Metaphor for a Missing Moment

The title is a lyric from a song by A Perfect Circle. A song entitled, "Orestes".

So I've been slacking on blog entries a bit of late. I feel like I've been running on fumes over the last week or so. Looking forward to spring break, to recharging. I'm not going anywhere exotic. Just home. I am eagerly looking forward to all of the little things: home-cooked meals, my dog, my bed, New York radio, the pizza place by my house, all of the small facets of home that just can't be replicated.

So...the last week. On to the topics old and new:

Baker Hall was a fun space to play in. Due to the performance hall acoustics, I didn't feel the need to make effort to project and be loud, and could focus my energy towards the actions and emotions of the scene. By working in Baker, I was able to get out of the mode I had been starting to get stuck in, focusing on being all loud and screaming, and cut through to the emotional truth of the scene.

Hilary's birthday was a blast. It was good to get together with friends and actually spend a Friday night doing something other than working. Granted, I regretted it when I realized how much work I should have been doing and how much I would have to make up, but it was worth it. On a personal note, I wound up smoking for the first time since November. I'm just chalking it up to a month and a half of stress and multiple shots of tequila, and moving on. I'm actually kind of happy, in reflection, that I didn't even really enjoy it all that much. Still, after slipping off the proverbial wagon just a bit, I need to re-dedicate myself. I like being able to walk up the mountain without gasping for breath, and I need to remember that.

Wintertime, over and out. A fine run, and congrats and thanks to all involved. You made my job worth doing. I'm happy it's over, though. I'm looking forward to the next projects in my life, to getting back to acting, and to continue to grow and develop in directing. Especially directing. I feel as though I'm just scratching the surface of my directing style, like there's this major epiphanic moment just on the other side of a wall of ice. I can see it, and I feel like I'm tantalizingly close to breaking through and making major discoveries. I'm eagerly awaiting the return from spring break, when I have actors to work with, to teach, and to learn from, and can continue to grow.

R&G rehearsals have been fun, but a bit frustrating personally. As I said in class today, it has been difficult for me to maintain the physicality of characters, especially of late, and I feel like my early work has suffered because of it. I haven't had much energy left by the time rehearsal rolls around, and I feel like it shows. On the plus side, I finally was able to get through a scene with Adam without laughing. Now I just need to keep a straight face with Justin and Tim, and I'll be all set.

The final performance was a relief. I've been struggling with the whole Greek theatre, presentational performance thing, afraid to trust my instincts because they seemed to be wrong. That is an extremely disconcerting feeling, being afraid to act on my actor's impulse. That said, I feel as though the performance went pretty well. I was able to cut through to the emotional core of Orestes' scene, and to find a reason why he was being so absurdly coy at the start of the scene. I had been struggling with this, because my natural instinct was to tell my sister the truth, in order to soothe her. It took a good deal of rumination to reconcile this. If we were to keep going with this, I suppose future work would be done in finding the physicality of the character, to go along with the inner work which has already been done.

I went back and re-read my blog recently. I observed that my writing has changed over the semester. It has become less free-flowing, less stream of consciousness-y, less emblematic of the mind producing it. This troubled me. I suppose some of that could be energy level issues, but I decided to create a second blog. That blog is more for general, state of my brain stuff. Since this blog is already trending towards a more focused style, I chose to embrace that focus and keep this blog more-or-less class related.

See you on the other side (of the break, that is)

Oy.

Class today. Not one of my better ones. I started the day by hurting an abdominal muscle doing my one sit-up for the day (the one where I sit up out of bed), which made breathing, especially diaphragmatic breathing, hurt like a bitch. I honestly can't remember what we even did during the part where we laid down in the dark because I could only focus on how much breathing hurt. I then proceeded to blow out my voice doing the exercise, whilst plumbing the emotional depths. I am not terribly upset to have to wait until Thursday, since I am also still fighting a tech week immune system. Eh, enough kvetching for one day.

I did enjoy some of the work we did in today's exercise, mining through the text to find the important words, the ones to attach weight to and the way to do it. I'm struggling to find what to do with my arms, though, because it still just feels like a rotation between about four different positions: out, up, down, forward. I would like to find some way to define my movement because I still feel right now like I'm just striking semi-random body positions while talking. Hopefully I can find a way to incorporate the body work into the dialog when we go on Thursday.

This is just silly

Until next time...

This Is An Entry In My Blog

Phew. Tech Over. Play Starting. Only a few more days of sleeplessness left, as I catch up on all of the work that got neglected over the last week or so.

Opening night of Wintertime went well. It's always nice, after spending a month-plus with a show, to see it in front of an audience. After reading the script that many times and hearing the lines that many times, certain parts start to feel dull, so it was good to see the play injected with all of the life of an audience. Technically, a solid show. Only a couple mistakes, only one really noticeable one. Easily fixable things, though.

Thursday was yet another day where I felt infected by low energy. After my scene, I began to see all of the emotional depths waiting to be plumbed, but I just felt unable to begin to do so on Thursday. I eagerly look forward to the first time Hilary and I will work on the scene together this weekend, when I can attack Sophocles' words with renewed vigor. As Hilary mentioned in her blog, we have never done any acting together (save for about 90 seconds of time in The Country Wife), so I am excited for the chance to collaborate.

