Hi gang,

After our fight with the town of Quincy, we're moving on and strutting it out!

Here's some of the neat stuff I'm currently working on:

Just got a Twitter account:
https://twitter.com/BettyBlaize

Given that some of the networks I compute from are very restricted, the coolness of being able to Tweet from my phone is simply delightful.

Fear the randomness that may result.  Hopefully I will restrain myself from continually tweeting "OooOOoo!  Shiny!"

Wrathskellar:
July 13-18 at The Arsenal Center for the Arts in Watertown, MA
Buy Tickets here:

This is a real departure for us.  Usually we're pretty shiny happy nekkid people (OK, not all of us are nekkid, and we're not all that nekkid... but anyway).  This time we are dark, spooky, mysterious, sensuous nekkid people.  I'm sure some of us were that way all along, but for my part, I'm a big goofball.  So this is a real challenge for me.

I'm embracing it though. I have one number that's a real costuming challenge.  And, if I don't need stitches by the end of the week, I'm considering the number a success. ;)  Ya gotta love a number like that.

The other is a dance challenge - I'm using my 3 crazy years of Indian martial arts training to build a Russian martial number.  Yes, I *know* that Russia is nothing like India. But if you can kick through someone else's chin, it really doesn't matter what country you come from - it looks pretty cool.  And as a giant white woman, I'm just a little bit more plausible in a sumptuous Russian coat.

Also working a duet with Joy de Vie, where she's the sweet innocent one and I'm the mean one.  The mean one?  Can you believe it?

So... come see me be mean, and dark, and mysterious!  I swear, I will not giggle.

location: Cafe Nation music: Something Spainish and Salsay

Even I can't be too hard on myself for this one:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hx5kG82536g

My latest solo work, done in partnership with Scratch.  I had the silk and the idea of the song, but he designed the awesome set that makes this more than just a pretty number with a big silk thing.

I really enjoyed doing it, and I'm pretty happy with the results, including parts I was worried were a bit boring.  Mostly I'm sad that the digital video refresh rate makes it seem less flowing that in real life.

So... instead of watching the video, you should come to the Great Boston Burlesque Expo, (April 10-12, Cambridge Hyatt Regency), and see it in person!  I'll be performing it, along with the awesome latest and greatest Boston Babydoll group number with truly insane floral costumes.  Picture the grandiose ideas of Mr. Scratch, along with the elegant costume talents of Miss Mina (who made the inspiration costume that started us off), combined with my own somewhat more get-it-done-fast skills, plus the blood sweat and tears of 4 other Babydolls + a professional costumer.   Yeah, crazy.  We had weekly costume "homework" assignments.  

Anyhow, that's just the tip of the iceburg for BBE this year.  As always we have:

• 3 Great Shows Friday, Saturday, Sunday - each show is completely different!
• Fabulous classes on Burlesque performance techniques and business topics.
• Some fabulous lovely legends
• A great vendor room
• Drop in Classes

But, we are always trying new things too, here's some improvements this year:

• A focus on new teachers - the teachers who stay on our teacher ranks are our absolute best, the ones that get rave reviews.  We have more than 50% new faces this year to keep classes fresh and new
• Vendors now have the option to have suites - so some will be in cozy hotel rooms.
• A legend critique session on Sunday
• Free breakfast with some of the packages.
• Master Classes on Friday - for an extra fee, many of our wonderful legends and top teachers have agreed to do a Friday block of Master Classes.  You'll also see classes from these great folks Saturday and Sunday, but the Master Classes are something extra special for dedicated fans.
• Me, with more sanity, I hope to have a helper at all times.  It might work to maintain a more stable Betty.  But then, I'm not all that stable to begin with. :)

See you there!!!

We have FOUR great shows in three weeks!

Two are private shows, so you're just out of luck. But the 25th and 26th you should start your Halloween festivities a little early, with two great shows, in two great locations!

Sat., Oct. 25, 8 p.m.
Howl-a-ween
So sexy, it's scary! Ioka Theatre
55 Water St.
Exeter, NH
Tickets: $10 in adv./$15 day of show (plus on-line fee of $2)

We're returning to one of our favorite locations - an old school theater in New Hampshire. It's well worth the drive from Boston, and it's a chance for us to visit our New Hampshire fans. We're pulling out all the stops for our favorite season, with awesome new special effects, crazy props and fabulous new numbers and dancers! You won't want to miss this!

