rex ♱ rosario

ㅤㅤactor | musician | artist | fashion creatureㅤㅤ

♱ projects

♱ home studio

♱ Training

♱ Skills

ㅤ❝ㅤ I don't know where I'm going from here, but I promise I won't bore you. ㅤ❞ㅤ David Bowie

october 15, 2024

Strange pattern I have, spacing out my blog posts 10 days apart from each other. Maybe I need to get out of cycle, shake things up.I had a lovely experience recently auditioning for the Sherwood Forest Faire cast in Austin, TX! It was a lot of fun, and I have the great fortune of getting the opportunity to play with some amazing humans and good friends!My debut in The Sisterhood of Lili St. Cyr's Rocky Horror Show production is this Friday. I am shivering with antici....pation and anxiety. I hope it turns out to be a fruitful experience and that I can make up for this utter lack of Halloween spirit lately.
There's just been something in the air, something about this season that's felt lacking and utterly overwhelming, work-wise, that has disconnected me from joy. I'm grateful that Sherwood auditions brought back some of that levity, and I'm sure RHPS will be a hilight of my October, regardless.I've finally started to learn to crochet a different kind of hat: a beret! I don't have any photos yet, but the learning process has been really great. I've learned magic rings and how to properly increase and decrease stitches - of course, after much trial and error. Sad to say I will no longer be able to joke about only knowing how to crochet one thing. Now I know how to crochet two things! :DLast night, I watched the movie ParaNorman (2012) to try and awaken some of the Halloween spirit. I'll admit to be shamefully late to the ParaNorman party, and I gotta say, it didn't disappoint! I loved how cinematic this one felt compared to Laika's other work, namely with how certain textures and colours appeared on screen like the whites of the characters' eyes, Courtney's lip gloss, the water in the bathroom scenes. I love when animation, especially stop motion, leans into use of texture in that medium. Norman, as a protagonist, was also very compelling. His gift to speak with the dead and how it is something that people ostracise him for in his community, is extremely relatable through both a gothy art kid lens, as well as a neurodivergent one.

october 5, 2024

I made this really cool tie for my look for my band's show, yesterday!

Modelled here by my new, and very cuddly friend, Gomi. We did a Hannah Montana tribute set and I really wanted to lean heavy into the alt look from the early 2010s. Originally, I planned to wear all white and black, and I went thrifting with a friend of mine to look for a white tie. I couldn't find any plan white ties, but I found this bright pink one that instantly caught my attention. One does want a hint of colour!This was the total stand-out, statement piece of my look. I just really wanted to go ham with the hardware and, in retrospect, I should have done the illustration work before attacking it with safety pins and studs.It really made me miss when I had a lot more free-time to upcycle and make my own clothes. I truly miss doing it, and the last few times I have had to get out my sewing machine for anything or crochet for hours on end, I've had a total blast.

october 3, 2024

On October 3rd, he asked me what day it was.
Don't forget.
Happy Birthday, Minto Aizawa from Tokyo Mew MewAnyway, nerd day aside, time has bled from day into day and it totally felt like today was October 4th instead of October 3rd. I wish I could tell you why, but I don't track my sleep. Every time I try, I just give up because my schedule is so inconsistent. That may just come with the territory of being an insanely busy artist.My friends and I are doing a writing challenge all of October, and I have been having a good time with it. It's actually felt like much less of a chore than the last times I've tried to do any writing challenges before.
I've been creating a cast of characters for a multimedia project, and these characters are in a visual kei band and an idol group, respectively. I already know a lot about visual kei, and a fair amount about idols from my proximity to friends who are kaigai idols and just generally working the anime convention scene and being into All This Wacky Stuff. However, I'm really looking forward to doing some deep dive research, along with crafting these character profiles. My goal for the challenge is to create characters that grab my heart and feel real to me. I haven't been this on fire about basically making up a bunch of OCs in ages!Other Quests for October:
♱ I am playing Riff Raff in a shadowcast for The Rocky Horror Picture Show! Our troupe is called The Sisterhood of Lili St. Cyr and they're such a lovely group of crazy humans. I am performing with them on 10/18 - SOLD OUT SHOW BTW - at THEE historic River Oaks Theater!
River Oaks re-opened with its official grand opening today! I'm so thrilled for the future of this beloved theatre here in Houston.
♱ My band, Nowhere But Up, are playing a bunch of shows this month! We play on 10/5 at St. Edith Stein Catholic Church's Founders Day Festival and have a rockin' Hannah Montana tribute lined up. We probably wouldn't be a band today if it wasn't for her, so paying this tribute is a huge full-circle moment for us!
We are also playing a big Halloween party on 10/26 at Mo's Irish Pub in Katy. Looking forward to getting creepy and kooky! I'm the resident Halloween guy of my family, so they really let me get to go all out and have fun.
♱ For Halloween proper, I plan on cosplaying The Vampire Lestat! The look I'm going for is going to be what we got to see in the SDCC preview of Interview with the Vampire season 3. I found a dupe for that iconic green coat on Depop for $25, and it just feels all like fate. Another full circle moment! I'm so excited to give his look a go.My calendar is lit up like NYC and, while I'm kinda struggling to juggle a fair amount of all this busy, I'm looking forward to the culmination of all these hilights.

