Captain Canada
For the past few days in STAC I've been working on Captain Canada. Captain Canada is actually going pretty well, I've learned all of my lines and songs and I think I have one more number to learn and then I'm all done and it's time to just keep running the show. I think that it'll turn out pretty good (or at least, I hope so) and though we have a lot of work cut out for us I have a feeling we can get it all done in time. I think if everyone gives their best effort and we actually work at it every day until STAC night we can pull it off.
Grace's Music Video
After a lot of drastic changes to the script (due to shooting and actor problems) today I helped Grace out with her video and we finally started to come up with some ideas that could tie the entire video together as a trailer for her fallback. I'm excited to be acting in it and happy that I could help her out.
My Project
As for my project, I really started to get more into songwriting as mentioned in previous blog posts, and at STAC night I'd like to perform one song that I wrote during the intensive that I fixed up during 4th quarter since I think it was the best song I wrote in STAC. I really hope I can have the opportunity to do that, since I've put in the work for it.
Overall, I'm really excited for STAC night, and I think we can pull of a really good show if we all work hard enough for it!
Wednesday, May 30, 2012
Wednesday, May 23, 2012
Captain Canada
For the past two days, I've worked with the cast of "Captain Canada" in rehearsals. I can honestly say that I am really excited for the final product. The script is hilarious and the music is great! I'm playing Elphaba and Coffee Girl and I'm pretty excited.
Yesterday
We had our first read through and scripts were given out. It was a lot of fun to read the show in it's entirety and see what I'd be doing. Then once we read through the entire thing, we started choreographing the Commissioner's dance number in the second act. The dance is so dopey, but so cute and funny at the same time. I'm really enjoying working on this show a lot!
Today
Today we finished the Commissioner number and started reviewing things in the Act II street scene. Things are getting done, and they're looking good, and I think at STAC night that we can put up a very well performed "Captain Canada!"
Yesterday
We had our first read through and scripts were given out. It was a lot of fun to read the show in it's entirety and see what I'd be doing. Then once we read through the entire thing, we started choreographing the Commissioner's dance number in the second act. The dance is so dopey, but so cute and funny at the same time. I'm really enjoying working on this show a lot!
Today
Today we finished the Commissioner number and started reviewing things in the Act II street scene. Things are getting done, and they're looking good, and I think at STAC night that we can put up a very well performed "Captain Canada!"
Tuesday, May 15, 2012
Two Blogs in One
So, I forgot to blog last night (oops), so I'll blog for both days on this one post!
Monday:
Just did some more memorizing, and basically had a successful day as a community member. I helped Sabrina a lot with her project, and started reading the scripts of projects that I agreed to be featured in. Yesterday was more of an "everyone else" kind of day rather than a "me" kind of day.
Tuesday:
I did something a little more unexpected today. Rather than continuing working on my monologues, I decided to go into a practice room and mess around a little bit on a piano. And it's actually pretty funny what the result is. I mean, I guess you really do get your best work done when you don't intend to, because I wrote out about 4 new melodies today that I intend to put lyrics to tomorrow. I was shocked.
When I left songwriting as my project earlier in the quarter, I felt as if I had no intention of going back to it, and now I'm finding it interesting again. So, to be honest, I don't know what's my project and what's my side salad, but I know that I'm definatley working equally on acting and songwriting as of right now, I just don't know what the bigger project will end up being.
I also had a few meetings with my community to clarify these things, and I feel as if they were useful. So overall, I thought today was a good day for me!
Monday:
Just did some more memorizing, and basically had a successful day as a community member. I helped Sabrina a lot with her project, and started reading the scripts of projects that I agreed to be featured in. Yesterday was more of an "everyone else" kind of day rather than a "me" kind of day.
Tuesday:
I did something a little more unexpected today. Rather than continuing working on my monologues, I decided to go into a practice room and mess around a little bit on a piano. And it's actually pretty funny what the result is. I mean, I guess you really do get your best work done when you don't intend to, because I wrote out about 4 new melodies today that I intend to put lyrics to tomorrow. I was shocked.
