The Day I Flew to L.A.
My first semester of university, I attended Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles. I had plans to audition for the dance program after completing my first year of school so I could really focus on my studies and my technique. For a number of reasons, that didn’t last, and I ended up back in Chicago before the school year ended. Then, I beep booped around the world a bit and landed in Chicago once again for law school. I practiced law for a bit and decided I’d like to revisit my original dream ten years later: to be on the artistic end of the endeavor, not the paperwork end.
In 2025, I saw an ad for an intimate table read in a blackbox theater at the Elysian, featuring an actor whose work I have long admired. I flew back to LA for the first time in ten years just to see that 120-minute show. Despite what the forecast said, when I arrived it was cold and rainy, which seemed unlikely in the worst way. The show ended, and my legs started to carry me over the theater chairs toward the person I’d come to see. I didn’t realize I was going to do this, but I introduced myself and said something like “Oh yeah we have to make this in Chicago. We really do, it’s amazing and it will get more love there.” This led to a cascade of incredible events over the past year and a half. That night changed my life, and I just have a few weather-drenched photographs to show for it, for now.
When I came home from my bizarre night in LA, my inbox was full from the night before. The connection had not only stuck, but it landed and proliferated. I suddenly understood that the ten years I spent Not In LA™ or Not In The Arts The Way I Thought I Should Be™ were very much worth it. I started thinking about what it would look like if I revisited my dreams with a lot more knowledge and lore behind me than the first time I considered them.
///Pausing here to acknolwedge my amazing friends and colleagues at Northern Trust, who could not have been more supportive when I shared the news that I was moving on to pursue this endeavor.///
Sometimes, the slow way is the better way, and flying to LA just to turn right around is the answer. I’ll die on the hill that Chicago is the best place in the world to make art, and I’m so grateful for my friends in LA for welcoming me and being down to clown. It takes a long time to build something from scratch, and sometimes it takes even longer for a production to move from a concept to a reality. For all the uncertainties that come with making art and experimening with improv, I am sure of one thing: I am willing to drop airline miles, several hours of sleep, and some pride to make sure we do this the right way. Luv u!