A remarkable, rare, and practically a command performance of the Charles Dickens classic holiday play, A Christmas Carol, was presented as an interactive, live show on Sunday, December 20, at The CATHE community center in Burlington, Wisconsin. How
do I know...because I was there tending to the spotlights for the
performance. My sister, Lori, was in the cast performing a series of
characters, including Tiny Tim and the Ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and
Future, while also engaging the audience in this refreshing English Music Style of
presenting a play.
This version, A Dickens of a Christmas Carol, presented by the Wisconsin Actors Ensemble, worked with the script actually used by Charles Dickens during personal performances on stage 170 years ago.
At times Lori had to "coach" someone in the audience who had a script sheet and was wearing props like a top hat or a dog's nose to get their lines right. At other times she would bring the play to the audience by selecting one or more to dance with her!
In this version, there was a member of the cast, Ted Tyson, whose job it was to coach the audience, letting them know with signs and objects, like a match box when the audience was supposed to scrunch plastic pieces together to simulate the crackling of a log fireplace. He also played a small keyboard adding silent-film like organ music to various scenes.
The anchor of the remarkable performance was the versatile, talented and experienced actor, Jimmy Iaquinta, who in the Charles Dickens style, held a manuscript of the play and by switching hats and scarfs and vocal inflection, somehow managed to play three or more characters, including Scrooge and Bob Cratchit.
Manning the spotlights, I couldn't help but focus in on my sister and marveled at her professional determination to put on the very best performance possible no matter who was in the audience, from royalty to commoner and everyone in between. There were no songs to be sung by Lori, but her acting voice is so lyrical and styled that what comes out of her mouth has the quality and impact of singing.
Her extreme range of projecting emotion and switching accents was also on full display from the sad scenes of Tiny Tim's illness to the enthusiasm of the street boy charged by a renewed Scrooge to go and buy a big fat goose for Christmas day dinner!
I suspect most actors, but especially for those in this acting troupe, you could tell they were performing in honor of their art form, joyously inhabiting the characters, and yes hopefully entertaining an audience, but even more to revel in the creative, artistic expression they thrive on during performances.
When the curtain finally came down and the actors took their well-deserved bows, instead of feeling drained and scurrying off to some private place to recharge drained batteries, they enthusiastically engaged with audience members, answering questions and switching characters once again to continue the "performance" with the mundane unscripted conversations of old and newfound friends.
It was all something to behold, especially from my perch in the balcony manning the spotlights, but when I finally came down to join the party after the performance, I was in something of a daze at having been a small part of a remarkable and inspiring theatrical event. There might not have been ten thousand people there, or a queen, or a famous celebrity, yet the Universe Smiled just the same and the world was enriched by the gift of their performance.
That's us above...Lisa and Lori around 6 years old. Can you tell us apart?? We eventually grew up and along with us grew a dream to tell stories to an appreciative audience. My sister, Lori, has been doing just that for years in her role as an actress, but last night that dream came true for me as well.
OMG...we just had our Hazel Moon book launch party and the event was absolutely Splendiferous!!! I had to make up a word with enough panache to even begin to sum up how delightful the entire happening was from start to finish! To begin with, we couldn't have asked for a more lush and beautiful setting...Peabody's Interiors (see decorated main entrance above).
I'm an interior designer with Peabody's and our fearless leader, Kelly Gallion, above standing next to our author poster which our gifted cover photographer and friend, Larry Zamba created, who arranged for our back cover author pic to be blown up as a book poster, was more than generous in agreeing to host our launch party there. It was a busy few days getting ready, but in the end it was all more than worth it.
I found an old wooden chest that served as the display case for our book, set up right in the front lobby so that when people came in they could buy one.
Lori got the idea to make sure that some of the snacks were the same ones mentioned in the book as being provided for the RATT band after-party that character, Angela, attended, including Nacho Cheese Doritos and Striped Dainties (right)! Go Lori!
We'd written out a script for the program which went beyond the traditional signing by adding songs with moon themes sung by local professionals, including Rick Mach (above left) singing Frank Sinatra "moon" classics along with David E. Kirby and Lori.
We also had an acting troupe including professional Elvis tribute artist, David E. Kirby (seated right) as Hazel Moon character, Cash Reynolds, local actor Jimmy Iaquinta, dressed in a Santa costume, served as our narrator, with Lori as both Angela & Lady Luna, and me, Lisa, acting the part of November.
