This is my Working blog post.

left to right - E Faye Butler, Lin Manuel Miranda, Michael Mahler, Gabe Ruiz, Barbara Robertson, Demetrios Troy, Gene Weygandt (not featured - due to running to get her car from the garage before drunkards took over downtown - Genevieve VenJohnson)

I've been holding off on writing about my experience doing my first commercial production, my first show in over a year, my first production as an equity actor and my first musical in Chicago -- for a lot of reasons.

My blog is supposed to be entertaining, as opposed to my LiveJournal account, circa 2002, where I whined like the college sophomore that I was. At least in this blog, I post funny pictures about celebrities, and whine slightly less. I'm not really sure how entertaining this Working journey would have been, had I been properly documenting it.

To be honest, had it not been for this current glass of Woop Woop Verdelho and that large goblet of Golden Monkey from Hopleaf, I probably would not be writing at all.

This last year has been a hard one, and the irony of me doing a show called Working after having been on unemployment for so dang long is not at all lost on me. My expectations of ensemble work, post school, my fears of being exposed as a fraud in an actual musical, and all major fears of failing everyone to the point that we close the next week aside, I can now say, as of this very moment, that I'm not unhappy that I took this project on.

(Do you see why they chose the much more upbeat Gene Weygandt (http://www.workingthemusical.com/genes-blog-working-brilliance/) to be the official blogger for the show?)

For God's sake, Emjoy - What the hell happened today?

Shut up, I 'm getting there. So, I started this whole thing in the middle of January, in desperate need of a paycheck and in desperate need of convincing myself that I was where I was supposed to be. There, in the circle, was THE E. Faye Butler, THE Barbara Robertson, THE Gene Weygandt, THE Mike Mahler, THE Demetrios Troy. And WHY was Gabe Ruiz, of astounding humility, energy and talent so effing calm? He must have all these powers and secrets I had no access to. And who was this Genevieve VenJohnson person? She has a million credits! How long would it take her to find out what a phony I was? Don't think that I didn't Google everyone. Because I did. And I was scared.

Then a beautiful thing happened. Despite the fact that we're not really allowed to look at or talk to each other during the course of the show, we somehow managed to become an ensemble. I adore these people I get to work with each day. And the work that Studs Terkel did in writing his gorgeous book, and the work that Stephen Schwartz, Nina Faso and later, Gordon Greenberg did on the adaptation began to shape itself around us.

Don't get me wrong - I stumbled. Big time. The whole doubting myself as an actor, singer, PERSON thing that we all do at one point and time. But these PEOPLE in this book were greater than the stupid, petty hardships that weren't really hardships at all, just things that were getting in our way to get to them. Their stories were the holy grail and getting to tell them.

I guess the reason I'm writing today (aside from being, let's face it, slightly giddy from sugar (I've now eaten a small portion of a Bailey's Irish Cream cheesecake)) is because watching Lin Manuel Miranda do a talkback after meeting with us briefly after the show, and seeing how humbled he was by the exact same thing that humbled all of us, reminded me why working and Working truly has been a blessing.