The first R&G readthrough on the feet is on Monday. After months of rehearsals and shows behind operating boards and calling books, not to mention directing, I can't wait to get back to acting, and being in a position where I can get coached, rather than the other way around. I am also looking forward to the joy of filling the stage with the ensemble and engulfing poor RosAndGuil in the world of Hamlet.

Alas, I must do some of that neglected work, so that is all for now.

Adieu.

Posting in Retrospect

It's now basically a full two days after class. I would've posted sooner, but I'm still working on finding time right now for eating and sleeping, let alone getting around to doing work.

So, class on Tuesday. In general, I had a pretty low energy level, from the time that I woke up all the way through the end of the day, so I was a bit lethargic during class. I enjoyed the group warmup, trusting each other to take care of the warming up of ourselves. I only wish I had gotten to do verbal, I learned some new tongue twisters. But alas...

I think the setup of our playing space was an example of too many cooks in the kitchen. That's why I just spent my time getting blocks, so that there would be one less opinion in an already crowded thoughtspace (I'm pretty sure I made up that word, but I like it anyway). At the same time, by setting down blocks in a more-or-less random way, maybe someone might have been inspired to make something from it. That's why there's usually only one set designer. But alas, it came together anyway, in solid fashion.

I need to rethink my sheet design for the next time we use them. I was feeling hindered by it, rather than aided by it. Not a good thing for a costume.

Looking forward to working with Hilary on the scene. I was led to think of the interesting paradigm in our department, being as small a crew as we are. I'm acting with people who I'm directing, and with people who have directed (or are directing) me, and acting with people that I'm stage managing, and stage managing people who have directed me, and a number of other permutations involving the different things I've done here. In truth, I'd say that we are all acting together though, regardless of what our title is, actor or director or designer. We're all playing our parts, although once we are not in the theatre arena, we are all peers again. For those three-ish hours, we take on the roles of authority figures, knowledge bases, and actors. Eh, musings on the meta...

Well, my night, regrettably, has just started. Many proverbial miles to go...

General Check-in, and Thoughts on Playwriting

Ah, tech week. I spent the night in Zoellner again last night. At least this time I managed to fall asleep on the carpeted floor of Diamond instead of the concrete floor of the studio. I don't think I've ever had the actor's nightmare at any point before a show, the one where you go on stage and forget all of your lines, or your costume completely falls apart, or some such embarrassing thing. However, last night (well, really this morning) I had a stage manager's nightmare, involving a gross amount of fuck-uppery and chaos. I wish the worst case didn't seem like a possibility, but my imagination is rather vivid.

Working with less seasoned actors for my directing scene has been an eye-opening experience. I have had to actively think about and coach things which, at this point, I myself have internalized and more or less do without thinking. I remember learning a good deal in the last couple years, while acting for various student directors, about the basics of body position, stage picture, stillness, etc., simply because those were the tools they had to play with. Hopefully, I can help some of my actors along on those fronts as well.

Thoughts on Andrea, the playwriting candidate: these thoughts will be brief-ish, because I left her session quite unimpressed. I didn't like the way she used the Tina Howe piece. Although the play itself was wonderful, the way she utilized it had this undertone of, "This is how you should do it." I know, I know, postmodernism and all, we can't create anything new, yadda yadda yadda. If playwriting was all about aping the styles of our predecessors, we'd all still be writing plays with Greek choruses. Furthermore, I wasn't really a fan of the writing exercise she had us do. I felt like the choosing of three things, which almost by nature had to be disparate, forced us into slightly to extremely absurdist writing, and I felt furthermore as if I was forcing two of the things into my scene. I had more or less found the game of the scene (to steal an improv term) in the snack food choice, but I still had to hamfistedly insert a foreign phrase and a dance step where they didn't need to be. On the plus side, the handout she gave us looks to be a useful collection of musings. All in all, I would say my least favorite of all the candidates thus far. One more to go...

Back on the subject of acting, I was Youtubing and found this clip of Sir Ian McKellen on the Late Late Show. You have to skip ahead to about 1:49 for the really fabulous part. Further proof of Sir Ian's dominance.

Oh well, break over. Back to tech...

This Title Used To Be An Atrocious Pun Involving The Word 'Greek'

Fun class today. I was a bit concerned coming in that we were going to start having predictable classes where we performed and discussed Electra. Enjoyed being surprised. Thumbs up, Kashi.

I was at a really low energy level this morning before class. I actually got a decent amount of sleep, but I was still knocked-out tired. I think it was just one of those days where I woke up at the wrong point in my sleep cycle. Anywho, the warmup was refreshing. It felt good to get back into actor mode after several days off. Note to self: learn tongue twisters.

Enjoyable to learn a bit about the culture that spawned the play we're working on. It was interesting to see how much of their ideas on culture, theatre and performance are carried on today. I am looking forward to working on specificity and precision of movement, as well as conveying power through the voice, both things which I think might come in handy for future roles.

I liked the male manner of greeting from Greek culture: the full forearm grasp, with the hand on the shoulder. It allows you to get a much firmer connection with the other person, much better than a limp-wristed handshake would. It's only about a half-step away from a hug, which is an awesome way to greet people that I wish was more prevalent. There's something very personal, in a good way, about establishing that physical vibe. It seems appropriate for a society in which homosexuality amongst men was a common practice and a man's friend was counted on to take care of his wife if he died.

I'm off to go sacrifice a bull for the strength to stay awake in this class.

A Productive Day

My class which follows P-Styles today had previously been cancelled, so when I found out our class had been cancelled, I went home and slept until 2:30.