september 29, 2024

Today, I had my first rehearsal for one of my two theatre productions that I have coming up in October, and it was such a gift to be practising on a stage again, and with other humans no less!I've been doing voice over work, primarily, for so long, I almost forgot what the environment was like. My theatre bones are still creaking, they're rusty and thirsty for oil. At 26, I fear the nearly ten years between now and my high school graduation, have atrophied a lot of my creative muscles. I've definitely improved in several respects (maturity and traumatic life experiences will do that to anyone, I fear), but there are basics I know innately, yet cannot teach. A name or a discipline will be on the tip of my tongue, and yet I will struggle to remember even the first letter of a word.Experiencing even Day 1 of this was such a thrill. I want to be able to do so much more of this. It's one of those feelings like: "This is it! This is the professional actor's life! I'm actually doing it!"
I love love love love love that feeling! I love interacting with new people!
Well, when it goes well at least. I fear my "interacting with people" bones may be rusty too (even if I enjoy doing it). I'm a serial extrovert, yet sometimes the neurodivergent brain will totally fudge my Charisma rolls.October is looking busy, but looking very much up. My calendar is lit up like a Christmas tree, but when isn't it?

september 19, 2024

A few reflections on the month so far:♱ I need to make it more apparent to my friends that I love them and I care about them. I need to say it to their faces. Yet, I still keep finding myself clamming up, a lot. Rome wasn't built in a day, et cetera, but i feel like this is something I've lost touch with. Maybe I was never good at it at all in the first place. I always told myself "Well, I show love in other ways." But making it apparent with words should be a basic first step. I'm doing my best to make that a much more apparent effort on my part.
♱ I booked my first audiobook ever this month! Very exciting. Love finally being in the ACX audition club. I don't recall why I got it in my head that I somehow was unable to finish my application/profile build on there, but here we are now.
♱ My bank accounts got hacked and I'm still financially recovering. If you would like to assist, my Ko-Fi is linked here.
I have open commissions for everything I do that's seen on this site. Thankfully, I'm all squared away with that situation, but it has greatly had me thinking about my own cybersecurity and just being more cautious.
♱ I am pursuing two theatre productions this month, one locally in person and the other online, and I'm thoroughly looking forward to both of them. So much for a restful month!! But exciting things are at play, I just know it.I'm really looking forward to an autumn season where I find my spark again. So far, the signs are pointing in an direction I am excited to head towards.

september 1, 2024

It's the first of the month, and I figured I'd write as I finish up an audition. I have a few of those lined up, but lately everything has needed to take something of a backseat.I had a fairly rough summer. For the last two years, I was an at-home caregiver for the grandmother of one of my best friends, and her passing kicked off my July, along with my car's head gasket bursting a significant leak. I then, in turn, essentialy lost a job and someone I cared about. I am grateful that our families are so close, but I still don't feel like I've been able to fully pass through the grief yet. I'm still finding myself a lot of the times wondering what to do with my time. I'm a fairly busy and creative person, so that shouldn't be difficult, right? Yet, I still find myself succumbing to depression and being overwhelmed by choice, and struggling to find a way to get a working vehicle back in my life as well.I'm opening up about this because I've found myself feeling desperate for creative work again, when earlier in the year, I was very much okay with the slow burn journey. Feeling hungry and desperate in this line of work, in this line of life for that matter can really throw a wrench into one's art. There's always something just a little off, if that hunger isn't channeled in a particular way? I just find myself listening back to nearly everything I record, looking at my crochet projects curling, looking at my art as a whole suffering for it and in my panic, not knowing where to find the leak in the sinking ship - metaphorically speaking.A dear friend of mine recently referred to this as burnout. I had been through a taxing summer - mentally, physically, emotionally, and have not allowed myself any opportunity to recharge. I get FOMO so badly, I want to work with all my friends. I need money to save up for a new vehicle so I can continue to work and to be active in my community in the way I like. My mind goes stir crazy when I don't have any little projects with serious little deadlines.I hope September, and the fall season overall, rejuvenates me. I'm often the sort of person that has really good autumn/winter seasons and not-so-great spring/summer seasons. Spiritual son of Hades and Persephone, or whatever. But, inevitably I always have something. I seem to just never be able to exist in perpetuity. Taking things slower, however, seems much more within the realm of possibility.

