The Annual Navel Gaze: 2012

by Phil RickabyEnd of Year blather, LifePosted on 3 Comments

This was a big year for me. I did one of the scariest things I have ever done: I left my job and went on tour with Keystone Theatre. The tour took our show, The Last Man on Earth to Montreal, Winnipeg, Calgary and Edmonton. It was, as you might expect, amazing.

The play received great reviews everywhere we went, and I was able to see parts of the country that I have never seen before.

I returned to Toronto, and began the hunt for an awesome new job to replace the old awesome job, which continues even as I write this. I’ll admit that it has been difficult job hunting for this long, and that I’ve been struggling against feeling discouraged. I don’t know what the next year has in store for me, but it will be something great, I know that.

Job hunt aside, the last few months have been pretty awesome for my creative life. I finished writing a rough draft of a play. I had decided to write a play about a period of Canadian history, but to do so in a Shakespearean style, which was quite the challenge. For a while it looked like I might not finish the draft and then finally…I did! And then I put the play aside, to give myself a rest from it for a while. I have a couple more plays I am working on at the moment: an as yet unnamed play set in WWI, a one man play called A Murder, and a Christmas play that is something of a story telling venture (at least for now).

So, now to set some creative goals for myself for the next year:

  • Finish the WWI play and the Murder play.
  • Go back to work on the one man play The Commandment, and look at staging it for a limited run.
  • Complete and polish the Christmas play, and stage it next December.

And of course, there’s the other thing:

  • Find an awesome new job to replace the old awesome job.

Let’s plan to meet back here at this time to see how I did.

Obligatory Year End Post

by Phil RickabyEnd of Year blather, Theatre, WritingPosted on No Comments

Now is the time of year, where everywhere you turn, you’ll find some yahoo with a blog providing a year-in-review post, or a top ten list, or something like that. And who am I to buck tradition? So, let’s get to it:

This past year has been pretty performance focused. I did the New Ideas Festival, made my directing debut, performed in a BYOV at the Toronto Fringe Festival, and finally turned a four year project into a theatrical reality with The Belle of Winnipeg. That’s more theatre than I’ve done in the last few years combined. This is good. I loved every second of it. After all, it’s what I trained to do. What I love to do.

I’m trying to negotiate the waters with my day job, to see what I will be able to do next year, theatre-wise. I’m taking on a bit more responsibility, but I need to make sure that I’ll still be able to pursue some theatre. We’ll see how that goes.

I’m also starting to concentrate more on writing. Progress on the next draft of the one-man play continues. I’m getting some feedback from some trusted sources, and then I’ll see where to take it next. I’m researching a historical drama, which I should be able to start writing within the next month to two months, and I’m going to be writing some short stories in the next little while.

I guess that’s the goal for this year. I want to keep acting going, but writing seems to be where the focus is right now, so that’s what I’m planning to be doing for the next little while. I’m talking to D.J. Sylvis about starting up a playwriting group, because (quite frankly) I tend to need the encouragement of others to keep the writing going. When it’s all over, I’d like to have at least 2 plays completed, and a few short stories.

Let’s review this next year at this time, shall we?