well, I mean, I don’t actually think that people go to the theatre hoping to see something that’s fully shaped. Like I think that people go when they sit down, they’re hoping they want it to be good.

And so they’re already on your side. For me, it became, this thing was like, oh, I can take them on this journey. Like I can take them on this journey.

And it was like really kind of awesome to have that feeling. Yeah. I’m really excited to go on that journey at your show.

I really am. Because I, and like, that’s another thing is like, my show is semi-autobiographical. So there was a huge fear that it was going to be like this, like narcissistic self-serving, like, yeah, come and listen to me.

Talk about me for an hour, you know? And it, it, it’s never felt that way to me, which is good. And God. But I like to think that it goes on a journey as well.

I mean, it, it literally does, but it’s, it’s a weird thing to do these solo performances in, in any sort of narrative. And I think it’s very empowering, especially in an age where we talk all the time about like how we should be confident. And we talk about all the time about how like, you’re the only you, and that’s a wonderful thing.

And like, that’s all well and good and very true, but it’s, it’s another thing to stand up and act on it and to embrace it. And I think as solo performers, you know, we know some very talented solo performers. And I think it’s a different experience of that confidence in yourself.

And that’s always changing. You know, there, there are going to be low nights where you don’t feel as great about it. There, there are going to be stupid high highs, like stupid high, but it’s, it’s never the same experience.

And, and yet it all builds you up. It’s true. I always start every fringe sort of like thinking, what the fuck am I doing? Why am I doing this? Who do I think I am? I have to remember the last time and how it can work.

You know, do you ever suffer from imposter syndrome? Do you like wait for the man to come with the clipboard and say, you are actually not this. You have to turn in your actor card and your pen and your paper. Yeah.

I think that like, it’s a really common thing that I’ve heard a lot of actors suffer with. I’ve never had it. I’ve never felt like I’m not an actor.

I’ve always felt like there are things I want to work on and get better at. I’ve always felt like there are things that I want to like explore more. I’ve never felt like I’m not an actor.

I felt like I’m a really bad actor. I felt like I’m really terrible. I’ve, I’ve also felt like I’m really great.

And you know, like the thing that I always, I tell students of mine and I tell myself very often is you stand on the shoulders of what you feel success is. So if I come to your show per se, and I’m like, damn, that’s amazing. Then I stand on the shoulders of that.

You know, if he can do that, that’s my peer. That’s my friend. I can go and do that.

Yeah. It’s that easy. And like, if someone else has a great show, I can stand on the shoulders of that.

If I have a great show, I can stand on the shoulders of that. But you’re never a rung below where you’ve been. You can never go down the ladder.

You can only go up. That’s my personal approach to everything. And I feel like as long as you hold tight to your successes and you learn really good lessons from the times when people would say you didn’t succeed, then you’re moving forward.

Yeah. Yeah. And what else can you do? Absolutely.

Absolutely. Here’s a question. Cause I always like to, I always like to try to gauge with people.

Do you consider yourself an extrovert or an introvert? Oh man. See, that’s a tough question, especially for a fringe artist who does a solo show. Um, I know my answer.

Yeah. Um, I would consider myself an introvert. I, I wear the face of an extrovert, which we often do.

We have to, you know, it’s, it’s a weird thing as a solo artist, you know, you finish the show and everyone wants to talk to you about the show. And I love that. I absolutely do.

I don’t want to, I don’t want to take away from anyone who wants to come and see me after the show. I love that. Um, but it is, it’s, it’s draining.

It’s all of your energy has just gone into this thing that you’ve created and that you’ve given them and then they want more. And it’s like, yeah, take it, take it, take it, take it. And then once the people are gone, it’s like, and I’ve got nothing and I’m done.

You know what I find the difficulty with, with fringe in a lot of cases is people want to talk to you as soon as that shows up. Yeah. Cause you know, you’ve gone off stage cause it’s a fake go off stage cause you have to come right back out and start taking your stuff off the stage as soon as you can.

And we want to talk to you that I’m like, I’m always like, if I can just have like these few minutes to get this stuff off the stage and decompress. There was one show in Hamilton, my second show where it was the first time that this show had fired, like really fired and everything was working. Cause you know, the first night was kind of like, it was getting through it.

And the second show, everything fired and I got off stage and I went, I need, and I needed that. And I was so glad that I had that moment for myself. That was not like people clamoring for attention.