After introductions by our narrator covering the background for how Hazel Moon was inspired, Lori and I, David E. Kirby, Rick Mach, and Lori each sang a moon-themed song. Lori then sang acapella several lines from a song written by her husband, Kent, before he died, to honor our brother, Mark, who'd also died way too young.
That led to an opening monologue from the Hazel Moon Prologue. Lori and I took turns reading paragraphs from the book.
That was followed by our acting troupe reading lines from Chapter 1, White Chocolate and later Chapter 3 Tourmaline. (cover photographer Larry Zamba seated right)
After a few more songs, the formal part of the book signing ended, we took some questions, and signed books.
All in all, it was a surreal experience mainly because only a few months earlier being authors of a published book was literally only a dream...and as these magical months unfolded it became apparent that Dreams Can Come True...
So, how would you get ready for your first book signing if you'd recently released your first novel and had no idea what to expect? Well, if you're a Minneti you get your stage-fright feet wet by putting yourself in the public eye!
Here's my sister, Lori, who flew to Los Vegas to be a spokesperson promoting Twicketer, an online ticketing company. Another Racine entertainer was there, Bob Bohm's family entertainment magic act! She's planning to be back home by the weekend so she can set up the final rehearsal for the "show" she plans to put on during our December 8th book launch party at Peabody's Interiors in Brown Deer, Wisconsin, from 6-9 PM, which will showcase her singing, Lori & I acting out a scene from the Prologue of Hazel Moon, and an acting troupe presenting a scene from Chapter 1, White Chocolate. For more information see our Press Release below.
What did I do, since I'm the frantic stage virgin, certainly a frightened little thespian Velveteen rabbit,who so wants to become a "real" performer, as compared to my experienced professional actress/singer, Lori? Well, Lori was supposed to act in a play based on Truman Capote's, A Christmas Memory, this week, so realizing it would be a good experience for me, I agreed to fill in. That meant a bustle of activity learning my lines and preparing psychologically for the performance which took place last night.
Fortunately, all went well. I played the 60-somthing older woman, who was still a child at heart and in her mind, seen above with her distant younger cousin. After studying the character I learned we both shared a belief in magic! The slice of Americana story, by the way, is beautifully written by Truman Capote and can be found online for anyone interested.
I got some compliments, and most of all I found I wasn't scared to be performing on stage, which I knew would serve me well on December 8th at our very first book signing! We'll see, though...and you can count on another post right after our book launch party!
Here's the beginning of the story with my first line.
Imagine a morning in late November. A coming of winter morning more
than twenty years ago. Consider the kitchen of a spreading old house in a
country town. A great black stove is its main feature; but there is
also a big round table and a fireplace with two rocking chairs placed in
front of it. Just today the fireplace commenced its seasonal roar.
A
woman with shorn white hair is standing at the kitchen window. She is
wearing tennis shoes and a shapeless gray sweater over a summery calico
dress. She is small and sprightly, like a bantam hen; but, due to a long
youthful illness, her shoulders are pitifully hunched. Her face is
remarkable—not unlike Lincoln's, craggy like that, and tinted by sun and
wind; but it is delicate too, finely boned, and her eyes are
sherry-colored and timid. "Oh my," she exclaims, her breath smoking the
windowpane, "it's fruitcake weather!"
The person to whom she is
speaking is myself. I am seven; she is sixty-something, We are cousins,
very distant ones, and we have lived together—well, as long as I can
remember. Other people inhabit the house, relatives; and though they
have power over us, and frequently make us cry, we are not, on the
whole, too much aware of them. We are each other's best friend. She
calls me Buddy, in memory of a boy who was formerly her best friend. The
other Buddy died in the 1880's, when she was still a child. She is
still a child.
"I knew it before I got out of bed," she says,
turning away from the window with a purposeful excitement in her eyes.
"The courthouse bell sounded so cold and clear. And there were no birds
singing; they've gone to warmer country, yes indeed. Oh, Buddy, stop
stuffing biscuit and fetch our buggy. Help me find my hat. We've thirty
cakes to bake."
It's always the same: a morning arrives in
November, and my friend, as though officially inaugurating the Christmas
time of year that exhilarates her imagination and fuels the blaze of
her heart, announces: "It's fruitcake weather! Fetch our buggy. Help me
find my hat."