When I left songwriting as my project earlier in the quarter, I felt as if I had no intention of going back to it, and now I'm finding it interesting again. So, to be honest, I don't know what's my project and what's my side salad, but I know that I'm definatley working equally on acting and songwriting as of right now, I just don't know what the bigger project will end up being.
I also had a few meetings with my community to clarify these things, and I feel as if they were useful. So overall, I thought today was a good day for me!
Thursday, May 10, 2012
Beats
Today was a pretty... interesting work day for me. In my last blog post, I mentioned that I was having a ton of trouble memorizing the exact words of my monologue, and how it made me kind of angry. As a result, today Luke called me into his office and asked if I was using the memorization technique he gave me. I said it didn't work. He said I didn't try it. And I agree with him after the fact, I really didn't. I tried it once, and I gave up when I didn't have it completely memorized the first time.
So, after this Luke gave me a play and he told me to find a female monologue in it, and then go photocopy it and come back to him when I'm done. So, I did photocopy it, and bring it back.
To be honest, I don't actually remember the name or author of the play, and I don't actually know what the full play is about. But all he said I really needed was the monologue, so I just decided to take the monologue and go. When I brought it back to him, he told me to read through it once and on the back write down what the monologue is about, and then bring it back to him.
Then, he told me to read it really fast to him, just do a quick read through. No acting, no worrying about memorization, just reading through it really fast. Then he took the monologue from me and told me to recite it to him. I could not do it for the life of me. I didn't even know the first line, and I tried to get out of the situation. Luke told me that I did not have to know the lines AT ALL, to just take the context of the monologue and recite whatever comes to mind. Luke gave me an example, and I tried to relay it back to him. Though it was not as great is his quick thinking, it was better than I expected to do.
Then it was almost like a cycle. We did it a few more times, just quick read throughs and then reciting it. And then Luke and I separated the monologue into beats, and defined what each of the beats had in it. For example, this particular monologue had 4 beats. Beat 1 was a sense of begging, and being trapped. Beat 2 was explaining a sort of a domino effect. Beat 3 was defending, and making both characters screwed. And Beat 4 was ordering and administering the plan.
Once I had those beats in my head, it was easier to really act the scene, and memorize it a little better, still using the same technique of "quick read through, then cite the monologue through ad-libing." I started memorizing some names, and some lines, and overall the story still made sense. My acting also loosened up, and I became more free with the emotions of the piece rather than the words. It was a totally totally different experience for me.
I'm really starting to memorize this piece, and when I went home today I couldn't help but start using the technique a little on my other monologue and it's kind of working.
So while interesting and different, overall I feel as if it was a pretty successful day for me!
So, after this Luke gave me a play and he told me to find a female monologue in it, and then go photocopy it and come back to him when I'm done. So, I did photocopy it, and bring it back.
To be honest, I don't actually remember the name or author of the play, and I don't actually know what the full play is about. But all he said I really needed was the monologue, so I just decided to take the monologue and go. When I brought it back to him, he told me to read through it once and on the back write down what the monologue is about, and then bring it back to him.
Then, he told me to read it really fast to him, just do a quick read through. No acting, no worrying about memorization, just reading through it really fast. Then he took the monologue from me and told me to recite it to him. I could not do it for the life of me. I didn't even know the first line, and I tried to get out of the situation. Luke told me that I did not have to know the lines AT ALL, to just take the context of the monologue and recite whatever comes to mind. Luke gave me an example, and I tried to relay it back to him. Though it was not as great is his quick thinking, it was better than I expected to do.
Then it was almost like a cycle. We did it a few more times, just quick read throughs and then reciting it. And then Luke and I separated the monologue into beats, and defined what each of the beats had in it. For example, this particular monologue had 4 beats. Beat 1 was a sense of begging, and being trapped. Beat 2 was explaining a sort of a domino effect. Beat 3 was defending, and making both characters screwed. And Beat 4 was ordering and administering the plan.
