true stories about the creative process, by Isa Adney
What did you like to do when you were a kid?
I've been thinking about that question a lot lately.
I put snails in a jar.
I wrote plays.
I acted in my own plays and one-woman shows. (Thank goodness YouTube did not exist then).
I memorized and performed scenes from The Little Mermaid.
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Oscar-winning makeup artist Dave Elsey on what to do when no one will hire you for your dream job.
I wish you could hear Dave Elsey’s voice. It’s all kindness and wonder, wrapped up in an accent that makes me long for the two weeks I spent across England in my third year of college, climbing up moors with sheep everywhere, eating jacket potatoes in places called the “Red Lion,” and trying chana masala for the first time in London.
Also there was the Monet room, which I stumbled upon while lost, roaming the giant halls of the National Gallery in London, the art museum guarded by giant bronze Lions in Trafalgar Square. I stood in the exact center of the Monet room, equidistant from each painting, and slowly walked closer until my breath touched the paint.
Read MoreI have loved Beauty and the Beast for what feels like my entire life, but there is one scene that has always stood out among the rest (and that is saying a lot because it had to compete with the library reveal and that time when she's trying to pick out a book on the step ladder and that first "There goes the baker...").
But the scene that has stayed with me long into adulthood is the one where she runs into a field of dandelions and sings, as the music crescendos,: "I want adventure in the great wide somewhere, I want it more than I can tell..."
Read MoreDoing creative work can be embarrassing: putting yourself out there for all to see, waiting to see if anyone responds, all the while unsure which scenario you fear more - someone actually seeing it and responding or no one seeing it. Both sound terrible in the beginning.
I'm sure there are things I probably never published because I felt embarrassed, or maybe things I never said. I'm sure there are projects and ideas I've never shared because I was embarrassed. Somehow I came to think that embarrassment about something before sharing it was a sure sign that the thing would indeed be embarrassing (i.e. a total failure).
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Broadway performer Ashley Brown on what it means to really choose your craft and your dream.
My coat is linty. It’s January and it’s one of the first cold nights we’ve had in Florida in years. This coat – my favorite – goes down to my calves, with a long lapel that makes me feel like Robert Crawley, Earl of Grantham in Downton Abbey, all dressed up for an ordinary dinner.
I try to get as much lint off as possible while I hustle from the parking garage across the street to Orlando’s new performing arts center. I want to look nice, sophisticated; I’m about to meet and interview a Broadway star, someone who originated Mary Poppins in New York and who’s played Belle on the stage, my childhood dream.
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