LISA & LORI MINNETI LAUNCH HAZEL
MOON, THEIR NEW FANTASY NOVEL
RACINE, MILWAUKEE
WISCONSIN, October 24, 2015— Local authors and
bloggers, Lori Minneti of RACINE and Lisa
Minneti of FOX POINT, will release their novel, Hazel Moon, with a book launch party hosted by Peabody’s Interiors in Brown Deer, 8655 N. Deerwood Dr., Milwaukee, WI 43209,on December 8, 2015 from 6-8:30 PM, formal
book signing to begin at 7 PM. Please RSVP at 414.962.4550
FORMAT
The Minneti twins have professional entertainer in their blood as well as
being authors and from the beginning Lisa & Lori knew they wanted to add a
theatrical element to their book signings.
The authors will get you in the Hazel
Moon mood with a selection of “Moon Songs” performed by David E. Kirby, a
well-known Elvis tribute artist, and author Lori Minneti, a member of the Rat
Package, a Frank Sinatra tribute troupe. Story character, Lady Luna, will be in
the house and along with other actors playing roles, will bring Hazel Moon to life by acting out scenes
from the book.
Attending you can look forward to experiencing the magic of Hazel Moon by being surprised and
entertained as well as being offered the opportunity to proudly add to your
personal reading library an excellent, layered, well-crafted, inspirational
fantasy novel.
SYNOPSIS
The fantasy novel, Hazel Moon, is
an urban Gothic fairytale with Celtic overtones that will take you on a magical
and mystical literary journey—a coming-of-age story set in the post punk-rock
era. In 1984 November Rainer Savitchian relives the fateful night of a full,
rising Celtic Hazel Moon. The story opens on a hot, sweltering summer day in
late August and unfolds over a 24-hour period, yet also spans centuries and
travels the universe. Set in the backdrop of the local and national American
concert culture, November and her best friend, Angela, attend a music festival
during which magic along with Celtic lore and legend unfold to help guide her
struggle to find passion, purpose, and conquer life’s demons. Hidden in the
prose are poignant layers of profound wisdom, parable, and metaphor inspired by
classic texts like Hermann Hesse's, Siddhartha.
Just click on the cover picture and it will take you to online purchasing.
The blog posts share the story of how Hazel
Moon was created. The authors hope to build a community of readers who can
interact and share comments on the blog.
Their book blog has some of their other writing and the blog posts tell the
story of how the book was developed. There are also excerpts from the book on
the blog for people to read. Our publisher’s blog, Heritage Press, also has
posts which share developmental experiences along with the publisher’s other
book offerings.
CONTACT THE AUTHORS
Lisa & Lori Minneti are available for radio, television, and author
interviews and appearances. For booking presentations, media appearances,
interviews, and/or book-signings:
PHONE CONTACT: Lisa Minneti, 414.550.0298, Lori Minneti, 262.909.1887
EMAIL: Lisa: lisam@peabodysinteriors.com Lori: lminneti@wi.rr.com
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
PROJECT BACKGROUND
The authors’ childhood unfolded as twins, caring for and loving each other,
always supportive, in a close Italian/German second-generation immigrant
family. Their teens became a magical and memorable time of growth and
exploration, our lives enriched and enchanted with the music scene and the
concert culture as we began to experience both local and national acts. They
remember their very first concert, at Memorial Hall (in Racine), the event
featuring pop rock sensation, Journey, and the heavy metal band, Montrose. A
local band important to them over the years was, Take Me. Kent Parco, Lori’s
late husband, was the bass player and songwriter for the band. They toured with
Duran Duran and opened for the Psychedelic Furs, Flock of Seagulls, and more.
The authors were among their huge fan base as they were instrumental in
introducing the popular new wave music scene to Racine. Other local bands they
followed were Wally Cleaver, Speed Kings, and Fairies Wear Boots. They were
hooked, and even though during their 20s they had to start earning a living,
they continued to embed themselves in the concert culture thriving on
everything connected to that world throughout their lives.
Life had been rolling along, bright and breezy, when suddenly a close member
of their family, their beloved brother, Mark, died before his time. Then, some
years later Lori’s husband, Kent, died as well. Within months of that last
passing, they felt the need to memorialize, to acknowledge and honor the gift
of their lives through some sort of artistic project.
