Not Quite Grad School

Fearless

2012-01-30T10:42:00.001-06:00

Bold.
Brave.
Fearless.
Ballsy.
A force to be reckoned with.

These are all ways in which my most recent performances were described. I played two characters in two different short plays as part of an evening of one-acts, and I was called bold, brave, fearless, ballsy, and a force to be reckoned with by my directors, by the writers, by my fellow performers, and by audience members - both people I knew and people I didn't. And while I love that these huge, beautiful words were used to describe my performance, I have no idea how to take them. I'm humbled by them. As far as I'm concerned, I was just doing my job.

I've been called fearless before. A fellow student of mine from my college years wrote several years after we graduated that he remembered me as fearless. And then in response to these characters I just played, I was called fearless by so many people. It strikes me as a bit odd because there are a lot of things I am afraid of. I'm afraid I'll never have kids. I'm afraid of singing a capella in front of people. Sometimes I have panic attacks and am afraid to leave the safety of my living space. I'm afraid that my cat isn't getting everything he should out of life and that it's my fault. I'm afraid I'll never be anything more than what I am right now.

But when it comes to performance, I don't think that getting up on stage wearing short-shorts and a red sequined halter top qualifies as me being fearless. I appreciate that others see it that way, but to me, fear doesn't factor in there. This was the case of being offered a character who had the potential to be amazing - she only has three pages of script, but volumes and volumes of character to create - and me accepting that challenge. As part of that challenge, I would have to be scantily clad on stage in front of 50 people a night. That wasn't really the hard part. The hard part was going out there in the other piece as a woman who felt totally justified in killing her husband, yet making her a sympathetic character so hopefully the audience walks away thinking she was justified, too. Or at least not wanting to condemn her. The hard part is going out on stage as a woman who knows the only good thing she ever did in her life was create a child who can create beauty, yet who still has to show her face in public. But as actors, aren't those exactly the kinds of challenges we seek out? Don't we all salivate at the thought of getting to play a sympathetic killer or a person who has been completely broken but has to live on day to day anyway? Don't we, as performers, live for that release that happens on stage when all of the bad stuff gets to come gushing out? Don't we live for being completely emotionally exposed and raw and in the moment on stage?

Maybe that's what people mean when they say I'm fearless. That I love those challenges. That I live for those challenges. That I throw myself upon those challenges with everything I've got and whatever production values come with the opportunity to be that emotionally present. If that's what they mean, I will take that word and wear it with pride. Because it does take a lot to expose oneself like that in front of a room full of people, no matter what you're wearing. And I am so blessed when I have that opportunity to try, that I'm going to embrace that opportunity whenever it comes knocking at my door.

Thank you for knocking at my door, Opportunity.

Imperfections

2011-07-14T09:17:00.002-05:00

I think in a weird way, as actors, we spend the entire rehearsal process trying to get everything right and then the entire run of the show cataloging all of the things that went wrong. We mark the time and remember the performances by whatever sort of catastrophe happened on any given night. Perhaps because they help us identify one performance from the next, perhaps out of some sort of disappointment that for all of our rehearsal work it still didn't turn out right, or perhaps because sometimes its just plain funny when things happen in the middle of a show.

I think I've mentioned here before that I'm in a production of Hamlet at the moment. We are only four performances in, but already, there was Opening Night, The Show Wherein Hamlet Died With His Hand On My Boob, The Show Wherein The Sword Hit Me In The Head And Landed In My Hand, and The Show With Sound Issues Wherein I Had Only Once Scene In Which I Did Not Mess Up A Line. I've also managed to get make-up on the costumes of at least two of my cast mates, I got my foot stepped on, the main exit door keeps sticking for people which makes furious exits kind of comical, and the skull was tossed and dropped one night which made people chuckle.

The thing that strikes me is that the audience seldom notices this stuff. I had seven friends in the audience the night the sword hit me in the head and landed in my hand, and not one of them noticed. Which I guess is a good thing because I'm dead at that point and shouldn't be pulling focus so if they are staring at the sword in a dead lady's hand instead of the rest of the action in front of them, we're all doing something wrong. But it is that kind of stuff that I kind of like talking about after a show. I like the silly backstage stories about how I got a SEVERE case of the giggles last night before scene 2.2 and was afraid I wouldn't be able to look Guildenstern in the eye on stage. Or the little dance that Rosencrantz does every night before 3.1. Or the moment of panic that happened at the top of the show when every single sound cue from the entire show started playing all at the same time and we're all in the bathroom trying to figure out how to start the show without the one sound cue that is supposed to be there. And if we're lucky, the audience will never know about these little things. But they are, to me, what makes live theater so much fun. They are what bring us together as cast mates. No, we're not facing dangerous crises like, say, soldiers in the Middle East are, but we run into obstacles all of the time that we have to figure out how to get past. And we do. And the audience applauds. And we get to feel good knowing that we conquered the giggles or the tech problems or the missed entrances or the people stomping around upstairs or the people in the second row chatting away through the whole performance and put up a good show anyway.

Though I'll admit, last night did not feel like a good show for me. I messed with my routine. My routine is never the same for two different shows, but within the framework of one show, I do get a little set in what I do. What can I say? I'm a creature of habit. But last night, I walked to the theater instead of taking the bus because it was gorgeous outside and I hate the bus. I did my warm-ups downstairs instead of upstairs. And I honestly felt a little not-ready when the stage manager called places instead of telling us we would be holding five minutes for the house. And then the weird sound cue at the top of the show...I just felt off of my game. Which means tonight, I'll go back to my regular routine and hopefully, all will be well. And I'll be totally ready to be stepped on or kicked or hit with a sword or for my flashlight to not work or my prop to be in the wrong place or to fall out of my chair or something.

I love live theater.

Ah, the Roles We Play

2011-06-09T09:03:00.002-05:00

It's funny how much responsibility we give to actors, given that they are supposed to just show up somewhere and do their job. Yes, as actors we have to be prepared to do that job, but ultimately, we have to report to someone else and fulfill that person's vision. That person is called the director. Or the producer. Or both. Thing is, I can do all of the homework in the world, I can show up with a million ideas, but if the director doesn't like any of them, I have to chuck them and go with what is best for this specific production. As actors, we have to be okay with that. As an actor, I am.

What I am not okay with is when my fellow actors in a production start telling me I've made the wrong choices. Beyond the fact that the first thing that they teach you in acting class is to not direct your fellow actors, as my scene partner, you are looking at the scene from a completely different direction than I am. Your character wants different things than mine. Your character has different experiences than mine. Your character's brain works differently than mine. This is why you were cast as that person and I was cast as this one. By the director. Or producer. Or both. Which is why when one of my fellow actors says something to me like, "I think you should do this," or "Wouldn't it be a better choice to try this?" what I hear is, "I don't want to have to work any harder to get what I want, so you need to change what you're doing."

Now, I understand that in every day life and every day relationships, people may say things like that to one another. "Honey, I think you should take out the garbage because I did last time." "You shouldn't drink so much." "Wouldn't it make more sense to put your pants on before you put your shoes on?" Okay, fine. Some of those are helpful suggestions. But depending on who these things are being said to, they can be offensive, belittling or condescending. If I'm changing my pants and the legs are wide enough that my shoes fit through them, it's actually a waste of time to take my shoes off and have to put them back on again. You don't know me. You don't know my pants. So just back off! Is how one could take that.

Same thing with acting. You've been focusing on your character; I've been focusing on mine. I know you want one thing to happen by the end of this scene, but I probably want something else. If we were both in agreement through the whole scene, it wouldn't be dramatic and nobody would write a play about it. If you don't give me what I want, I'm not necessarily going to give you what you want (depending on the script). If you're not getting what you want, you can change your tactics to try to get it. Or you can tell me I should just cave, which is, to me, the lazier choice. If the director thinks I should give in more, let the director walk me through that so it feels like I'm getting there on my own. I'll take it a lot better, it will feel more organic, it will feel mine as opposed to feeling forced. I know I can be the quiet type, but that doesn't mean I'm not considering things and thinking about things and processing what happens in each moment. It is your job as my scene partner to effect me and be affected by me. It is my job as your scene partner to effect you and be affected by you. If you are not affecting me in the way you want to be, I don't think it is fair that I should have to change my reaction without you changing your tactics. So please don't ask me to. Leave that part to the director. It is his vision we're putting up here, and if he doesn't like it, he'll say something. You don't need to.

End rant.

Can play...

2011-04-05T08:51:00.002-05:00

Being an actor is weird. It's just weird. It forces you to think way too much about the stupidest little things about yourself.

I know you've all heard the stories about some 30-year old being cast as a high-schooler in something like the original "Beverly Hills, 90210." Stuff like that happens because while one might think, "They need a bunch of high school kids, so they should cast high school kids," sometimes the high school age kids who come in to audition can't act their way out of a paper bag or just aren't pretty enough to fit the aesthetic of the piece. So they look at slightly older actors who have the experience and maturity to handle the scripts, but who also still look young and pretty.

In Hollywood, young and pretty is essential. Or at the very least, it makes you marketable as an actor.

This sort of thing manifests in what actors/directors/agents refer to as an "age range." As in, you may be 36, but you could pass for anything from 23-45, largely depending on wardrobe, hair and make up.

I, however, find myself in a rather odd position. Physically, I am young and pretty. No, I don't have the lollipop figure that is so prized in Hollywood these days, but I have nice skin and giant eyes that don't have crow's feet or huge bags under them and healthy hair and all of that. My age range would probably be mid-twenties to mid-thirties. At least that's what I think I look like. I know a lot of people are shocked to find out I passed thirty already. A while ago.

But in the last three or four classes I have taken, my teachers have selected pieces for me to work on where my characters are in their forties or fifties. The play I'm currently in, my character is fifty-five. And last night, I was asked to read for Gertrude in "Hamlet," who I have always pictured as someone in her forties or fifties.

I don't look forty or fifty.

I'm not afraid to look forty or fifty. There is a part of me that is kind of anxious to get wrinkles and have my hair turn silver because I think I will make a gorgeous little old lady. But I'm not there yet. And I know why I'm being asked to read/perform these parts - I am a mature person who comes across as the sort who "has it together," and most 20-something type characters aren't very "put together." Directors are trying to match me with characters who fit me mentally and spiritually. And those characters are twenty years older than I actually am.

In a way, I guess I should be flattered that they think I can handle those kinds of roles. But there is a weird sort of mourning period that an actor goes through when she realizes her chance to play Ophelia or Juliet has passed and she will only ever be considered Gertrude or Lady Capulet. Granted, Lady Mac is awesome. And the character I'm playing now is awesome. And there are a lot of great roles for more mature women out there that I can look forward to playing for the rest of my life. But in a way, it makes me a little bit sad - I have the rest of my life to play Gertrude; if I'm ever going to be Ophelia, it has to be now.

And I have to wonder if it's worth it to take care of my skin and hair and all of that, to try to maintain a youthful appearance, if it's only going to confuse directors. I think a lot of them get my headshot and think, "She's cute, she could be our [insert romantic lead here]," but then when I walk in with confidence and whatever they think, "Oh, no, she's actually closer to the fading starlet, but she doesn't look old enough for it, so do we want to use her or go with someone more age appropriate?" Or something. I don't know. I've not talked to any of these directors about it, but I'm guessing it's confusing to get an actor who looks one way and performs another. So maybe I should just let myself go so I start to look older than I am, or maybe I should start acting more insecure so I can get the younger roles while I still look young enough to play them.

Or maybe I should just shut my big fat mouth and be grateful that I'm being considered for roles at all. Especially the challenging ones.

Monologues

2011-02-04T15:16:00.002-06:00

Okay, here's my thing about monologues. Monologues are the worst possible way to audition someone. They just are. Yet everyone continues to use them because they are the easiest for the auditors. Let me back up.

For those of you who don't know, a monologue is a piece of dialogue that just one character says. You've got one guy talking for an extended period of time with nobody else interrupting him, that's a monologue. You've got one dude by himself on stage "talking things out," that's a monologue (or sometimes a soliloquy). There are (in my mind) two basic types of monologues - storytelling monologues and active monologues.

A storytelling monologue usually starts with something like, "When I was four years old, I remember my daddy comin' in from the fields one day with a look on his face that I had never before seen in my life..." and continues on to tell the audience about this horrible day wherein the speaker learned that her mother died in a tragic tractor incident because daddy had been drinkin' too much again. It's a story. Which is what a lot of monologues are - stories. Think about a normal conversation. When you are speaking for a long time without anybody else interrupting, you're usually telling a story of some sort, yes? That's what these monologues are - they are an opportunity for the playwright to impart some important bits of information to us, the audience, about the character. And that's fine. Most acting teachers and coaches will tell you to stay away from these monologues for the purposes of an audition, though, because let's face it, they're boring. Unless you are going to re-inact finding your mother mutilated in the field and then flail your fists against the air as if it were your father's chest as you pounded on him in grief, they're boring. And nobody actually tells a story that way, so you really just end up looking silly acting out something that happened when you were three.

There are also active monologues wherein you are trying to get the other person in the scene with you to do something. Or, in the case of Hamlet's famous soliloquy, you are trying to figure out a puzzle that is driving you nuts. These are the monologues you should use for auditions (except maybe not Hamlet's soliloquy because it's been done a million times over and they do recommend you try to do something a smidge original, but let's face it, there are only so many Shakespeare monologues, right? He's not writing anything new at the moment). These monologues have actions and objectives and all of those lovely things that actors ask themselves (and their directors) about during the preparation. What do I want? What I am trying to achieve? How am I trying to get that with these words? And since you are often trying to get something from another party in these monologues, you have something to focus on, which is good.

Except when you use these monologues in an audition, there is nobody else on the stage with you. They usually tell you not to use the auditors as your point of focus either because auditors don't like being yelled at, sworn at, or (believe it or not) seduced in the middle of audition. So all of this time that you have been preparing yelling at your husband for not treating you the way you should be treated, you get there and there is no husband. You don't get to experience him walking away in the middle of your speech and having to use the next words to get his attention again. You don't get the feeling of him pushing you away from him to motivate screaming the next line at him. And if you do decide to scream the next line in the audition setting, you have a 50/50 chance of coming off as brilliant or as a complete psycho who has no business on stage.

So you walk into the audition room, with your pieces memorized and worked on with your coach or your teacher and you do them the way you prepared them for this particular audition. Which is not the way they would ever actually be performed if you were doing them in a show because when you take this paragraph out of context, it needs a little tweaking to hold up as a real piece. And of course, in the real show, you'd have the reactions of your fellow actors to work off of and the appropriate costume, but you have to go into the audition knowing that they're not holding that against you because they just want to see you and what you can do. Except it's not really you because if it was you, you'd be wearing your favorite jeans and flip flops (which are NOT real shoes, I don't care how many bows and flowers and sparkly things you put on them) and your hair would be in a messy ponytail because you didn't have time to shower after going to the gym and you would never be saying these words anyway. So what the auditor is NOT seeing is you. They're not seeing how you work. They're not seeing how you perform. They're not even necessarily seeing what you would do with this character because it's highly likely that any impulses you once had about this person have been coached right out of you in order to make the piece "audition ready." They are seeing you walk into a room, spout some words, and leave, all the while trying to be exactly what they are looking for.

You know what? You will never be exactly what they are looking for. Never. Or maybe once out of every ten thousand auditions you go to will you fit the bill exactly as you walk in with your obscure Russian monologue that nobody has ever heard of before. And you will not be what they are looking for because while you may nail that obscure Russian monologue, they are not doing that obscure Russian play. They are doing some contemporary clowning piece and really want to know if you can move and speak. You walked into the room without falling down - hooray! You have a voice that carries - hooray! If you pass those hurdles, you might make it to callbacks if they happen to be looking for a white female of average height and weight with shoulder-length hair. This is why they give you sides to read at a callback - so they can see if you really are what they are looking for. What do you do with this specific character? What are your impulses in this particular setting when you have not had the life coached out of you yet? How do you work extemporaneously with people you've never met before?

I don't mean to rip on coaches or theaters that use monologues for auditions. Coaches are very helpful and can point out things you may have missed to take your performance to the next level. But I think it is important to note that no coach will make you "audition proof." No matter what it is they tell you to do, another coach or another director or another auditor will always want you to do something else. There is no perfect way to perform a monologue - there is always room for interpretation. And somebody is always going to want to see a different interpretation.

And theaters have a lot to think about when they are putting a show together. I have been to callbacks where they are just then deciding what sides people should read - there is a lot to take care of to prep for auditions. So yes, it is easy to ask people to come in with a monologue, and you can at least weed out who fell down when they walked in and who didn't. But I think it is far more useful to the theater, and helpful to the actor, to do auditions with sides. The actor gets to show what kind of work they put in to preparing a character - specifically the character you would like to see them play. And the director gets to see if the actor really is right for the gruff cowboy, or if he'd be better suited for the kindly saloon owner one step earlier in the process. It just eliminates the time used in evaluating monologues that you'll never ask to see again and that have little to nothing to do with the play at hand. Gets the ball rolling sooner, so to speak.

There are, of course, auditions for which assigning someone a specific character doesn't really work. Season generals, for example, when they might be looking to cast four or five shows at a time. There, they want to see your versatility as an actor so they might ask you to do pieces. Which means shorter pieces. With the thought processes sped up so you get them both in under two minutes. Taking them even farther away from an actual performance setting performance. I can see why monologues are kind of useful here, but still, they suck and there is going to be one auditor who loves you and one who thinks you should just go home. That's just the way it is.

I could just be grumpy today, and if that is the case, I apologize. Or maybe I just suck at doing monologues. I tend to get called back and/or cast more often when my auditions include reading from sides than doing monologues, so maybe I'm just prejudiced and if that is the case, I apologize. But I would like to find someone who thinks they are the greatest thing since sliced bread and have a chat with that person to find out why. Because very seldom is the theater about just one person. So why do we all have to work so hard to be just one person in order to get onto the team that is making this film/play/acrobatic stunt show happen?

I'm done venting. For now. Sorry.

Stage Kisses

2011-01-26T09:56:00.002-06:00

I kissed my teacher last night.

I proceeded to spend the rest of the evening freaking out about it.

My very first stage kiss was actually in an audition. I was called back for "Angels in America: Part 1" in college, and the scene I was reading was between Harper and her husband and has something in it about a "buddy kiss," and there is supposed to be a little..."buddy kiss." The kind of kiss a Mormon couple shares when the husband is gay and the wife is a drug addict. And I was reading with a man who is at least ten years older than me, who I had never worked with before (or hardly even met), but I had to go in for the "buddy kiss" and it was fine. Nerve wracking in a way, but fine, because at that point in my life, I really didn't have that much experience with kissing in general and here I was, new to my acting career, kissing a veteran actor who I'd just met, being called back for the female lead in a mainstage show at the end of my first year at college. There was a lot of pressure. But I think I did okay.

My second stage kiss was in a class in college - my second year of college. I was originally paired with a scene partner who decided he didn't need to come to class or rehearse with me outside of class, so I was re-partnered with a guy in the class who I actually had quite a crush on at the time. The scene was from "A Hatful of Rain," and I played a woman who is pregnant with her husband's child, but in love with my husband's brother. He played my husband's brother, who was also in love with me. At one point in the scene, he is supposed to go in for a kiss and I push him away with a sort of, "Kiss your brother's wife with that mouth?" kind of thing, and then he goes in for a real kiss a couple of lines later which actually lands. Well, in my first rehearsal with this new scene partner, we were sitting across the table from one another just reading the script. When it came time for his first move, he kind of leaned across the table like he was going to go for the kiss, which surprised me - I didn't know we were doing that in the read through. So a couple of lines later, when the kiss was supposed to happen, I decided I would be the polite actor and meet him halfway because it was kind of a big table and it just seemed like the nice thing to do. Silly me. We both went up for the kiss and ended up smashing faces. I think I split his lip in the collision. Not exactly the kind of stage kiss you want to have, especially not when it is a first impression of sorts on a new scene partner on whom you have a crush.

I have done many more stage kisses since then. And a fair amount of normal kissing, too. And for the most part, people tell me I'm good at it - men and women, because I have kissed both men and women. But I have to say, stage kisses are a strange sort.

With normal kisses, it's generally safe to say that both parties like each other, at least a little bit. First kisses can be a little scary, but you usually know that this is okay. Or the first one can be tentative to feel out where the other person is, with the more passionate kisses following later, once you both know you're on the same page. Yes, things like the taste of your breath and the softness of your lips factor in a bit, but there is some leeway there. If you really dig someone, you may kiss them even though they just had a cigarette and you don't smoke. Or, if this is someone you've been with for a long time, they know that your lips get chapped in the winter, so it's no big deal.