Sun., Oct. 26, 8 p.m.
SINDAY AT CHURCH

Church of Boston
69 Kilmarnock St.
Boston, MA

It's Sunday, time to go to Church and learn about sin!

The Boston Babydolls present a sermon in seven parts, featuring an
all-star line-up: Greed, Pride, Envy, Sloth, Wrath, Gluttony, and a
special appearance by Lust!

We kick things off (pun very much intended) with some high-stepping
action from Can-Can Revolution, Boston's favorite French-kissin'
cuties. Then the gypsies of The Poludaktulos Orchestra work their
magic on you. The Boston Babydolls take the stage at 10 p.m. for a
sermon you won't ever forget!

Advance ticket sales close at 8 p.m. on Saturday, Oct. 25. After
that, tickets are available at the door for $13.


( Fun from Betty )

Sorry this is so last minute folks!  But you should run out if you possibly can - it's due to be a great show!

http://troupesfortroops.eventsbot.com/

We're supporting our troops by sending them a unique, and very cool pin-up book called, "For The Boys: Pin-ups for the Troops", and this Burlesque Festival is designed to raise funds to send books to the troops. Over 3,000 books have already been sent, but the demand for this unique and entertaining book is high and we need to send more!

Wed, Jul 02, 2008 at 8:30 pm to 10:30 pm EST
Cambridge, MA

Tickets are $10 at the door - a great deal since you'll get to see a bunch of fabulous troupes - the Babydolls are just one of the many groups.  This should be a really awesome event.  I'm particularly excited to revive both a number from Boston Billards this month and a number from the Dewar's Repeal Day show.

-Betty

Wow!  And here I was trying to get my act together to post, and it's already time to announce about another fabulous show at the Coolidge!

It's the return of The Boston Babydolls' BURLESQUE: BY WOMEN, FOR
WOMEN, Saturday, April 12 @ midnight

The ladies of New England's leading burlesque troupe take the stage at
The Coolidge Corner Theatre for a special show just for the ladies*.
All the burlesque goodness you've come to expect from The Boston
Babydolls, plus a mini-burlesque lesson and more!

Tickets are $12 in advance ($18 the day of show). You can buy tickets
and read all about the show at http://coolidge.org/node/1692

No kidding -- this show will sell out!

BURLESQUE: BY WOMEN, FOR WOMEN
Saturday, April 12 @ Midnight
Coolidge Corner Theatre
290 Harvard St.
Brookline, MA 02446

* - yes, we mean it. This show is for biological women only.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Seriously, from me, this is a great show.  Last time we did this, it not only sold out, but the gig was packed with wonderfully raving fans.  And truly joyous fans make for a phenomenal show, because the extra energy makes a good routine into a great one.  Knowing how awesome it was last time, we're all geared up to try to top ourselves and make this one even better.

Professor Badger's Cabinet of Curiousities (www.eightcornerglobe.com) will be at Carnival d'Amour with us, adding to the circus atmosphere.  It features "Human anomalies, Wonders of the Animal Kingdom, Nature's Mistakes, Genuine Historical Artifacts" and so much more!

Scratch showed them to me at a local sci fi convention this year - and it was truly awesome.  They converted a modern hotel room into this awesome creepy museum of things creepy and weird.   Now they'll be in one of the rooms at Carnival d"Amour - seeing the room I think the lighting could be awesome and with a bigger, less obviously-a-hotel-room space, I think they can do great things.

I'm actually sort of jealous on the audience on this one -  I know I will be in performer head space and not fully able to enjoy the show with costume changes, warm ups and generally being ready.  So I don't think I'll get to see all of the awesomeness we have in store.

mood: excited

... you find your underwear on the sidewalk in front of your house and you are simply happy that the prodigal underwear has returned.  My student was a little horrified.  I couldn't tell whether it was (A) that my underwear was on the sidewalk, (B) I admitted it, or (C) I was actually happy that my underwear had returned home, since it's my favorite basic black pair, I use it for shows a lot, and I'd been looking for it.