It’s almost like, yes, please, but wait for me outside. I will be outside, but I need these moments to like, shake this off. My first space at Fundy was really great that way.

Um, in that like, once I was off stage, everyone was encouraged to leave the space, which was great. But you have a really short turnaround time. So unless I was the last show of the night, I couldn’t hide out in there for long.

And so, you know, you don’t really have decompression time. You have cleanup time. So like I would tidy.

Fortunately, I don’t have that much to my show. So that’s easy. Um, and then my dad would break down the door to come and see if I needed any help.

I was like, just give me a, would you just, I love you just go. Um, and then, you know, you have to go out and it was this huge lobby where everyone would congregate and just wait for you. And it’s like, there’s one of me and I so appreciate the 60 of you, but I’m one.

Yeah. What is your, so one of my challenges as an introvert is flyering. I’m like, if I, if I’m going to fly airline, I am like around the corner, head between my knees, like breathing before I go and do it.

Do you have any, any trouble with, with flyering or are you managed or do you manage to manage it? But it’s the same thing. It’s, it’s sales of yourself. Um, I do a lot of my promo online as much as I can because there, there is a little bit of distance there.

Um, even if it’s electronic distance, there’s a little bit of like, I can choose when to respond to you. And like, if I don’t have the time, I’ll, I’ll make time later or whatever. Um, but it’s, it’s tough going out and trying to convince people to come and see you in your show.

Um, and again, as introverts, like we can wear that mask. We’re actors. We can wear that mask of like, come see me, but it’s, it’s exhausting.

Then you have a show to do. It is. And that’s what I always give myself.

Like, so if my show is like nine 45 tonight, um, from eight o’clock. Yeah. That’s my time.

Yeah, totally. I need that too. Cause otherwise, cause you know, I’m going to find a flyer Franny’s line because I think she’s going to have a good one, but also like I need to build up after that.

Yeah. It’s, there is like, you need your energy because you’re about to give it all to a room full of strangers, you know? And like, you want to give them the absolute best of you, which means that you need to go and find the best of you after you’ve given the best of you to the people that you’re firing. So it’s, it’s a tough sort of thing to do.

I have a friend who’s coming with me to stage manage my show in Halifax. I know I’m so thankful. And she’s literally said to me, like, put me to work.

I’ll do anything for you. I’m like, Oh, here’s the flyers. Here you go.

Yeah. This is the first time that I’ve been completely alone on a show. So, um, this is the, this is like, go young introvert, spread your wings and fire.

Isn’t it great? It’s tough. It’s tough. Yeah.

Um, I feel like, like I look like yesterday I was flyering before 25. I was like, okay, so after this show, I’m going to leave here and I’m going to fly as people go. And I was like, wait a second.

I, I already gave a flyer to all these people. Yeah. So, yeah.

Okay. But it’s still like trying to build yourself up to do the thing. Yeah.

It’s tough. It’s really tough. And like, that’s another thing is especially in cities that you don’t know super well, or you haven’t spent a lot of time in.

It’s like, I’m going to Halifax. I know, I think three people that live in Halifax and not particularly well. I know like two.

Yeah. And so it’s this thing of like, we’re coming and we’re landing in your territory. We don’t exactly know where all of you fespy people are.

We’ll try and find you. But it’s, it’s this thing of like you barrage the people at the fringe and you want to walk that line of like, I don’t want to harass you, but please come and see me. Yeah.

And at the same time, like trying to reserve enough of yourself for the art that you’ve created. And it’s, it’s tough. Yeah.

When do you, when do you arrive in Halifax? What’s your… I arrive on like the 29th, then we kind of like settle. Oh, you were really like dropping in right before. Yeah.

Yeah. And then the 30th we, we start. Yeah.

And then I’m there until like we wrap on the 9th and I think I’m staying that night and then coming home the 10th. Yeah. Yeah.

In and out. I’m there on the 27th. Oh, nice.

And I’m, so my plan is, where are the venues? Right. I plan to like, I plan to like, first I need to find that because I need to be able to, then when I get a schedule, I’ll be like, okay, so I’m going to go here and here and here. Yeah.

But also like, where’s the, you know, where they get the posters up and all that stuff. And I haven’t been in Halifax in like over 20 years. So my memory of the place is very sparse.

Yeah. I feel you. I’ve never spent much time there.

I’ve been in there like a few days, cumulatively. And like, I have no idea really what I’m walking into. Um, I just got my billet information, which is great.

