The YouTube algorithm served me some Sandra-Oh-on-a-talk-show content today and I watched her tell Seth Myers that the first Shakespeare play she did was Love’s Labour’s Lost at theatre school. Oddly enough, I had come across the program from that show a couple of weeks ago as I performed in my current production of the off-Broadway sleeper hit Oh My God, My Mother Is Dead and Why Do We Have So Much Stuff??!!, which has entered its third month of an unlimited run in our basement. I’m starring as the daughter of a woman who bought and saved a lot of stuff, but now that the mother has died, that stuff has to be sorted through and dealt with. The twist is the daughter also has stuff, like boxes of theatre programs, so now she has to deal with her dead mother’s stuff AND her stuff, but mostly she ends up just sitting in the cool basement ignoring what has to be done and looking through boxes of stuff and going “hmmm, look at that.” It’s riveting.

I have no memory of seeing LLL, which I guess was performed the fall after I graduated from the National Theatre School of Canada in May 1991 as these folks were in first year when I was in my final year (I was trained in technical production: lighting, sound, stage management, technical direction, production management, carpentry, etc. I have acted, but am not trained, which was obvious if you ever saw me act.). I remember going back to see the third year students do a show in December, so this must have been on at the same time.

This class was an especially talented group of people and many have gone on to great theatre, TV and film careers. Although I don’t know any of these folks now, it’s still fun to see them pop up in movies or on red carpets or talk shows. Weird, but fun, like my show, which you can catch from now until the basement is empty, which, at this rate, will be never, so you have lots of time, don’t rush.