Once I had those beats in my head, it was easier to really act the scene, and memorize it a little better, still using the same technique of "quick read through, then cite the monologue through ad-libing." I started memorizing some names, and some lines, and overall the story still made sense. My acting also loosened up, and I became more free with the emotions of the piece rather than the words. It was a totally totally different experience for me.
I'm really starting to memorize this piece, and when I went home today I couldn't help but start using the technique a little on my other monologue and it's kind of working.
So while interesting and different, overall I feel as if it was a pretty successful day for me!
Wednesday, May 9, 2012
Transitions and Memorization
Today, I worked for two periods on memorization, and I'm honestly super super frustrated to say that I'm getting nowhere in memorizing this monologue. I tried Luke's technique and created a completely different monologue while ad-libing and it really didn't satisfy me. I really wanted to memorize it, and I couldn't, which was odd for me because I'm usually great at memorizing monologues and lines, and for some reason with this monologue I've really been having trouble. Is it because I feel to much with it? I honestly don't know.
So, after getting really really mad about not being able to really memorize, I pulled out another monologue from my folder called "To Gillian on her 27th Birthday" and I literally memorized it in 10 minutes. Same length, and I memorized it in 10 minutes, without breaking it up into beats, or a climax, nothing. Just straight up memorization.
So, I don't really know what to think of this. Did I analyze the other monologue too much? Is that why it made it harder to memorize? Or did this new monologue appeal to me a lot more? I have no idea. I definitely still want to do the other monologue, it's just giving me a harder time than this new one is. So, we'll see what happens.
Also, both monologues that I've been analyzing and memorizing have been sad, dramatic, or angry pieces. They've all been really serious. My original intention for this project was to finish it off with one serious and one comedic. So now I'm on the hunt for a comedic piece to work on as well. I want at least one comedic and one serious (though I'm not sure which serious I'll pick as my final one yet, or maybe I'll even do both).
Today, I also helped a member of my community, Sabrina. She was looking for a new monologue from film and I introduced her to a website I knew about that held a ton of film monologues, and she found a lot of new monologues to work on that she enjoys, so I guess I felt like a pretty helpful community member today.
Overall, today I really started to change everything again, and I'd consider this a transitional day, and tomorrow I want to start working on all of the new things I came up with today.
So, after getting really really mad about not being able to really memorize, I pulled out another monologue from my folder called "To Gillian on her 27th Birthday" and I literally memorized it in 10 minutes. Same length, and I memorized it in 10 minutes, without breaking it up into beats, or a climax, nothing. Just straight up memorization.
So, I don't really know what to think of this. Did I analyze the other monologue too much? Is that why it made it harder to memorize? Or did this new monologue appeal to me a lot more? I have no idea. I definitely still want to do the other monologue, it's just giving me a harder time than this new one is. So, we'll see what happens.
Also, both monologues that I've been analyzing and memorizing have been sad, dramatic, or angry pieces. They've all been really serious. My original intention for this project was to finish it off with one serious and one comedic. So now I'm on the hunt for a comedic piece to work on as well. I want at least one comedic and one serious (though I'm not sure which serious I'll pick as my final one yet, or maybe I'll even do both).
Today, I also helped a member of my community, Sabrina. She was looking for a new monologue from film and I introduced her to a website I knew about that held a ton of film monologues, and she found a lot of new monologues to work on that she enjoys, so I guess I felt like a pretty helpful community member today.
Overall, today I really started to change everything again, and I'd consider this a transitional day, and tomorrow I want to start working on all of the new things I came up with today.
Monday, May 7, 2012
Memorization
Something that's horribly hard, memorization. Thankfully Luke gave me an easier method to work with so that I don't have to memorize the monologue word for word, but still, it's hard.
Luke's method is that you read the monologue or script once and then flip it over and try to say everything, without looking, and pantomime the parts that you don't know. I can see this working well, but the thing is, I don't really know any of the script enough to pantomime it.
