Two Months

I can't believe it's been almost 2 months since I've posted on here.  So much has happened to me and I've learned and grown unbelievable amounts.  All of my time has been spent either in rehearsals, shows, meetings, or just hanging out with people, blogging has been at the bottom of my priority list.

Coffee has never had an effect on me as it does in Playerdom.  It's not that I don't have the opportunity to sleep, it's just after finishing at 11 or 12 at night, I want my social time.  Usually I do get into bed around 2, which for the summer is an acceptable time to hit the sack, but I'm up for fight call (rehearsal before every show to ensure no injury or death, haha) for our player show at 9 am.

I love doing the Player shows.  It's like a cup of Folger's.  Seriously, everyone drags their butt out of bed and arrives at fight call groggy, but after half hour (the required time before any show for the actors to get dressed, basically prepare themselves for the show) we are ready to put on an awesome show.

Rarely in a young actor's life does one get to perform a show for 20 times, but we get to.  Before being a Player, I would've been tired of doing a show.  Now?  I could do shows 100 more times and never get bored.  They teach us here to always experiment, to never let a show get easy for you.  There is never a goal in which there is an arrival point; the actor is always searching for ways to go deeper in the world of the play.  (By "world of the play," I mean totally succumbing to the character's thoughts, goals, surroundings, etc.)

Some experiments I've done to keep my characters in the world have been...never letting my vocal production be untruthful; moving only when my character needs to move; pretending I lost a son, and wondering if all of the people my character came across was my son; visualizing my surroundings; having the same inner monologue (what my thoughts are saying, such as, "give me money") throughout the entire play; doing my actions and saying my words at the latest point of attack; give my character sexual thoughts; give my character violent thoughts; being open to stimulus; having a secret; changing the volume at which I'm speaking; having the goal of my scene partner to look at me or touch me...etc.

These all seem like miniscule experiments, but they made a load of difference in each performance.  I was discovering new things every show.  It was soo cool.


This "never arrive" theory, I've applied to other aspects in life as well.  You never arrive at some goal in learning, or finding happiness.  To take things, or--in a larger sense--to take life, inch by inch is a much feasible task than yard by yard.  Also, knowing that there is always more to explore, in whatever you are doing, so many possibilities open up.

We have a saying here, "live moment to moment." It basically means having trust in this moment so fully, that trust will allow you to focus and allow depth within that moment.  Don't be thinking about what comes afterwards, just focus on the task at hand, and the character's, or your, intentions will come across.  Human's can't multi-task, it's a proven fact, so why should we expect our characters to?  (Or vise-versa)

As far as learning and developing goes, now I feel I'm at a stand still.  I made such great strides at the beginning of the summer, now I'm not noticing the tiny steps I'm taking to getting rid of Cami, and delving further into a character.  It's frustrating.  I keep telling my Player Project mentor, that I feel I'm on the edge of a breakthrough, but it's not coming fast enough.  It may be because we aren't rehearsing a show now.  Being the end of the summer, we only have "The Reluctant Dragon" shows in the morning and no rehearsals until after vacation week.  It may be because I don't speak in Dragon (I'm the right arm of the Dragon, way fricken awesome).

It's amazing how what you learn by rehearsing a new play can be applied to the show you are performing every day.  We never have a chance to breathe.  An hour after the opening production of "The Princess and the Pea" we started rehearsing our next show.  We were sprinting earlier in the summer, and now that we are walking; we aren't getting much of an artistic workout.

Even though I'm taking itty bitty tiny steps towards becoming a better actor, I feel I'm still making progress.  I've been trying towards progress with all of my might.  My director told us a story about one of the Resident Actors who spoke to some college theatre students. (This is paraphrased, but the gist is still there)  They asked "How do you make things important to your character night after night?"  The actor replied with, "Will power.  'Cause if you don't have will power, go find another profession."

Boom.