first read through, macpics, and haircuts.

so, it's been a while, but things are starting to get underway for Macbeth! we had our first read through last tuesday, and it went very well. it was so exciting to hear the characters come to life. we had a great time eating pizza and homemade brownies, and made our way through the entire script laughing along the way. although Macbeth isn't the happiest of plays, the cast is sure to make this a great experience. I heard someone describe the Bard In The Quad show as one of the most challenging experiences I will ever go through as an actor here at Oregon State. I also heard that it will be one of the best experiences of my life. I can't wait to continue to be challenged and grow as an actor here.

as a promotional tool, our director is making Macbeth trading cards with all of the characters, which will be passed around town. if someone collects all of the cards, (some will be harder to find than others) then they will get a discounted ticket! I think it's a great idea, and the pictures have turned out very beautifully!


during these shoots I had to wear a wig due to the fact that my hair is not very 1920's, at all. but taking them made me extremely excited to get my hair cut into a 1920's bob for the show. I think I will take my inspiration from Louise Brooks, as long as the costume designer approves of course!

preview...

here is a preview of the space we will be performing in during this summer's production of Macbeth... it's HUGE!

hopefully the weather will be better than it was on the day of auditions!

onto the next project!

I have officially made it into OSU's production of Macbeth! rehearsals start next month and there are ten shows that will run this august! I am so excited for this opportunity and I can't wait to get started. there are so many talented people in the cast and I know I will learn a lot from being able to act with them. also, I know that doing Shakespeare will certainly challenge me, and I know that this production will give me huge opportunities to grow and learn as an actor.

our amazing director has started a blog about the show! right now it has the production concept and where she got all of the inspiration for the show. check it out!

http://projectshakesperia.tumblr.com/

why can't we just take it with us?

another wonderful show has come to a close. I can't say I feel much different than I did with the last show. I'm sad it's over, and very much looking forward to my next project. I do want to share a few images from the show however! one of the lovely ladies in our cast is an avid photographer, and spent a lot of time during the rehearsal process and backstage shooting the cast. on closing night, everyone received a rose with a portrait and note attached. it was a beautiful gift, and i really wanted to share some of her images because they are gorgeous. enjoy!












all images © J. Seus

lastly, I had auditions for the next production here on campus yesterday. Shakespeare's "Macbeth" will run over the summer and call backs are tonight! I should find out whether I made it by tonight or tomorrow!

opening weekend YCTIWY

opening weekend is over and we're preparing for another three shows this weekend! I'm supposed to be at a pick up rehearsal right now, but unfortunately due to a power outage we were not able to rehearse. but that does mean I have a little extra time, which includes updating my blog!

the first three shows went very very well. every night there was new energy from the audience, and new mishaps on stage (in the final moments of saturday's show the couch was broken!) hopefully this weekend's shows will be even better. we've definitely taken strides forward, and it's been very fun to see everyone growing and learning from each other.

here are a couple rehearsal photos, taken for the newspaper and our archives:




here is the official poster for our production. these are posted all over school as well as around the community!



like I said, we have three more performances, then I am auditioning for another show on sunday. also, I have a scene from Sheridan's "The Rivals" that I am performing in acting class this friday. it has certainly been a big week for memorizing! more to come :)

third week of rehearsals!

so we are officially all memorized! (or we're supposed to be) tonight was the first rehearsal completely off book and I have to say the play is really coming together. there are a few kinks that still need to be worked out, but for the most part things are going extremely well. tomorrow night's rehearsal will supposedly have props which will be great. you'd be surprised at how difficult it is to run through the motions of a play without all the props necessary, and for this production there are a lot of props! this past week has been mostly memorizing lines, but also developing a very strong character. Alice is kind of a difficult character because she is the most "normal" of the family, but she is still part of the family. so I have been trying to find Alice's quirks, and finding a way to portray them on stage.

I also heard a new term today in rehearsal that I think can help actors very much when trying to develop characterization. our director called it "acting keys". acting keys is when you determine what would your character carry in his or her pockets. do they even have pockets? do they carry a purse? do they not carry anything? what would your character have on them on a day to day basis? all of these questions seem so trivial at first, but are actually extremely helpful when putting together a fully embodied character.