On other news... had a show at TT the Bears last night for Sean and Suzie's Mardi Gras Ball.  A really fun show.  I got to dance two songs with a live band.  Super awesome!  I love live bands, the energy is so much better and I'm happy to roll with the randomness that can come with working with humans who do their own thing.  The crowd vibe was good too.

We have SO MUCH going on:

- Carnival D'Amour - Valentine's Day - Thursday February 14 - ourselves, the awesome band Cirkestra, and a ton of our variety act friends.
- Geometry of Love - at the Ioka Theater - a stage I adore - it's a wonderful, renovated, old time theater that makes me feel like a real Burlesque star.  I'm super excited since I am reviving a number from last year, writing a new one and doing a new favorite of mine...
- Rack Em Up - February 10th, I'll be there playing pool... badly!
- The Expo - I've talked about it a lot, but this time I'm pleased to report the Babydolls are working up something Friday night as a group.  We're reviving one my first numbers but upgrading it significantly.  Mina and I just started costume planning and I'm thrilled that we are pooling our resources and experience to make some pretty fabulous costumes for the gang.

-Betty

mood: bouncy

After a long hard day of planning and estimating work for my Clark Kent like daytime life, I grabbed a quick salmon dinner (YUM!) and came home for a night of more planning.  But, unlike the frustrating work of daytime - this got done!

Go check out  The Boston Burlesque Expo Conference Pages to see my lovely work.  Scratch did the layout and navigation, I did the class page, teacher, page and updates to the submission page.  Behind the scenes the schedule is floating by our wonderful teachers ready for posting on Monday, January 21 (stay tuned!). 

I'm really psyched - we have a hardcore pool of my favorite teachers from last year, plus a whole bunch of wonderful new teachers from this year.  Teachers are coming down from Canada and all the way from LA and Seattle.  This is totally exiciting!  The energy is really getting juiced up this month.

WHEEE!

I've practiced both my solos for Brrrrlesque!

My big black men's coat is done, complete with lapels.

I've caught up on my Boston Burlesque Expo teacher mail.  I'm psyched, we're going to have even more fun this year, as I think our space is way better and I'm already getting great teacher feedback.

Fear my righteousness!  Wohoo!

It is often hard to get up the motivation to get everything done - it's always so easy to procrastinate and let stuff pile up.  So I'm feeling smug about having so much important stuff done.

Speaking of Important Stuff - Come see Brrrrlesque!
Crucial data:

Saturday, Dec. 15, midnight
BRRRRLESQUE
A Winter Wonderland
The Coolidge Corner Theatre
290 Harvard St
Brookline MA 02446
[ Directions ]
Tickets: $12.50 in advance
$20 at the door

We've got a ton of new numbers, including Miss Honey Do, Miss Mina, Miss Dominique Immora, myself of course, and even Miss Vita.  Vita's been really busy with America's Next Top Model and her regular life, so we haven't seen her much.  So I'm really looking forward to seeing her very bubbly self as she takes the stage with us!  Whee!!

Oh!  Almost forgot - ANNNNNDDDDD  Best Sellers is doing a wine tasting from 9:30-11:30 before the show.   They are an awesome wine shop just across the corner down Harvard Street from the Coolidge - easy walking distance.  They specialize in reasonably priced wines.  Last time I went figuring on buying a bottle and pretty much restocked my wine cellar for under $100.  They had so many wonderful wines, and I was simply shocked at how little I paid.  They really do find some really great stuff and they're prices never make me think twice.  I'm planning to do some significant Xmas shopping this time!

BTW - have you noticed that Xmas is getting shinier than ever?  Scratch, Mina and Miss Red had to dissuade me from taking home shiny little cone-trees made entirely out of colored jingle bells.  I figured I could make a cone bra out of them that would make Madonna envious.  And then when I hopped it would jingle.  I tell you, would that not be the bee's knees. :)

That's what I do, right?  :)

I have a whole bunch of projects coming up.  Definitely a burst of creativity in the works.

1 - make copper dress tearaway and make some blue undies for the Dewer's private gig next Wed.  Feel lucky if you got a personal invite from Scratch, it's a private party.  If you saw me at Halloween you're getting a glimmer of my crazy plan.  (Scratch, if you're reading this, don't forget my book...)