With stage kisses, this is something you have to do for the sake of the scene, regardless of how you feel about the other person or how the other person feels about you. You could loathe one another, but the script says you're madly in love, so you have to kiss. And you know that they don't want to any more than you do, but you suck it up and try to make it look good for the audience. Or maybe you really do like your scene partner, but your scene partner is married or involved with someone else. You want to put on a good show for the audience (and so it will affect your partner), but you don't want to be perceived as pushing it so far as to be inappropriate. Or perhaps your partner isn't attracted to people of your gender. There's that old adage from men doing sex scenes who say to their partners, "I'm sorry if I get turned on, and I'm sorry if I don't get turned on." In some ways, there's just no way to win in these situations. You just have to hope that your breath doesn't stink, that you don't split anyone's lip open, and that you can both just get through it with minimal damage.

And it's that much weirder when the stage kiss happens with your teacher.

So, to set the scene from last night's class, we were up on our feet doing our monologues. My piece is essentially about how much I want to screw over my sister. I'm tired of being overlooked (middle-child syndrome), my husband is dead, I killed the guy who killed my husband, I gouged a man's eyes out, and I now have my sites set on the dashing (and conniving) bastard son of the guy who's eyes I poked out. My sister wants him too, even though she already has a husband. So in my monologue, I'm talking to my sister's messenger/cabana boy, trying to get him to let me read this letter my sister wrote to the hot bastard son. And I'm supposed to give the messenger/cabana boy a token of some sort to give to the hot bastard son so when my sister sees it, she'll know I'm boinking him, too. "If you do find him, pray you give him this/And when your Mistress hears thus much from you/I pray desire her call her wisdom to her." Meaning, "When you see the bastard, give him this. And when my sister hears about it, hold on to your hats, boys, 'cuz she's gonna blow." So anyway.

In class last night, the teachers were coaching us through the monologues. In some cases, when a monologue is directed to someone specific, they will jump in and play the part of that someone specific so that we can have someone to focus on and get reactions out of and play with and whatnot. So the male teacher jumped in to play the messenger/cabana boy. He folded up a piece of paper (which was supposed to be the letter from my sister to the bastard that I want to read) and shoved it down the front of his pants. So I molested him. There is the line, "I'll love thee much," basically saying, "I'll screw your brains out if you let me read that letter," so it wasn't totally uncalled for. And when he shoved me off, I flew into a rage against him and my sister. By the line, "If you do find him, pray you give him this," I was angry and sexy and powerful and threatening, so the "this" was a kiss. I stormed over and kissed my teacher, so that he, as the messenger/cabana boy would have to either then go deliver my message by kissing the bastard, or he would have to tell my sister that I kissed the bastard (through him) or whatever. It put him in the lovely awkward position of having to deliver a message that he really doesn't have a good way to deliver. It was not a romantic kiss. It was a kiss of power and control and belittlement. And then I get to shove him off and tell him he should go kill the dude whose eyes I gouged out.

I have to admit, it was great. It felt great - the whole monologue felt great. It is a piece that kind of depends on the reactions of the man I'm talking to, and my teacher gave me a lot to work with which was fabulous. He's so fun! And in retrospect, I'm proud of myself for taking that chance. It has been a while since I got to do this. I'm understudying a show at the moment, so while I am going to rehearsals three times a week, I don't get to work while I'm there. I get to watch other people work. It is interesting to watch other people work and see their process, but it does tend to make me self-conscious about my process. Especially when I see how I would do things differently, but they were cast and I was not, that kind of thing. Anyway. It felt great to be back on my feet, moving about, taking chances, following impulses, going "balls out," so to speak. And the whole class really responded to it. The teachers said I did great work. It was a good class and I needed that.

But as soon as my monologue ended, I was mortified that I had kissed my teacher. Mortified. He is a professional actor. He has been on Broadway and various television shows and movies and he has the phone number of an author I really like in his cell phone. He has been to the Tonys. And here's me, still learning this craft, and I just go up and plant one on him in class? What the fuck gives me the right to invade his personal space like that?

The fact that I was in class gives me the right.

But still. I started freaking out about all of the stupid things, too - were my lips too tense? Should I have put on lip balm first? Did I have too much lip balm on? I wasn't as worried about my breath because it was a closed-mouth kiss, but still. All of those silly things you worry about when you kiss someone out of the blue were compounded by the fact that this is my teacher. I don't know that a director would ever block the scene so that Regan kisses Oswald there - I don't know if anyone would find that an appropriate action. But it was an impulse I had in the moment in the scene and he was there so I followed it and holy crap I kissed my teacher. In what context is that appropriate?

In the context that this was class and he was functioning as my scene partner in an attempt to get me to push my boundaries.

But he's my teacher. On whom I have an Artist Crush. I told my classmates during the break that I was mortified at what I had done and they were very supportive. And some teasing happened. They started trying to figure out ways they could work a kiss with the teacher into their pieces because let's face it, everyone who meets this man develops a crush on him of some sort. One guy was like, "Kissed the teacher: check!" Like a life goal had been accomplished. So I felt a little better about it. But still. I don't think I offended him or pissed him off or anything, but if I did, I apologize. I think we all know that it was the context of the scene and this power trip my character was on and really, I just want to someday be able to do a scene like this. But I grabbed his butt, too. Something about my performance last night had to be inappropriate on some level, and for that, I apologize.

Just between you and me, though, given the opportunity, I'd do the whole thing all over again.

Voice

2010-12-16T09:01:00.003-06:00

I had an audition last night that I was excited to get because it wasn't for a storefront theater, but a theater that actually has a little bit of a reputation. You may not have heard of it, but some people in the theater world have. And I don't mean to slight storefront theaters because some of them are really wonderful - this audition just felt like a little bit of a step up for me from what I have been doing (or trying to do). And yes, it was an audition for understudy positions, but still. It was a foot in the door, so to speak, so that felt good.

It didn't go as well as I hoped, but I didn't tank it, either. I don't think. They may think so. But they laughed during my first piece (which is comedic, so that's good) and they worked with me a little on my second, which was good. I kind of like it when auditors ask me to work on something because it means they see potential, they just want to try something else, and I get the opportunity to show them that I am directable. I'm still willing to bet that I don't get the part, but I'm glad I went.

One other thing that was interesting was that one of the auditors noticed a sort of hoarse quality to my voice and asked if that was normal. Thing is, I don't think it is, but I don't know. I told her I was a little dried out because I was - my sinuses are being kind of bipolar as of late. But it got me thinking about my voice.

There have been a couple other instances in the last year when I am trying to talk loudly enough to be heard in a bar or something like that wherein someone has asked me if I'm catching a cold or losing my voice. Which makes me wonder if the way I'm trying to project my voice is ripping it up. Or maybe I've ripped it up singing "Me and Bobby McGee" too many times. Who knows? But it did occur to me that at least last night, when I was doing my second piece and I was trying for the big, booming, full voice that I was also speaking in a very low register. I like to try to speak and sing in a low register. It might have something to do with my own weird denial of the fact that I am female and women have higher voices than men. See, most of the actors and musicians I look up to are male, and even the women I like sing too low for themselves. I can hit the high notes - I was singing along with "O, Holy Night" in the car the other day (because yes, I am listening to Christmas music this year) and I can hit those lovely high notes on the "Noels." But somehow, I have gotten it in my head that if I'm speaking from my diaphragm, pushing the sound out from my diaphragm through a relaxed and open throat and jaw, that the sound should be lower. Alto or tenor as opposed to soprano.

So maybe I just need to accept that my voice is higher than that. Maybe I am a soprano. And maybe if I am a soprano trying to speak like a tenor, that is why I sound hoarse - my voice doesn't want to go that low so it gets gravelly.

On my way home in the car, I did my monologues again, trying to stay in a medium-to-higher register, to try to convince myself that I can still be powerful if I sound like a girl. I think as long as the intention is there, it should work. I just need to get used to how it sounds.

Is it weird that I notice these things about myself? Do other actors have these kinds of discoveries based on a sort of off-hand comment made at an audition?

Stillness

2010-12-10T08:03:00.002-06:00

So I'm taking this Shakespeare monologue class and I'm loving it. The teachers are brilliant and wonderful and make it such a comfortable learning environment at the same time they push us to get to the crazy places. I love it. LOVE IT. If you are ever in need of a Shakespeare education, let me know and I'll put you in touch with these two. They are lovely.

The monologue I'm working on is by Hermione from "The Winter's Tale." She has been accused of adultery (of which she is innocent) and was thrown in prison by her husband, the King, where she gave birth to his kid which he doesn't think is his kid, so he had the baby sent out into the woods to "fend for itself" so to speak. And the monologue I'm doing is while she is on trial, he threatens her life if she is found guilty. So she basically responds with, "I'm not afraid to die because you have already taken away everything that I loved. But just know that I am innocent, and if you kill me, my kids will still know I am innocent and won't you feel silly then?" And the emotional place the teachers have been taking me to get into all of the shit that this woman has been put through is gut-wrenching (and I have to say, it's marvelous to get to sob like that once a week, especially if you have someone standing there right next to you with their hand on your back, one hand supporting your head that you have let drop forward, which is what happens in this class. Because yes, she is torn up, but she has to defend herself), but the bit I had not been paying any attention to is that this woman is the Queen. And she's standing in front of probably the whole town who are all judging her while she pleads not for her life, but for her name. As in, this is not the time or place for her to lose her shit. This is an instance when she needs to STAND AND LOOK AT THE DALEKS, so to speak. She needs the beautiful, calm fury of the Doctor punishing the Family of Blood. She needs to stay composed.

As actors, we are told that audition pieces should show a little bit of everything we can do. They are supposed to show us off. Which most of us think means including some kind of physical movement because most of us would like to show that we don't move like stick people. But here I am, working on a monologue that might be best served by standing absolutely still. So the teacher said to me, "Stillness is a choice." And it's perfect. It's beautiful in its simplicity. If I am still and calm as the Queen in my rage as I fight for my honor, I am that much more of a sympathetic character and my King is shown to be that much more of a lunatic for doing this to his wife, who still truly, truly loves him.

"Stillness is a choice."

And when I got home, I felt this kind of catharsis because in my regular life, especially in social situations, I am often still. Not because I'm not engaged, but because I am observing, or because I feel the need to balance out the craziness around me. So I felt justified in my life, almost like when I found that article about "How to Care for Your Introvert," that "made it okay" for me to be an introvert. It is okay if I am still sometimes.

I can't wait to try it again next week.

Nope

2010-11-22T10:53:00.001-06:00

And my streak of not getting cast continues.

The thing is, I know it is not for lack of ability and that is a huge thing for me to be able to admit that. It's something else. How I look with the lead guy or scheduling things or whatever. It is the intangibles that are out of my control at this point that seem to be getting in my way.

So of course, I look at myself and wonder what I can change about me that will make me more marketable. Should I cut and dye my hair? Should I work out more? Should I start wearing more makeup to auditions? Honestly, I don't know. The one thing that Hollywood would seem to tell me is that I should lose some weight, but even doing that in the past didn't help. So what can I do?

I can keep trying. That's really all I can do at this point, is to just keep trying and hope that someday, something will stick.

Someday...

Ego

2010-11-16T09:09:00.004-06:00

The actor ego is a very fragile thing. As I'm sure you know, I spent a week or two there thinking I was pretty damn good. As of last night, I'd say about 90% of that feeling has left me.

I'm not saying I doubt my abilities. Not at all. I'm still good at this and I still work really hard and I'm clever so I can figure things out. But one has to wonder sometimes...

We're working on a new scene in class and I met with my scene partners (there are three of us in the scene this time) and we talked about things and one of the main things I need in the scene is a defined relationship with the man, who plays my sister's husband. It's pretty obvious in the text that my character is in love with him and has been for some time and while we were talking, the other woman in the scene suggested that perhaps he and I had slept together at some point and that her character either knew it or was suspicious. And I said no. Because I had thought about it and I know that for me, I feel more sexual tension when I haven't slept with someone. In my own mind, I equate physical intimacy with a separation, largely because the majority of the men I have been intimate with disappear shortly thereafter. And I'm not even talking about sex - a couple have ditched me after an intense make-out session. So because of my own fucked-up-ed-ness about relationships, I thought it would fuel me more as an actor if my brother-in-law and I as characters had not slept together.

And I got my ass handed to me.

I feel like I need to apologize to the other woman I'm working with because I should have listened to her suggestion from the beginning. And I should have listened to the man in the scene because I think he was initially leaning towards us having slept together, too. So I apologize to the both of you that I let my ego get in the way of making the riskier choice.

Because as it turns out, the teacher had us get up into environment. Well, she had me and the guy get up into environment, anyway. The scene is weird - he talks with her for a while (six or seven pages), then I enter and she leaves and I talk to him for a while (six or seven pages), and then she comes back and the three of us are on stage for three pages before our scene ends. So the first half of the scene was the two of them reading at the table. And then I fucked up my entrance and the teacher coached me through it. And then my sister left the scene and they chatted about the work that was just done at the table and the teacher said to get rid of the table because she wanted the two of us up in environment, which was then thrown out the window when we said we hadn't slept together.

And I'm still kicking myself because it is the riskier, scarier choice to say yes, we had slept together. That should be one of those automatic things, like when you're developing a character and you ask yourself if you love the other person in the scene with you, you answer "Yes" because that connects you to them. "Yes and" instead of "No but." You don't have to be intimately in love with them, seeking marriage and a life together, but if you choose to love that person, you are invested in them on some level and therefore, you are invested in the scene. So the answer to the question, "Have you two slept together?" when it is not answered in the script should always be "Yes." Because that is the scarier choice. It should be an automatic that I should have learned back in Tech 1.

And now I'm "shoulding" myself. Man, I'm having a bad morning.

So the teacher had us do the first dozen lines of our part of the scene a couple of times - once as if we hadn't slept together, once as if we slept together last night, and once as if we slept together five years ago - and the differences were remarkable. The difference in how I felt about him, and about my sister, and about myself, and about my relationship with him, and my relationship with my sister and it became glaringly obvious to me (which it probably already was to everyone else in the room) that yes, these characters have slept together at some point. It makes the dialogue make more sense and brings so much more life into the scene.

And my point with this whole entry is, that while I've been on my little ego trip, I seem to have forgotten some very important fundamentals.

Yes, I found them again. And yes, I am the sort of actor who will try different things and who is open to being proven wrong. And I don't know - maybe it was like a therapy session where I had to get there myself instead of having someone tell it to me. But it's frustrating. And it's frustrating, in part, because this is the teacher who I auditioned for and I haven't found out yet if I was cast or not, but I know some people know if they've been cast, so I also felt last night like this was another callback for me. Like she maybe had some doubts about what I would be like to work with so she really wanted to work with me to see if I could handle her show and I don't feel like I did very well. I missed the most obvious, most basic of choices. I felt like I was called out for not having done my homework. I did homework. Just the wrong assignment. But also, this is class. I should not be putting the pressure of trying to win a role in a completely unrelated play on my classroom discovery. This was essentially a first read - a first real read where all of us had read the script, knew (at least sort of) who our characters were. This was exactly the time to fuck up and try different things. This was "play space" and I turned it into "pressure of performance" space and I fell flat on my face doing so.

Fuck.

So I'm frustrated today. I know I can do this. I just need the opportunity to do it and if I continue to perform at this level (even though I know I am capable of performing at that level), I will not get the opportunity. I need to step up my game. Or something.

"Yes, and..."

Energy

2010-11-09T11:10:00.001-06:00

I was thinking about something else yesterday before class that I want to write down so I don't forget it. I feel, though, that it is important to note that I was thinking about this before class because if any of my classmates are reading this, I don't want you to think that something you did inspired this post. This post is not at all a commentary on last night's class, just sort of a general reminder to myself.

And I am, admittedly, a little nervous to post this here because I know I sound really pretentious, but I'm trying to keep track of my learning process as a performer and this, for me, is a big one. Please know I'm not trying to sound like a know-it-all. These are just my thoughts at the moment.

There seems to be this trend in Hollywood right now where blase is cool. The slacker is cool. The disconnected, apathetic character is cool. I don't mean to name names, but Ellen Page strikes me as one of these sorts of actors. Maybe this is why I don't really want to see "Juno" - in the previews I saw for it, it looked like she just really didn't care. I think this is also my issue with Matt Smith as the Doctor - he spends lots of time running around being weird, but I don't really see things affecting him as strongly as they have affected other Doctors. You can stand there and look at Daleks, or you can STAND AND LOOK AT DALEKS. He chooses the former. I would prefer to watch the latter.

For those of you who watch "America's Next Top Model," I'm talking about what Ms. Tyra Banks refers to as "being fierce."

Now, I'm not saying that every character out there has to be some cracked out whackadoo hopped up on speed in order to be interesting. But I think there is a difference between the actor being apathetic and blase and the character being apathetic and blase. If the actor is blase, I don't want to watch that. If the character is blase, but the actor is fully invested in being blase, that can be interesting.

I know I'm not making a lot of sense, so I'll try a couple of stories.

These two swing dance teachers came to Chicago many years ago and held workshops and many many dancers all around the world consider these two to be just about the best there are. After all, he's one of the people who sort of resurrected lindy in the 1980's or 1990's. And she is...well, she's adorable. There are no two ways about it. Anyway, in their workshops, they were stressing the fact that a dance is a conversation and that the follow has just as much right to speak as the lead and that the lead needs to know how to listen, too. Which is a lovely concept for people who have been dancing for a while and are comfortable with the basics and are looking to push their dancing to the next level. It becomes confusing, though, when you're still counting out the beats in your head and trying to remember if you start with your left foot or your right and suddenly, you are being told that when he's leading you through a six-count turn, it's okay to tell him to stop and wait while you make it an eight-count turn so you can be wiggly for two counts and show off. Suddenly, you're just focused on showing off. You forget that you're supposed to be connected to your partner and inspired by the music; you just want to get in that little two-count wiggle so you can say you know how to dance like the super adorable internationally beloved teacher with the cute accent. And your partner, your poor lead, who is still struggling with the concept of leading from his center instead of jerking your arm out of the socket is focusing so hard on trying to keep the beat that he jerks you through your little two-count wiggle and then remembers he was supposed to just let you do that, so he stops dancing completely because he's lost and frustrated and needs to find the one again, so you wiggle some more to fill the empty beats and he thinks he's just supposed to let you, so he does and you find yourself wiggling for thirty-two counts before you've run out of appropriate wiggle and you both look at each other with an awkward grin that says, "There's a downbeat coming up soon. How about we hit that?" and then you get back into the dance, completely self-conscious and afraid to try that again. At which point, inevitably, the teacher walks by in the workshop and encourages you to wiggle and you're back where you started.

All of this could have been fixed if the dancers knew what they were doing in the first place, and then tried to expand on that knowledge.

I think the same applies to theater.

In one of the first classes I took at the theater where I am now taking classes, we would have to come up with some activity that was difficult to do (but not impossible) and of the utmost importance. One woman decided her activity would be writing a suicide note. Which could be a great exercise, or it could blow up in your face, as the teacher pointed out. If you choose to be a character who really wants to die, then there is nothing to prevent you from just offing yourself at the top of the scene and bam! You're done. Scene over. If, however, you happen to want something from the other person in the scene, no matter how minor that thing may seem, but you really really want it, then you have a scene. If you want to die, but you need to have one last cheese sammich first and your scene partner makes the best cheese sammiches in the world. Or you don't really want to die and the whole thing is really just a cry for attention - the attention of the person in the scene with you. You can still be the super depressed character who sees no other way out of this situation, but there is something more to that character. There is something that makes us, as the audience, want to watch. We want to know if he'll make you the cheese sammich, knowing that as soon as you eat it, you'll die. Or we want to know if she'll confess her undying love for you, thus preventing you from kicking the chair away. That one little glimmer keeps you alive on stage as an actor. As opposed to the actor who just doesn't care about anything. What is the point in that scene?

But I think the problem starts in our very first acting classes. We are told to relax and get comfortable on the stage. This often leads to slouched posture and aimless meandering around the environment. When you think of relaxing, that's what you think of, yes? Sitting comfortably on the couch, maybe kicking off your shoes, getting to a place where you could easily fall asleep. What I think the teachers mean (I could be wrong, this is just a theory) is that we should not be nervous or self-conscious about being on stage, not that we should lull ourselves to sleep. It is possible to be comfortable and still alert. It is possible to be comfortable and still engaged. I think the direction to "relax" is a suggestion that we not judge ourselves, that we just let the moment-to-moment of the scene happen. I don't think it is a direction to check out. But I see that happening all of the time. People on stage just being, for lack of a better word, floopy. In an empassioned scene, they stand with one hip cocked lazily out, doing the head bobble, and when they can't take the emotion of the scene anymore, they turn slowly and take a couple of steps, dragging their feet a few inches to the left of where they had been previously. The passion is indicated by the loudness of their voice, not by their actions or behaviors. Is that how you fight with a loved one? Is that how you seduce a potential lover?

