I was the Nutcracker Prince in Olympic Performance Group‘s performance of The Nutcracker this year. It was a unique experience for me, being a ballroom dancer (not a ballet dancer), and I learned volumes through the process. And I got paid!
This is a highlights video of some of my dancing, some footage I shot backstage, and some video recorded by my wife during the production.
Here’s a little diddy that Jill and I danced to at the Olympic Performance Group‘s performance of “The Nutcracker,” which I was also in. We don’t have many recordings of us dancing, so I’m glad we got this filmed for our Bainbridge Ballroom website!
I often am asked for recommendations when people are looking for a musical, and I keep losing my DVDs when I lend them out to people, so I’ve started a small (but ever-growing) list of films that I commonly recommend. So far I only have three categories:
Musicals (United States/Europe)
Asian Cinema (including drama as well as martial arts films)
Storytellers have the ability to tell history in an engaging way, personalizing it for their audience. Lin-Manuel Miranda, genius writer/performer behind “In The Heights,” the 2008 Tony-winning “Best Musical,” has turned his talent to early-U.S. history with his latest project.
“The Hamilton Mixtape” is still incomplete, but Miranda was asked to perform a selection at a White House gathering in May. It made its way to YouTube and Vimeo in the last three weeks, and I stumbled upon it yesterday.
As work has been slowing down, post-wedding season, I’ve had the extra time to brush up my demo reel and put something together to show what I’ve been working on for the last year or so. I’ve gotten a lot of feedback through Twitter and Facebook, so if anyone has anything to say, please pitch in!
A wedding demo reel will probably come sometime soonish.
I just wanted to post some recent work that Jill and I have done. We filmed this wedding two weeks ago today, and I put together a short highlights clip for the couple. I really like the way the ferry boat footage turned out in the second half. They were a lot of fun!
We have been working hard in the last week to get our new ballroom lessons publicized. We’re working with Bainbridge Ballet to offer several ballroom classes in the coming months. Check out our new website, Bainbridge Ballroom, and enjoy the poster!
(Photo by…us. We set up the lighting and studio in our living room, then Lilian snapped the pictures for us.)
In July 2008 I met Mary Kent in Gibraltar at the Scrabble Club in John Mackintosh Hall. She was a delightful but sad woman who was good at Scrabble. After talking with her on a few different occasions and telling her about my film project in Gibraltar, she told me about her plight.
You can read about it in another post I made, and watch Mary tell the story herself, but the short story is that Mary’s daughter was taken away from her by Gibraltar Social Services while Mary was in Gibraltar on holiday, visiting from the U.K. Though neither Mary nor her daughter were residents of Gibraltar, Social Services held the daughter indefinitely, forcing Mary to stay in Gibraltar and wait. After more than a year, Mary was homeless, jobless and traumatized. Her young daughter was put in with corrupt teens who had problems with drug abuse and crime, and Social Services somehow deemed this more beneficial for the daughter than to be with her family, able to return to the United Kingdom.
I received an email today from Mary, who has been unable to return to Gibraltar after crossing the border into Spain for work. She has returned to the U.K. and is fighting to have her daughter released and returned to her home and family. She has given me permission to publish her email here.
Please read it. I don’t know what else to do to help this good woman, but she and her daughter have lived through three years of hell and its time that they be allowed to return home together. If anyone knows any way to help, please contact me and I’ll do my best to contact Mary.
Video, part 1:
Video, part 2:
Here is her letter:
hi garrett how r u an your wife and baby doing? sorry i got cut off the other day using the library computer. as i was sayin i haven’t seen Megs for a year. no communication at all. social services gained custody and as soon as they did all contact was cut. sayin Megs didn’t want to see me so god knows what they have told her or they are just doin it to alienate her more.
we went to spain for a while after we were refused entry back into the country after a day out in spain and no passports. lo and behold the slander and defamation reached us there too as we were workin for animal in need. social services told our boss we were child batterers. sick twisted evil, they not only cannot admit they got it wrong they seek to destroy everything we do & take everything we have got. our beloved dog mike who was with me in the video was grabbed cause we were homeless, another by-product of what social services did to us.
givin me the choice between my job and contact with my daughta. what did i choose?? got it! which lost us our home unable to pay our rent, kicked out by spanish bullies cut up scarred for life. so twice over now they have lost us our jobs and homes. Psychological warfare i would say so. we also got another dog troy who due to the slander our last boss took him too. so no job no home no dauta no dogs, we returned to britain.
currently unemployed, doin our best to hang on in there but the grief the lack of sleep the nightmares and continual lack of support is gradually wearin us down and tearin us apart. everywhere i turn its out of there jurisdiction or not enough funds or people don’t believe us cause gibraltar is doin its best to make it look like we have done something wrong, tightly sewn it up along with the police the judicial service, and who are they gonna believe: a nobody with no money or the supposedly competent educated government of gibraltar?
i do not know where to turn next. i haven’t got the money for a private lawyer and i’m even bein ignored now by the english government, why cause obviously they have been told i’m a loony tune and to be ignored. how wrong? my family friends in disbelief, some even doubtin. my whole life destroyed because a few individuals cannot accept they fucked up. i suppose not surprisin really. imagine the outrage the panic the loss of tourism the public disgrace they cant afford that. so what is my life worth? my daughtas my sons, my older daughta, and my extended family. what does it matter if they tear everything apart, destroy everything i got right in my life, my children, my work, my relationships. their country, their precious reputation and money comes into it. How can you compensate destroyin an entire family for nearly three years?
i thank u for listenin and your belief an the work u have done. how can we spread the news more?
as i said before i know who i am and i am not an abuser in any way shape or form, i brought my children up as best as i could, and i would say my only fault was i worked and studied too much and wasn’t there as much as i wanted to be. in my twenty years of teaching bein a host mother a holistic counsellor, army officer, a carer, a giver, i defy anyone to say i hurt them or was abusive. more importantly ask my children. I read what the person said about me anonymously (that speaks volumes, not brave enuff to say who they are!) whereas i am ready to put my knife in the hands of the public i have nothin to lose except my daughta.
apparently there is a court review on friday as to wot happens to Megs my guess is they wont return her even to my mum, once she’s out of their grasp she’s free to talk and tell the truth.
u were right in sayin i was never accused of battery, another new piece of venom, likened to what happened to baby p have these people no shame? i can guess who is behind it all a few people with dented egos who i have insulted and called incompetent, why should i say they are right when i know they are the furthest from the truth. they haven’t done thorough checks, if they had they would see my record is clear up to the point they took my daughta. then it changes constant arrests for drunk and disorderly, one for possession of cannabis, assaults on police, my god! they have done a good job and what can i prove?
i hope and pray THERE IS a god and the people involved in this sick twisted nightmare pay the price for their sins. me i live in hope next friday they return her to britain then i will feel happier, then watch and see wot happens next. at the moment they have a noose round my neck: i talk i never see my daughta again. if i don’t i may never see her again our lives are in the hands of the sickest twisted evil out there. please if u have any suggestions or can help more please do i am on my knees and feel alone in all this.
regards to u both stay in contact and please remain to have belief in me. i do not mind if u publish this letter, also u may want to read wot my son wrote on your blog.