18 days until opening night!

second week of rehearsals!

i'm already exhausted! but the process is still going very well! we are still in the middle of trying to memorize lines and working with very minimal props. lines are due next sunday so i've been working hard to get those cemented in my head. next step is beginning to make some strong character choices. there is one scene in particular where my character goes through a complete arch on stage that I feel I need to work on. but its very difficult to do that when you're still carrying around your script!

tonight we have a day off, and we had a short rehearsal yesterday because there is another show this week in the Lab Theatre. it's Tony Kushner's "A Bright Room Called Day". the play was extremely moving and I felt that the whole production was extremely well done. it reminded me why I love the theatre so much. because it moved me and affected me in a way that just reading a textbook can't do. the show is in association with Holocaust Week here on campus, and is a very powerful piece about love, hope, and the destruction that can come out of carelessness. Also, there was a great quote in the program that I have to share.

"You'd be surprised how much being a good actor pays off". -Ronald Reagan, May 1, 1984

so, I continue to strive to be a "good actor". as promised, here is a rehearsal photo from the other night. the set has been primed and none of the furniture is the actual set furniture. it's always exciting walking into rehearsal because you never know what work has been done on the set or what new props we'll have to work with. we have some idea of what everything will look like, but we're still in the very early stages.



this is a scene of craziness just before the Kirby's come over for dinner. I can't wait to work more on this production! it's been so much fun so far I can't even imagine what it will be like once the set is done and we have all our props to work with.

first week of rehearsals!

so my effort to keep up with my blog has apparently failed this past month. but good news! I'm back to a bunch of hard work in the theatre! it feels great to be back and spending so much of my time working on our next production. the play is called "You Can't Take It With You", a comedy written in the 1930's by Kaufman and Hart. here is a plot synopsis of the play that I found online:

"At first the Sycamores seem mad, but it is not long before you realize that if they are mad, then the rest of the world is madder. In contrast to these delightful people are the unhappy Kirbys. Tony, the attractive young son of the Kirbys, falls in love with Alice Sycamore and brings his parents to dine at the Sycamore house on the wrong evening. The shock sustained by Mr. and Mrs. Kirby, who are invited to eat cheap food, shows Alice that marriage with Tony is out of the question. The Sycamores find it hard to realize Alice's view. Tony knows the Sycamores live the right way with love and care for each other, while his own family is the one that's crazy."

my character, Alice, has been quite interesting to play. on some levels, I feel like I am very closely connected to Alice, and on other levels she is nothing like me. I can't wait to continue developing her character in rehearsals. the great thing about rehearsals is being able to constantly explore and discover new things about the character you are portraying!

I have to say that I am extremely excited about this play. we have a very talented cast and a hilarious script. there is one downside, however. we open in four and a half weeks! the pre-production process of this show is going to be VERY short and I feel like before I know it this play will be another one for the history books. right now I am in the middle of trying to memorize lines which always seems to be a challenge in the midst of trying to complete all my other school work. however, one method I learned from a fellow actor has been very helpful! I wrote down all of my cue lines (the line right before your own is said) on one side of a note card, and my line on the other. these not cards are a great way to test yourself, as well as familiarize yourself with other lines in the play. I highly recommend it! writing the notecards themselves is definitely time consuming, but worth it in the end. I am going to try and memorize all of Act I, Scene I as well as Act I, Scene II before tomorrow night's rehearsal, but this is how many lines that is...


time to get to work!

p.s. pictures of our awesome set and rehearsal photos to come soon! (hopefully)

rejection

well, I hate to follow up an audition post with one titled "Rejection", but I am afraid I must. I didn't get the part I auditioned for on friday, and I have to say i'm surprised by my reaction. I must say I was really looking forward to the possibility of this role, and no break from the theatre, but that's obviously not an option any more! I guess I never truly realized how blessed I am to have been given the opportunities that I have been given. the roles i've been able to play have been so rewarding, and so my first meeting with rejection is proving to be difficult. however, one thing an actor must understand is that the director is looking for the best person for a role. I was not what the director was looking for, and you have to accept that fact and move on. there will be more plays!