So, today I spent most of the day reading and re-reading the script, to get a feel of all of the beats, and what Karen Kohlhass calls "the Climax" of a monologue. I found that the climax of my monologue happens to be when the character says "Connie - my best friend - I guess she was getting hysterical. I know she didn't mean it, but she said 'You had to go and open your Jew mouth.'"
I feel as if though that is the climax because that's when the story starts to turn to what she does after the fact, and how she actually got to the place that she's currently in that you know absolutely nothing about until the last line of the monologue, and even then it's still a little unclear. It also is the point in the monologue when you realize that the persecution is getting really serious, and you can tell that that is absolutely her breaking point, because the line that follows it is "I went home that night."
I think reading, and re-reading the monologue was a good thing for me to do today, because now that I've sectioned most of it off into beats and now that I have the "climax," I can start using Luke's memorization technique so that I have it memorized and then I can really start applying the acting to it, and putting myself into the monologue, more so than before.
Luke's method is that you read the monologue or script once and then flip it over and try to say everything, without looking, and pantomime the parts that you don't know. I can see this working well, but the thing is, I don't really know any of the script enough to pantomime it.
So, today I spent most of the day reading and re-reading the script, to get a feel of all of the beats, and what Karen Kohlhass calls "the Climax" of a monologue. I found that the climax of my monologue happens to be when the character says "Connie - my best friend - I guess she was getting hysterical. I know she didn't mean it, but she said 'You had to go and open your Jew mouth.'"
I feel as if though that is the climax because that's when the story starts to turn to what she does after the fact, and how she actually got to the place that she's currently in that you know absolutely nothing about until the last line of the monologue, and even then it's still a little unclear. It also is the point in the monologue when you realize that the persecution is getting really serious, and you can tell that that is absolutely her breaking point, because the line that follows it is "I went home that night."
I think reading, and re-reading the monologue was a good thing for me to do today, because now that I've sectioned most of it off into beats and now that I have the "climax," I can start using Luke's memorization technique so that I have it memorized and then I can really start applying the acting to it, and putting myself into the monologue, more so than before.
Sunday, May 6, 2012
Moving Forward
Though it took me the entire week, I finally found a monologue that I feel works perfectly for me. The monologue that I've decided to work on right now is called "The Young and the Fair" by Richard Nash. It is about a 17 year old girl named Lee who is a young Jewish student that has been battling with discrimination.
At first, I kind of didn't want to work on this monologue, because I felt like I had no real connection to it in reality. I'm not Jewish, and I've never been persecuted about my religion. I felt like it would almost be out of place for me to work on this monologue.
After a meeting with my community (Sabrina, Viviana, and Grace), I realized that I actually did have a deeper connection than I thought to the monologue. Someone in my community brought up that I can use any time in my life that I've been persecuted in this monologue, and I agree, I totally can.
I also learned that although I have no real attachment to the monologue (since again, I am not Jewish), this monologue is one of the first that actually makes me feel something. It's hard to describe, but I truly feel everything every time I read or practice this monologue. It's kind of terrifying in a way. If this is the first time I'm really feeling something in a monologue, what about all the other ones I've been doing all my life? That scares me. But in the beginning of this quarter I told myself to try everything that scares me, so I guess I'm pretty glad it does.
After a meeting with Luke, I was ready to start working on it. Luke gave me some worksheets with vocabulary that was kind of like an outline of the book he gave me, and he also taught me a new memorization technique that's been working pretty well.
I've been working on the monologue now as often as I can, and I'm really enjoying it. So far this has been the most emotional monologue experience for me, and I don't exactly know what's going to happen next with it, but I do know that so far I like the way it's currently going and I hope it continues.
At first, I kind of didn't want to work on this monologue, because I felt like I had no real connection to it in reality. I'm not Jewish, and I've never been persecuted about my religion. I felt like it would almost be out of place for me to work on this monologue.