It was around eight years ago when Lisa walked into a library with her
younger brother, Michael, and saw a brochure encouraging anyone feeling the
impulse to begin writing a novel. It was one of those powerful serendipitous
moments that light up a clear path to follow. Slowly the story of Hazel Moon and the characters that tell
the story began to take shape, often based on experiences and people in their
lives. For any reader who knows them personally and or knows their family
history, it would become apparent that much of what takes place in the book
represents fictional adaptations, often embellished with surprising twists and
turns, of actual people and events in their lives
Now that Hazel Moon is completed
and coming out they definitely feel the deep satisfaction of having honored the
lives of everyone who inspired them, but especially those of their family
members who passed too soon.
EARLY INFLUENCES
Hazel Moon has been in formal
development for eight years and the publication process, involving editing and
shaping, shooting the covers featuring both of the authors, took nine months.
Looking back, they can see that informally all of their life experience became
the raw material for their story and characters, but even when they began
writing complete chapters, it was not at all clear that their novel would even
be published. The remarkable story of the serendipitous meeting with their
publisher is documented in their blog and the publisher’s.
They’d always been readers. Their grandmother often gave them gifts of
books. She’d originally given books like Wuthering
Heights & Jane Eyre to their
mother who passed them on and later all the volumes of Shakespeare and Jane
Austin, grounding them in the classics. Their mother, who was a voracious
reader, also set a good example for the young authors to follow. To this day
they try to read a new book a month, though with busy professional schedules,
don’t always succeed.
Twins, the authors do many things together and even when they’re not
together in the same physical space, they still feel connected sharing each other’s thoughts and feelings. Coauthoring Hazel Moon was a deeply collaborative
experience—the kind, they feel, only close twins can have. Since Lori was
passionately involved in the dramatic arts, they both dabbled writing a murder
mystery which was turned into a play and performed. When they formally decided
to write Hazel Moon eight years ago
they’d been writing on and off for years. It is their hope that one day Hazel Moon will be adapted into a film
and or performed as a play.
Almost nine months have passed since our publisher began preparing the Hazel Moon manuscript for publication. The Hazel Moon Magic seemed to begin back then and hasn't let up.
After reading my original manuscript through, early on he suggested the title, Luna, and prepared a working cover based on the opening Prologue where November talks about wearing yellow rain boots to look for salamanders and frogs out in the woods. What you see above was the original working cover he prepared for use on Wattpad, a social media writing platform we used to jointly edit the manuscript.
Yesterday I met with the publisher again to write a press release and happened to be wearing a pair of yellow rain boots, given to me by my sister, Lori,as a recent birthday present. While working on Hazel Moon on Wattpad my sister and I adopted pen names, mine was "Roma" and Lori's was "Venice." If you look closely at the boots you'll see my pen name, "Roma" on the side!! Lori had no idea that name, Roma, would be on the boots when she purchased them!!
In our story, the characters November and Angela are so one-of-a-kind individuals, and prone to display any number of cute quirks as the story unfolds. In one scene, Angela begins coughing while trying to sip a drink and is specific about asking November for a straw to put in a cup. Yesterday I was caught sipping a latte out of a straw and it became all too apparent that so many of our characters traits were drawn from our personal foibles and eccentricities!
But now for the most amazing Magic that happened yesterday. Only hours before, I'd been discussing other authors and other books with our publisher, suggesting he might be interested in Sylvia Plath's, The Bell Jar, as well as Erica Jong's, Fear of Flying. The very next day I went to a series of rummage sales with family not expecting to get anything in particular and what did I find, two hardcover volumes in perfect condition for 50 cents each...and what were the titles...yep, The Bell Jar &Fear of Flying!!
At our meeting I presented them to our publisher, told him the story, and our mouths both dropped open as we wondered why the Hazel Moon Gods or fairies or angels or whatever is behind such magical synchronicity swirling around our project, continue to remind us that Hazel Moon has taken on a life of its own and is now a Child of the Universe...
And speaking of "children" on December 8th our Hazel Moon book launch party will take place. The project began, that is our book was conceived, on April 4th 2015 when I experienced a profound moment of synchronicity running into our publisher at a Walgreens on the day before Easter. By December 8th 2015 nine months will have passed...the time it normally takes for a child to develop and be born!
My busy amazing sister, coauthor, and professional entertainer, Lori, was at it again as one of the featured performers at a Frank Sinatra tribute concert at George's Pub in Racine, Wisconsin last night.