(The teacher called me out for hiding my face when the emotions got too intense in a scene I was working on. I know I do it, too. I know I go for the comfortable instead of the risky, so I'm not trying to point fingers here while I paint myself as perfect. I have found myself bending at the waist to scream at someone instead of walking toward that person, which is one of my biggest actor pet peeves and I yell at myself in my head for it afterward. This is a reminder to me as much as to anyone else that energy is a good thing and it can take many forms. But you gotta have it.)

I think I'm mostly saying that I see a lot of actors who need to get their bodies involved in what they are doing. If you keep your center and keep your core, you can still be relaxed and comfortable on stage, but you will be engaged in what is going on. You will have life and energy and be compelling to watch. Even if your character is apathetic and blase about the world around him, most apathetic people secretly really want something. To be loved, or to be noticed, or to get out of this stupid po-dunk town. And it is the want for those things and the frustration of not getting to have them that leads to apathetic behavior. But as an actor, you need to have that desire and that frustration living in you before you can be properly apathetic on stage. If you just aim for the blase, your audience is going to tune out before you say your first line.

It's like trying to put the wiggle in the dance before you know the steps.

I don't know. I could be talking out of my ass. Or this could be lesson #7 in my self-taught class on how to be more like David Tennant (who is not a perfect performer, but almost every time I watch him, I'm inspired to go out and live and perform and feel and love and let myself be ripped open with heartache, so at the moment, he's who I'm looking to for inspiration as a performer). Hamlet's soliloquy, for example. He's contemplating suicide. But he's hurt and confused and feels betrayed and honestly doesn't know if he is more afraid of continuing in his current state or of the unknown thing that happens (or doesn't happen) when you die. It's a speech about suicide, but it's a speech about so much more than that, and that is why it has stood the test of time. Can you imagine Hamlet going out and delivering this speech as blase dude? There'd be no point for the rest of the play. He is despondent, but that doesn't mean he doesn't care. It is because he cares so much that he has become despondent.

Wow, I'm sounding like a pretentious windbag now. Sorry about that. I did have a moment in class last night where I was feeling pretty good about myself (as I have been for a couple of days) and then it all kind of caved in and my humility kicked in and said, "You don't have all of the answers. You've only been studying this for fifteen years - what could you possibly know about acting?" and the little self-doubt demons came creeping back up my spine. I would like to say that I think I know something. And I think that thing that I know is that acting is living truthfully under imaginary circumstances. And in order to do that, one has to live truthfully on stage. It's not about being cool and blase - it is about being truthful. And there is so much more to being cool and blase and apathetic that you as an actor need to know before you can get up there and be those things as a character, none of which are really cool or apathetic or blase.

I guess I wish I saw more people being passionate about what they do instead of flippant about it.

I'll stop being whiny.

Twofer

2010-11-08T10:19:00.001-06:00

I had two auditions this weekend and got two callbacks out of the deal.

Hooray!

I don't mean to boast - I know that boasting is distasteful - but I have to admit that in my book, it is a little personal victory to be called back from both auditions. One was monologues, and while I don't think I nailed my pieces, I think there were good elements in them and at the very least, I wasn't scared. The other was readings from the script and I think I did pretty well. Largely because they had me reading for a supporting character, but then the director asked me to stick around and read for the lead, and when I was done, the director said, "Good read." And now I've been called back for the lead.

I'm trying not to get my hopes up too high for either show because as we all know, I've been called back for other shows wherein I am ultimately not cast. But I have to admit, it is a confidence boost to know that I went in to two different auditions this weekend and didn't fuck either one up. It goes back to that whole trusting myself thing I was talking about a couple of weeks ago. I feel like I am in a place where I can say, "I'm good at this. I'm damn good at this," and believe it. Being damn good doesn't always mean you'll get cast, but I can hold my head up high and know that when I am cast in something, I will bring so much frickin' life to that stage they won't know what to do with me. Again, I don't mean to boast; I just have confidence that I don't think I had before.

The weird thing for me about the one callback (the one where I am being called back for the lead) is that I had sort of relegated myself to playing supporting characters. I don't know if it is because I don't think I'm thin enough or because my window of opportunity to play the ingenue has passed, or if it is because in all of my years with the theater where I was a company member, I was always cast in supporting roles, but I had sort of decided that I am a supporting character. Which is totally unfair. I could carry a play. Where I am, right now, in my journey as a performer, I could carry a play. I think I have the strength. I think I have the stamina. I think I have the courage to go all of the various places that a lead character would need to go. I know I have the drive and the determination to put in the work to make it happen. Maybe that is the next step in my development - to embrace myself as a lead actress.

Or not. I could be talking out of my ass.

But have you ever wanted something so badly that it hurt? I loved going into these auditions over the weekend and getting up on the stage for three minutes at a time and acting. Putting everything I could into these characters I'm just starting to get to know. And I have to admit, it's hard to come home after that and be...not acting. That's the frustrating thing about where I am right now with trusting myself and whatnot - it's great and I want to do it all the time, but until I'm in something, I'll just get to do it in fits and spurts once or twice a week. What can I say? I'm an addict. I love the connection. I love the emotion. I love the freedom and the conflict and the study and the work and the release in the end. I want to do that all day every day.

And maybe one of these days, I'll rock a callback as much as I rocked the initial audition, I'll be cast in something, and I'll get to do that in more than fits and spurts.

Selfish

2010-10-23T08:59:00.002-05:00

I came to the realization this week that I really am a selfish person.

I go to lunch from time to time with a friend of mine from acting class and we talk about what we're doing in class and where we're having problems and what we think about the whole business and stuff like that. And I was telling her this week about how I feel like I'm finally getting to a place where I trust myself as a performer and the words that all of my teachers have been telling me for fifteen years are starting to sink in as truths, not just random sounds strung together and she asked me how I got there. In my mind, up to this point, I feel like I'm here because I have nothing else to lose. She asked me what I meant by that.

I don't know if I can tell you what it feels like to have nothing left to lose. I had problems telling her. It came out as a sort of "I've been trying for fifteen years to do this and I've not gotten very far in my career. I keep auditioning and not getting cast even though I do a good job. And recently, my great big plans blew up in my face and I had to face the humiliation of telling everyone that no, really, it wasn't happening." And since most of my friends were not there for the heart-wrenching decision weekend, and since most of my friends are lovely, friendly, helpful-type people, they asked me all kinds of obvious questions about what I could have done and I had to tell them that I tried that and it didn't work. I tried just about everything and it wasn't going to work so I had to swallow my pride and not do it. That was hard. That was really fucking hard and I know that I made the right decision, but it still made me feel like just about the biggest loser in the world. As if I had been stood up at the altar or something. And even in my plans to keep moving forward and to give it another shot, I don't feel like I'm really getting anywhere. I'm still auditioning and not getting cast. One of the classes I wanted to take was canceled, another postponed and then two sessions rescheduled. I feel like I have tried so hard for so long and all I really have to show for it is that my classmates think I'm talented and that's lovely, but I would like to at the very least be in a show right now. Which I'm not. And you put this all together and it feels like when it comes to acting, I have nothing left to lose. I have suffered just about every humiliation a person can at the hands of this silly career.

So why do I keep doing it? Why do I keep trying?

Because I love it. I honestly and truly love it. My teacher was apologizing for making me go through the most emotionally difficult moment for me over and over and over again in class, but I loved it. I love having to go there. I love being able to go there. I love the dirt and the pain and the screaming and the connection and the love that I get to experience up on stage. I know I have written before that I want to live fully - I get to live fully on stage, even if it is in class - and I love it. I will take every moment of it that I can get.

So here I am, at a point in my development where I have nothing left to lose, where I feel as if I have hit the bottom and continued to sink, so I get up there on stage and give it everything that I have because I don't have any other choice. I am selfish and I love doing this. So I am going to do it. Even if nobody will put me in a show, I will keep taking classes so I can keep doing this. I enjoy it. I want to do something I enjoy. That is selfish behavior. But you know what? I'm okay with that.

Good Night

2010-10-19T09:47:00.002-05:00

I had a really good night in class last night. Really good.

My partner and I were up on our feet, working in our environment for the first time and we struggled for lines from time to time, but that happens. But there was honest connection and honest emotion and so much pain and rage and vulnerability. It was great. And, it wasn't perfect. The teacher called me out on my "thing" - I have a "thing!" I have wanted to know for some time if I had a "thing" and she saw it last night and called me out on it and it's so true. I was hiding my face in my hands a lot. And it will make me that much more open and raw if I can still have those feelings without hiding my face. I'm looking forward to trying that next week.

There were a couple of odd bits for me, though. One was that so much of the scene is SO emotional for me, but when the teacher would stop us to make a comment, I came right smack out of it. Maybe that is because she tended to stop us when the scene was going south anyway, but it felt weird. But I guess it is good. I know I have ragged on actors before for not being able to leave it on stage once they come off, but it felt odd to go from 100 to 3 in a half a second, you know? And I think I did a decent job of getting back up to about 85 or 90 to start the scene again when it was time to go. It would be nice to learn to jump back in at 100 - that will come with practice. I think I wonder if it made it appear false to my classmates, though, that I came out of it so quickly. I'm up there screaming and crying in pain, and then I'm looking the teacher in the eye taking notes and agreeing that I need to not hide my face and being very calm and technical. Does the fact that I did that make the intensity of the scene just five seconds beforehand seem false?

It didn't feel false.

Which brings me to my second oddity.

When I was learning lindy from my favorite lindy instructor who lives in Europe (I believe he's still there), I remember that he broke it down to such a fundamental level that to the observer, it might look like not a lot is going on. But for the dancers, it is this intense, connected, completely in-tune conversation of movement. He told me once that he couldn't feel my fingertips. So I fixed that and he could control either my head, my hips, or my feet just through my fingertips. For me, acting is very much the same. When you get to that level of connection, where you are taking in what your partner gives you and reacting honestly and truthfully to it, you can make your partner weep with the slightest tilt of your head.

But I think I got into a sort of dangerous place in both dance and acting because of this. The place where I was looking for connection so tiny that the end result looked tiny to anyone watching. Yes, I was feeling everything and yes, I was reacting to everything, but it was all small and perhaps internal. I would get mad, but not furious. I would be happy, but not sickeningly in love. That kind of thing. And that's not always called for in the theater. First of all, nobody writes a scene about someone who gets mad. They write about hideous burning rage. Nobody writes about couple who are content. They write about couples who are hopelessly in love, fueled by passion, desire, and lust. And as theatergoers, that's what we want to see on stage. Not to mention the fact that if you're playing a big house, nobody can see it in the back row if you wink. So I think I was in a place with my acting where I knew large reactions were called for, but they felt false. They felt exaggerated and sometimes forced. But last night, I think I realized that it is not about making the movements bigger. It is about raising the stakes. If you find out your husband is cheating on you, you will be hurt and angry. If you find out your husband, who you gave up the life you always wanted for yourself so you could be with him, who you have become completely emotionally dependent on, who is the father of your only child who is your great joy in life even though he's a little off, who you care for and depend on, who you honestly think you would shrivel up and die without, is cheating on you with a goat, your guts will spill out of your mouth, you'll double over and writhe on the floor in pain, screaming until you can't scream anymore. And it will be honest. And it will be truthful. Because it is that important to you.

It's funny. I have technically been studying theater for about fifteen years and all of the things the acting books have told me are just starting to sink in. Trust yourself. Raise the stakes. The only way to fail is to not try. They used to be just words to me, but in the past couple of weeks, they have started to creep in under my skin and become part of me as a performer. I love it. That moment when everything starts to click. And I can't wait to see where I go from here.

Trust

2010-10-12T09:12:00.002-05:00

I had a good class last night. In all honesty, though, I wish I had the opportunity to work more. This is the one problem with scene study classes - if you have six groups who all need to do their scenes in a three hour class, each group should get a half an hour, but if one group goes over, everyone else gets less time. Such is life. And I know it all evens out because different groups go first every week, but still. I wish I had gotten to work more last night.

But the teacher said I did some very good work. I still have some homework to do in terms of building my character's world, and my partner has some work of his own to do which I think will give me more to work off of which will allow me to give him more to work off of and so on and so on and so on. But for a table read, it wasn't bad. The scream that happened at the end of my scene wasn't the noise I had wanted to make just then, but I guess you can't go into this sort of thing hoping to make a certain noise at a certain time. It has to just happen organically. Truthfully. And truthfully, that was the sound that came out of me in response to what was going on.

But what struck me between my audition over the weekend for the show in which I did not get cast and my class last night was, I feel like I'm moving towards the place where I trust myself as a performer. I know I can get up there and give it my all. I'm losing the fear of failure because I think I'm learning that the only way to really fail at this is to not try. I may try the wrong thing and the director might ask me to do something else, but as long as I make strong choices and commit to them fully, I will look like an actor who is fearless and full of life and engaging to watch.

Another thing that came up again last night was intimidation. I was "intimidating as hell," I think someone said. I think this scene calls for it, but I think I also got some of the vulnerability of the character in there, too. Which may also be intimidating because supposedly my husband is still in love with me and for me to be able to be vulnerable with him when he just shattered my entire world has to kill him, too. Or something. But I don't want to be generally intimidating. That's not what I'm after. I want to be the sort of performer who inspires other people, not scares them. I hope, I really truly hope, that my friends and peers feel comfortable talking to me about things. Even performance things. I have one friend who I get together with and we talk theater and I love it. I love talking to her about the problems we are each having with our creative journeys because we usually get to some place where we get an idea for something to try next time. It's great. And if she was intimidated by me, I don't think that would work. I hope she's not. Just like if I ever start teaching this stuff, I want to be an approachable, encouraging teacher. I would want people to see my work and think, "Wow, I want to be able to do that. Maybe she'll let me pick her brain," instead of, "She's so much better than me." I don't know how much control I have over that. I just hope I come off as open and approachable, not as untouchable.

It's funny that it has taken me fifteen years of studying this stuff to get to this point. To start to get to this point. But I'm glad I'm moving in this direction. If I'm going to be a David Tennant kind of actor, I have to be fearless and give it my all. And it's nice to know I can.

Rollin' rollin' rollin'

2010-10-11T11:14:00.002-05:00

So seeing as my grand plan kind of went kablooie this year, and I have to wait until next year to give it another shot, I am trying to find ways to fill my time. I have always loved stage combat kinds of things, so I thought I should try to find a place in Chicago where I could study (as opposed to those three-week intensive courses taught in July in Seattle. Not that those don't sound like fun, but they would require waiting until July and somehow being able to finagle three weeks off of work). And I found one.

There is a group that trains about five blocks from my apartment, twice a week. For twenty bucks a pop, I can go train with them. So I did. On Saturday. I was nervous as hell walking in there, but they were very nice and very supportive. And they had me jump right in doing forward rolls and backward rolls and jumping over someone who was rolling at me and rolling under someone who was jumping over me and rolling over mats and practicing a simple fight sequence and learning how to do (essentially) a belly flop and a backward fall and some punches and kicks and spins. And some of it, I sucked at. Horribly. I need to work on my flexibility so I can get a decent crescent kick. But some of it, I was pretty decent at. I've never considered myself a gymnast, but I was able to do fairly well on the jumping and rolling stuff. For a first-timer, anyway. And the rest of the group was very encouraging, which helped a lot. Though they do say that if you are uncomfortable trying something, don't do it.

There was something really fun, though, about jumping in and trying everything. I'm not the sort who flips. Ever. I look at people who can do flips and am astounded. But there I was, taking a running start to dive and roll over someone who was coming at me, and I did it. Not perfectly, but I did it. I flew through the air, tucked my head, and rolled through on my back to a (sloppy) landing. How often do adults get to do that kind of thing?

I'd like to get good at this. There is a woman in the group who is absolutely fearless and I hope to someday be like her. I know it will take practice, if for no other reason because I will need to get familiar with my own body and it's limitations and I need to get comfortable working on a bouncy floor that isn't going to hurt when I fall on it. Right now, I still have the "Oh my god the floor is rushing at me really fast and I'm going to hurt myself!" reflex. Which is not what happens here. You learn how to throw yourself at the ground in such a way that you won't get hurt, and you practice on a soft floor so even if you screw up, you're okay until you're comfortable enough to know you're not going to screw up and then you can go do the same thing on concrete.

I think this could be good for me. Something physically active that challenges me to do things I didn't think I could do. That's bound to build up some confidence, right?

Though I will say, I took one landing a little hard on my left ankle. I don't think there was any serious damage, but it's a little tender. And I don't know if it was the stunt training or the strength training I did earlier that morning, but just about every muscle in my body is screaming at me. My favorite soreness is in my butt - if my butt hurts like that, it means it got a good workout, right?

Good News, Bad News

2010-10-11T11:04:00.002-05:00

I had an audition on Saturday for an original piece and I nailed it. I went in there and gave it everything I could. I read for two different characters and I think I managed to make them each their own person, but I also think I brought some of myself to each character. And I really enjoyed the audition, too. There are some auditions that have a relaxed, encouraging atmosphere and this was one of them.

So I was not cast.

Which is disappointing, yes. I think I could have brought something interesting to either of the roles I read for and I felt really good about my performance, so it would have been nice to get to explore the character more in rehearsal and then bring her to life in performance.

But the director did take a minute to send me a personal email saying how much he enjoyed my audition, how he was fascinated by the layers I brought to the characters, and how he was really disappointed that he couldn't use me in this production. I thought that was extraordinarily nice of him. Directors don't usually take the time to let the people who weren't cast know that they weren't cast at all, much less to tell them that they gave a really good audition and offer up words of encouragement. So thank you to this director for taking the time to send me that note. That meant a lot to me.

Though I will admit that it was a little hard to take. I don't know exactly why I was not cast, but it looks like it was one of those things that was completely out of my control. I don't look right with the lead guy or some role was already promised to someone else or something like that. Something about which I can do absolutely nothing. Which is hard for me. I like to be able to learn from my experiences and I'm not sure what I can learn from this. Other than I am good at this. I can go in there and give a great audition if I just trust myself. And that if I keep trying, something will eventually have to stick.

Thoughts

2010-10-05T14:39:00.002-05:00

So I've been assigned a scene from a play about a couple who are having some marital problems, largely because she finds out in the course of the play that he is in love and sleeping with a goat. The play is The Goat, or Who is Silvia? by Edward Albee, appropriately enough. Because if there were multiple plays about men sleeping with goats, we might have to stop and take a look at things. And I love this play. It is raw and gritty and real and torturous and so far out there bizarre. I think it is really going to push me as a performer to play this woman who has been so horrifically betrayed, but who still loves her husband so deeply. And it's going to be hard to not just be snide through the whole thing, but that's another issue.

My question is this: As we were discussing the play as a class, it was decided that the man playing the husband (any man cast as this husband) has to love that goat. He has to cast that goat and imagine making love to her and imagine liking it. He has to imagine staring into the goat's eyes and being completely swept away. Which, as you imagine, might be hard for some actors to do. My question is this: in the context of the play, the husband doesn't think what he is doing is wrong. He truly believes that he is in love with his wife and with the goat and that his love for the goat came from somewhere innocent and pure and beautiful, not some sordid thing that happened in his past that turned him into a deviant. He talks about going to therapy and realizing that he has nothing in common with the other people there because his love for the goat is true, whereas they sleep with geese and dogs and pigs out of some psychological trauma. So I have to ask any actor who is cast as this man, in order to prepare for this role, do you have to be in love with a goat, or do you just need to be in love with someone (something) that isn't your wife?

The character knows he is hurting his wife and he knows that infidelity is wrong. He doesn't think loving this goat is wrong, and he defends his love of this goat to the end of the play. So does the actor playing him need to imagine making love to a goat? Or does he need to imagine making love to someone other than his spouse who makes him ridiculously happy? Does the husband's guilt come from the infidelity or from the fact that it is a goat or both?

Honestly, I don't know. I think the answer would be different for every actor who plays the husband. But I would think that if, for the actor, the thought of making love to a goat is repulsive, that kind of goes against how the character feels about his relationship with the goat and may give him a self-hatred that I'm not sure he has. Whereas if he does his preparation around his wife, and then does some preparation around meeting the fantasy partner of his dreams (who is not his wife), I think that might get closer. I don't know. I could be full of crap myself. It's just a thought.

