Cheers from London!

I am here everyone! We got into London earlier today and we had an awesome day! I am going to do some serious updating when I get back to the states but I'll try to sneak on here as much as I can throughout the trip!!! Today was incredible, I have never been to Europe before and I just love it so much already! London is such an awesome city! So much culture! Our day consisted of a long flight, Buckingham Palace and seeing the changing of the guards, me almost being run over by a motorcycle, walking through Hyde Park and seeing Royal Albert Hall and the Peter Pan Statue, seeing the London show "Thriller Live" honoring MJ's and Jackson Five's music, and going to the Absoulut Icebar! Pictures to come!

Cheers, 

krystina :)

PS: I swear you guys, updates to come also about going on for Wendla, Anna, and saying a horribly hard goodbye to Kyle Riabko. 

Wendla in Baltimore!

Hey guys! Just wanted to let everyone know that I will be Wendla tonight here in Baltimore for my first time!  I am so excited! If you are in the area, you should come!

krystina :)

Tweeting!

Good morning!

I am now officially on Twitter!!! I did not understand that thing for a loooooong time, but now I love it! The only thing I still don't understand is the whole @KrystinaAlabado thing. What is that? Are those comments to me like my wall or messages or something? How do I do that to someone else? 

Please follow me on twitter!!

krystina :)

Part Two. The Ilse Experience.

I can't believe it is over. My six shows flew by so quick! I honestly had the time of my life being able to play Ilse in Spring. I learned so much about myself as an actor and about performing, and I am so thankful that I did. My last night as Ilse which was Wednesday here in Louisville was the most insane show ever, and I am ecstatic that I was a part of it. So I was on as Ilse, Lukie was on as Melchi, and it was Krista's first show in the chair of rock so energy was already high. But, to add on to that, we had like the best audience we've had in a while. They were laughing hysterically and cheering like crazy after everything. They were so appropriate with the way they acted because sometimes when we have audiences like that, although they are so much fun and loud, they will laugh at the beating scene, and sometimes hoot and hollar after Left Behind. But this crowd was enjoying themselves and having a great time, but was also so smart. They laughed at the lines that most of the time go over audiences heads and there was dead silence after LB. No applause which was so beautiful along with no laughing in Beating. It was awesome. As performers, we naturally will feed into that energy coming from the audience, so that show for us was very high in energy and super fun. I ran on for my scene in act 2 and I could already feel that I was going to be an emotional wreck. The funny thing about being a swing is that you never really know if that will be the last time you get a chance to play that role, so that is how I treated it, even though the opportunity may arise again on tour. I gave every last ounce of what I had that night and it was an amazing experience up there. I was really connected to Blake and I rocked the hell out in DDS/BW. My hair was everywhere, on my mic, in my mouth, all across my face. It felt incredible, and hearing that huge applause after the song for some reason killed me and I immediately broke down and could not stop. It was a moment that I will never forget on stage, because at that moment, I realized that this life I am living is something that is so irreplaceable and some of the best times I will ever have. At that moment, I felt the most vulnerable I have ever felt on stage and in front of that many people. I let go of all inhibitions and let everyone in, and it taught me so much about myself as an actor. Thank you to everyone that I was able to share these experiences with as Ilse, and for all the well wishes and positive thoughts. I will never forget it. 

Ok enough with mushy stuff. Here are some pictures from my run!!

Krystina :)

PS: My heel feels so much better thank goodness. At least now I will have a permanent scar to remember Spring Awakening!! Haha. 

Part One. The Ilse Experience

Words cannot describe the feeling I felt as I walked onto the stage for the first time with my hair braided, wearing a green romper. Playing Ilse has by far been the highlight of the tour for me. And being able to play her six times in a row? What else could I ask for. This past weekend truly seems like a blur to me. I did four shows as Ilse and they all flew by so quickly. This weekend is one I will not forget. I finally got to see my family! My mom, dad, little sister and brother, and aunt all flew into Pittsburgh from Phoenix to see me perform as Ilse and I could not be happier. Before this weekend, I had gone on for Martha three times and Thea six times and unfortunately, no one in my family was able to make it out, but this time they did and it meant the world to me. I am a big family girl, so having them all in the audience and onstage (my brother and sister got to sit onstage Saturday night), was incredible. It is hard for my family to come out this section of the tour cause they live on the other side of the country and we are stuck to the east coast! You east coasters are lucky, I miss my west coast! Anyway, going on for Ilse was such a wonderful experience for me. I learned a lot about myself as an actor, and it was a great opportunity to be able to do it four times in a row because each show, I made something better, tweaked this, polished that, and tried new things. I get more and more comfortable as they go on which is great for tomorrow because I am playing Ilse here for Louisville's Opening Night!! So it feels good to have four shows under my belt, because I will be able to ease into it tomorrow. It's funny, my first show, as I was running out after saying "Moritz Steifel" with my hair all over the place, (for those of you that saw it, you can testify to that haha) barefoot, holding flowers with Gustav Baum's shirt on, I had that moment again. The moment of "Holy crap I'm actually doing this for a living" and that made my first moment as Ilse even more exciting. 

So show story. Show number three, the Sunday matinee. It's time for Totally Fucked. As you all know, Ilse is barefoot the entire second act. For some reason I never thought about the fact that I could potentially injure myself with no shoes on, probably because Steffi has never spoken of it. Anyway, the still blah blah's go by and then the crazy blah blah's start happening. So I'm jumping and whipping my hair and dancing around when suddenly, I think I'm in Andy's way so I move over...no more like jump over...and end up slamming my foot on the corner edge of the middle platform and it completely gashed my left heel. It. Hurt. So. Freaking. Bad. Ah. So I hit my end pose in Fucked with more of a pained look on my face rather than pissed. I wasn't sure what happened, so I sat down in my chair to watch the Vineyard Scene, and I look down and sure enough. Blood everywhere. So I immediately leave the stage to find that my heel and foot is throbbing and bleeding everywhere. I quickly throw some neosporin and a couple Band-Aids on it and scurry back to the curtain to enter for the letter pass, noticing that each time I put pressure on that foot, I want to scream of pain. So I basically did the rest of the show with this really awkward limpy thing and got off stage to find that I ended up with a serious Spring Awakening battle wound. (To be honest, I felt sort of bad-ass about it, so I showed the boys all the blood and stuff...they were pretty impressed haha). But let me tell you. Ouch. I'm so happy I had only one more show to do after that and that I could spend today resting it up. It was tough at the night show last night because I was having trouble putting pressure on it. It is interesting however, because the adrenaline from performing made me not even think about it while I was on stage. Of course though, the second I start walking backstage it kills, but that is the power of performance. The show must always go on! 

I am so looking forward to the beginning of this week. I have two more shows as Ilse here in Louisville, Kentucky. Tuesday and Wednesday so if you are in the area, come check it out! I am so so SO excited!! But don't worry, you won't see a limping Krystina Ilse cause it's all better now!

Krystina :)