Um, I just got my tech information, which is great. I don’t have my tech information yet. I just got my tech rehearsal time.

So we’ll figure that out. Uh, hopefully it’s coming for me. Oh, yeah.

Yeah. It’s actually literally just, that’s so funny. We did the thing.

Yeah. It’s, it’s like, it’s that thing of like, where am I going to put stuff and where is it actually going to serve me? And like, we spend money on this stuff. Like I pay for those postcards.

I pay for those posters. You know, I pay for those ads online. Like it, it all adds up pretty fast plus expenses to be there.

And I’m paying somebody a per diem to come and like be by my side. And it pretty quickly becomes quite a sum. And I don’t know that there’s a huge appreciation of those facts when that’s being considered by like our audience members and not for any reason other than why would you know that? No, like you’re not doing these things.

They don’t, they won’t, they don’t know. Cause they’re, they have never been on this side of it. Yeah.

Yeah. Um, have you ever done any fringes other than, so any other than, than these East coast lines? No, no, I haven’t. I’m very excited for next year.

I really, my, my company has its feet under itself now. And so I’m very excited to apply to a lot more of them next year. Are there any that are high on your list to do? I really want to do Winnipeg.

I’ve heard so many great things. Um, I want to do Vancouver, which is obviously where I’m living. Um, but it’s pretty pricey.

Um, and it’s, it’s another hometown crowd at this point. So it’s like a little scary. Um, Edmonton, I would love to do love, love, love, uh, Toronto, Montreal.

I’d love to go to the prairies and do stuff there. Like, I just want to do it all. Yeah.

Yeah. I am. So I’ve done Montreal, Toronto, Winnipeg, Calgary, Edmonton, Edmonton still scares me.

Like I’ve done it and it still scares me. And it is really just because of like, I feel like Winnipeg is, you know, almost as big, but there’s something about Edmonton and how compressed, like, so there’s this defined area for both, but like on a Friday night in Edmonton, that area is packed with people in a way that nothing else is. And so on the upside, all those people are there for free and still fly her away on the downside.

Like that’s a lot of energy to be putting out for people. And it’s the biggest in North America. So, you know, there’s a lot of pressure there.

I got so scared and so excited when you said all of those things. It’s like, there’s a little war within me. Like that is exactly what I found Edmonton to be like.

You can do so well there. Yeah, no, I would die to go there. Um, I have another show that I’ve written, um, first draft of, which I submitted to Fundy this year.

Didn’t get in, which is okay. Cause I have much more time to develop it. Um, right.

A fully pledged idea. What? Um, so I’m, I’m hoping to submit with that one next year. I think it’s always, it’s always hard with, with fringe applications.

Cause there’s the people who I’ll be like, like who applied the way that you did the first time, which is like, here’s a title. I’ll figure it out later. Right.

And then there’s when you have the show and you’re like, okay, so now I’m going to apply. Yeah. And then some of the States are a little different.

Yeah. They’re totally different because before it was like, if I get in, I’ll come up with something. Yeah.

But if I don’t, whatever, I don’t spend 750 dollars or whatever. Right. And then if you have a show now, it’s like, I really want to perform this show.

Right. It’s such a different thing. Cause I submitted with one of each this year.

So like the one that I had a title for and a premise for, and the one that I’ve performed now. Yes. And like, I had both experiences simultaneously.

I really want to perform this. I want to do this again. And then the other experience of like, well, that’s fine.

If I don’t get it, then I’ll just, you know, I’ll do that another time. And then I watched, I literally watched the broadcast of the lottery for the one that I hadn’t fully realized yet. And I didn’t get in.

I was, you mean all my, well, the gods were not on my side and I was not a fan of that. Um, but yeah. And there’s also like, it was my hometown fringe again.

So I really wanted to do it. And they’re like coming off the heels of such a great year Yeah. But that’s the way the cookie crumbles.

I mean, that’s the, that’s the, the, the problem with the lottery system. I mean, it’s democratic and anybody like anybody can get in. What are your thoughts on the lottery system? Oh, I have many thoughts on the lottery system.

See how I’ve flipped it. And now I’m the interviewer. I did.

I see that. Here’s my thing. Um, I like one of the things that I appreciate about fringe over some other festivals is that the lottery system keeps it random.

You are never getting what somebody thinks is good theatre or important theatre, which I’ve seen in some other festivals where I’m like, okay, so now we’re just doing important theatre and there’s no subtlety and no room for, for fun or anything. Yeah. There’s no air.