Out of Practice

2010-09-27T23:31:00.003-05:00

For someone who has been described as fearless on several occasions, I am finding myself to be afraid of just about everything lately.

Tonight was my first class of the new session, but the second class of the session - I was at a convention last week and had to miss the first class. And the teacher had me get up and work first, which, yay! I like to work first in a lot of respects because especially when everyone is working on the same scene, you don't feel pressure to do what the person before you did, or to avoid doing what the person before you did. On the other hand, you get to watch everyone after you learn from your mistakes and you spend two and a half hours wishing you had just one more shot to try it again. On the up side, this teacher is very good at identifying what each of us needs to do with the scene - there are six women in the class and each of us is going to interpret the character in our own way because we are six very different women. And this teacher allows for that - she's not trying to pump out six cookie cutter performances. And by the end of my time working today, she had seen great improvement and called me a strong actor, which is a good thing.

But I was scared up there. I was holding back. I didn't feel prepared. I didn't feel comfortable. And I would like to think that at least part of it is because it has been a while since I was in class so I'm a little out of practice, but I think there is more to it than that.

See, I had alluded to this grand plan that I had, and it almost came to fruition, but then it didn't. It didn't necessarily go away, but I kind of had to start over and all of the plans I had made for now are on hold and in limbo for at least a year. Which has me feeling really weird about my life right now. Like I'm not supposed to be here. Like I'm living on borrowed time or something. And on the one hand, it is great because it is sort of forcing me to stay open to whatever might be coming up - I'm kind of just going with the flow and seeing where life decides to take me, instead of having a solid plan. But on the other hand, I have this feeling that there is something else I'm supposed to be doing and that has me sort of watching my back all of the time.

So it has manifested as trepidation on stage. Which turns into the fear that this is it - this is my life. Day job that drives me crazy, classes a couple of nights a week, watching all of my friends get married and have kids all around me while my life goes...I don't even know where. I'm in a holding pattern for another year until I can try again to make my plan happen. And I'm doing my best to fill that time with things that make me happy, but what if the same thing happens next year? And the year after that? And the year after that? Then what? Do I spend my whole life taking classes while the rest of the world happens around me?

It must be a good class to get me thinking like this. If it doesn't leave you feeling like shit, you weren't working hard enough, right?

I'm fine. Really, I'm fine. And I will continue to be fine. I just need to remember that it's okay to be scared everywhere else, but on stage, I have to be David Tennant. There is no fear in class. Class is safe space. The stage is safe space. And if I have to be afraid up there, I have to turn that fear into something beautiful and useful that will affect my partner who can then affect me. That's art right there, baby. And if the rest of the world is going to go on around me, the least I can do is spruce it up a little, right?

...and scene

2010-06-21T09:39:00.002-05:00

Tonight is my last class of this session and I'll kind of be glad when it is over. I have enjoyed this class and enjoyed the scenes we have all worked on, though I think it might have been nice if it was a nine week class and we worked on three scenes each instead of an eight week class wherein we worked on two scenes each. I don't know that there was enough script analysis time to merit working on one scene for four weeks - we'd read it one week and talk a bit, and then come in and perform it three times. I'm not sure what to do differently tonight, but I guess that is to be expected because it is moment-to-moment work so I can't know what to do or what is going to happen until I get there. All I can do is prepare my background information and know my lines and know what I want from my partner when I enter the room. Beyond that, it's anyone's guess.

My other class ended on Saturday and I will miss that one a lot. It was sort of the last in the series, and probably my last with that group of people, many of whom I'd been in class with for almost a year now. I have grown to love my classmates deeply and trust them immensely and I will be sad to not be in class with them anymore. It's funny - it occurred to me on Saturday that the scene I was working on was kind of about losing a friend and I've grown to really love the woman I was working with this session and here was our last performance so it was doing a scene about losing a friend knowing that I'm losing my scene partner. I'm not losing her losing her - I know we'll stay in touch - it just seemed appropriate. We did well, too. Granted, it took us three times to get into it, but once we were there, we were really there and it felt great. After the scene, the teacher kind of took me aside and told me not to lose this because there was some really good work done. I think the most important things I need to remember from this class are that I need to speak my point of view, I need to speak my point of view clearly, and to always choose connection. I want to play around a bit with my warm-up technique, though, so it won't take me three tries to really get into it. I do my homework, I cast my characters, I build my private life and I'm up there on stage full of history, but I want to be able to hit the ground running and I need to figure out a way to get myself there. Be it looking at a picture or reading over a list of my important points or whatever. I need to figure out a way to get there at the drop of a hat instead of gradually warming into it.

But yeah. I maybe be on a bit of radio silence as I take the rest of the summer off from classes. But I do want to thank all of my teachers and classmates for working with me, pushing me, challenging me, being there when I had my little breakdowns and my big breakdowns, encouraging me, loving me, and accepting me as we all went on this journey together toward becoming fuller, more complete performers. I love you and hope all we get to work together again someday. Hopefully on a play involving monkeys.

The Good and The Bad

2010-06-15T13:35:00.002-05:00

I don't know that "bad" necessarily applies, but I didn't feel good after my class last night. In retrospect, I'm not sure why, unless it was a discomfort with the character kind of thing. My partner and I actually did some really good work. The teacher coached us a bit, and then one moment would lead to a new revelation and we'd find ourselves going a whole new direction and that was actually kind of fun. And exactly what the acting/rehearsing process should be. We freed ourselves up a lot and we affected each other and found new things in the script we hadn't found before. I just went home feeling like crap, though. Not sure why. Acting is supposed to be hard work. It's supposed to be exhausting and frustrating when your character is ultimately the loser in the scene. And I'm the loser in this one - I try so hard to control the whole situation, but end up not getting my way in the end. I get put in my place. Maybe that's good for me. I dunno.

On Saturday, my partner and I got an "excellent work" from our teacher. She had comments for us afterward, of course, and good ones, too, but she (and the rest of the class) was really impressed with our scene. That felt good. She made a good point, though - in the beginning of our scene, I'm kind of telling a story and I haven't connected to why I am telling this specific story to this specific person at this specific time. I need to work on that more so we have a connection through the whole scene and not just the second half of it. But that one felt good. I like the character. I like the relationship my scene partner and I have developed. As much as I'll be happy to have my Saturday mornings back, I'll miss this class.

I kind of want to talk to both of my teachers after our classes end to see if they have any parting words of wisdom for me. From the one class, I think I've learned that I need to speak to my point of view and I need to speak to it clearly. From the other one...I'm not sure. I don't know that I'll be taking more classes with these teachers, though, so I kind of want to get my last bit of advice before I don't have easy access to them anymore, you know?

Anyway. I only have one more of each class so I really have to step it up and bring it. I think there is some reality TV show out there about being an actor - I should be on that show. I think I'd do quite well.

Addendum

2010-06-08T09:44:00.001-05:00

Oh! One more thing.

No, the scene is not about you, but there is a lot you can do to prepare for a scene if your partner is not available to rehearse. All of that stuff about filling in the gaps - you can think about that on the train or in the shower or while you are doing dishes. Your scene partner doesn't necessarily need to know what kind of underwear your character wears, but if you want to know what is in your character's underwear drawer, go ahead and know it. There is nothing that says you can only work on things with your scene partner present and script in hand. When teachers talk about being prepared for class, this is what they are talking about.

Okay, now I'm stopping.

Give it to Me, Baby...uh huh, uh huh

2010-06-08T08:38:00.003-05:00

I was thinking about a couple of things in class last night and part of me thinks they could be the beginnings of the foundation of my own theories on acting and part of me thinks they are really pretentious observations that I feel kind of bad making even though I know they apply to me, too. But I'm going to go ahead and write about them from the "these are helpful hints for actors to keep in mind" perspective. I don't mean to tell you what to do in your craft - you are welcome to tell me to piss off - these are just things I have observed that make scenes more enjoyable to watch and to be in.

Acting is not about you. It's not. Yes, it is you up there and yes, you get to fill in the gaps in the character with whatever you want to, but it's not about you up there. It is about the moment and the scene and the circumstance and the connection you have with your scene partner. Think about real life - when you're talking to a friend or family member and you're an active participant in the conversation, the conversation is fun, yes? When you are listening and responding? As opposed to when your mind is elsewhere and you're not really paying attention to your friend. The second option there is a dull conversation that neither person wants to be in and that will probably end really soon. Scenes work the same way. There is a reason your character is there, speaking these specific words at this specific time to this specific person. If you were supposed to tune out, the author would not have written the scene. So be involved. The scene is not about you. It is bigger than that.

Acting is an exercise in giving. Now that you are invested in the scene and focused and talking to your partner, you are giving him/her something to work with. As the scene partner, you shouldn't just take that as an opportunity to show off. You need to take it in, let it affect you, and spit it right back out so that you give your partner something to work with. If you think of the scene in terms of fueling your partner instead of playing an emotion, you will find that the emotions come, and both you and your partner are fueled by the whole thing. The more you put into a scene, the more you get back out of it. So try it. Try giving your scene partner something. Try giving your scene partner something real. If your character was supposed to be lost in his/her own head, the author would not have included a second character in the scene. Though there is purpose even in a monologue or soliloquy, but I'm not talking about that right now.

Dialogue is a conversation. I know a lot of people think that the hardest part about acting is memorizing lines. I think that is because they are thinking of the lines as just a stream of words. They're not. The lines are a conversation. There are words said by one person that spark the words said by the other person and so on and so forth. One character asks, "You're not mad at me, are you?" and upon hearing the word "mad," the second character replies, "Mad at you? Why should I be mad at you?" It makes sense. It's logical. It's how people talk to one another. So if you stop thinking of it as a stream of words that have to be memorized in a certain order, the right words come out a lot easier than you might expect them to. And building on that, adding it to the idea that acting is an exercise in giving, as you memorize your lines, take note that there are certain words that you say that trigger what your partner is going to say next. Please please please please try to remember to say those trigger words. In the above exchange, if "You're not mad at me, are you?" comes out as, "You okay?" then the response of, "Mad at you? Why should I be mad at you?" no longer makes sense in the realm of the conversation. Without reference to that word "mad," a whole chunk of the scene can be lost. So please try to look at the scene as a conversation, not just a random string of words. You have a lot of stuff in there that you need to be able to give your partner, emotionally and verbally, so be aware of that.

They are called plays for a reason. There was one woman in class who said she was having a hard time with her character because it is a secondary character in the play as a whole and there wasn't a whole lot of information about her in the script. The teacher told her that she was then free to fill in those gaps with whatever she wanted. That made me think a lot about the roles I've been given. I am seldom a lead character. I have been a lead, and I have been part of an ensemble. But even back in college, when I was cast as Francis in Five Women Wearing the Same Dress, I remember the director telling me something along the lines of she would have like to give me a character with more stage time, but I was the only person she trusted to be able to play Francis without turning her into a caricature. She trusted me to take the little bit I was given in the script and turn that into a complete person. And I remember several people telling me I was fascinating to watch on stage because even when I wasn't the focal point of the conversation, I was doing something. I was active. I was alive. I was in the chorus of Romeo and Juliet the opera in college, too, and in the opening party scene, the rest of the chorus was standing in little clusters, hugging the scenery so to speak. I had this hideous pink dress on that turned into a giant bell when I twirled, so as the curtain came up, I twirled, just to add some life to the scene. And then, knowing the scene wasn't about me, I went back to being background when someone else needed the focus. My point being, if you don't have a lot of information about a character, make it up. If questions aren't answered in the text, answer them however you want to answer them. Use your imagination. Play! Make this a real person. Just because you only have two lines doesn't mean you are any less of a person than the guy who has two hundred lines. Last night, for the first time in a long time, I was proud of the fact that I usually play supporting characters because I felt like it meant my directors trust me as a performer to fill out the story or the scene as it needs to be filled out without a lot of fuss. Like they know when I'm in the supporting cast, they don't have to worry about it - they can focus on the stuff in the foreground knowing the background is under control. I don't know if that is what any of my directors have thought, but it is a possibility that occurred to me last night and it kind of made me happy.

Take every opportunity to practice your craft. EVERY OPPORTUNITY. I'm not saying you should "be on" all of the time or raise the stakes at Thanksgiving dinner for the sake of making things dramatic, but when you are at a rehearsal, be at that rehearsal. When you are in class, be in class. When you are meeting with your partner outside of class, use that time to work out some of your issues. I don't understand why some people think it's okay to slack off in class. You're paying money to be there - don't you want to try stuff? Don't you want to learn? Why are you taking classes if you don't want to push yourself and grow? Is it really that much fun to get up there and be blase about everything? I know I have been guilty of this one in the past - I've gone to rehearsals and wished I was somewhere else. I have spent a few class periods not jumping up to work in repetition. But class time is experimental time. This is your opportunity to do things you would never be able to get away with in an actual show. This is your chance to try stuff and be crazy and push things so far that the teacher tells you to reign it in a bit. But you know what? The teacher probably won't tell you to reign it in because by the time you think you've taken it too far, you're probably right where you should be. And here, in class, in this safe space, you have the chance to get comfortable with what that feels like. Don't waste that time worrying about whether or not you look cool. Get up there and work with your partner, give him or her things to work with, make your point of view known, follow your impulses. If you don't do those things with any sort of regularity, you'll fall out of the habit and your abilities will atrophy. Trust me, they will. So use every moment you are given to practice your craft.

Okay, I'll get down off of my high horse now. My teachers probably have a whole slew of comments for me that are in contradiction to everything I just said, but these are the things I was thinking about in class last night. That, and the fact that I really am good at this. When I don't get notes or comments from my teachers, I think it is probably because they're not seeing a lot that needs major fixing, not because they have given up on me as being a hopeless case. I'm not hopeless. I'm good at this.

Self-Doubt and Wonderment

2010-06-01T14:47:00.002-05:00

What kind of mint?

I'm suffering (a bit) from bouts of self-doubt, in large part because I'm not getting the same kind of feedback in my classes that the other students are. In my one class, the teacher has been able to identify little ticks and quirks and safety mechanisms that just about everyone else has, but she has said nothing to me. Do I not have these things, or has she just not seen them yet? I can't imagine that I'm an actor without habitual behaviors. Does that even happen? I don't think so. She has called me out for not speaking my point of view in repetition, and I noticed myself being fearful in repetition last class, so that's something I can work on. I used to be fearless, but I was really trepidatious in working with one scene partner in particular. I should have followed my instincts instead of worrying about how they would affect him. My job is to affect him. Anyway. But then when I'm up doing table work with my regular partner, I don't get a lot of notes. Hardly any. I say a thing or two about my character or about the circumstance of the play, but that's about it. Now, I don't know if that is because of where we are sitting in the room in relation to the teacher - maybe it's harder for her to see me - or if it's because the real meaty bits for my character come later in the scene and we haven't gotten there yet, but I don't know what to do when I'm not getting notes. I just don't. I know I haven't explored everything that there is to explore about this scene or this character, but one would think that if I'm not getting many notes, that I'm doing a decent job, yes? Or that I'm doing horribly and she thinks I'm a lost cause. I don't think I'm a lost cause, and I don't think she's the sort of instructor who would give up on me if I was - I've seen how she works with some of the other students in the class who are visibly struggling. She's not the "give a free pass" kind of teacher. So why am I getting a free pass (almost)?

I have been told by directors in the past, when I ask them for feedback after going several rehearsals without any, that "When I can get the rest of the cast to where you are, then I'll give you notes." I know that is meant as a compliment, and it is very flattering, but it also makes me really self-conscious. I want to learn. I want to grow. And I can't do that if I don't get any notes. Anyway.

I do like the scenes I'm currently working on, so maybe I am doing well enough with them that the teacher doesn't see anything glaringly awful about it and is just going to let me play. I guess that's an option. It's funny - for the scene I'm working on for my Saturday class, I have the feeling that the character is one of those women who wears too much jewelry and not enough underwear, if you know what I mean. Flow-y, flowery dresses, long necklaces, kind of looks like a hippie. So I wore a long, floral dress to class with some more jewelry than I normally wear and tried to make my hair look kind of messy, like I didn't really try to style it, and the response from my classmates, scene partner, and the teacher, was that I looked really nice. I hadn't meant to look nice. I meant to look like I didn't care about my appearance. Oh well. Anyway.

I'm just rambling now, so I think I'll stop. I am good at this. Maybe I just need to do something glaringly awful to prove that to myself.

Cool

2010-05-18T08:13:00.002-05:00

Acting is not about being cool. You can't get up there and "be cool" any more than you can get up there and "be funny" or "recreate that spontaneous moment." It just doesn't work. The harder you try to "be cool" and the more you focus on "being cool," the less the audience cares about you and the harder it is for your partner to connect to you and the scene just falls flat. The brilliant thing about acting is that the more you are uncool on stage (or screen), the more the audience loves it and thinks you are then a cool actor. Think about it. When has Michael Cera ever played a "cool guy?" Would Al Pacino or Jack Nicholson be as respected as they are if they didn't know how to just completely lose their shit in movies like "The Shining" or "Scent of a Woman?" We, as audience members, sit and wait for the characters in front of us to just lose it. And when they do, we lose it with them and have that beautiful cathartic moment that lets us go home feeling like we just experienced something great. But if they keep it all in and just play "the cool guy," we never get to have that experience and we walk away dissatisfied.

This is my current issue with the new Doctor - I think he's kind of caught up in "being cool" and hasn't figured out yet what it is about the Doctor that makes him cool. And in class last night, several of us were concerned with "being cool," and it made our scenes flat. But once we got over that and started working moment to moment and trying to affect one another, the scenes totally came alive and it was wonderful.

That being said, acting is also a very giving activity. As an actor, you have to give your partner things to work with. You have to let them know what your point of view is so they can have a point of view about that and you can have a point of view about that and so one and so on and so on. I was called out on Saturday for not making my point of view clear, and it's true. I got caught up in judging what my partner was saying and I couldn't find the right words and I got flustered and lost. I should have just observed what I saw, and let him know how I felt about it. On the up side, right after I was called out, I jumped right back up and did another scene, and then got called up into a third. Like the old adage about falling off a horse - if I hadn't gotten back up immediately and tried again, I would have over-analyzed what I did and I would have gotten self-conscious. Acting is a very active thing. You have to do it to get good at it. Sitting and thinking about it just starts to drive me crazy.

But the whole giving thing. You have to give your partner things to work with, and they, in turn, give you things to work with. And then a scene comes alive. And you give the audience that experience of feeling something or witnessing something grand. When you decide to "be cool," or "be collected," or "keep your shit together," you have already decided to disengage from your partner and nothing will go anywhere fun. I was guilty of this last night just as much as the next guy. I decided that my character was strong and sort of protective of herself and that was that. I don't know that I was giving my partner anything to play with. And by the same token, he had most of the dialogue in the scene, but I don't feel like he was really saying a lot of it to me, it was just sort of being said. But then the teacher tweaked our scene and gave us some things to think about so by the end, he was physically threatening and I was really afraid, which added this wonderful dimension to the scene that had been completely lacking in previous weeks.

I dunno. There was another woman who got sort of reamed in class on Saturday because we couldn't see her face through her hair. I had one teacher in high school, I think, who used to yell at all of the girls to tie their hair back in class so we could see their faces. There are some women in these classes I've been taking for whom hair issues have been present since day one and it wasn't until this current class that anyone said anything and I'm glad she finally did. I'd like to be able to see what my classmates are doing, but I can't see emotion through hair. The instructor on Saturday, though, took it a bit further and talked about how actors want to be seen and they want to find their light and they want to be visible and they want the person in the back row to know what they are feeling and that if someone would rather be up on stage hiding behind his or her hair, maybe he or she should think twice about pursuing an acting career. I felt for the woman who was being told this - I really did. But I think there is merit to what the teacher is saying. And I think it also applies to the "being cool" and "giving" aspects of acting, too. If all you want to do is be in movies so you can "be cool," please stay home. If all you want to do is be an actor so you can make money, please stay home. If all you want to do is be on stage so you can be in the spotlight, either write a decent one-person show or stay home. If you want to get up there and connect with someone else so you can experience things and you want to play and experiment and give and receive and learn how to (safely) just loose your shit so everyone in the room can have that catharsis with you, then please look me up and let's do a scene together. Because that is what acting is about. It is about all of those moments that we don't allow ourselves to have in real life. It is about wanting things and doing what you have to go get those things. It is active. It is about pursuing objectives. It is about effecting and being affected. In other words, it's not about "being cool," and it's not about you. So get over yourself.