2 - construct puppet coat and get a head from Scratch for Brrrleesque, December 15.  A new Betty Blaize Special coming soon, the song is perfect, this is totally going to rock.

3 - whip out the white silk, blue dye and a spray bottle for Mina's new number for Brrrlesque, I'm honored to be doing my first custom solo choreography written for someone else for Miss Mina to a song we both love.  It's going to be truly gorgeous.

4 - Burlesque Expo is humming along.  Class planning for another year commences.

I pioneered a new (to me) from of choreography annotation - I whipped out my iPod, sang the choreography over the song and recorded it all with my iPod voice memo recorder.  10 minutes later it was uploaded, burned on CD and distributed.  Best new toy of the year for Burlesque dancers.  Last year the iPod changed my life.  This year its the recorder... I've also been using it for classes with my Indian dance instructor, as all the music I work to with her is sung live by her.  So her compositions don't really exist in recorded media.  The song may, but generally her particular arrangement doesn't.  Since tape wasn't readily uploadable, having the new recorder is a god send.

One other accomplishment - I crystallized a  pair of gloves.  The pros that read my journal are probably going "ho hum...", but it was new to me, and I was very pleased at making a template for an anal retentive repeatable pattern.  All my other crystal work has been on non-stretch surfaces, so I was very nervous.

If you didn't see the Wet Spots, you missed a pair of fabulous, fabulous shows.  They are awesome, and if I do say so myself, we are pretty darn cool ourselves. :)  I enjoy shows for a number of reasons, but this time my favorite thing was definitely watching the other acts.

And now you should be kicking yourself if you didn't come see us last week.  But you can make it up to yourself by coming to our Halloween show.  As you know, our Halloween show gets a lot of our energy.  This year, we don't have a full Out for Blood run, but we do have a bang up show:

Two new shows coming this weekend!

I feel rather bad - we've had a bunch of shows and I've been so busy preparing for them, I didn't post ahead of time notices.
But now is a great one - the Wet Spots are coming our way for a night of naughty fun!
-------------------------------------------

First off - come see our next show:

The Boston Babydolls: Around the World
Friday, May 11, 2007, 8 p.m.
Saturday, May 12, 2007, 8 p.m.

The International Lounge
184 High St.
Boston, MA 02110

A Burlesque World Tour!

Travel around the globe with Boston's Best burlesque troupe in an evening of classic burlesque acts! A sizzling score of red hot jazz and cool big band blends with the most beautiful burlesque babes in Boston for a night of sexy fun!

Join some of your favorite Boston Babydolls for a burlesque world tour, with stops in France, Germany, Russia, Cuba, The Islands, exotic Arabia, and the good ol' U.S.A.! Your tour guides for the evening include the delicious Dominique Immora, the fresh Honey Do, the buxom Betty Blaize, Miss Mina -- the mistress of The Boston Babydolls -- and more!

Tickets are only $25. Feeling like a big shot? A limited number of V.I.P. tickets are available for only $10 more! These $35 tickets are down front, where you get the best view of the show – and the personal attention of the performers!

Advance tickets are strongly recommended. The show is 18+. Valet parking is available. Purchase tickets here or by calling (212) 868-4444

Hooray for Hollywood! The Boston Babydolls are saluting the silver
screen, and you've got a seat on the aisle! Boston's best burlesque
troupe has whipped up a batch of movie magic just for you! Whether
you're a sci-fi fan, a mystery buff, or you scream for horror, this is
the show that'll pop your corn! When the flirtatious females of
filmdom aren't heating up the stage, Herr Alaric will be playing all
your favorite theme songs. Ready for your close-up? Than grab a
fistful of dollars and head on over to The Paradise Lounge. Tickets
$10 ($8 for appropriate Jazz Age attire), 18+ for admission; 21+ to drink.

Featured Dancers:
Miss Honey Do
Penny Royale
Dominique Immora
Betty Blaize (hey! that's ME!)
Vita Lightly


As an added incentive - you can see my utterly fabulous, hand made hat that is beyond ostentateous. It's extraordinary and I'm really quite proud of it.