The group is known as the Rat Package and they've been singing Sinatra for years. Above, Lori sang "Lady is a Tramp" along with lead singer, Rick Mach, a veteran performer and the producer and director of the cabaret troupe.
After three long sets and singing on close to 30 songs, Lori, ever the professional, wanted to discuss how the show went and how she could improve. That's my little sis... (I'm 40 minutes older...lol)
As we look forward to our December 8th book launch party at Peabody's Interiors, I know I'm going to be leaning on Lori for support as being in front of the public has always been her "thing" and I know she'll handle the book signing like the professional that she is!
Well, good thing the author pic our editor had selected for the back cover of our book was a little out of focus because it was on his to-do list for things to improve before the first printing of Hazel Moon. A good thing because without the push we wouldn't have come up with incredible author pic you see above!!
As you can see, this was no ordinary portrait. With the Wizard of Photography Oz, Larry Zamba, guiding the action with the skill of a Hollywood director, Larry knew that for us two subjects getting the background music right was going to be half the battle.
When asked to describe how the shoot went, here's what Larry had to say. "The music started off with Wild Cherry's "Play That Funky Music White Boy," as the twins entered the studio. It progressed from that song through a stream of rap, featuring artists like Salt-N-Pepa, a concert Lisa had recently attended in Milwaukee. Lisa hit her stride with "Rapper's Delight" by the Sugar Hill Gang! By the end of young Michael Jackson's effervescent song, "ABC," finished I had the money shot for the author pic. After the session we reviewed the images and settled on the one that most captured their indomitable, free, and ageless spirit. It was Halloween weekend, so as a reward for their hard work, after the shoot it was off to a local haunted house. Arriving 15 minutes late, we went through anyway after seeing zombies, freaks, and goblins outside milling around in the parking lot. Lisa and Lori enjoyed a good scare!
Regarding the technical aspects of creating the author portrait, I had a very clear idea where I was going with the image before they arrived. I'd recently committed to a manifesto regarding the nature of my photography going forward--My images would now reflect fantasy, creating colorful photographs filled with escapism. They will be entertaining and full of illusions, ambiguities, and curious contradictions that celebrate differences. I want my subjects to look like they might have just jumped out of a comic book! Since my photos are a culmination of my life experience, they are in part self-portraits. And, since I love the collaborative process, especially working with talented people, their influences will be felt too.
With that mission statement in place, I had just finished painting the wall to match the mood I was going for. It has to have an '80s feel, hence the bright, almost neon blue, but still couldn't appear dated. In fact the paint was still wet in spots as Lori discovered when she accidentally got some paint on her hand. The crowd shot feature was added in later. It took a crew of helpers, including my daughter, to hold up phones and mics to get the group effect. My hands are featured in two of the images, one shot by my daughter, the other by myself. Adding them all to the finished shot was challenging. After getting the right feel for the beautiful chaos before me, I rotated everything to the right to create the sense that the twins were being mobbed by paparazzi. The entire technical effort, including post production Photoshop work, took 16 hours. For example, Lisa was in a rush to get to the shoot and forgot to do her nails. I manged to painstakingly color them in using Photoshop. Also, the twins were both under the weather and it took some doing to sift through the many preliminary shots until I captured just the right image where they both looked like they were on top of the world despite their coughing and sniffles!"
This year Lori and I ended up with our guys at a private Halloween costume party that took place at a friend's house. We had been eager to promote our upcoming book by dressing up as the characters, November & Lady Luna, from our Hazel Moon story, wearing name tags, and passing out book business cards with our blog address on them.
When that didn't seem appropriate to the setting, we instead we shifted gears and knowing we would be needing a book trailer, began working out scenes and matching characters and with those at the party, all close friends, who might fill those roles in our upcoming book trailer!
Lori's man, Dave (above), projecting a quiet confidence, we thought would make an excellent Cash Reynolds, while my guy, Jeff, who could pass for an Irishman, would be a terrific Finn McCool!
Our choice for November, Stacey (above right), was there as well!
Now we have to get to work writing a script, selecting scenes, casting the roles, rehearsing, and finding the right videographer to capture and edit the trailer, adding hopefully original music from Lori's husband, Kent, who sadly passed eight years ago, but who was a musician and songwriter. Thankfully, Lori's background in the theater, especially musical dinner theater, will be invaluable!