Myself included.

Scene Study

2010-05-03T16:14:00.001-05:00

I'm really nervous about my class tonight. This one is a contemporary scene study class and I've been partnered with a man who gets nothing but rave reviews from everyone who has worked with him, doing a scene from a show that actually made me sick to my stomach by the time I finished reading it. It's a play about a stalker and the stalking victim. There is no actual violence in it, but the threats are there and they're disturbing.

We read some of the play in class last week. It starts with a blind date and I told the class in discussion that I have been on that date a million times. And that maybe she said certain things just to be nice even though she doesn't want to be there. And that maybe she agreed to go out a second time because as a single woman in her thirties, maybe she's starting to wonder if she let Mr. Right go already for some stupid reason so she should be more open to the quirks of others instead of dismissing people outright. And I realized as I read this play that I am the stalking victim. I have not had to change my name or move cities to get away from someone, but I have broken up with people who had problems letting it go. And I have been on that date a million times and I have said those things to be nice and I have started to wonder if I should give the creepy hairy guy a second chance because maybe I'm being shallow and all of that kind of thing. And I think that's why I was assigned this scene - because I am this woman in so many ways.

So I'm nervous. Because I've not worked with anyone in this class before. Because this is has the potential to be gut-wrenching. And because they're all really good performers and I know any of you reading this who know me would say I'm a really good performer, too, but I felt almost out-matched in class last week. I'm really going to have to bring it and that scares me.

And excites me. It's scary in the good way. This is what I wanted, so this is what I shall get.

Last Class

2010-03-29T15:33:00.002-05:00

So tonight is the last class of this session and I'm nervous about it but I also really don't care. Which is a horrible horrible horrible thing to say because it's not true. I do care. I want to go in there and do well. There are 11 people in the class and the last exercise is paired-up partner work, so I get to do two scenes and I'm thrilled that I get to do two scenes and I'm thrilled that I get to do two so very different scenes and I love my scene partners and I don't want to go in there and let them down.

That being said, since the time that this session of classes started to now, I have watched the efforts of the past year sort of go up in smoke. That's hard to take. When you pour your heart and soul into something and find out it's just not enough, that hurts. It hurts enough to inspire a person to rethink his or her goals and try to reevaluate how to get there, if she still wants to get there. And it can sour a person on the whole "being an artist" thing.

I will always be an artist. I will always come up with ideas for songs and projects and I will always love performing. The question is, do I still need to be an artist outside of my own home, or could I be happy living the 9 to 5 lifestyle, creating stuff that nobody else ever sees or hears or experiences? The answer is, I don't know.

The frustrating part is that I am a good actor. I'm doing well in these classes. My classmates like working with me. My classmates like watching me. My teachers have some really wonderful things to say about my work. Which means that there are about fifteen people who know I'm really good at this and who would encourage me to continue to pursue my dreams. Outside of that circle of fifteen people, I can't get anyone to give me the time of day at the moment. I know some people who would be in a position to help me and I have asked in the past and nothing really has come of it. I know people who could help my music career, too, but I somehow can't get them to spend three minutes listening to a song. The greatest skill that I lack as a performer is the ability to network. I'm horrible at it. I hate the inane getting-to-know-you chit-chat. I hate coming off as an opportunist. I hate being constantly sized-up. I'm horrible at tooting my own horn. And if I am going to go anywhere in my career as an artist, that is exactly what I am going to have to do. The question is, in the face of my recent onslaught of rejections, do I have the energy, confidence, and motivation to do that all on my own? The answer is, I don't know.

So in the meantime, I'm going to my class tonight to do my two scenes and I hope they go well. If they don't, though, it's not the end of the world. This session will end either way and I still get to sit and think about whether or not I want to continue with these classes. It sounds like several of the people I enjoy working with in the class will not be continuing, which is another factor to consider.

I don't know. I honestly don't. I'm sure I'll figure it out at some point, and I hope I start to care again soon because I really do love this and I love being the girl who dreams big. But it hurts when your big dreams turn into big disappointments and sometimes, you just gotta take the time to heal. I have loved this class and I love my classmates, but I think I may need some time to heal and for that reason, I'm glad it is the last class of the session.

Ick

2010-03-16T15:36:00.002-05:00

I just felt icky after last night's class. In my scene, I was stuck between a gross place and an even grosser place - do I stay with the uber creepy guy or the violent guy? Disclaimer: I was in no physical danger in the scene at any point. Not even close. We just had this really off-the-wall set-up for our improv scene that just left me feeling icky. And the fun part is, it was based on an actual play. Which we knew going in, but I didn't know what play. Now I kind of wish I didn't know which play because I don't particularly like the author. I know, I know, he's famous and everyone loves him and his stuff is classic, but I hate the female characters that he writes. Hate them. I had to play one in a scene in class in college and it still goes down as one of the worst classroom experiences I've had. If you're going to play, you should do so in class, yes? My scene partner wanted me to essentially do a caricature of this woman the way everyone else ever has played her, and I wanted to do something a little different and it was just bad. Just plain bad. And I really didn't like that teacher very much, either, so I'm kind of soured on this particular author. Which may be why I just ended up feeling icky last night.

I don't think it was bad work that I did last night. But I wasn't the character as she is written in the play. Which makes sense, as I didn't know what play the scene was based on. The teacher told me I have to reach about ten levels lower on the despair ladder to get where this character needs to be and the funny thing is, in my prep, I was there. But then I walked in and my partner was all kinds of creepy and I just got defensive. So of course I go home and beat myself up for not nailing the character, even though I didn't know who she was supposed to be. I got a lot of things right - all she really has is her sexuality, so my costuming choices were right. But I hadn't lost all hope or all respect for myself. Which may be the fundamental difference between myself and the female characters written by this particular author. I don't know. I'm getting a copy of the script because we are supposed to start working on the scene for our final class, so we'll see what she's really like.

I think it could be really good for me to play the type of character I don't normally get to play.

I think also, that in my real life right now, I am trying so hard to find the positives and keep myself sane and find some sort of belief in myself that I just couldn't lose all of that on stage last night. I'm feeling a little better, though still antsy, and I'm making the plans that I can make, not knowing what's going on. And I have to do those things. If I just let myself be lost and disgruntled and sad, I scare the crap out of my family and friends. Myself sometimes, too. But I'm holding it together at the moment and it's possible that it was just too hard for me to let it all unravel last night, particularly with my uber creepy partner like that.

Here's hoping I get a present soon so I can either hit bottom and know what that's like so I can put it on stage, or so I can regain some faith in myself so I know it's okay to hit bottom on stage. I know that makes no sense to you and that's okay. It makes perfect sense to me.

Update

2010-03-09T08:41:00.001-06:00

See, the thing is this. I'm good at this. I'm really good at this. I feel like a total bitch saying I'm good at this, but I'm good at this.

My exercise in class last night felt really weird. The character was very close to where I am in my own life right now - sort of one last shot to make it as an actor or she has to give it up completely. I've been feeling that way lately, in large part because I don't feel like I'm getting anywhere and the rejections right now just really hurt. Really hurt. It's a question of do I keep trying even though it hurts more than I can tell you, or do I give up on my dreams which will hurt more than I can tell you so hopefully I'll feel better later on? Neither is a good choice. And the character I played last night was desperate to fix things so that she could continue to be an actor. But I don't feel like I really got to release everything in my release - I was an absolute mess over the weekend when I determined my mantra for this character is "I'm not done being an actor yet," but when I said those words in class, they just felt different. I didn't implode. I cried, but it was very soft. And then, of course, the scene was set up so I didn't know my partner very well to begin with, so I wasn't completely prepared to fall to pieces in front of him. And he's not an actor I have worked with before in class, so that added to it, too - I wasn't sure how far I could push him or how far he was going to push me. And it didn't feel like he pushed. I felt like I did a lot of pushing and I was actually kind of rude and bitchy to him, which was as close to a release as I got in the scene, and he just took it. Agreed with me and moved on. And the whole scene was just...awkward and weird. The teacher called it compelling and thought it was really good. I just felt...weird.

After one of the later exercises, I think I figured out what felt weird about it. It was very much a talking scene. Exposition galore. And I kept trying to stop myself from asking questions in favor of making observations to try to keep our relationship present and in the moment, but it made for really strange conversation, which, given that the scene was so conversational, felt really odd. And then, I don't think I got to release in the scene. Not in any sort of big, satisfying, emotionally cathartic way, anyway, which is what I was hoping for considering how painful the prep for this exercise was. But it didn't come up. As much as I accused him of being the problem, he just took it. He didn't push my bad buttons at all. He just kept trying to be charming, but then would say something awkward and strange and I didn't trust him, but I could see he was trying and I don't know. It wasn't any sort of circumstance in which I would open up and bare my soul to this guy. I do think I gave him a couple of opportunities to call me out on my shit, but he missed them so we moved on. And on the one hand, that is disappointing and I wish I had gotten to release the way I needed to. But on the other hand, it means I went into this exercise with some sort of objective and when the circumstances changed, I went with it. I didn't try to force the scene to be something other than what it was.

I do feel a little bad because at least once, I felt like I was calling my partner out on behavior that perhaps has some roots in his past classroom performances. I apologize for that - I shouldn't be "directing" anyone on stage, and in a way, that's exactly what my character did to his. But then, as I watched some of my fellow students perform their exercises, I found myself wishing I was in the scene with them so I could do exactly that. Call them out on their shit. I know I'm not supposed to do that, but it does bring me back to the thought that maybe I would make a good teacher someday.

I talked to my teacher a little bit this week to see what it is I need to work on because as lovely as it is to be called compelling and to know that I do good work in class, I want to be able to improve on something - I need some direction. She said I need to work on trusting myself. That I know how to do this and I know what the right thing to do is and to just trust that I'll get up there and do it. I don't know that I'm there yet - obviously since I'm second guessing a scene everyone thought was lovely. But I do have a tendency to do do scenes that get deemed lovely, when I'm working with people I've worked with before or I've never been on stage with or people who are struggling in class or people who are excelling in class. The scenes I'm in usually turn out pretty well. I still miss things - opportunities - but I'm still learning. And I'm also guessing that at least some of those missed opportunities wouldn't be missed if I had a script to work with that pointed them out to me, if that makes sense. Doesn't mean I'm going to stop trying to not miss them, but still. I think I've gotten pretty good at being emotionally free to bounce from playful to furious and back again in two seconds flat. I think I've gotten pretty good at recognizing when I'm going into my head so I can try to shift my focus back to my partner. I think I've gotten pretty good at observing my partner. I don't feel like I'm a selfish actor, though I may be a semi-defensive one. And I'm not afraid to go to the scary dark icky places. I'm just...good at this.

So now that I have that knowledge, what do I do with it?

I'm Sorry

2010-02-16T09:23:00.002-06:00

Last night was probably the most difficult emotional work I have done in class. I'm still kind of reeling from it, which pisses me off in that "this is why Heath Ledger died" kind of a way. I need to be able to snap out of this and remember that it was a scene in a class and does not represent who I am as a person in real life.

It was a scene that dealt with rape, or didn't deal with it, as the case may be. I was not the victim - my roommate and scene partner and best friend was - and my uncle was the supposed perpetrator. In the world of the scene, this uncle is pretty much the only family I have and he has always been good to me. In the world of the scene, I talked to him before I talked to her and he painted her as the bad guy and the attacker. So I was less than sympathetic when she revealed what had happened. And I think that is the part that was/is the hardest for me to deal with. I am, in real life, a nice person. A supportive person. The sort who listens and who will just hold a friend when she is sad or try to make her laugh when she's had a rough day. I am, in real life, a good person and a good friend. In the world of the scene, I was horrible. I was (and still am) mortified by some of the things I was saying to her, but in the world of the scene, they were my truths. I didn't trust her. I hated her for accusing my uncle of that. I wanted it to be her fault or a joke or a something because how am I supposed to choose between my only family and my only friend? And in the end, I lost them both.

I don't think I have cried that hard in a really long time and I was completely drained by the time it was over. I went home and made my cat hug me and curled up in bed with a teddy bear and episodes of South Park to try to get back to normal. But the scene just kept playing and replaying and replaying in my head and I kept beating myself up for all of the things I could have said or should have said and I kept looking at the moments when I could have shown more compassion, or when I wanted her to show some compassion or understanding for the absolute crap situation I was now in and how else could I have tried to make her see that and all of that stuff. And I finally fell asleep at about 12:30, but I woke up again at about 2:30 with this stuff still circling through my head and I couldn't get back to sleep. And it pisses me off! It was a scene! In class! It was all imaginary! None of it actually happened! The teacher had one note for us - she said I needed to fully realize the truth that what I had lost was my friend. I think I did, I just don't think I verbalized it very well when she told me to speak my truth. I said, "I don't want to be alone," knowing that I was. But that was the only note she had for us. Our preparation on our own was great, our preparation together was great, our moment to moment work was great, we were both present at the same time that we had all of this shit to deal with. And the rest of the class was kind of stunned by our work, too. I'm just kind of kicking myself because when it was all over, I really needed a hug but I didn't want to look like that actor who couldn't snap out of it when the scene was done so I just packed up my stuff like normal and by the time I could have asked for a hug, most of my classmates were gone. So I still need one. Badly.

I'm afraid that my classmates saw me as the villain in the scene. I'm afraid that if I make a career out of being a villain, I will have to do scenes like this over and over and over again and I won't have anyone to hug me when I walk off set. On the one hand, it would be great because I will effect people - my scene partners and my audience. On the other hand, I can see how it would get hard to take after a while.

I think the scene was also really hard for me because I based the character of my uncle on one of my real uncles, and I had a picture of him sitting on the table in our apartment. And I know this uncle. He is wonderful and smart and supportive and caring and will help his family through anything if they need it. I could see him actually taking care of me when my parents were killed, if something like that were to happen. So for her to be accusing him of that...it made it very real for me. And I can't decide if that is a good thing or a bad thing. Yes, it upped the stakes for me, so in that respect, it was probably a good thing. But it hurts to think of my uncle that way, so in that respect, maybe I should have cast a slightly more fictional uncle. I don't know if my choices to cast people close to my heart are good ones or bad ones. The answer is probably "yes."

What's really funny is as I was watching the other scenes in class (we went last), I started to feel really unprepared. I knew who I had cast as my uncle and who I had cast as my boyfriend and what life had been like for the last year with this woman as my roommate, but I honestly didn't know how to feel when I walked in the room or what I really wanted from her. Part of me wanted her to be the liar, part of me wanted her to not be the liar so she could still be my friend. And when it came right down to it, as I was standing in the hallway waiting while my scene partner had her release, all I could think about was how all of my girl friends in high school turned on me over something really stupid and petty and how much it hurt to not have girl friends anymore. So when I walked in to do my release, I was already hurt and angry and crying and desperately needing my friend. I am kind of proud of myself that I just let the emotion happen, based on the preparation. I think that was a good thing. The preparation fueled me, but it didn't overtake me to the point where I couldn't be present in the moment. Because all I had was the moment and what was going on in front of me. So in that respect, yay! I did good work!

I don't know. I know it wasn't real. I know it was some really great work. I still feel the need to apologize to all of my girl friends for my behavior, and I want you all to know that if you find yourself in a horrible situation like that, you can come to me and I will be supportive. I'm so sorry that I even thought those things, much less said them, even just in the context of class. I'm sorry to my scene partner for being so awful to her (even though as an actor, it could be considered a gift). I'm sorry. I'm sorry if I hurt you and I'm sorry I wasn't a better friend in the scene. In real life, I am a much better friend than that. I'm sorry.

Catch Up

2010-02-09T08:42:00.002-06:00

So there has been a lot going on and some of it I can talk about and some of it I can't yet, so please bear with me as I'm kind of vague.

I have gone on 14 auditions in the last two weeks. Of these fourteen auditions, I'm only holding out hope that two of them might produce something. Might. That's not an "I was cast in something!" that's an "I think I made it past the first round of auditions" kind of a thing. For anyone who watches reality television, I think I made it to episode two of a thirteen-episode season. It doesn't necessarily put me any closer to winning the million dollars, it just means I haven't gone home yet. And the sad part is, I'm thrilled that I haven't gone home yet. I could be sent home tomorrow - I don't know. But I'm still living in the house and for now, I have to take comfort in that because I really don't have anything else to go on.

What is difficult about these fourteen auditions in two weeks is that I worked really hard to get ready for them - really hard - and at least twelve of them didn't even give me a second thought. Hell, a lot of them weren't even paying attention as I was up there emoting my heart out. Granted, there are a million reasons why a casting director doesn't cast someone, many of which have nothing to do with skill or talent. Maybe they don't need any more little white girls. Maybe they'd rather have a blond. Maybe they need someone who isn't involved in other things at the moment. Maybe the chemistry between me and the lead guy isn't quite right. And sadly, all of these things are out of my control. And I know that as an actor, I have to get used to rejection. This business is largely about rejection. The one time you get hired is the anomaly in a seemingly never-ending stream of rejections. And you're supposed to build up a thick skin and not take it personally and keep your chin up and go to the next audition with a smile on your face, ready to blow them away. But it has been a long time for me. I wasn't auditioning for a while there because I was a theater company member, and then because I took some time off to be a rock star. And to take twelve rejections in two weeks, often times when the auditor wasn't even looking at me... Some of them felt like I was put into the "no" pile the second I entered the room. And I entered the room well. I put on the pretty pretty make-up so my skin glowed. I did my hair so it looked full and bouncy and vibrant. I wore the figure-flattering trousers and nice sweaters and comfy shoes that set me just a little bit apart from all of the other little white girls auditioning. And I smiled and said hi and was very personable. And before I could even open my mouth, they had already decided that I wasn't right for the part. That hurts. I'm sorry, but it hurts. I know I'm not the best audition they are going to see in a day, but I am trying really hard and I know that given the opportunity, I can light up the stage, but I don't get the opportunity. So all of that knowledge that it could be about looks or quotas or schedules or some vendetta the director has against some teacher I studied with ten years ago that is supposed to help me deal with the onslaught of "no, thank yous" does very little to get me into a show or provide me with opportunity. Which is all I really need. An opportunity.

So I start to think that maybe some of the rejections are the result of something I did or didn't do. Maybe I should have cried. Maybe I needed to show more desperation. Maybe I should have done the piece that has more movement. Maybe I should have sung a different song. Maybe I really need some vocal help and the sound of me talking for two minutes really just grated on the auditor's nerves. Maybe I came on too strong. Which leads us to...maybe all of my hard work just wasn't enough. Maybe I'm not good enough. Maybe I just don't have what they're looking for - what anyone is looking for. Maybe that's why I'm not in a relationship either - I'm holding out for some guy who makes me feel a certain way but no guy that would make me feel that way would ever feel that way for me because I just don't have what he is looking for. And I watch the lives of all of these people around me moving forward - people getting married and having kids and finding new jobs and so on and so forth - and I wonder if I am holding onto a dream I should have let go of years ago so that my life can move forward along the path it is supposed to take instead of fighting so hard to make it move down the one I want it to be on. Because it gets tiring to have to fight so hard all of the time. ALL of the time.

But I'm still in the house. I haven't been sent home yet.

And I got to go to class last night - the new session started. It sounds like it is going to be similar to the last session but moreso. I know that doesn't make sense to anyone outside of the class, but that is okay. And I did decent work. I don't know that I was completely invested in being in love with my partner, but I certainly let his actions and words affect me. And given the circumstances, even though I was supposed to be completely in love with him, I also think it was appropriate to scream at him and hate him and not want to be near him. Maybe that's what love is sometimes. It can't be all flowers and kittens all the time, right? There are going to be moments when your lover really, truly hurts you. And moments when you really, truly hurt them. I don't know. I got to some weird, scary emotional places last night (and I'm actually kind of annoyed that the scene ended when it did because I think I was about to break in half), but I think a lot of them had more to do with how I now felt about myself than how I felt about my partner. I was taking in what he was saying to me, but I don't think I was very focused on him, if that makes any sense. I kept burying my head in my hands, which, even in the moment, felt to me like an indicator that I was going into my head when I should have popped out of it and observed something about him. The teacher thought it was some good work and he liked our preparation that we were able to throw together in five minutes, so that is good. I don't know how much "constructive criticism," so to speak, to walk away from last night's class with, though, as it felt a little more like an exercise in improvisation instead of an exercise in preparation - which is what the rest of the session is going to be. I dunno.