I'm currently watching 'stage beauty', a great film about women becoming actors. if you haven't seen it yet, and you're interested in the theatre and/or theatre history, I highly recommend it! one of my favorite lines from the movie is:

"a role does not belong to an actor, and actor belongs to a role"

I think that's brilliant, and pretty thought provoking. hopefully I will find more ways to fill my time now that I have a few weeks off from any extra-curricular theatre things.

auditions

I had two auditions yesterday. one fake, one real. during acting class we had a fake director come in and we had to perform monologues as well as do cold readings. it was very interesting and intimidating.. the "director" was very rude (he would cut us off when we were talking, etc.) and because of that, I learned a few important lessons. first and foremost, I learned that in auditions you HAVE to be confident. even though we sat and watched the director's behavior, it was extremely essential to walk up in front of him and be confident. those who walked up shy and unsure of themselves were sure to be disrespected. in the real world, directors are on a time schedule and they don't want to waste their time. the second thing I learned is you have to be yourself. they don't care about much, just how you look and how you act. you have a very short time to impress a director, and you have to be prepared to do so. don't try to be something you're not. it won't help your cause.

my real audition also taught me a few things. it wasn't until I made the decision to read for the role that I realized how much I really wanted the part. and so, going into the auditions I was very nervous because I wanted the role so badly. half way through the audition, my competition showed up, and stayed in the room to watch the rest of my scenes. I felt very awkward because I knew the other woman who was auditioning. I had to come to the realization that this will happen again later on in my career. in the acting world, there will be times when your competition is your best friend. although I haven't found out whether or not I got the part, i've realized that if I don't get it, it is because i'm not the best person for that part. the director has to put on the best show possible, and if I don't get the part it is not because I am a bad actor.

there will always be more plays. and there is much comfort in knowing that.

wow.

opening weekend was AMAZING. the energy from every crowd was a little bit different, and every night was a new enriching experience. opening night was especially great. although there weren't that many people in the audience, they were extremely smart and caught a lot of the witty oscar wilde jokes. friday and saturday's audiences were much bigger, and that gave me a huge adrenaline boost.

here's a glimpse of my backstage life:

I can't believe we only have three more shows until it's over. this is one thing I have never liked about theatre: you work on a play so hard, and for so long, and in the blink of an eye it's gone. sure, you'll always have the memory of the experience, but you will never get the experience itself back again. I will have a nice couple weeks of a break from the theatre, apart from classes; auditions for the next show are not until the end of march. as much as I thought I would be looking forward to this break, I'm not so sure about it anymore.

opening night!

so this week has been filled with tech rehearsals, stage makeup, and wigs, and finally opening night is here! I was hoping to post some pictures from the cool things i've done this week, but I left my camera at the boyfriend's house.. oops! hopefully i'll get it back soon and put up some cool stuff to actually look at.

I'm kind of impressed at how calm I am about opening night. I haven't been on stage in a long time, and i've never been on a stage as big as the one we have here. I'm sure once I start to hear our stage manager begin to call how much time we have left, it will start to hit me. I can't wait!

my first big opening night.. I feel accomplished.

pictures to come soon!

case of the mondays

yes, it's true. I have a case of the mondays. i'm tired and definitely unmotivated to go to a geology class very soon. but! there are a lot of very exciting things going on in the world of the university theatre! tickets for the "An Ideal Husband" go on sale today! it's been such an overwhelming and tiring process to do my first college show, but the rewards have been greater than I could ever imagine.

we have our first full costume, hair, and make-up run through tonight! the press from the local newspapers are coming to take photographs, so needless to say i'm very nervous. but even before all that I have to perform a shakespeare sonnet in acting class today. i've never performed shakespeare, although i've always loved reading his work. so today should definitely be an interesting one!

here is the sonnet i'll be performing:

sonnet #88

when thou shalt be disposed to set me light,
and place my merit in the eye of scorn,
upon thy side against myself i'll fight,
and prove thee virtuous though thou art forsworn.
with mine own weakness being best acquainted,
upon thy part I can set down a story
of faults conceal'd, wherein I am attainted;
that thou in losing me shalt win much glory:
for bending all my loving thoughts on thee,
the injuries that to myself I do,
doing thee vantage, double-vantage me.
such is my love, to thee I belong,
that for thy right, myself will bear all wrong.

first post.

why blog? honestly, i've thought about this question a lot. I have a couple friends who have started blogs, mostly photographers that have interesting things to say and photographs to display. I, however, no longer consider myself an avid photographer. i'm just a normal girl trying to make her way through college as a theatre student.

so again, why blog? I don't know who is going to read this. blogging is a completely self-indulgent process, and it will continue to stay that way. and so, I want to blog for me. I want to improve my writing. I want to remember how I was feeling throughout my college career. I want to express myself.

if anyone does decide to read this blog, I hope that maybe you will get a laugh or get inspired by my random ramblings of life as a college theatre student. if not, at least i'll have a new outlet, a new escape. isn't that what we are all searching for anyway?