...and Then Some

I had a good exercise tonight. I felt kind of unprepared and I guess in a way it showed, but in another way, I had a good exercise. There was one specific detail in my back story that I hadn't quite figured out and I think that is what ended up doing me in. But I wasn't really done in. The preparation work I did was good. I just could have done more. And I could have let more of it show. I think I sort of skimmed over the "how does it make you feel" question and focused a lot on the urgency of the situation. But I think I had a good balance of getting my activity done and staying engaged with my partner. I was identifying things in her, I think perhaps even more than she was identifying things in me. I probably could have tried harder to get her to leave me alone so I could finish, but that didn't feel right. And like the teacher said, I needed to let more of my back story show. In my story, I royally fucked up. Big time. But the class didn't see that because I didn't show that. Or I didn't show it enough. I didn't feel enough shame. I was confounded and confused and disappointed in myself, but I wasn't completely, utterly ashamed of what I had done. And I needed to get there before the exercise started. I also could have prepped my props better, and myself. Which I'll know for next time. I'm already building the story for my next one and I think it is also going to be good.

The exercises that happened before mine were interesting. A lot of my classmates are confused by these new exercises. I almost feel weird saying I'm not. I think I get it now that the first class was about getting us in tune with ourselves so we know what our impulses are and we get comfortable exploring the uncomfortable places in a public(ish) setting. Now we are adding in more and more elements of the Theatre with a Capital T, but still trying to hold onto the following impulses bit. As in, my impulse as Kitty, with all of Kitty's life experiences, might be to laugh when someone calls me beautiful. Whereas if I put in the imaginary circumstances that I am not me and I just tried to sleep with my sister's potential boss so that he would give her the job, I might get angry and hurt and start crying if someone calls me beautiful because I'm feeling dirty and shameful and want to hide from the world. It is still a truthful impulse, just fueled by different circumstances. These exercises are designed to give us different fuel because as actors, we will never be ourselves on stage. I had an improv teacher tell me once that given the choice, always play a character in improv exercises because they are much more interesting than you are. The combination of these two classes is helping us get to a place where we can infuse as much emotional life and truth into a character that is the absolute opposite of ourselves as we have as regular everyday people.

I got a lot of positive commentary from the teacher today. And the criticisms were constructive ones and I think she enjoyed giving them. There is a part of me that thinks she chose me to work tonight because she likes to see me work and/or thinks I have potential. There were a couple of rough exercises and when she asked if I was prepared to work tonight, I think she did so thinking that mine could be a good, energizing exercise. Like after you have a mediocre dance with someone, you seek out one of your favorite partners to have a really good dance. There was part of me that felt like I was the really good dance tonight and that felt amazing. By no means did I nail it. But I did good work and got good comments that I can use to make my next exercise even stronger.