I was talking to my classmates before class about my onslaught of rejections and they said that I know I'm a good actor so everything will be fine. I told them I don't know that. They were surprised by that statement, and then, when we went into the theater, they all sort of sat in a clump around me. I don't know if it was a conscious choice - in previous class sessions, we've all sort of had our space with a chair or two between students - but last night we all sat next to each other in a little clump with me in the middle. And for a moment, I felt wonderful and loved and supported. Even if it was accidental, these people have become my friends and they like having me around. And even if I fail miserably, even if I am sent home empty-handed in the next round of eliminations, they believe in my talent, they like to work with me, and they enjoy watching me work in class. They will still be my friends.

So I'm still in the house. And I'm not alone in here.

Thank you for that.

Evaluations

2010-01-25T20:27:00.003-06:00

We didn't have class on Saturday, we had evaluations. On the one hand, I got a really good evaluation. I am imaginative, I have a good sense of dramatic structure, I'm not afraid of conflict, I'm engaging to watch. All excellent things. I'm left not knowing what to build on, though. Not knowing what direction to go in except forward. We must go forward, not backward, up, not forward, and twirling, always twirling toward the future. I like the twirling bit. I think I still need to work on being soft and falling in love more, or easier. I did have a moment in an audition where I was paired with a guy I'd never worked with before and we were doing some improv that was very much like class and I was vulnerable with him. I needed him. I kissed him. And what was great about it was that he just went with it, so he gets a lot of credit for that. If either of us gets something as a result of that audition, I think we both get credit for it. But my point is, I know now that I can get there. I just want to explore that a little bit more.

One interesting thing that one of the teachers said was that I'm not afraid of confrontation, and I seem to relish showing off my dark side. On stage, that is very true. More and more, lately, I've started to realize that one of my biggest goals as a performer is to be described as "fearless." Not necessarily in the "jumping off of buildings" sense of the word, but in the "willing to play the blackmail artist who just wants this one last score so she can leave the country with her boyfriend and forget about the gross Texan men she had to scam and the fact that he thought this last woman he had to sleep with to get money out of her was good" sense of the word. If I can't be the person in my ordinary, everyday life who takes emotional risks, I want to be that person on stage. And if I become this fearless performer, what kinds of roles will I get? Scum bags? Prostitutes? Liars and cheats? Maybe pursuing a career as a villain is a viable option. And how funny would that be if I came to one day make a living by playing the bad guy all of the time? I think it would be funny. And probably a lot of fun. I'd get to die a lot and get beat up and thrown in jail and I'd probably get to yell a bunch.

I'm not saying I only want to play the bad guy from here on out, but those are roles I never would have thought to put myself in. What if I just open up my mind and consider trying it? I remember when I played Francis in "Five Women Wearing the Same Dress" and the audience applauded when I got kicked out of the room. They saw me as the bad guy. They didn't like me. It was my first exposure to being not-the-good-guy and it was weird. It made me want to try that much harder to win them over later, which was probably a really good character building exercise for me as a person and as a performer. Anyway.

The next session of classes starts in a couple of weeks. I have a few more auditions between now and then, so we'll see what happens. I'm looking forward to the next session of classes and to learning and growing more as an artist. I had a really good artist weekend this weekend and I'd kind of like to make those a habit.

Salve for Your Broken Heart

2010-01-21T09:39:00.001-06:00

So last night was the last class of this session. There is one more day, but it is evaluations so nobody will be working. I hadn't worked (as you know) in quite some time - not really since before the new year, save a two minute scene last week when not enough people were prepared with activities to fill a class so we did some regular neighbor work. And I was rusty. RUSTY. My prep as a neighbor was not good, so the teacher helped me up the stakes on it and make it more vulnerable, but I don't think I got fully behind the new stakes in my twenty seconds behind the door. And my scene partner was crazy woman who wouldn't listen to anything I was saying, and I wasn't listening to anything she was saying and she pelted me with a doughnut, so I pelted her with one and then I was pissed that I had non-vegan doughnut glaze all over my hand, so I wiped it on her shirt and she (as an actress) had an audition after class that she had to go to with doughnut glaze on her shirt and I felt like such an asshole. So to that classmate, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I hope your audition went well and I hope the doughnut washes out of your shirt. I'm so sorry.

The teacher didn't have a lot to say to me after the exercise, which was disappointing. I was standing there feeling like absolute shit and all she really said was that I can do the crazy landlady thing. Maybe she saw a bigger investment in my circumstances than I felt? But I felt like crap about my performance and I wanted to be reemed for that and I wasn't, which means I spent most of the rest of the class sitting there feeling like shit. This is not the note on which I wanted to end the class. For the most part, I think I did pretty well in the class. It still irritates me that I have problems making the soft choices and/or being in love, but for the most part, I think I did pretty well in the class. It just sucks that my last exercise had to be one wherein I felt like I was half-assing the whole thing. I don't like to half-ass things and I'm annoyed with myself that I did it. And that I didn't get busted for it. I even said that I find myself getting into this pattern where I want my dialogue to be interesting, but then I catch myself and force myself back into observational repetition. She said it was a good thing that I can get back to observation and that some of my best moments last night were when I did that. I feel like it takes me out of things, though. Or maybe I'm overanalyzing it. Maybe it's a good thing that I recognize when I'm going into my head and that I've found a mechanism for coping with that, even if the coping mechanism is a head choice designed to force me back out of my head. I don't know. I feel like crap about my exercise last night. My scene partner and I both apologized profusely to each other for general suckage. Which is too bad, because I really enjoy working with this woman and I really enjoyed her set up and I think she is fantastically talented and then I went up there and gave her crap to work with. I'm sorry. We'll be better next time.

The teacher said something about one of the exercises last night, encouraging someone to go for the not-so-obvious choice, or the scary choice, to take risks. She said something along the lines of, "If it doesn't fit in the box, you should grab it." I thought to myself, "I don't fit in the box. Someone should grab me." And then, "Perhaps it is because I don't fit in the box that people don't grab me." And I'm not just talking romantically here, though it is an appropriate metaphor. I think it applies to my artistic career, too. I wrote a couple of weeks ago about how I've played so many diverse roles that sometimes it feels like people don't know what to do with me. I don't fit in the box, so they don't know how to cast me. I'm a pretty little white girl, but I'm strong and intelligent and quirky in a way that cute little white girls normally aren't. And I'm older than I look, too, both chronologically and spiritually. And musically - as much as I want to call my music rock and roll, it's really some rock/alternative/folk/acoustic combo thing that is maybe best described as the love child of early Liz Phair, Danny Elfman, and the Foo Fighters or something like that. It doesn't fit in a box. And as much as labels think they want to find the next great thing, it's scary to take a chance on something that is not easily quantified.

That being said, I don't want to fit in the box. I'm very happy not fitting in the box. I don't want to create the same art as everyone else. I like being odd. I just hope it doesn't hamper my artistic career too much. But if it does, it will just make it that much sweeter when I actually get there.

After class, I met with one of my classmates to work on monologues. We both have a couple of big auditions coming up and thought another set of eyes on our pieces would be a good thing. And it was. I met with another coach last week and the week before and once over the summer and it was great - he was incredibly helpful. But it is nice to get a second opinion, too. And it's nice to have someone to focus on, just to try it, so that you can have a nice mental picture in your head when you go in there and have to do your monologue to some point on the back wall of the auditorium. But it felt good. My classmate's comments were really helpful, so thank you, classmate, for your comments. And it felt a little odd to be coaching him, too. He is very talented. VERY talented. And much further along in his career than I am, so it felt a little odd to be commenting on his performances. But I think it was also a good thing for me to get a little practice coaching someone. To try to find those moments that could be stronger or clearer, and help the person get there without saying, "Well, that was a mess." Practice with constructive criticism and encouragement techniques. I think I did okay. He seemed to listen to what I said and at least took it in to consider it. Whether or not he keeps it and uses it is entirely up to him, but I'd like to think that I at least gave him something to think about. I think that is what a good coach does.

So anyway. Evaluations on Saturday at which point I'll know whether or not I get to move on to the next class. I hope so. I like doing this. I love learning. I love doing this, specifically. And I apologize to my one classmate for sucking and getting doughnut glaze all over you, and I thank my other classmate for your feedback on my audition pieces. Here's to Saturday!

Three

2010-01-12T09:04:00.002-06:00

Last night was the third class in a row where I have not worked. I think I was close, but one guy had a stronger point of view than I did (though they were similar; he was just a little farther to one end of the spectrum than I) so I didn't get to work. It's funny - in the first class, I was okay with it if I didn't work in a day. There were days when I hoped I wouldn't have to, and I enjoyed sitting back and watching. Now, I want to work at just about every class. I love this exercise. I love these situations. I love going up there and following impulses and feeling intensely. I like watching, too, but I'd much rather be doing.

I wrote this the other night after watching "Hamlet" with David Tennant. I put it in my normal online blog, but I think it is appropriate to put it here, too. This has moved beyond just taking classes for fun so that I feel like I'm doing something to an overwhelming passion.

I know what my life is supposed to be. It is supposed to be passion and love and fury and anger and fire and tears and laughter so loud it shakes the mountains. It is supposed to be glory and heartache and triumph and turmoil and beauty as far as the eye can see. It is supposed to be magnificent.

But those things don't often happen in the real world. At least not for me. The closest I get is a laugh so loud it disturbs dogs in a three-mile radius. The real world is censored and muted and safe. There's nothing wrong with that. It is censored and muted and safe for a reason - so that we can all function in it and carry on the usual business of being alive. Nobody would be able to do their jobs if they felt the anguish of Hamlet every time someone did them wrong. Nobody would eat if they felt the passion of Juliet as she drank the vial of poison. The world would cease to function if everyone walked around experiencing the world as intensely as characters in books and plays and movies do.

But I want to. I want to feel everything that intensely. I want to live that fully. I want to experience every aspect of the human condition the way they experience it on stage and screen. I don't like to do things halfway. I don't like to be missing out. And in so many ways, I'm missing out already. I'll never marry my high school sweetheart because I didn't have one. I'll never have the four day Vegas marriage because I'm too smart for that now. I'll never even know what it's like to grow up in another country because I only get the one childhood. I'm tired of missing out. I'm tired of capped emotions. I want to live the life that the characters on the screen do.

I know, I sound like a crackpot. I know I can't live that way all of the time. But if I am one of the characters on the stage, I can live that way for a very short time. I can scream and weep and leap for joy and boil with rage and love with my whole heart until my body aches. I can experience...everything.

I know what my life is supposed to be. I know what my life is supposed to be and it is not supposed to be this. I know what my life is supposed to be. Please, oh please, oh please let me get there one day.

The teacher last night said that there are three kinds of people - those who make things happen, those who watch while things happen, and those who wonder what the fuck just happened. I want to be the sort that makes things happen, and I think for the most part I am. When I wanted to learn to dance, I did it. When I needed to find a job, I found one. When I wanted to try veganism, I made the change. When I wanted to go to Australia or Europe or New York or San Francisco or Texas, I went. There is very little that keeps me from doing the things I want to do. By the same token, though, the acting coach I went to last week (and who I will be seeing again tonight) said that one thing I can do to try to keep myself from screwing up auditions (I psyche myself out. I think, "I should have chosen a different piece," or "I should have entered the room differently," or "I should have worn the other pants," or whatever and I get nervous and then you can hear it in my voice, which makes me more nervous and I get cottonmouth and it all just starts to come out horrible) is to think back to a time when everything was just working for me without me really trying, and then enter the audition room in that state of mind. There have been times in my life when everything was working, but I was working my ass off to have that and to keep it. When I had my band. I felt invincible with my band, but I also felt the pressure to not let them down. I had to coordinate rehearsals and book gigs and write new material and make us feel like we were moving forward as a unit. It was a lot of hard work. I loved doing it and I loved the way it made me feel, but I had to work super crazy hard to have that band. And when I used to dance, I worked really hard at being a good dancer. And when I was with my theater company, I worked my ass off for every single show I was involved in. I don't know that there has ever been a time in my life when I have had something good that I didn't have to work my ass off to get, and then work twice as hard to keep. And even if there was such a time, I'm sure I feel differently about it now, as that time has past and I've lost whatever it once was.

I don't know. I scheduled a slew of auditions for myself in the near future because I need to get back out there and do this. I need to do this every day. And I'm just going to have to go into each and every audition knowing that a) they want me to be good, b) I am good, and c) what I have chosen to do is exactly what I am supposed to be doing. I just have to know it.

Here we go with that whole "growing an ego" thing again...

Imagination

2010-01-10T18:52:00.001-06:00

Yesterday was the second class in a row that I didn't get to work. I haven't worked since I was slapped. But that's to be expected - there are a lot of people in the class and when we only get through two or three exercises in one class, that's only four to six people working each time. And I have worked a lot - both as the person with the activity and as the neighbor.

I was talking to a woman in the class after she had just worked, and I told her I was hoping her character would come in with a certain point of view. The one she brought in was good and it was a really interesting scene, but I had a different idea and I shared it. She said she thought about that, but since her actual perspective is the absolute opposite of my idea, she didn't think she would be able to get behind it enough to make the scene convincing. That bothered me.

Granted, this particular woman was out of town and missed a bunch of classes, so she hasn't gotten to see how ridiculous some of the set-ups and some of the neighbors have become. But she wants to be an actress, and she doesn't think she could get behind choices that she herself would never make? That would seem to indicate that she can only ever be cast as a character that is very close to who she actually is. And granted, she is beautiful and sweet and I'm sure there are plenty of roles in which she would do just fine, but still. I want to play characters. I want to play characters who are very different from who I am so that I can learn more about myself and about the world. Besides, when you play someone who is different from who you are, you get to exercise your imagination to try to figure out why you are completely behind this choice that your character is making that you would never in a million years make. Take some sci-fi show, for example. In my average, ordinary, every day life, I would probably never make the decision to go out in category 5 hurricane winds and rain in order to flip a switch to shoot a nuclear missile at a lake in order to clear things up. Nor would I ask anyone else to do so. But in the case of this particular small town that is about to be ripped apart by severe weather patterns, I have to go do that or everyone will die and I have to get 100% behind the choice to save the town at the risk of my own safety. And if the thought of thousands of people dying isn't enough, I have to imagine that one of them is my kid or my husband or my mom or whatever it would take to push me out that door to save the world. As an actor, I have to be able to do that. So why not practice in class? Make the choice you would never in a million years make and then find some way to justify it.

If for no other reason, then just because it's fun.

If You've Ever Wanted to See Me Get Bitch-Slapped...

2010-01-04T20:46:00.003-06:00

...you should have been in class tonight. I got walloped and walloped good. In her defense, I was blackmailing her for ten million dollars, but she slapped me across the face in a way I've never been slapped before and in a way I never hope I get slapped again. And in a way you'll never understand if you're not an actor, I am really frickin' proud of myself. I did my job. I effected my partner so intensely, I pushed exactly the right button, that she had to slap me. I get to take some credit for that. I also get to take a little credit for not slapping back like I very badly wanted to. And after the exercise, the teacher liked that we both created these textured, complicated characters and that we weren't afraid to be ugly. I'm proud of that. Maybe its building the ego he so sorely thinks we all need, but I'm proud of the work I did today. I still need to find the opportunity to be soft and fall in love, and I'm working on that. But I'm taking steps and learning how to take risks. That's a really good thing. Let's hope a little of that bleeds into my real life. Minus the getting slapped bit.

Armor

2010-01-03T10:14:00.001-06:00

Or armour for our friends overseas.

I had an excellent exercise in class yesterday. So said the teacher, even. I was frustrated through most of it because I felt like my partner was very much in her own headspace and it wasn't supposed to be an exercise about her, it was supposed to be an exercise about us. But anyway. The teacher had to coach me a bit to take down my armor. Which normally, would upset me a bit because I get tired of having armor there so the fact that it is still there and still shows up all of the time bothers me. But she also said that it was perfectly natural for the armor to come up, given the circumstances, and that I wouldn't have had the full support of the audience the way that I did if I hadn't completely fallen apart before I put up the armor. See, in the scene, I'm getting ready to tell my boyfriend that I'm pregnant. My neighbor comes in and tells me she slept with my boyfriend, got pregnant, and he made her abort. One option, while she was telling me these things, would have been for me to rail against her and tell her I didn't believe her and I had to talk to him and throw her out of my house. But I didn't. I took what she said as true and lived in it for a moment. I cried really hard, and I shook a lot. And then I built up my armor because that's what you do when your foe has vanquished you. But then I didn't know how to take it back down, and I needed coaching with that. All in all, though, the teacher said there was some excellent work, so I'll take that.

I was drained afterward though. I was talking to a classmate of mine afterward about how much strength and energy it takes to do this and how empty you can feel once your exercise is over. If I do get to a point someday where I get to do this professionally, and I am paid to go to these places on a daily basis, I don't know how I would have the energy to go out and party and get high and mess around with other hot young stars. I just wouldn't. I'm going to be a very dull celebrity who just wants to go home and go to bed after a long day of work. And you know what? I'm okay with that.

Hour

2009-12-30T21:34:00.002-06:00

I was supposed to work tonight in class but we didn't get to me because the other exercises got really very deep and took a lot of time. I'm not complaining. They were interesting to watch. Still a lot of not-following-impulses or not showing emotions or not calling partners out on their emotions, but there was also some breakthrough type stuff happening and people going places I had never seen them go before, so that was great.

The teacher talked about ego tonight. He thinks we all need to have the biggest egos in the world. We need to be able to take them off when we get on stage so that we can take everything personally, but we have to think the world of ourselves in order to be able to survive (emotionally) the things we put ourselves through. We have to hit the absolute lowest lows a person can hit, but still have that one little glimmer of hope that makes us fight for what we want even though we have nothing. And if we get the job, we have to do that every night for two months of rehearsals plus six weeks of shows, if not longer. We have to have huge egos to be able to survive that.

I don't have a huge ego. I think we all know this by now. I have a bit of an ego. I know I'm a good cook. I know I've written some good songs. I know I'm a good actor. But I'm also the first one to say that there is always something more I can learn. At one point, the teacher asked one of the women in exercise what her strengths as a performer are. That's a good question for all of us, and one I've thought about in the past few days. I think my greatest strength as a performer is also my greatest weakness - my versatility. I have played so many characters - men, women, a four-year-old boy, old people, young people, creepy people, weak people, strong people, strange people, loud confident people, mousey people, and my latest creation - the creepy-Stepford-wife=octopus-like hooker. I love that I have played so many different types. It has allowed me to explore all kinds of different parts of my being, and I think I've done really well in all of these different roles. But I think it's also a bit of a weakness because it makes me difficult to cast. When I was with my old theater company, it was easy to cast shows from the company. There was the loud, silly guy. The loud, crass girl. The romantic leads. The funny straight man. And then there was me. I don't think they knew where to put me most of the time, so they would cast everything else first and then just fill me into the blank spaces wherever they could. Not that there is anything wrong with that, but as an actor, it can be a bad thing to not have a type - if people can't categorize you, it can make it hard for them to cast you, or to know what roles to submit you for. If there were more Johnny Depp style roles for women, I could be that type. But let's face it, there aren't. Willy Wonka is a man. Edward Scissorhands has a human female counterpart, and if someone were to build a robot woman, you've all of a sudden got a porn film on your hands, not a touching story about misfits who find each other and are then torn asunder.

But anyway. I think I need to take a minute to list what I think my strengths are as a performer, in the hopes that maybe, one day, I'll have the kind of ego my teacher thinks we should all have.

I am versatile.
I am adaptable.
I am flexible.
I am very good at reading my partners and reacting to them.
I create interesting characters.
I am good with improv.
I move well.
I think I give my partners a lot to work off of (though I would need someone else to corroborate this. A couple of people in my class have remarked that I'm a lot of fun to work with because there's a lot going on, though, so I think this is a safe one to say. See? I don't even have enough of an ego to say "I give my partners a lot to work with" and stick with it).
I can sing (especially Bobby McGee).
I can dance.
I am reliable.
I work really hard.
I am passionate about this.

On paper, I look like a pretty good actor, huh? New Year's Resolution #2 for me - learn how to believe that I am a great actor. Time to grow an ego, darling. Time to grow an ego.

High Class

2009-12-29T10:04:00.002-06:00

I really don't have much to say about class last night. Some of the work done was really amazing. Some of it required a lot of coaching as the actors struggled with their own mental blocks.

