Kimleigh Smith

T-O-T-A-L-L-Y! WINS THE TOP TWO HOLLYWOOD FRINGE FESTIVAL 2010 AWARDS
Posted by totallykimleighsmith at 1:54 am
Jul 022010

Top of Fringe

Best in Theatre
- Posted by totallykimleighsmith

Sheena LaTalk Hi Kimleigh! Here’s the link to your terrific interview on my “Sheena Metal Experience” radio show last week:http://latalkradio.com/images/Sheena-071310.mp3
0:00 / 0:00DownloadRight-click and save as to download.
I hope that your friends and fans enjoy it and I’d love to have you back again…you’re great radio guest!
- Posted by totallykimleighsmith at 8:32 pm Jul 26 2010

T-O-T-A-L-L-Y! is a high-energy autobiographical solo show by Kimleigh Smith that works, and works on a lot of levels. First and foremost Kimleigh is a force of nature. Her energy and spirit carry the day as she tells her story, which is by turns harrowing and hilarious. Her dance training is evident from the very beginning, which surprises and delights given her self-confessed 195-pound frame.
Dressed as a cheerleader, Kimleigh grabs the audience and takes them through her journey to sexual maturity from her arrival at a Midwestern college as an uber-peppy 17-year-old virgin, through painful revelations all the way to her eventual reawakening as a modern-day Super Woman in Los Angeles. There are many stops along the way including Chicago, many therapists offices, and several different careers.
The journey is a rough one. But through good and bad, Kimleigh is positive, funny, eloquent, and candid—often explicitly so, but you never feel uncomfortable. Her rapport with the audience is so strong that you are with her one hundred percent. Go Kimleigh go! So much so that you have to stop yourself from cheering her on from your chair. As she tells of her various troubles “down there” as she says, it’s like you know her, grew up with her, and you instinctively want to take care of her.
But Kimleigh doesn’t need anyone to take care of her. By the end she is her very own superhero. And that’s what we see in the show. She is a performer in complete control of herself and her show, even when things don’t go exactly according to plan. Whether it is major life obstacles or minor technical glitches, Kimleigh faces problems head on and with a dazzling sense of humor.
The story of T-O-T-A-L-L-Y! is inspirational, entertaining as all get out, and truly worth seeing. Kimleigh Smith’s presentation is polished, honest, and specific, down to her own shiny superhero-themed program. I saw the show on a Wednesday at 10pm and (as there are with these awkward time slots sometimes) there were a number of empty seats. But I imagine that will not be the case moving forward so show up early, get a drink in the bar upstairs at Dixon Place, and see this great performance.
- Review FringeNYC Festival 2010

T-O-T-A-L-L-Y, winner of the Top of the Fringe Award as well as Fringe Award for Theatre, got the early buzz and packed Theatre of NOTE at most performances. As candidly written and performed by Kimleigh Smith, it is a powerful journey from naïve teenage cheerleader to a woman of inner strength, told with brave honesty and athletic agility. It was crystal-clear why her honed talent drew audiences like a magnet, under the expert direction of Paula Killen. A future home is being sought to continue Smith’s totally engrossing story.
- Posted by totallykimleighsmith at 11:17 pm Jun 302010

T-O-T-A-L-L-Y!
By Kimleigh Smith
Directed by Paula Killen
T-O-T-A-L-L-Y!KIMLEIGH PRODUCTIONS
Brown Venue, 2010 Orlando International Fringe Festival

Entering this show, I was vague intrigued by the title device of typing with the CAPS LOCK on and pouring a whole pitcher of hyphens all over everything. But then Ms. Smith bounced on stage in a cheerleaders outfit, pom-poms on her toes, and all became clear – she’s fluent in CHEERSPEAK! She eventually calms down, clears her system of the OMG’s and BFF’s, and we meet her fascinating life. Her story is intensely personal, completely engaging, and even a bit kinky. She leads us from college cheerleading triumphs at a Kansas football championship through partial paralysis, a typical bad relation, and into the deeper understanding of herself, her self image, and the blinding insight that sex can really, really be a lot of fun.

While all that sound very self help-ish, her high energy storytelling and bubbly persona make this a special event. The cheerleading helps her suppress a deeper secret, one that only she would know but couldn’t understand, and this gives us some surprises and a sympathetic thread to follow. We never get a lecture, but instead we tour though the naughty and nice bits of her Id, Ego, and a pretty darn explicit tale of trying to find a date on Craig’s List. I think we can all pick up a few tips from this lady, and the buzz you might pick up in the beer tent is completely true – this is one of 2010’s hot shows.

This event is part of the 2010 Orlando International Fringe Festival. For schedule and ticket information, please visit http://OrlandoFringe.org
- Archikulture Digest by Carl F Gauze

2010 Fringe Festival — posted by matt palm on May, 21 2010 12:25 PM
Discuss This: Comments(3) | Add to del.icio.us | Digg it

Reviewed by Mary Frances Emmons, Special to the Sentinel

Kimleigh Smith starts her hilarious one-woman show with a bang and never lets her energy flag for even one of her allotted 60 minutes — the voluptuous LA-based triple threat lands every laugh in T-O-T-A-L-L-Y, and there are lots.

Seventeen-year-old cheerleader Kimleigh has a secret (v-i-r-g-i-n) and the story moves with dizzying speed from innocence to gang rape to a Herculean level of denial, followed by hysterical paralysis, hypnosis and recovery years later, after she has saved a life on the way to reclaiming her own.

It’s a riveting story – though one best-suited for adults — and the infectiously appealing Smith established instant audience rapport in her opening show Thursday night, despite a preachy patch or two toward the end. A fearless performance, and one you don’t want to miss. All I can say is “w-o-w, WOW!”
- 2010 Fringe Festival - Reviewed by Mary Frances Emmons

Fringe review: T-O-T-A-L-L-Y!, T-O-T-A-L-L-Y! Kimleigh Productions, Los Angeles, Calif.

By Elizabeth Maupin

Picture the teenage girl who, like, totally says “like, totally” all the time. Then picture her so irrepressible that you, like, totally like her – and that’s Kimleigh Smith, the ball of fire who tells her own compelling story in T-O-T-A-L-L-Y!, a narrative that shifts from light to dark in the blink of an eye but never allows the ‘V’ word – victim – to cross your mind.

Kimleigh, after all, thinks of herself as a superhero. She’s a 17-year-old cheerleader who has just seen the most amazing championship football game ever, and only a strange paralysis that begins to afflict her “from my girl parts down” persuades her that anything happened to her that totally amazing night.

Smith, who has acted in some major regional theaters and done a fair amount of TV, has put a fair amount of time between her present-day self and what happened to her when she was 17. (Her show is aimed at audiences 17 and older.) But the gripping story continues, and Smith seems to have come to terms with it. With a personality this strong and this appealing, you have to figure this woman can conquer anything she wants.
- May 23, 2010 by Elizabeth Maupin