A lot has happened in the past few weeks. I was sad to learn that I did not get cast in either of the two shows I auditioned for but I’m learning how things work and I think it is for the best. I wasn’t really passionate about either of the shows and I already have a lot going on and the plate is filling up. It’s about time – I was starting to watch movies without falling asleep in the first 20 minutes… definitely an indication that I have too much time on my hands. What is nice, however, is that the extra time has allowed me to explore the city, see some shows, work out more, and even take a dance class – I’m taking musical theatre dance… I know you wish you were a fly in the wall of that room. This weekend I got to head downtown … I ended up spending the day in Central Park and exploring the neighborhoods uptown. There was a great dog festival of some kind in the park that was hilarious to watch. I don’t think you can ever get enough of seeing dogs with shoes on all four paws or tiny hooded sweatshirts. Somehow I don’t think Leuven would fit in with that crowd. That night I saw a comedy show in the east village which was pretty good (especially for $5!). On Sunday I became a member of the Westchester county art society. I had been asked to work an event at the school library – basically pouring drinks at an art gallery opening. It was great – I ended up meeting a lot of artists and chatting it up with the locals (I even gave out my digits – to an older woman who wanted me to work for her at her next gallery opening) … not a bad way to make some quick cash, drink wine, and get cultured all at the same time!

I’m funny! Who knew?
Despite my initial disappointment with general auditions, I did, however, audition for the comedy troupe on campus, Lampoon, and was offered a spot in the troupe! This was really exciting for me – while I’ve done a lot of comedic improve with BIG (Baltimore Improv Group http://www.bigimprov.org/ ), I’ve never done sketch comedy (think SNL). Lampoon seems to be a combination of both. We actually had to submit a sketch for the audition, and since I have no experience in that, I was a little nervous about my first attempt at the writing gig. But I guess it worked – let’s all hope to god that my comedy writing improves or this could make for a very long year. Anyway, I meet with the troupe tomorrow night for the first time – more to come!

Getting Naked with the Bard…
Additionally, I have joined forces with three of my fellow first year theatre grad students to create a brand new theatre company on campus. The company is called The Shakespeare Naked and will involve two troupes – one all-male and one all-female. The troupes will practice separately – spending the rest of the first semester working to build and strengthen their work as an ensemble and finally choosing one Shakespearean play for both troupes to rehearse. The second semester will be spent rehearsing the two separate productions, which will be presented to the community in April. We are both working on the same play for a few reasons – one to explore the differences in the single-gender interpretations (obviously cross-dressing is involved as they did back when these plays were first presented), and also to allow us to play as one full company – mixing the casts by either a performance in which the audience decides who plays which character or some other idea like that.

I’m really excited about this project. I believe it’s really a challenging endeavor and I think it will be a big success. Besides my improv group, I’ve never worked in an ensemble based setting – typically I do plays with casts that only work together with the sole purpose of creating a final product so there is little time to develop craft and build a true group dynamic. Moreover, Shakespeare has always been a bit intimidating to me. I don’t have a great amount of experience with it so I know this will push me to explore classical text. It feels like blasphemy to say this around a theatre crowd but for years I really didn’t even like Shakespeare. In the past few years I’ve begun to grow a stronger appreciation for it but it takes time to do so. It’s a shame because so many productions are done badly and are therefore a huge turn off to many popular audiences (which was the case for me). So, our goal (as the company’s title implies) is to strip down the text and really get into the essence of what has made Shakespeare to be referred to as the greatest playwright of all time. The show will be produced with minimal sets, costumes, and props – with direct focus on the acting and themes of the play. Alright – I’ll get off the Shakespeare soap box and move on. Anyway, that’s the big project lately.

-Academia-

Acting Up
Riiight… so besides the aforementioned goings on, I’m still taking classes. Overall, they’re going well. It’s definitely starting to pick up in pace. Currently I’m working on a number of scenes and monologues (and even poems) for a few of my classes – scenes from Othello, Agnes of God, Spike Heels, and Danny and the Deep Blue Sea; monologues from The Altruists, Hamlet, and Look Back in Anger; and poems – “She Walks in Beauty” and Shakespeare’s sonnet 130. I thought it would be tough to keep them all straight – memorizing at least, but I’m getting the hang of it. I think my favorite “assignment” as of yet was preparing and performing “Green Eggs & Ham” by Dr. Seuss (the teacher is trying to get us to play around with rhyme when we work on Shakespeare but since I read the book to my little brother at least 5 times a night for about a year when he was younger, this was like second-nature to me). I do so like that Sam-I-am!