I got to work in the last exercise of the night, which was done really fast because we didn't have much time left. I was the neighbor, so I only had about a minute to come up with a story and a purpose, so I drew on the first thing that came to mind - I had been watching "Secret Diary of a Call Girl" the other night. I cast myself in the exercise as a woman who had come to New York a year ago to be an actor, had little success, and kind of fell into a career as a call girl instead. And in the exercise, I was trying to get my scene partner to come work for my agency so that I could start climbing the ladder within my business. Seedy, huh? The teacher described me as a creppy Stepford wife type person, and she described the way I moved at one point as octopus-like. Not at all what I was going for, but okay. I was creepy and manipulative and I sold the hell out of it, so that's good. The only question that the teacher had for me was about my vulnerability, which (in retrospect) I think existed in two places - that this is my career now instead of acting, and that if I don't get her to come with me, I lose my status within the agency. The teacher then instantly went back to my partner who missed both of those moments that I had (though the teacher only saw the first one), and told her she should have jumped on them. Which then makes me ask, how can I show my vulnerability honestly and truthfully if my partner doesn't notice it? Granted, I don't know that I had enough invested in either vulnerable point to really push them, but if the teacher saw it, it must have been there. I could go into my own headspace, I guess, and wallow in the number of auditions I failed at, but truthfully, the motivation to get at her was stronger than the motivation to have my own personal pity party. And since she didn't call me out on my failures, it was easy to skim over them and move on. Which I think is the eternal question that surrounds this kind of work - how do I get to where I need to go if my partner doesn't push me there? In work that is so dependent upon the other person, if they're not giving it to you, how do you get it? Do you have to push them harder to notice? Do you just push yourself? Is it a matter of you not giving them enough to give you enough to get where you need to be? It's kind of a mind-fuck, huh?

My partner got stuck in her head. A lot of people last night got stuck in their heads. I probably do sometimes, too, but we all need to remember (because we've been told a million times) that when you feel yourself getting stuck, FOCUS ON YOUR PARTNER AND MAKE AN OBSERVATION. What do you see? What is your partner doing? How do you feel about your partner? If the best you can come up with in a moment when you are stuck is "You're smiling at me," then say, "You're smiling at me" and go into repetition. You get back to emotional life when you get out of your own head.

I wonder if people keep retreating to their heads and keep not taking risks because they are afraid of what the rest of the class will think of them if they go there. There was a woman who came in one day with the exercise of writing her suicide note and she was uncomfortable talking about it before class, and kind of felt the need to let us all know that she was not, in fact, suicidal. I wonder if people are afraid that we'll all think they are these characters that we create when we go into exercise and that is what is stopping them from making the choice to take the job as a call girl or a drug dealer. But the thing is this - this is theater. This is imaginary. The activity is real and the emotions are real, but everything else surrounding it is completely imaginary. COMPLETELY IMAGINARY. Yes, I played a call girl last night. No, I am not a call girl. Yes, I played woman a few weeks ago who set her baby's crib on fire because she wanted the kid to stop crying. I would NEVER in a million years set a kid's crib on fire. That would never even appear in my brain as an option for how to get a baby to stop crying. But there are people out there who would think that way. And for the purposes of this class, I think it is good to push ourselves into uncomfortable places. Go ahead and cast yourself as the scum of the earth. Go ahead and make the choice that you would never in a million years make and see what happens! There was a beautiful moment in one exercise last night where one woman was a nanny and her neighbor came in and tried to get her to be a drug dealer instead and in the middle of the exercise, very quietly, she agreed to do it. He was startled by her decision and said, "Really?" and she completely backtracked and started freaking out. It was marvelous! It was true. It was like she really wanted to say yes and wanted to know what it felt like to say yes so she did, but then her logical brain kicked back in and she knew she really couldn't do it. You couldn't have scripted it better. It was brilliant. And that is how this is supposed to work. She wasn't really agreeing to be a drug dealer, and he wasn't really a drug dealer. They were actors in a scene exploring what it might be like to be presented with that opportunity.

I'm explaining it all wrong. Suffice it to say, our class is safe space. Take chances. Take risks. Agree to do the things you would never do in your regular life, just to see what would happen. And the other people in class will not walk out thinking, "Gee, I wonder if he is really a sexual psychopath." They will walk out thinking, "That was brilliant and fun to watch and engaging and he was really brave to go there."

I want to be brave enough to go there.

Sad

2009-12-20T22:33:00.002-06:00

My exercise was too close to me today. 90% of my backstory was completely true. Which means when she came in and told me I was making an ass out of myself, she was telling me I was making an ass out of myself. And I had to wonder if I really am.

The teacher thought I needed more prep or deeper stakes or something - I was completely invested and I don't know that I could have prepped more. It is possible that it didn't all show - he didn't ask questions that covered all of the bases I had thought of. But I should have been able to show those things and I didn't. He thought that what I had put together was good in a couple of respects, weak in a couple of others. And my partner told me afterward that I am fun to work with. I enjoyed working with her quite a bit, too, even though in the moment-to-moment work of the scene, she was driving me crazy and making me feel like shit.

And I brought home the feelings of shit. I know I shouldn't, but I did and just a moment ago, I got almost unspeakably sad and I'm not exactly sure why. Failure in class can be a good thing because you can learn from it. And there was one guy today who made up his own sort of homework assignment, completely missing the boat regarding what these activities are supposed to be, so at least mine wasn't as bad as his. And some of my classmates are still talking about an exercise I did earlier in the week, so I must be doing something right somewhere. But today my exercise was about me and I was told that I sucked and it hurt. So right now, I hurt. Because part of me thinks it's true. Trust me - I had a mirror in my exercise today and I didn't necessarily like the dancing the girl looking back at me was doing.

And I thought about the holidays a lot today because they're coming up but we're not really doing much for them in my family this year (everyone is scaling back), so I really don't have much to do holiday-wise this year which is nice because it's not stressful, but it is kind of sad to not be doing much for the holidays. And I'm sorry and I'm afraid to say anything about the holidays at all because I'm likely to offend someone I didn't intend to offend, so I think I'll just have to say that I'll enjoy them again when I have my own family and am able to create my own traditions. Until then...I need to find my motivation.

I dunno. I'm sorry. I know my exercise couldn't have been that bad, but I'm just really sad right now. Which says I should probably go to sleep. Good night.

My Plan

2009-12-16T20:48:00.002-06:00

My plan was to come home from class, do some laundry, work out, go to bed and get ready to work tomorrow.

That was my plan.

That's not going to happen.

My brain is not functioning on a plane that will let me really talk about what just happened in class, but just know this - it was good. It was damn good. I ripped up my throat. I have some mystery red mark on the back of my left hand. But most importantly, I affected my partner, I was effected by my partner, and I lived truthfully moment to moment. The teacher commented that I did very well trying all sorts of different tactics to get what I wanted. I kept yelling at myself in my head that I was being conversational instead of repetitive, but I don't think that was really an issue. The teacher stopped us right after there was a weird shift in the scene from hard to soft that neither of us really knew what to do with, and she told me I should have jumped on the soft impulse sooner. I was having problems identifying that it was okay to be soft (if that makes any sense) and then my partner said something first that was not soft and the teacher called her out on going back to tired old places that we'd already been. But in general...I can't even describe it. We were both there. We were both connected. We both wanted something really really really badly. We both observed and were observed. The class was laughing and afraid and excited. That was a fucking good exercise. I feel fucking great about it. And I've learned that I swear like a sailor when I get passionate about something. There was a moment when my partner was right up in my face and I had an impulse to kiss her which would have been totally hysterical and completely out of the blue so I didn't follow it, but it was there. Next time, I should. And like the teacher said, I didn't get soft very quickly (which may be a good thing for guys, but it's not what I'm going for in acting class). It bothers me that this teacher keeps seeing me be hard and mean and strong. I know I've been soft and weak and vulnerable at other times; I just don't know that she has seen it. I almost feel like I need to set up an exercise that will make me be soft, but I'm not sure how to do that. I don't know what the other person would come in with.

My whole body is alive right now. I don't know if you know what that feels like or if it even makes sense, but it is like every nerve is firing all at the same time. I'm over-stimulated and completely exhausted at the same time. My scene partner and I had to hug each other a couple of times after our exercise and I think we could have very easily collapsed into each other and fallen asleep.

And so I came home to my cat. Who is so beautiful it breaks my heart. And he has no idea why I need to hold him for a minute longer than usual. Or why I'm completely scattered as I make a giant bowl of popcorn that I'm eating in fits and spurts. And I love him so much I want to cry right now. That is my truth, right now, in this moment. I want to cry because my cat is so beautiful. Sweet jebus, I'm a crackpot.

The other exercises tonight were interesting. More engaging than some previous ones have been. They made me realize how much time we spend not saying the things we want to say or need to say. Both of the teachers in this class have encouraged us to just say it or just go there or to allow yourself to be ugly or vulnerable or scared or whatever. One of them told us to run towards the confrontations. He was also quick to tell us that this is perhaps not the best advice to follow in real life. But a couple of weeks ago, when I went to see the Swell Season, Glen Hansard told a beautiful, heartbreaking story about a woman who lost her son in the Twin Towers and he dedicated "Say It To Me Now" to her and I sobbed while he played. He played with no amplification, standing on the front edge of the stage as if his life depended on it. And he said it. He encouraged us all to say it. Just say it. And in a strange way, it makes me sad that my classmates can't make themselves just say it in the completely safe, completely imaginary world created in our classroom. If you're not going to say it there, where will you ever say it?

So here are some of my "just say its" in no particular order:

I'm annoyed with you.
I'm flattered that you would ask, but I'm really not interested.
I still have a crush on you (though it's not as strong as it was) and probably will until you get married. Which, for a second, I almost thought you were going to and I think my heart stopped.
If I could ask just one thing of you, it would be for you to be nice to me for one full day. And be nice in my general direction for one full day. No negative commentary, no snide comments, just be nice to me. Because I am a person and I do deserve that.
You know how to make me feel dumb and I don't like that, so I'm removing myself from the situation. Which hurts because you also know how to make me radiant.
I appreciate the effort, but that's not really what I'm talking about.
I love you and don't know what I would do without you. You hurt my feelings a couple weeks ago.
I really just want to be near you.
I miss you.
That's not my problem.
There are things that can be done to change it.

I wonder if my tendency to lean on the hard feelings in class has anything to do with all of the crap going on in my regular life. And if even just one of the annoying things shifted to be less annoying, if I would start to lean more towards soft feelings. I wonder.

One Step Ahead

2009-12-15T14:33:00.002-06:00

I didn't work in class on Saturday - the cards just didn't fall that way. Which was fine because I was wearing really uncomfortable shoes so I don't know how well I would have done anyway. But one thing did occur to me about my classmates: we all sit there and watch everyone else's exercises. We know what kinds of questions the teacher is going to ask in regard to our preparation. Why don't we ask ourselves those same questions when putting our activities together before class so that we are prepared?

I try to. I know the teacher is going to set me up to want something from my partner, so as I think about each exercise and what I'll be doing, I try to think of what I could possibly want from another person. That might change when I find out which of my classmates I'll be working with, but it's good to have an option, or to have at least considered it. A couple of my classmates have created situations full of despair, but when asked why they are so desperate, they can't come up with specifics. Why not? Pull something out of your ass if you have to. You want to kill yourself because your husband just died and you can't bear to be without him. Which means you could also want love and affection and attention from someone else (i.e. your scene partner), and the thought of that could make you feel really guilty and if you get it...see? That's a scene. As opposed to, "I want to die because I'm messed up and I don't really want anything." That's boring to watch. It's boring to hear about. And it's really funny to me that some of my classmates are having so much trouble with this because the one instructor has told us probably five times now to take risks, to use our imaginations, and to just friggin' try things. I don't think this is the kind of setting wherein either teacher is going to tell us it's too far out there to think that if my sister makes it over before the place is clean, she's going to smack the shit out of me, and then drag me to the airport kicking and screaming, burning down my apartment on the way out. That would light a fire under your ass to clean the place up, wouldn't it? Nice, high stakes. Nice, imaginary situation. But what it will produce is nice, real reactions and emotions. And if you look at the really good movies or plays you've seen, there is almost always some element of the fantastic or extraordinary involved. If this wasn't an atypical day, nobody would have written a play about it. Even "Seinfeld," the show about nothing, managed to elevate the urgency of nothing to epic proportions - Jerry stealing the last loaf of marble rye from a little old lady on the street, the fight with the Soup Nazi, Kramer in general. All of these situations start out normal - he needs bread to take to a party, they're trying to buy lunch - but they get pushed into the ridiculous because for some reason, it is WAY more important that this happen today than any other day and if it doesn't happen today, somebody is going to die. That level of urgency, that level of desperation is what makes something engaging to watch. That level of urgency is what is going to push you as an actor to your emotional extremes. So why not, when you're preparing for an exercise in class, build in that element of urgency and push it past the boundaries of normalcy to the level of lunacy that somebody would actually want to watch? What's stopping you? Especially in class where it is safe to experiment and play and be ridiculous.

For example, in my first exercise, if I didn't fix those pants, we were going to lose our house and my sister was going to disown me. In my second exercise, if I didn't finish my taxes, my boyfriend was going to dump me and kick me out of our apartment, leaving me penniless, jobless, and homeless. In real life, it is entirely possible that either of those outcomes would not happen. I could probably plead with my boyfriend for another week or so in the apartment until I could find my own place and get on my feet. But in the exercise, I think it is important to believe that it won't go that way. If, for no other reason, because I become more engaging and interesting to watch when I have that kind of pressure on me.

I remember when I took Meisner in college, the teacher boiled it all down to six actions that you could play (though you could combine them as necessary, i.e. celebrate someone in order to seduce them), and what your character wants. Everybody wants something. As actors, we have to figure out what it is our character wants, and then make that the absolute most important thing in the world. In my next exercise, I want to go on tour, and if I don't, I'll curl up in a ditch and die. Should be fun, I think.

Please, Sir, May I Have Some More?

2009-12-10T09:39:00.002-06:00

I had another good exercise in class last night. I think I got a good balance of paying attention to my activity and my partner at the same time. I got really angry and I got really despondent. The teacher didn't have much for me in the way of comments, though. She didn't like the environment I created, but other than that, she said it was "pretty decent." I'm not sure what to do with that. Other than make sure the next environment I create is a little more indicative of where my set-up puts me.

A lot of my classmates seem to be having problems with the introduction of imaginary circumstances into things. My thought is to just make something up. If you don't know why you would do something, make something up. Which may or may not be the right approach. For example, one of my classmates didn't really have any feelings one way or the other about the woman whose "apartment" he supposedly just visited and then was going back to, and he therefore had problems figuring out why he would say to her, "I'll be back in five minutes" and why would he come back in five minutes. From my point of view, the thing is this: he returned to the apartment in five minutes. That is a given. It is up to him as an actor to figure out why, whatever that reason is. Maybe he just set a fire in the apartment down the hall and is coming to get her out. Maybe he wants to help with her activity and needed to go find supplies. Maybe the heat is out in his place and he wants to be somewhere warm. Whatever. The truth of the situation is that he went back to her apartment. As actors, we are given those truths all of the time - they are called "scripts." We have to figure out what will motivate us as people to actually do those things. It can be directly related to the other person on stage or it can not be, as long as it gets you there. Because once you are there, who knows what is going to happen? Maybe you show up wanting to evacuate, but end up falling in love and you both burn together in a beautiful Romeo and Juliet type tableaux. You just need to make up a reason to be there. The rest of it will happen how it happens.

Or I could be totally wrong. I have been pulling stuff out of my butt to fill in the spaces in my activities - I've given myself imaginary children and diseases and boyfriends and jobs and all kinds of things - in an attempt to up the stakes in my exercises and I am apparently just doing "pretty decent" work. I don't know what that means. I don't know if that is good or bad. I don't know how to improve on "pretty decent," unless you tell me why those specific words were chosen to describe my work as opposed to, say, "great" or "stinky."

I like that I can leave this class feeling good about myself. I wish I could help my classmates who seem to be struggling so much with it. And I think I need to find a mirror for my next activity, for which I am totally going to trick out the space.

...and Then Some

2009-12-02T21:05:00.002-06:00

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.

Well Done

2009-11-21T15:32:00.002-06:00

I had two good exercises today.

We were supposed to bring in an object from home and build completely imaginary circumstances around it - what it is, where we got it, why we keep it, etc. And one by one, we went up with our object, said a little bit about it, and then someone came in to fall into the repetition exercise from the first class, but using the fuel of this object through the scene. My first exercise was with one guy who I really enjoy working with and it made me really happy that as soon as our bit of stock dialogue was over, we both just kind of looked at each other and fell into a hug from across the room. I don't know if that killed his object preparation or what, but he was happy that I was there and I was happy to be there. It got a little frustrating because he was still trying to be about the object and I wanted to be able to ask him what was wrong instead of saying, "You're hurt," but that would lead into script and dialogue and character and we're not there yet. But it felt like a pretty good exercise. If nothing else, I was soft when I needed to be soft and when he needed me to be soft and that's a good thing. I don't think the teacher said anything to me after that exercise.

My second exercise was about me and my object. It started out like this:

Teacher: What is is?
Me: Rocky Raccoon.
Teacher: Where did you get it?
Me: They gave it to me at the hospital when my daughter was born.
Teacher: How long have you had it?
Me: 1034 days.
Teacher: Why do you keep it?
Me: Because when I get her back, it's how she'll know I'm her mom.
Teacher: How does it make you feel?
Me: (crying already) Really sad and guilty.

And then the scene started. Now, with only that to go on, the woman who came in did what any human being with a heart would do - she tried to comfort me. We went through crying and screaming and laughing and love and release and in general, I think it was a good exercise. At the end of it, the teacher told her she should have tried to yank the raccoon out of my hands - I wouldn't let go of it - because we don't need to be nice to each other on stage. She had tried gently to take it from me. I wonder if she knew my whole back story if she would have ripped it out of my hands. I wonder if she knew my whole back story if she would have tried to comfort me. See, in my story, after I gave birth to my daughter, I suffered from pretty severe postpartum depression. A "friend" of mine introduced narcotics into my world to try to make me feel better which, of course, they didn't. And one night in January (January 23, 2007) when my daughter was about 9 weeks old, it was really cold in my place (because I hadn't paid the gas bill since before she was born) and she wouldn't stop crying because she was really cold and I just wanted her to stop crying so I set fire to her crib to try to keep her warm. Our neighbors called the fire department - I was treated for smoke inhalation and they determined from my psyche evaluation that I should be institutionalized until I was no longer a danger to myself or my child. I didn't get to see her in the hospital. I honestly don't know if she survived - the doctors won't tell me where she is. So I keep this raccoon that they gave me at the hospital when she was born so I can give it to her when I am well again and allowed to see her. Because all I want in the world is to know that she is okay.

Pretty good imaginary circumstances, huh? Nice and specific, but VERY far removed from my reality. But it made it really hard to accept it when my scene partner was comforting me because I wasn't sure I deserved to be treated nicely. Which may be why I held onto my circumstances (and the raccoon) as long as I did. I did eventually put it down and took her hand instead. I did find myself reminding myself to pay attention to her reactions to my reactions, too, and there were a couple of times when I think I did that really well. I found myself shying away from saying very complimentary things to her like, "You are an angel" or "You are beautiful" because after watching her in class for nine weeks now, I know she tends to shut down when you say nice things to her and I didn't want her to shut down. I wanted both of us to stay involved so instead I said, "I love you." Because I did. She was wonderful to me and by the end of our exercise, I was letting her be. So that felt great. When the teacher asked me how I felt about it, though, it took a minute to put it into words. I didn't want to say, "That was amazing!" because that would be boastful and I didn't want to be boastful - I wanted to encourage commentary so I can learn. I said I wasn't sure if I focused on my circumstances too much or if I should have focused on my partner more or if I struck a balance between the two. He said he thought I hit a decent balance, but that in general, between and object and a person, you're always going to get more out it if you focus on the person. That makes sense.

What was also really nice was that as soon as the exercise was over, all of those feelings were gone. The guilt over setting my imaginary daughter on fire. The pain of having my child taken away from me. The feeling of failure in knowing that I was following in the imaginary footsteps of my imaginary mother who wasn't there for me either. All of it. Poof! Gone. I was back to regular old Kitty, childless, fire-less, and with a wonderful loving mother, able to look at the exercise from an outside perspective with a semi-critical eye. I didn't get bogged down in thinking I'm a horrible person for being able to imagine doing those things. It was an exercise for a class. Nobody was harmed in the process. If anything, we gained valuable experience as actors for it. Which brings me back to the previous classes and how they made me feel like shit. In those classes, I was following my impulses as me. In this exercise, I was following my impulses as this character I created. And then I was able to turn her off and get rid of her. That is a really really really really really really good and valuable thing, too.