As a side quest, look at this really sick cake I made! I baked it for my sister's friend for her birthday. She's turning 25, and did a whole SpongeBob theme based off of that really silly joke SpongeBob and Patrick have in that one episode where Patrick joins SpongeBob in boating school. It's French Vanilla flavoured with homemade buttercream frosting. I made a gradient with frosting colours for the first time, and also painted using gel food colouring and a toothpick for the first time, in order to get the flower designs on there. Lots of experimenting to be done. I am NOT a master baker or anything, but I did a pretty good job.Quests for September
♱ Finish some crochet pieces for friends
♱ Anime Houston 2024 - I'm staff for this con! Looking forward to working with all my friends, but oof did it sneak up on me.
♱ Learn some more songs proficiently on bass guitar. My band has a big gig coming up at the end of the month, and our busier season usually starts in autumn
♱ Prepare for Halloween - I know for sure I want to do rockstar Lestat from The Vampire Chronicles, but I must make sure I have any and all other costumes together and planned. I never do just one. October is always such a big deal for me.
♱ Hopefully, be able to recoup my overall fortitude and financial situation/car situation. Maybe a mostly empty month (besides the aforementioned events) will mean I can actually take some time to tackle these things head on and fully recharge the system.I hope whomever may read my posts has a net positive autumn, whatever that may mean for you - rest, refuge, productivity, happy memories, freedom, or even no change at all. Gratitude is good to try and practice, no matter the season.

august 20, 2024

I have been a fan of Anne Rice's The Vampire Chronicles for a very long time. Since I read Interview with the Vampire in the 8th grade and was transfixed, and felt so seen by her characterization of one Lestat de Lioncourt, I have loved this series so much and it informed a lot of my growth, philosophy, and identity as an adult.That being said...I had a lot of feelings when I decided I would finally stop avoiding to watch Queen of the Damned (2002).
I took about 10 pages of notes on a A3 size notebook, filled front and back, and yet somehow my prevailing consensus about the film remains unchanged.Aaliyah's performance as Akasha is the stuff of legends. She is the crown jewel of a movie that is just so-so, but very pretty stuff if you enjoy the 00s nu-metal/nu-goth look like I do.One of the facets of Ricean vampires that is, frankly, what makes a great deal of their core is the gothic romance element. These vampires yearn and crave and literally and metaphorically bleed for connection. As much as Townsend's Lestat complained of how lonely it is to be immortal, I certainly didn't see any of it. His chemistry with Jesse, Marius, and anyone (except for Akasha in their short time together) is so unfortunately dry. Washing out the queerness of Rice's immortals on top of that makes these creatures lovely to look at, but not to watch.I'm much more silly in my frenetic, two-column, colour-coded notes. My Pochacco multi-chamber multi-colour pen was very helpful to translate my frenzy of mixed emotions in response to this. I also understand my response is very dramatic. I'm a very dramatic person, most days of the week.Some of the hilights from my frenzied notes include:
♱ "MESH SHIRT WITH STUDS <3"
♱ "Yeah, she's their daughter, but also the family disappointment."
♱ "I love Jesse's jacket, but hun, that's not business professional."
♱ "Those are some squeaky fucking violins."
♱ "JENNIFER COOLIDGE MOAN????"
♱ "Marius travelled to every single European country in that sentence oh God who coached him on this accent"
♱ "I made a corset like Jesse's once, but then I accidentally made it too small and had to be cut out of it."
♱ "OOH WAH AH AH AH"
♱ "Afraid to do a twirl? Scared to do a hip thrust?"
♱ "'She took Akasha's death into herself' was delivered with the same energy as 'Somehow, Palpatine has returned.'"

august 15, 2024

Trying to format this website has truly been a learning experience in and of itself. It's been well over 5 years since I've touched this sort of thing, but I think I'm definitely getting the hang of it again. You can certainly try to teach an old dog new tricks, and this one certainly still can...where was I going with this metaphor?
Either way, welcome to my new little chaos corner of the internet. I think proper blogging has become something of a lost art, and I'd really like to document things properly, and learning a new skill along the way seems very helpful.