Where: Paradise Lounge
969 Commonwealth Ave
Boston, MA



More info on details here:

www.BostonBabydolls.net/performances/dollhouse.php

So... show is done, and I'm on to the Boston Burlesque Expo - an extravaganza February 16-19 here in Boston. Hence the name. We're clever like that.

I'm class coordinator and so I'm running about hunting down teachers, panelists and panel moderators inside and outside of the Burlesque scene. I'm staring to get energized, and it suits the post-show crash fairly well - in that I get to be a bit hermitlike and sit around in a bathrobe and fool around on my computer.

Before time slips away from me, I wanted to just take a few minutes and reminisce on some of the really great parts of the Out for Blood show we just finished. So I can always remember the good stuff.

( warm and fuzzy post-event processing )

Now I dive back to email, and soon to bed.

Communications on LJ and Tribe have sucked lately. My day job has suddenly cracked down on personal communication mechanisms, so my lunchtime/afterwork highbandwidth access has gone to zero. And after a day on a fairly new computer and a T1, the gerbil powered computer on ADSL is not very enticing.

Phew!!

Now I remember why I do this. I was wondering there for a minute.

We just had opening night here at Out For Blood. Our audience was not packing the house, but they were attentive and enthusiastic, and that's what it takes to make me happy. I'm easy that way.

OK... I'm even easier than that. :)


As per usual (you'd think I'd have learned to roll with it by now), tech was stressful, dress rehearsal was problematic, and the opening night was way, way better than that. Load-in and first rehearsal on our stage had me beat, frustrated, feeling worthless and so bloated I wanted to just drag myself up onto the beach and wait for rescue workers. Dress rehearsal was better, but I was still having serious issues with my last number, which was the closer for the show... so I felt it really had to smoke.

And then... it hit. The "glow" of performing with lights and stage and tech was starting to build in dress. And then the last run of the dress rehearsal my last number - The Spider - popped. It was all I could do not to yell "YESS!!!!!" into the darkness as the lights went off. (why not yell "yes!" in dress rehearsal... because according to the law of cartoons, that means a large, smoking hot stage light will fall you immediately thereafter - being a cartoon myself, I have to recognize and obey these laws of Toon Physics)

Tonight was great - no insurmountable snafus and plenty of times were I had the extra oomph to make a move pop, extend, or otherwise be fully completed. We had a very proud moment where our music got a bit weird - we lost the cartoonish entrance music and went right to the main song for our three person number. God bless my cohorts Mina and Honey - we entered in character, we psychically agreed what had to be cut to get back on track and we fell into it like this is exactly what we meant to do. That's a wonderful troupe moment right there.

Spider ran great. It can run better. There's always room to improve - be sharper, crisper, bigger, tighter, better. The beauty of a month long show is I can run it tomorrow... and tomorrow... and tomorrow...

And my Twirly Girl pasties are in, so I can be super shiny for The Spider tomorrow and not make do with my regular red pasties! Now I will have even-more-sparkly boobies! Yay!

mood: jubilant

Progress is being made on the pile of Babydolls goodness for our show coming next week. Got wire for fixing headwear. Got 3.5 out of 6 pasties finished. That's 3 pairs... How do you make 1/2 a pastie? You get the tassel and less than half the sequins sewn on it. :)

Still have:
- tearawayify the caftan
- actually fix the headgear, don't just visualize fixing the headgear
- fix the panel bits so they are not dorkariffic
- fix the corset cover
- practicepracticepracticepractice
- practice new spider intro music

Had a nice time being a burlesque diva last night at Masala Art. The guys working the bar and the waiting of tables were among my favorites of the staff and the place was really slow. So we spent the evening talking about tassel twirling, the artistic removal of clothing, great burlesque bits of the past. No, these aren't gay guys, they are exceptionally clueful straight guys who have figured out that opening up the Burlesque Topic will me talking about boobs all night long. A subject that everyone seems to find agreeable. :)

Managed to make a pastie at the bar waiting for my dinner to come. :o

After looking at my list of OFB things to do yesterday, I decided that the most potentially time consuming, and slightly risky task was the skirt for the Sister Act. I have a choreographed place for a remove... so I better have a skirt!
( the fun of sewing )