Yeah. And then, so with fringe because of the lottery, it gets random and gets really random sometimes. It’s frustrating if you don’t get in.

And sometimes like I think to myself, like maybe if it was like two categories, got it, got a show with a script, don’t have a show with the scripts, you know, but again, that separates the democratic nature. Yeah. I share your thoughts here.

Like there’s, there’s huge advantages to it. And there’s like, there’s some pitfalls, you know, and it’s, it’s disappointing because I’d like to see the best of both worlds. Sure.

I don’t assume to have any ideas how to make that happen, but I think there should be some sort of, I don’t want to, I absolutely don’t want to say merit based system, but like some sort of something, you know, in, in some cities, not Toronto, but there’s the BYOV system. I like that a lot. Yeah.

For example, in Edmonton, there’s the La Cité Francophone, which is the French school that’s been a BYOV venue and it’s a curated venue. And so people apply and you get to go in. Maybe that would be a way of doing it is having like a curated venue.

Sure. And that’s, and a lot of, a lot of, a lot of fringes do have that. Toronto doesn’t, but a lot do.

And they, you know, it’s a great way to, to be able to, costs more. Of course. Yeah.

Because you have to pay the venue and you have to pay your fringe fee. So you better make sure that you can get, get people in. But in a city like Edmonton, there are people who go to the BYOV first because, I mean, they’ve been at this for like 30 years.

These are shows that were chosen. Yeah. They’re curated.

So they have some merit. Yeah. Maybe I’ll go and see the rant, the lottery shows.

Yeah. Someone’s stamping those. Yes.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

So there’s a, there’s a lot of that, which is kind of interesting to watch. Yeah. I like the idea of the BYOV as a, as an option for people who don’t get in the lottery.

Yeah. For the ones that don’t have anything that’s quite like that. I get kind of frustrated because then I feel like they’re gatekeeping.

Yeah. And it’s, it’s curious too. Like I wonder from an audience perspective, simply because I’m not on that, not really on that side of the fence where like, of course we’re actors, so we go to these things, you know, so we have opinions in that regard, but like for the non artist audience member, I’m curious about whether or not that keeps people away or draws people to, you know, the idea that these are, these are just written shows and not necessarily curated or not necessarily chosen or, or what have you.

And if that would change. It, it kind of depends on the fringe. Yeah.

Cause you know, I think the majority of fringes are kind of like a St. John, where if you say I’m doing a show in the fringe, the first thing that most people ask is what is the fringe? It’s a very true thing. You know, whereas in a Winnipeg or Edmonton, if you say I’m doing a show in the fringe, they’re like, Oh, what’s your show or what venue or, you know, so they know it, which is a real luxury. It is, but St. John’s building, you know, and that’s what’s so exciting is, is more and more people are going, Oh, I’ve heard of that.

And hopefully more and more people will go, Oh, I’ve gone to that. Yeah. And it’s, it’s such an important forum for us as artists to have these low barrier opportunities to go and form and create things without having those limitations imposed on them.

So I’m on both sides. Yeah. I see both sides.

It’s a tough one. It’s a toughie. This requires more thought.

So is there anything in particular that you’re looking forward to taking the show to Halifax? Yes. So it’s really going to be my first time forming in a city with a solo show where I know nobody. So I feel like I’m going to get a very honest reflection on what the piece is.

So I’m very happy it’s grown from what it was last year. It was, it was fun last year. I really loved it.

I enjoyed it then, but I’m happy it’s, it’s evolved into something more. So I’m excited about that. I’m really excited to explore a city that’s kind of between St. John and, and, and where am I going? And Vancouver.

Yeah. In terms of like the art scene. So like St. John has a pretty small concentrated art scene.

Vancouver has a much more expanded art scene. Even if our indie theatre is still kind of a small art scene. And Halifax is kind of like that middle ground.

So there’s like some professional stuff and some indie stuff and like kind of everything in between. And I’m curious to see a new environment and to really see what Halifax has to offer. You know, especially as a girl whose parents have been screaming at her to move home to Halifax for a while.

Vancouver, I’m not going anywhere. I’m just curious. But it’s, it’s, yeah, there’s, there’s so much that I’m eager to see there.

And just like a new audience, you know, a fresh set of eyes, I feel is always a good thing. Yes. You know, and especially with a solo show and you can certainly speak to this too, is like the show does evolve around the audience.