Life is a Cabaret
I’m really loving my Singing Workshop class. We work on a new song every week – any song we want so long as it could possibly be performed in a sort of cabaret setting. So far I’ve sung “Jimmy” (Thoroughly Modern Millie the musical), “You Don’t Know Me” (Ray Charles), “Makin’ Whoopee”, “Bette Davis Eyes” (Kim Carnes), “Rita’s Tune” (Sweet Smell of Success the musical), and the next two are “Knock on Wood” (Eddie Floyd) and “Lost & Found” (City of Angels the musical). It’s a blast – it was a little nerve wracking at first because everyone in the class is very very talented but I’m beginning to loosen up and just have fun with it. If you have any requests, let me know :)

Shadowland
Ahhh puppetry class. Contrary to popular belief, I’m not the most skilled at arts and crafts. Ok, so it’s definitely more involved than tracing my hand and adding colored feathers to make a turkey – that I could do. I just don’t have an eye for shadow puppetry. I appreciate it as an art form – more so now that I realize how inept I am at it – but I think I need to be a little more patient when working with a utility knife (I don’t even think that’s what it’s called – box cutter maybe?) Anyway, I’m currently working on a mini-shadow puppet show with another girl in the class. It involved two characters murdered accidentally and the killer driving off into the sunset with a song from the Pulp Fiction soundtrack in the background. Yeah, definitely a disaster. However, I did have to do a research project and presentation on shadow puppetry styles in China, India, and Indonesia (which turned out to be an hour because my topic was so massive – I really do have a problem with curbing information). So, despite the many hours spent in the library and creating a 50 + page power point, I have learned to love it as an art. It’s really pretty cool and I’d like to one day see a live performance. Point of the story – if you’re ever in China, India, or Indonesia, and the tour guide tries to sell you on one of the many tourist attractions, I highly recommend the shadow puppet shows!

Alright, while I’d love to stay and chat, it’s time for some reading. Hope you all are well. Anyone up for a visit soon? Let me know!

To fill you in...

As September draws to a close, I figured what better way to spend a Saturday night than to create a blog - I know you envy my life already just in knowing how I spend my night off. So, I have been meaning to e-mail friends and family for a while now to fill everyone in on how the school year has begun. The last time I did anything like this was when I studied abroad and I'd write lengthy (to put it mildly) e-mails about my travels around Europe. So, after recalling how my brother Joe mocked my travel novels, rather than bombard your inbox with e-mails you probably don't want to/have time to read, I decided to create a blog for anyone who is interested in knowing what I'm doing and if it was worth it to invest two years and an exorbitant amount of money into earning my MFA. I hope you enjoy the light reading.

What I'm doing:

I'm at Sarah Lawrence College, a small liberal arts school in Bronxville, NY (just north of the city). I'm going for my Masters of Fine Arts in Theatre with an Acting concentration. There are about 18 theatre grad students total but about 130 undergrads who also take theatre classes. It's a two year program and, while I have very clear ideas about what I want to do with the degree, my hope is that throughout my time here I'll learn and discover new things that may completely reroute my career plans.

For now, if you ask me what my current goals are, I have three ideas:

1. To teach at the undergraduate level or to teach acting at a conservatory/arts-focused high school.
2. To serve as an educational director at a professional theatre. While there I'd like to create and run an after school theatre/acting program for inner-city and/or underprivileged children. As a lot of city schools don't have funding for the arts, I'd love to find a way to give kids that outlet.
3. To act on the professional level (without waiting tables all my life).

Now, with that said, if Saturday Night Live calls me asking to replace Tina Fey, you can assume the aforementioned goals go right out the window. :)

So, how to reach these goals? While my focus is acting, I can also take classes in other theatre disciplines (a major reason I liked Sarah Lawrence) - such as playwriting, directing, design, production, dance, etc. However, for my first year I've stuck to focusing mainly on performance based classes.

I'm taking 7 classes (on average theatre grads take 6 to 8 classes) and private voice lessons once a week. These are the course descriptions of the classes I'm enrolled in:

• Acting the Poetic Text: The emotional, vocal, and physical demands of acting in poetic plays are extreme. In order to rise to the challenge of performing in such works, the actor’s instrument must be capable of expressing poetry. The objectives of this course are to explore various techniques designed to tap and release the actor’s raw passion, to develop the physical stamina necessary to perform poetic text, and to work toward creating a performance vocabulary appropriate to the scale of poetic text. Particular attention will be paid to honing the skills necessary to speak complex language with clarity and precision. We will begin with the works of Shakespeare and move backward and forward in time, depending on the composition and the specific needs of the class. The course culminates in a performance project. This class meets twice a week.
• Singing Workshop: We will explore an actor’s performance with songs and various styles of popular music, music for theatre, cabaret, and original work emphasizing communication with the audience and material selection. Dynamics of vocal interpretation and style also will be examined. This course requires enrollment in a weekly voice lesson and an Alexander Technique course. Class members will be selected by audition during registration week. This class meets once a week.
• Comedy Workshop: This is an exploration of the individual’s comic voice and the classic structures of comedy. It begins with a focus on improvisation and ensemble. Theatre games, status play, storytelling, and the Harold Exercise develop the artist’s freedom and confidence. The second semester introduces the students to commedia dell’arte characterization, vaudeville comic and straight partnering, political satire, and parody. The workshop produces a Comedy Night at the end of the year. Each student performs five minutes of stand-up comedy in a club atmosphere. This class meets twice a week.
• Alexander Technique: The Alexander Technique is a neuromuscular system that re-educates and enables the student to identify and change poor and inefficient habits, which may be causing stress and fatigue. With gentle hands-on guidance and verbal instruction, the student learns to replace faulty habits with improved coordination by locating and releasing undue muscular tensions. This includes the ease of the breath and the effect of coordinated breathing on the voice. An invaluable technique that connects the actor to his or her resources for dramatic intent. This class meets once a week.
• Linklater Voice Training: Students will begin to open the channels of communication as physical and psychological tensions release. Using technical and imagistic exercises, students will open their connection to breath, develop resonance and range, increase sensitivity to their creative impulse, and strengthen their voice. There are two separate sections (and times) for this course, and each meets once a week
• An Intuitive and Impulsive Exploration of Text: A Useful Tool for Actors and Directors: This course strives to release the creativity of each student through intuitive and impulsive responses to text—primarily plays, film scripts, and poems—and to discover the practical uses of this approach to acting and directing in theatre and film. The participants will do exercises, scene work, and a year-end performance with a view toward increasing their ease, imagination, spontaneity, and power. Although physically demanding and largely visceral, the course work will provide an enlarged intellectual and conceptual understanding of acting and performance. This class meets once a week for five hours.
• Puppet Central: Through puppetry, this course will develop student’s skills as directors, writers, and performers and encourage the pleasures and rigors of creativity in a performing medium. Students will research and study a global range of puppet styles and forms—Western models like hand, rod, and string puppets, as well as Eastern practices like Indonesian shadow, Japanese Bunraku, among others. Contemporary construction methods and a variety of manipulation techniques will be explored. Students will build a short, original puppet piece from the ground up. They will design and construct the puppets, write the scripts (or scenarios), choreograph, rehearse, and publicly present short works in progress. This class meets for four consecutive hours, which includes a two-hour lab, once a week.

Now that you have the descriptions of the classes, here are my thoughts:

My professors are amazing. They all have incredible backgrounds and expertise. Many of them act/direct/write on a professional basis in the city as well so they're a great collective resource. My comedy teacher, Christine Ferrell, is my newest hero. She's a terrific teacher, is currently acting in a show off-Broadway. Her passions are improv, comedy, acting, and teaching - I want to be her someday. The teacher for the class with the really long name (Intuitive.. bla bla bla) is Ed Sherin. Ed has directed Broadway shows for decades and was the executive producer for Law and Order for ten years. His wife is Jane Alexander (which I had no idea and actually saw her with him last week!) I am excited to get to know all my professors - more to come on them. I do like all my classes. Comedy is my favorite, we're doing improv now and I enjoy working with all the students - very different skill levels but all very funny. Singing Workshop follows right behind (though it makes me nervous - the talent in that class is amazing.. i feel like I'm in an episode of American Idol every Thursday afternoon. The first day of class I realized that we had been expected to bring in a song. I told the teacher, Dave, that I hadn't brought music. He told me to use the audition song I prepared and had me go first to try it out. Thanks. So I sang the song "Jimmy" from Thoroughly Modern Millie. I felt ok about it until everyone after me rocked out some blues number. I learned quickly. Last week I did "You Don't Know Me" (a Ray Charles song) and my next one will be the 80s classic "Bette Davis Eyes" - look out Kim Carnes. Linklater and Alexander Technique are great. Both are very low key, relaxing classes that basically aim to give an actor more ease and comfort yet physical and vocal strength when performing. The poetic text class is challenging for me because we're dealing mostly with Shakespeare, Hamlet to be exact. And Shakespeare has never been my strength - well, I just don't have a lot of experience performing his works. And (don't laugh) but Puppet Central is definitely going to be the most challenging. It requires a huge amount of creativity and a sense for choreography and movement. Next time you see Kermit the Frog, think of me.

When not in class, I also work about ten hours a week at the Sports Center at the front desk. It's pretty easy and it gives me a chance to get work done.

I'm living in Bronxville in a two-floor apartment in a three-story house. It is a 10-minute walk to school and a 5-10 minute walk to town and the train station. The Metro-North Railroad is what I use to go into the city. It's about a 30 minute ride and trains usually leave twice an hour or so. The train is about $11 roundtrip so it's not bad. The town is very nice, almost remind you of The Stepford Wives for its extreme degree of perfection. Good restaurants, cute (but expensive) shops, a handful of bars, a movie theatre, etc. I live with two guys - one graduated from the grad writing program last year and works in the city and the other is in his second year of the writing program. However, I don't see them all that often because I'm on campus quite a bit.

So, how am I doing?

It's definitely been an adjustment. It feels like college all over again except not as carefree. I miss Eli and Leuven a lot, my friends and family, Baltimore, some of my students, having my own place, a steady paycheck. I don't miss dorm parenting, living in the suburbs, driving myself nuts with a 24/7 job, or faculty meetings. I love being so close to the city. I walk everywhere I've seen 2 Broadway shows already, enjoy not driving all the time. I'm anxious to see how the year progresses - work load, shows, classes, etc. I had auditions last week for the fall season of plays. I got called back for a show but will find out tomorrow if I made it. I am also auditioning for the comedy troupe on campus on Monday night. I'll keep you posted.

So, that's the long and short of it (more the long) for right now. Miss you all!!!