After a meeting with my community (Sabrina, Viviana, and Grace), I realized that I actually did have a deeper connection than I thought to the monologue. Someone in my community brought up that I can use any time in my life that I've been persecuted in this monologue, and I agree, I totally can.
I also learned that although I have no real attachment to the monologue (since again, I am not Jewish), this monologue is one of the first that actually makes me feel something. It's hard to describe, but I truly feel everything every time I read or practice this monologue. It's kind of terrifying in a way. If this is the first time I'm really feeling something in a monologue, what about all the other ones I've been doing all my life? That scares me. But in the beginning of this quarter I told myself to try everything that scares me, so I guess I'm pretty glad it does.
After a meeting with Luke, I was ready to start working on it. Luke gave me some worksheets with vocabulary that was kind of like an outline of the book he gave me, and he also taught me a new memorization technique that's been working pretty well.
I've been working on the monologue now as often as I can, and I'm really enjoying it. So far this has been the most emotional monologue experience for me, and I don't exactly know what's going to happen next with it, but I do know that so far I like the way it's currently going and I hope it continues.
Wednesday, May 2, 2012
Monologue Studies
Since I forgot to blog yesterday and I'm due for a blog today, here's both days in one.
Tuesday:
I was working on my song when I realized that I really just couldn't do it anymore. I was getting bored with it, and kind of fed up with not succeeding. So, I stopped writing.
My problem? I never figured out my "side salad" project to work on when I'm not writing. So, I stopped by Luke's office and he told me to do something with acting and handed me a book called "The Monologue Audition: A Practical Guide for Actors" by Karen Kohlhass. From then on I started reading the book and working on my "side salad" project, which is monologues.
This book gave me all the basics for studying and performing monologues. On one page it gave a checklist that I now swear by before starting to act and it was this: "Who is the monologue addressing? Where is it found in the play? What happened up to this point in the play? Why is this character speaking this monologue now? What does the character want the other character(s) to do as a result of this monologue? What are the stakes? Does the character succeed or fail?" Along with these guidelines, there was a sample monologue in the point of view of a girl telling this boy named Johnny that she's always loved him. At first I thought that these introductory questions could really only apply to this particular monologue, but I realized as I started to search a few more up to test it, that the questions go with just about every monologue, and make it extremely easy to figure out your objective in the scene and how you should act it to the fullest extent. I really liked these points on the checklist, and I'm finding myself use them with all of the monologues I've been finding.
One thing in the book that really caught my eye and that I found really helpful was a technique the author described as "finding and isolating the climax," meaning taking the most intense part of the monologue, and making it it's own section and working around it. The author also used the same monologue about the girl loving that boy Johnny and applied it to this as well. She first left the monologue as is, and only bolded what she felt was the "climax" of the scene, which happened to be the line "Why didn't it happen between us? Why did I fail?" After this on a new page, she broke the scene into parts, still leaving the climax bolded and wrote about how each scene should be felt or acted based on what the climax line was. In this case, it was her complaining that they were never together, no matter how hard she tried. So the author wrote that in order to really make the climax line big, to portray the rest of the monologue as a "bitter happiness" so that the audience knows that the relationship never worked out from the beginning.
I also read a little about auditioning, and what to look out for and what to look for in an audition, and all of it was really helpful. I've decided I really really like this "side salad" project, and it's a really great break away from my songwriting project because it's something completely different.
Wednesday:
I continued reading a little more of the book today, but I got a little bored with it, so I decided that it was time to start looking for some actual monologues to work on, now that I really know the basics.
While talking to Luke, I learned that monologues from monologue books are completely frowned upon in the art world, and that the chances of even being chosen for a job while using a monologue from a book is slim. He advised me that the best way to find a monologue is to pull it from an actual play, because that's your best chance at finding a good monologue. He told me that you can sometimes find monologues from plays online, but the chances are slim, and you need to do really good research. So, that's what I decided to do. Really good research.