I think there’s this like, kind of gross taste in our mouth about like a solo show. Oh, it must be all about that artist up on the stage and all about them. And then, and it’s really not, it’s really not, it’s really all about the audience that goes to see them and informs the piece.

You know, it’s, it’s so much more collaborative with the audience because the nature is there’s only one person there and you can’t do a show as one person. I don’t think. I was, and you know, it’s the, the audience is your scene partner and they’re all you’ve got.

And so you have to bounce off them. And I, you know, I know the beats, but I don’t know how it’s being delivered tonight. You know? So it’s kind of always exciting to see where it goes.

It’s really exciting to see where it goes because it’s, it’s, it’s not something you and I narrate at all. It’s, it’s something that is very much given to us by the people in the room and the energy in that room and having to adjust, like if the crowd doesn’t really feel like it’s this crowd and last night’s crowd definitely went this way, but we’re not on that road tonight. And you can’t, I mean, that’s the thing is like the audience because of different audience every night, like what the audience last night liked.

Yeah. You can’t give them the same. No, it’ll be crickets.

Yeah. I have, I have a part in my show where I talk to my phone as the millennial I am. Yeah.

And I recorded it twice last year. I thought I had more, but I only recorded twice and it’s the same section of the show and it’s completely different. It’s literally just me sitting there listening to something in front of the audience and the audience’s reactions are so starkly opposite.

There’s, it could be a laugh track in one of them. Like it’s, they’re just losing their minds and yay. Um, and then in the other one it’s dead silent, but I got better reviews from that show.

Right. So it’s like, it’s, you can’t gauge what they’re thinking. You have to orchestrate the show around what you’re getting from them.

Yeah. And then you never know until afterwards what, what they’ve carried away from it. Yeah.

I’ve done performances where nobody laughed. Yeah. And you think, Oh, they fucking hated it.

Yeah. And then they just can’t stop raving about it. And you’re like, I know, where were you? I was in that room.

I needed you. What are you doing? Please come to our shows and laugh at us. We love it so much.

Yeah. No, it’s, it’s, it’s such a different beast. It’s like, I know exactly what you’re talking about.

I’ll walk out into the hall and I’ll be like, Oh my God, I’m sure it’s empty. Nobody wants to talk to me because they all thought it was terrible. And everyone just like flies at you.

Oh my gosh, the best thing about it. It’s like, are you in the same room? I’m so confused right now. You just kind of stand there and you’re like, Hey, I could have used you in there.

I didn’t know, but that’s the thing is like, you, you don’t, you don’t know. You can feel if you’ve really got them. You can’t always tell if you don’t.

So I was doing a show years ago when I was doing the tour to multiple friends. We were in Montreal and the audience was so quiet and we were doing like the play that we did is like a play in the style of a silent film. So we’re not talking.

So it’s like we have a live piano player and so we need their laughter. Yeah. That’s a lot of solitude.

And they were, and they were so quiet and we were like, we’re dying here. We’re dying. Yeah.

But we couldn’t see because of lights and stuff is that everybody was just sitting there smiling and they weren’t laughing, but they were smiling and they loved it. And it’s like, you can’t know that we had the same thing just happened. I put up a collection of short plays at West just before I came back.

And, uh, it’s six shorts that we did each night in our opening night. Oh God. I was the producer.

I went up and I gave the little, like opening the house speech. They didn’t laugh at me. I am funny.

They did not laugh at me. They didn’t. I could see them.

I didn’t feel like they were smiling. Some of them were, but I felt politely. And then we did the first three and we had our intermission and like, no one cracked up, no one giggled, nothing.

And then we did their second act. And there’s a few couple of really funny pieces and people like started to soften and whatever. And the last piece just brought the place down.

But like people came up to us afterwards, talked to us and it was a cast of like 16, 17 and two directors. And we were all just surrounded by people who were raving about the first half of the show. And it’s like, you guys, we can’t, you know, like you can be, you can feel when it’s a really terrible silence.

I think you can feel that. But when it’s that in between place, it’s like, and then you have to let it go. You gotta let it go and do it anyway.

And you’ve just got to not care and trust your work and all the other terrible things that acting coaches say to us that we never quite believe. And then, and then all of a sudden it happens and the life isn’t coming. You can’t be like, and punchline.

Yeah, you can’t, you can’t, but you hit it in a different way and it hits or it doesn’t, you know? Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah.

Well, Mariel, thank you so much for talking with me. Thank you so much for this. I had a lovely time.

This has been a Homebody Productions production.