BWW Blog: Beating, Packed Days, and More

Hi! I feel like every week I come to write one of these, I get slightly more stressed. I'm currently sitting in the sitzprobe for Spring Awakening, and they sound freaking incredible. It's so powerful to finally hear the sound come together with the band and mics, I can't wait to see the final product.

Interspersed with rehearsal for this show, I'm also deep into Brilliant Traces, with Caleb, Silas, and Kelsey. They're working us hard, usually two to three hours per day, every day except Sunday, and since it's only the two of us onstage, it's nonstop hardcore acting. It's basically another acting class on my schedule, since Kelsey and Si are giving us homework that's usually assigned in upperclassmen acting classes and are treating us like professionals. We're responsible not only for learning our MANY lines, but also writing out our Goals, Obstacles, Tactics, Expectations, Driver, and Tempo for each beat (this is apparently called 'beating'). It's time consuming, but has been helping connect objective to the words.

Having so much time intensely focusing on acting and being put under a microscope for every choice has made me much more self-aware of how I am viewed onstage. Si and Kelsey aren't afraid to call me out on staying focused on objective and tactics, and to not settle for my default state. My acting has been getting more introspective and reserved since doing film and coming to college, since I was trying to avoid overacting, but I'm now learning that big choices are often better and can be just as, if not more, honest. I need to remember that my character is a real human, and real humans move their arms and have varied inflection.

A few days ago, during one beat we were working, I had to say my lines while searching for an escape from this barn/situation. Previously, I had been looking around aimlessly while saying them, but I tried consciously thinking "I need to leave this place. I need to get out. I need to leave this place. I need to get out" repeatedly while saying them. This small change in thought made my next cross to the door significantly more motivated, and that's something I need to bring to the entire show.

My days have been pretty packed recently, with classes, all sorts of rehearsals, and extra events. This week, Tony Kushner visited Western, and the School of Stage and Screen and the English Department got an additional Q&A session with him. I sat right in the front, and got to introduce myself afterwards. He was truly one of the smartest and most well-read people I've ever met in real life. His thoughts on religion were especially interesting to me, because he is a playwright who often includes religion in his works but is an agnostic himself. As not a particularly religious person myself, when he said that he writes about it partly to avoid becoming complacent, and to stay curious, because how could we possibly know, was inspiring. I'm not about to be more religious, but hearing him discuss it made me want to learn more about it (my philosophy class has also encouraged this). Along with this insight, he also casually named dropped THE Stephen Sondheim, and called Trump "the antichrist", not because he's simply awful, but because it's surprising how many Christians support him considering how little he embodies Christian values. I feel so grateful for the opportunity to sit and listen to his wisdom, thanks WCU!

On a totally different tangent, we are still working on "No Man" choreographed by Ashlee, Kirsten, and me, and have to squeeze in time to teach the other four girls in that number the choreography, which is a scheduling nightmare, but it's turning out fun and full of feminism. We only have 20 seconds of choreography left in both the Ballet 1 and Tap 2 routines, and there's a chance I'll be incorporated into the Tap 1 number that I'm helping in, so I'll be performing in 4 numbers total for the showcase in two weeks. Lots of performing coming up.

We're still rehearsing for the Freshman Showcase that's two days before Brilliant Traces, and I have to finish blocking "Marry the Man Today" with Bre. The day after the Dance Showcase are auditions for next falls' productions, which I still have to find a monologue for. The monologue requirements are difficult to find for girls, so I might have to do some gender bending. And then right after that, we have Controlled Chaos, which will most likely include at least one of the films I'm featured in, and then I pack up and am off to Lost Colony! It's majorly crunch time, but right now, I'm just enjoying hearing Adrian sing "Left Behind".