I found a few monologues from some plays that I want to try, but I know that I defiantly want to work on one comedic and one serious monologue, so that I learn how to master both ends of the spectrum. I used this website:
http://www.stageagent.com/Shows/Monologues/
to really start my research in serious monologues, since I already have a comedic monologue in mind from the Off-Broadway Musical "Most Likely To: The Senior Superlative Musical" that is really funny and that I like a lot.
I learned a lot today while researching monologues, and how hard it is to find a really good one. I can't wait to find one that I really fall in love with and then dive into working on it. I haven't worked on a monologue in a really long time, and I'm excited to get back into it with my new found knowledge. I think I can pull off two really good monologues if I try really hard, and that's exactly what I intend to do.
Tuesday:
I was working on my song when I realized that I really just couldn't do it anymore. I was getting bored with it, and kind of fed up with not succeeding. So, I stopped writing.
My problem? I never figured out my "side salad" project to work on when I'm not writing. So, I stopped by Luke's office and he told me to do something with acting and handed me a book called "The Monologue Audition: A Practical Guide for Actors" by Karen Kohlhass. From then on I started reading the book and working on my "side salad" project, which is monologues.
This book gave me all the basics for studying and performing monologues. On one page it gave a checklist that I now swear by before starting to act and it was this: "Who is the monologue addressing? Where is it found in the play? What happened up to this point in the play? Why is this character speaking this monologue now? What does the character want the other character(s) to do as a result of this monologue? What are the stakes? Does the character succeed or fail?" Along with these guidelines, there was a sample monologue in the point of view of a girl telling this boy named Johnny that she's always loved him. At first I thought that these introductory questions could really only apply to this particular monologue, but I realized as I started to search a few more up to test it, that the questions go with just about every monologue, and make it extremely easy to figure out your objective in the scene and how you should act it to the fullest extent. I really liked these points on the checklist, and I'm finding myself use them with all of the monologues I've been finding.
One thing in the book that really caught my eye and that I found really helpful was a technique the author described as "finding and isolating the climax," meaning taking the most intense part of the monologue, and making it it's own section and working around it. The author also used the same monologue about the girl loving that boy Johnny and applied it to this as well. She first left the monologue as is, and only bolded what she felt was the "climax" of the scene, which happened to be the line "Why didn't it happen between us? Why did I fail?" After this on a new page, she broke the scene into parts, still leaving the climax bolded and wrote about how each scene should be felt or acted based on what the climax line was. In this case, it was her complaining that they were never together, no matter how hard she tried. So the author wrote that in order to really make the climax line big, to portray the rest of the monologue as a "bitter happiness" so that the audience knows that the relationship never worked out from the beginning.
I also read a little about auditioning, and what to look out for and what to look for in an audition, and all of it was really helpful. I've decided I really really like this "side salad" project, and it's a really great break away from my songwriting project because it's something completely different.
Wednesday:
I continued reading a little more of the book today, but I got a little bored with it, so I decided that it was time to start looking for some actual monologues to work on, now that I really know the basics.
While talking to Luke, I learned that monologues from monologue books are completely frowned upon in the art world, and that the chances of even being chosen for a job while using a monologue from a book is slim. He advised me that the best way to find a monologue is to pull it from an actual play, because that's your best chance at finding a good monologue. He told me that you can sometimes find monologues from plays online, but the chances are slim, and you need to do really good research. So, that's what I decided to do. Really good research.
I found a few monologues from some plays that I want to try, but I know that I defiantly want to work on one comedic and one serious monologue, so that I learn how to master both ends of the spectrum. I used this website:
http://www.stageagent.com/Shows/Monologues/
to really start my research in serious monologues, since I already have a comedic monologue in mind from the Off-Broadway Musical "Most Likely To: The Senior Superlative Musical" that is really funny and that I like a lot.
I learned a lot today while researching monologues, and how hard it is to find a really good one. I can't wait to find one that I really fall in love with and then dive into working on it. I haven't worked on a monologue in a really long time, and I'm excited to get back into it with my new found knowledge. I think I can pull off two really good monologues if I try really hard, and that's exactly what I intend to do.
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