Hi Everyone,
Happy Thursday.
Hope you're all having a good morning so far! It's been a good week since my last blog if not a little quiet vocally!
Last Friday I had some work to do in the morning before having a physio session and then meeting my friend Haley for a bit of shopping and a good old catch up over lunch! I then headed to work and by the end of the show I was absolutely pooped! My voice had decided it didn't want to sing anymore and as much as I rested and steamed and slept on Friday night I woke Saturday morning and realised there was no way I was going to get through one performance let alone two. So I was off work and on mute! I did some work on my laptop and drove around a little bit because I love driving and it gives me a great feeling of independence which kind of makes you forget any worries. Maybe I should call my car Hakuna Matata?
I hate being off work but I knew the best thing I could do would be to relax and let my voice recover. So it ended up being a very quiet weekend really. I watched lots of TV and listened to some new music I had downloaded and read a few bits and pieces of research for a couple of projects I have coming up.
It did me some good to relax and Sunday. I chilled during the day, drove to a Starbucks to sit and read and let my mind switch off and then headed over to a friends house for nice food, a couple of films and no talking! Perfect.
I woke on Monday morning and just placed my mind in a positive place and decided that my voice was not in control and that I was going back to work no matter what. Luckily my voice seemed to listen to my way of thinking because I was able to sing and talk again come midday- clearly the rest works a treat! It's bloody boring though. For someone who likes to talk, being completely mute is really dull!
So I headed in to town go for a run and a swim - was annoyed because I'd forgotten my goggles and my eyes go weird if I open them under the water so I just did 30 lengths looking like a dog who'd just been thrown into a river and was trying to paddle his way out but going against the tide. Well hey, it's still exercise eh?!
After that I met one of the boys from the cast and we went to chill in the park before work. My friend Oli Tompsett was watching the show on Monday with his wife which was nice and I saw them afterwards for a quick hello before heading home to let my voice recover from being thrown straight back in at the deep end!
Tuesday morning I woke and had a few boring things to work on like speaking to my accountant and mortgage advisors and all that sort of stuff and then I headed for a run at the gym before meeting my lovely friend Ben Stott who I worked with on Wicked - he's my brother from another mother! It was really great to see him. After our coffee I met with my friend Holly who was my dresser at Ghost until last Wednesday. We went to the cinema to watch 'Salmon Fishing In The Yemen' which stars Ewan McGregor (who used to be in my dressing room at the Piccadilly Theatre when he did Guys & Dolls and he's signed the wall in my toilet!) and Emily Blunt. it was quite slow moving but good. Quite often one of the main reasons I go to watch films in the cinema is to be inspired by actors who I admire. It's always good to watch other people's work and this is one of the most valuable bits of advice I give to aspiring performers in my opinion - just get inspired. Watch things, listen to things, read things. Anything that is going to make you feel motivated and inspired. I do it to help me during long contracts on a show where I am having to perform the same role 8 shows a week for months on end. It makes me feel really excited about it all!
After the film I had a meeting with my manager and then headed to work for the show. I then went home to get a good sleep before a busy day yesterday (Wednesday). I woke and wrote my morning pages which is a new thing I have started doing after a friend told me about it. You basically wake up and write 3 A4 pages of whatever comes into your head. It sounds a lot but once you get going it's really easy and it's a great way to clear your head of anything you need to and then get your mind in gear for the day ahead. It takes me 20 minutes an the most liberating thing is that I can have really messy hand writing because no one is going to read it - not even me. The idea is, once you've written it all you juts forget about it! It's brilliant. So yeah I did that yesterday morning and then jumped in the shower before heading to the cinema to watch 'The Lucky One' which is Zac Efron's new film. Now a lot of people will find this quite surprising but I actually get really inspired by Zac Efron's work. Four years ago I played Troy Bolton in the stage version of High School Musical at the Hammersmith Apollo in London and it was amazing. I watched the film quite a few times before auditioning and starting rehearsals so I have really seen how his career has completely changed since then and the stuff he is doing now is really well respected stuff and I think he's made some incredibly wise choices in his career and I admire him for that and actually think he's a good actor! It's a good film. I mean, it's clearly been shot so that all the teenage gals and guys who fancy Zac get their fill of his biceps, pecks and ass but the story is good and the location and scenery footage is stunning! I really enjoyed it!
After that I went for a run and a swim at the gym before meeting my agent for a catch up and then heading into the theatre for a rehearsal. We have started applying a few changes to the show which are adaptions which were made to the broadway production so last night's show involved a few script changes, new lines and new lyrics. I actually had to sing a complete new verse in one of the songs and believe me when a song is in your muscle memory having sung it daily for 4 months it's pretty damn hard to change it and focus on new lyrics, but I managed it and I like the new version. It's good to keep us on our toes too! I like that it's getting updated.
I was being mocked at work last night by people telling me I was 'The Ghost With The Most' which is the headline for the fitness feature I did for Attitude Magazine's 'Active' section. It's 5 pages of (semi clothed) photographs of me in sports gear and an interview. Lots of people ask me on Facebook, Twitter and in person for workout tips and for inspiration and diet advice - well although I refuse to give advice because I don't consider myself qualified, I just do what I need to do personally - I do recommend you buy this because it does reveal some tips and tricks I have that work for me and I tell them all about how I keep in shape! Let me know what you think if you buy it.
After the show last night I needed my sleep because of the busy day but it was a good one.
I woke this morning and wrote my 3 pages and now I'm typing this before I head into town for a chill out couple of hours and then two shows. I have lots of people I know watching the matinee today so I'm looking forward to doing what will hopefully be a great show.
Before I sign off for this week I want to mention the Gotye cover video that Siobhan and I recorded and filmed and that ghost released on YouTube last friday. We loved the original song and thought it'd be fun to do our own version of it but make it a little closer to the feel of our show. If you haven't seen it already, take a look, we're delighted with the positive response. Over 15,000 views in 5 days! It's spreading like wild fire! :-) Thanks for passing it around!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NoK1zSQMeBo
Have a great week folks.
Keep believing!
Sh-Boom!
Mark
