#sparkchamber 101617 Halcyone Hurst
A very timely visit to the #sparkchamber today! Halcyone Hurst, a native of Provincetown, MA, is producing Eugene O’Neill’s A Moon for the Misbegotten as a fundraiser for the Provincetown Pilgrim Monument and Museum. She is also playing the role of Josie Hogan. The show runs tonight and tomorrow — October 16 and 17 — at 7pm at 1 High Pole Hill in Provincetown.
If you are lucky enough to be in town, check it out! Good show for a good cause!
How did she get to here? Born and raised in Provincetown, MA, her roots in that town are deep — four generations on both sides of the family grew up there. After graduating from PHS in 1998, she traveled and lived elsewhere — New York City, London, Los Angeles, Jamaica. In Jamaica, she met her partner O’niel, and together they moved back to raise their daughter FJ in Provincetown. [They also have a pug, Bento.]
“This has been the first time in my adult life that I am living in Provincetown. I know in my heart this is where we should be. It has been an adjustment in so many ways. FJ is a year-and-a-half old. I am discovering what it means to be a mother and stay true to myself ... as an artist... as an actor … I have performed all along through my pregnancy and FJ’s first couple of years, but this is the first production I’ve taken on.”
A dream in the making for ten years, “since Stephen Mailer and I did a scene in Suzanne Shepherd’s acting class,” she is making it happen. “I’m overwhelmed, overjoyed, scared and excited. I hope I can pull this off the way I have been picturing it. I’m hoping in another week I will feel like Superwoman. For now, I have to keep my head down and work work work focus and work!”
1.] Where do ideas come from?
Ideas come from the place where my passion [energy, heart] connects with my mind and my world — the world I live in, the space I occupy … or how it occupies me physically, and I guess mentally, too.
2.] What is the itch you are scratching?
My teacher Suzanne Shepherd says, “You did not choose to be an actor, you chose passion.” The passion inside me is alive and well. It won’t let me rest. It won’t let me have distance from the stage for very long. If I’m not acting, directing, singing I feel I’m denying myself my truth. I feel a void. I feel I’m not even being the mother I want to be. I feel less than. My passion is my fuel.
3.] Early bird or night owl, tortoise or hare?
Tortoise. I am always paying very close attention — to myself, to those around me. I’m mindful of every moment. And then I trust it all comes together for me at Go Time.
Daytime is for work. Morning is [in my perfect world] for mentally setting up my day for the work. This includes, thinking, preparing, spacing out, playing with FJ and getting her off to her wee care. I am most productive from 9 am to 7:30 pm. FJ and O’niel get me from 4 pm on. Though it’s funny, my circumstances have changed so I am figuring out my process again at this transitional time in my life. Evening is for relaxing and [hopefully] feeling satisfied with myself and my day.
Rehearsal, no matter what time of day, is the time — the time to work; the time to play; the time to learn; the time to wake my emotional life and use whatever I find.
Oh, and lists! I rely heavily on lists.
4.] How do you know when you are done?
I’m never done. My craft is a living, breathing part of me. Every role I’ve played, every play I’ve read, everything I’ve directed, every song I sing, every scene for every class — never leave me alone. I never put a bow on anything. I love the work. It’s true, “The more you know, the more you realize you don’t know.”