No class next week for the holidays. I'm glad to have gone out on a positive, you know? If I had to stew for two weeks about a bad exercise...ouch. Instead, I get to feel that little glimmer of confidence in my abilities as a performer. I dig that.

A Bit More

2009-11-19T11:28:00.002-06:00

I want to write a bit more about my exercise from last night because I'm in that sort of a mood and it's what I do. I think about things too much.

We were supposed to choose and object on the stage and create completely imaginary circumstances surrounding it - what is this object, where did we get it, how long have we had it, why do we keep it, that sort of thing. I chose a mug. It was the first thing I bought for myself when I moved into my first apartment. I bought it because I didn't have a lot of money, but I wanted to feel grown up and independent and I thought if I had grown up mugs, it would validate me.

In the course of my exercise, the teacher asked a lot of questions about this mug and about how I was feeling. I felt silly and embarrassed because it was a mug that validated by worth as a human being, but I didn't say that bit. I said I felt silly and nervous because of my connection to the mug and my vulnerability surrounding it. But I didn't push it that extra step to actually show my classmates what that mug meant to me. And in that moment, the mug was the only thing keeping me standing. I almost cried several times, but I didn't let myself. Afterward, the teacher pointed out a couple of places where I could have made more vulnerable choices and I took that as my "what I need to learn for next time" thing.

What struck me after class (or during, while other people were doing their exercises) was that I chose an item that isolated me and reminded me of my isolation, which is something that I'm dealing with in my current life. This wasn't my friend's mug or my mom's mug or an heirloom mug passed down to me by my great grandmother, this was my mug that I bought for myself for my first apartment where I lived by myself. Nobody ever used the other mugs in the set because nobody ever came over. Those, for me, are very real circumstances. And it bothers me that my first impulse didn't include another human being, real or imaginary. It was a solitary impulse. Because I'm feeling solitary. But even in that feeling solitary, I didn't let my classmates know that it bothers me. I didn't trust them enough in class to break down and show the weight of my solitude. I still had to be strong, which is why I felt silly.

So what I think I need to work on, in class specifically (but maybe in life, too) is connecting with other people, not just with objects. If this object belonged to someone else, then I have that person's feelings to take into account, too. If this object means something to them and I broke it...imagine what sort of doors that would open up. And I need to work on not always being strong and keeping it together. I need to let everything fall apart, even for a moment, even just on stage.

I can do it. I know I can. Gotta bring my A-game and just let it happen. For the sake of my worth as an actor, I have to let myself be a total mess for just one moment.

That's kind of exciting.

There It Is

2009-11-18T20:55:00.003-06:00

There it is. That feeling that I suck and am a terrible person. Yay! Class has started again.

We're starting to bring in more imaginary circumstances and I think I need to let my imagination fly more. I know I'm a creative person, but my "imaginary circumstances" were kind of dull and kind of close to me. I need to make riskier choices and get farther away from myself, which seems almost contradictory to everything from last class. But acting is living truthfully under imaginary circumstances. Last class was about living truthfully. This one may be about imaginary circumstances. Gotta roll with the punches and be ready for anything.

Hooray for sucking!

Session Two

2009-11-18T15:26:00.001-06:00

Tonight is the first class in the next session of classes and I am so nervous my stomach hurts. Every time I think about walking into that class tonight, my heart rate jumps through the roof and I find myself short of breath. I'm not sure why. Most of the people in the class are people I know and have worked with for eight weeks already. There are a couple of new faces (I think, based on the email that went out reminding us that we have class today), but I shouldn't be this scared of starting a new class.

I think it is because I have no idea what to expect. I'm guessing we'll continue with some repetition stuff and add onto it and build from there throughout the next eight weeks, but I don't know for sure. I'm afraid of what I'm going to do in this class. Not in a "I might hurt someone or myself or be asked to do horribly immoral things" kind of a way. In more of a "what deep dark secrets of my soul are going to be revealed on stage now" kind of a way. And in the general introverted sense of "I'm going to have to go interact with people and be energetic and enthusiastic and whatnot" kind of a way. But even without all of that, not knowing what to expect can be a very scary thing.

I know I'll do fine. I know I can handle whatever they throw at me. And I'm looking forward to seeing my friends again and working with them more. I just hope I can convince my GI tract of that before class starts.

Your Misfortune

2009-10-31T18:08:00.000-05:00

When your faith in life is gone, come and speak to me
When you're down and all messed up, seek my sympathy

When everybody says no, no, no
Well it's your misfortune and none of my own
Wrong wrong wrong
Well it’s your misfortune that sweetens my song

I can be the friend you want
I can be your confidante
I can be the right reminder at the right time
Throwing out the lifeline

Stand in the light, stand in the light, stand in the light
Stand in the light, stand in the light, stand in the light

When your face is caked with mud, come and speak to me
When the chill creeps in your blood, seek my sympathy

When everybody says no, no, no
Well it's your misfortune and none of my own
Wrong wrong wrong
Well it’s your misfortune that sweetens my song

I can be the air you drink
Every single thought you think
I can be the right notion in the meantime
Warm you like the sunshine

Stand in the light, stand in the light, stand in the light
Stand in the light, stand in the light, stand in the light

It's a Mike Doughty song and when I saw him play it in concert a couple of weeks ago, it made me cry. Since the first time I heard it, I have sort of fantasized about having someone say those things to me. Finding my confidante. Which is maybe an unfair thing of me to say because I have wonderful friends and a wonderful family and they will always be there for me if I need something. But I was reminded again in class today that I am alone and hard and proud and strong and that none of those are really good things and I need to cry now and as much as my family and best friends might want to be there for me for that, this isn't something they can fix. Which, again, sounds horrible of me. My family loves me because that is what families do. I need some sort of indication from the outside world, from society in general, that I'm not a total freak show mess who is beyond hope. I need someone to recognize that I should be standing in the light instead of cowering in the dark. I need someone to accept me.

I was really hard in my exercise today. I was angry and just wanted him out of there and it never occurred to me that if I sat down and cried, he might leave. Walking away felt like it would have been me disengaging (which is boring in the exercise) or dismissing him and I was in no place to dismiss him (emotionally). The teacher did call him out on not being vulnerable in the scene, and maybe if he had been, I would have been able to more readily go to the place of defeat, but either way, it never occurred to me to walk away.

I feel like I am strong because I have to be. And I feel like I've had to be strong for such a long time that I'm not sure I know how to be anything else. And I'm afraid that that has alienated me.

Last night, I again found myself wanting a boyfriend/life partner type person. And I know that every time I express that desire, people tell me to just hang in there. Thank you. I do appreciate the support and I appreciate the fact that technically, I am not alone because I have my friends and I have my family. But I have a question. What is the longest period of time (not counting birth to your first date) that you have been single? Really single. No prospects, no fuck buddies, no ex who's still messing with your head by calling you up to hang out. What is the longest period of time that you have been without that intimate physical and emotional bond with someone?

I went on my first date when I was fourteen - I asked a classmate to the Turnabout dance. The following year, he asked me to Homecoming and I then asked him again to Turnabout. I think at one point, we went on a double date for Valentine's Day, but the other woman in the couple was rather uncomfortable and I think she and I spent more time chatting with each other and giggling than paying attention to the boys. Since that time, I have dated men for 1-3 months about every 18-24 months. I did have a little "thing on the side" for about a year, though I don't know what it was on the side of since neither of us was really dating anyone else and when he started seeing someone, we stopped. But that's it. That is my dating history. If you average that all together (let's say 2 months out of every 21 from the age of 14 to 32 (18 years is 216 months, divided by 21 is about 10 times 2 is about 20 and a half months plus the one year weirdness thing) I have "dated" for about 32 and a half months of my life. In the past eighteen years, I have been single for over fifteen of them. Fifteen. Not fifteen consecutive years, mind you, but when the bits of time are only broken up by 1-3 months, well, let's just say I spend a lot of friggin' time being single. I spend a lot of time wanting men from afar who I can't have or I don't know how to talk to or who I have told that I want them but they don't want me. I spend time fantasizing about movie stars and musicians (bald and Irish, though not necessarily both in the same guy, though sometimes yes) who would write songs like "Your Misfortune" for me and sing them to me and just hold me when I'm angry or scared or upset or broken. And the reality of the situation is, I come home to my cat and write blogs about it and try to make myself strong again so that I can go hang out with my friends and not be consumed by the fear that I am completely abnormal because I have spent 92% of my life NOT in a relationship with someone.

And this has just shown all of you how sad and afraid and desperate I really am. Why can't I do this in class?

I needed a hug after class. I needed someone to hold me and maybe even let me cry. And I know that if I asked someone, they would have hugged me. But I don't know how to ask for that. So I got in my car, listened to "Your Misfortune" the whole way home, came home to my cat and sat down to blog about it. So I can get past it and make myself strong enough to go out and have fun on Halloween.

Happy Halloween, everybody.

Exhaustion

2009-10-24T19:23:00.002-05:00

So I needed to work more in class.
Done.
So I needed to work with the woman I've not worked with at all yet.
Done.
So I needed to settle something with another woman.
Done.
So I needed to fall in love.
Um...

I worked a lot today and I'm proud of that. And a couple of times, I fell totally flat on my face and even that was fantastic. I think part of what was holding me back from working was the fear that I would suck. And a couple of times when I went up today, I sucked. And the teacher still gave me feedback, still encouraged me. She didn't give up on me. She's there to help and that is amazing.

There are several things going on in my life right now that are teaching me that it is okay to ask for help, even if it is for seemingly selfish reasons. What does anyone else gain by me becoming a better performer? Unless they come see me perform, nothing. But I want to get better and this teacher, this class, my fellow students, are all helping me. Do you have any idea what a relief it is to know that I don't have to do every single fucking thing by myself?

I got angry a lot today. I was nervous and shaky and did a lot of yelling. It felt great. There is a woman in class who I haven't worked with very much, but I worked with her today and after our exercise, the class took a break, but we just hugged. For about two full minutes. Her hair smelled like fruit. And I think we both just needed that. We were so angry and hateful with each other on stage and I think in the discussion after the exercise, we realized that our anger and hatred really came from caring about one another deeply and we were able to manifest that in this wonderful, powerful hug.

I also worked with the woman I've not worked with at all yet, twice. I jumped in on her in the warm ups, and I called her up into exercise with me and it was great. I think she had some break-through moments, too, in dealing with her own darkness. I saw it and I called her out on it and she loved it.

And during the break, a man who I like to work with very much showed up, and when he got up to do an exercise, he called me up. I love it that he loves to work with me. And as part of the exercise, I was supposed to confess to a horrible thing I have done to him (fictional) and then we start the scene, both of us with this knowledge. I told him I punched his mom and broke her nose (which I have never done as I have never met his mom, nor have I ever punched someone in the face). And we had this beautiful exercise. The words "I love you" were used. I know I need to fall in love at some point in class, though I think I started the scene in love, I didn't fall during the exercise, if that makes any sense. The teacher said it looked like we were a married couple who had been together for a long time. It was wonderful to care that deeply, and to know that even though I punched his mom, he would eventually forgive me. I don't know if it was what the teacher had in mind when she told me I need to fall in love (or she'd like to see me fall in love), but there was a lot of love in that exercise, amidst all of the anger and hurt.

And I wonder about me and love. I have so many people in my life who I have known and loved forever. I have so many people in my life who would probably end up forgiving me if I punched their moms. We have a comfort with each other, and a deep, deep caring for one another. We have an old love. A true, deep, comfortable, old love. Like my friend who sent me a text message during class (that I got afterward) asking if I had plans for tonight. I just spent two and a half hours screaming at people and pretending I had slept with boyfriends and punched people and wanting to get beaten up because Lord knows I deserved it, and my friend wanted to know if I wanted to hang out. This class makes you explore the deepest, darkest, scariest corners of your own existence, and I still have people in my life who love me. Even with all of those deep, dark, scary corners. Maybe because of them. I got that text message and I laugh/cried in my car for about ten minutes, wishing that I could have that kind of release in exercise, too. And I wonder if when I said before that I don't know if I've been in love, if I might have to revise that statement. It's interesting to me that I didn't fall in love on stage - there was no giggly, tingly, early stages of falling in love part - I just started out in love. When I ventured into the loving part of my being, it was this old, all-encompassing, comfortable, accepting love. And maybe that's what me in love looks like. I don't do the giddy girly crap. I dive right in to accepting someone exactly as they are.

Maybe.

So all in all, a great class. A great class. I worked a lot. I loved. I hated. I yelled. I laughed. I fell flat on my face, and I just kept on going.

And now I'm really tired. And looking forward to the next class to see what is going to happen next.

Love

2009-10-21T20:30:00.002-05:00

I need to fall in love.

We had evaluations tonight. I don't know how well I evaluated myself, but the teachers said I'm doing okay. I've had some strong classes lately and I am definitely ready for the next class. Very good news for me, and I'm really excited to be able to take the next class and work on the next step. But in the three classes that remain, I need to work more (which I knew - I've been sitting there watching a lot and on Saturday, I pushed myself to work more and that was a good thing. I just need to continue on that path) and I need to fall in love. I need to explore the softer feelings.

Which, of course, I thought about the entire way home. It's true not only in class, but in my real life, too, which is why it's such a scary proposition. I thought about my dating/crush history and I'm not sure I know what me in love looks like. I loved a drug addict for many years (who told me ten years later that he is gay) who spent about five or six years playing with me, teasing me, not giving me what I wanted or needed but getting pissy when I tried to get it from someone else. I felt like I was in love, but that was not a healthy love, nor a reciprocated one. I currently have a ginormous crush on a man who lives a bajillion miles away and who is not romantically interested in me, but I compare every man I meet to this guy and get bored if they don't measure up. The most recent guy I dated who I thought I might fall in love with didn't even have the guts to dump me when he found another woman. He waited for me to dump him in a text message and I found out that the woman he left me for was someone I knew and it was a totally lateral move. She's a great woman, but so am I. I've dated men before who have told me that they loved me, and I think I've said it back a time or two, but I think those feelings were more "I care about you and what happens to you" kind of feelings as opposed to "I want to build a life with you" kind of feelings. I loved them like I love the rest of my friends or my family; not in a lose-control-can't-stand-to-be-without-them way. I don't know that I've ever felt that, especially not in any sort of healthy setting. I don't know if I've truly been in love, so I don't know what that would look like on stage. I don't know how to get there.

I think I know what classmate I could try to go there with, even though in the grand scheme of things it would be completely inappropriate. This classmate was actually a character in a rather inappropriate dream I had while napping this afternoon. I think I kept chocolate in my kitchen junk drawer in this particular dream, too. Anyway. I wonder if I hold myself back from going there in class because so many of my classmates are in relationships and I feel really weird foisting myself on someone in exercise in class who is in a relationship. That's a boundary I'm not comfortable with. But it might be necessary for my growth as an actor. And that statement makes me sound like a horrible person. Of course, there is always the possibility that I'll make a move and get rejected, which could also be beautiful.

In either case, I need to figure out a way to go there. I need to fall in love. Both in exercise and in real life. Hopefully with different people in each setting.

Resignation

2009-10-17T18:09:00.003-05:00

I am a handful.
I scare people.
I am too intense for a lot of people.
I am atypical.
I am far from perfect.

But in all truth, I'm getting pretty good at this and I love that. It terrifies me on a regular basis and leaves me feeling like shit, but I love it.

Because I Have To

2009-10-15T14:52:00.004-05:00

I've been putting off writing about Wednesday night's class because I know exactly what I need to say and exactly what I need to do and it scares the crap out of me. I have that knot in my stomach that could mean I need to visit the ladies' room, or I could vomit at any second. Which means it is time to write about Wednesday night's class.

It wasn't anything particularly special. I jumped in on the tag part of the night a bit more than I have in the past, which is good. I wanted to get more involved, and I took a baby step towards that. And I was called into a scene, and I called someone into the scene. When I called someone into the scene, it wasn't very good. Neither one of us was really invested. We weren't emotionally involved - neither of us was effecting the other, nor allowing the other to affect us. We just kind of were and it was bland. I don't know that it wasn't truthful, but there were no stakes. So it was bland. When I was called into the scene, I think the guy called me up hoping I would help him get to a breakthrough moment or something. And some of the stuff I called him out on might have helped to get there if he didn't get to heady about it. Which means I probably could have been more effective in my word choice in working with him.

But because of other things that happened in class that I'm not going to get into because it's not necessary, I left class the other night really really really wanting to say all of the things that I really want to say to a bunch of different people. And because of that, I have been avoiding writing this entry.

This class is therapy. But it's not supposed to be therapy. And for as much as I have railed on Heath Ledger for not being able to let it go once he was off the set, I find myself transferring things from class to my everyday life. I find myself attracted to someone while in exercise, and I leave the stage thinking about the men I am (or have been) attracted to and what I could say to them or what I should have said to them. I want to tell the one guy that I have had a crush on him ever since he walked in, sat down, and ordered himself a sandwich and a beer. There is something inherently sexy about a man who will go out alone and have a meal. And since that time, I have discovered that he is an intelligent, talented, funny man and just a good person. He is kind and thoughtful and open. Except when it comes to me, it feels like. He has missed just about every important event in my life since I met him, and I'm not just saying he wasn't physically there. He has never said happy birthday, he made no comment about the birth of my niece or the break up of my band or my falling out with my theater company or my fainting spell or any of it. And that feels like crap. But I can't really fault him because I've never told him that I have this huge crush (I've gotten close, but I've not actually said it and I have been told many times that men are just kind of dense so you can't be subtle with them and expect them to get the hint. You have to actually say what you're actually thinking or feeling) and he's just going about the everyday business of living very far away from me and we're not all that close so my life doesn't really register on his radar. There is more important stuff going on than what's going on with me and I understand that. And I wonder, if he knew, if he would pay a little more attention. Probably not. But I wonder. And I wonder if me saying something would make things weird, and I wonder if me saying anything would make me feel better or make me feel worse. I kind of think if I said something, I would then at least know one way or the other and if he's not interested, I could get over it. But I already know in my heart of hearts that he isn't and I'm still not over it, so maybe saying something would only serve to make him uncomfortable which is not really what I'm going for. Though if we were in exercise, making him uncomfortable would be great because it meant I affected him.

So to the man I've had a crush on forever, I have a crush on you. A bigger one that I would care to admit to. I know that it is completely impractical, but it's still there and it just kind of makes me wish that we were able to take a more active role in one another's lives. Because I think you're wonderful. I wish I knew you better.

And now, even without seeing/hearing/feeling his reaction, I just feel dumb, so I'm going to stop now.

Next?

2009-10-10T17:23:00.002-05:00

I had two good exercises today. The teacher said I was just "on." Yay! I followed my impulses. I showed emotional range. I did things that made no sense. And the bitch in me wants to ask, "So what's next?"

I don't mean to say I have mastered this. I haven't. I"ll probably have a couple of terrible exercises next week and all will be right with the world again. But I want feedback! I found my challenge and I want it to keep going. Keep pushing me. Make it harder, up the stakes.

It made me really happy that the guy I worked with last week ("the bully") called me up to work with him. REALLY happy. In my opinion, he's one of the best in the class, so the fact that I pushed his buttons and he liked it and wanted to work with me again...that's a good feeling. And we had another great exercise. I cried. I laughed. We kissed. I jumped. It was...I so wish real life could be like that. Where it's okay for your emotions to go all over the place, and it is equally okay for the people around you to have no idea what to do with that. I have one relationship in my life where we started it out saying that it's all okay. Anything we have to say to each other is okay and whatever reaction the other person has is okay, we just kind of have to promise not to give up on each other. And truth be told, I don't think we want to give up on each other. And it is one of the most valuable relationships I have ever had. The only problem being it's kind of a long distance thing, so we can't just pop out to get a beer together, you know? Else than that...it is so freeing to know that even when you are at your worst, someone will be there. She may disagree with you, but she's not going anywhere. She's just offering a different perspective. And when you're at your best, she's there to celebrate with you. That's what this class is. Your scene partner is in there with you for better or worse and everything that happens up there is good. Unless you disregard your impulses or physically injure them.

I love this class. I love the people in it. I love the instructors (even though they still kind of scare the crap out of me.) And I love doing this. I love it. So what's next? Bring it!

Tee hee.

Retrospect

2009-10-08T16:07:00.001-05:00

You know what it was? I was bullying the bully, when, if anything, I wanted to be bullied. I don't like being a bully. I hadn't intended to be a bully, it just kind of came out that way. And I think he had gotten to this comfortable place wherein being the bully is what he does, and when he encountered someone who could maybe bully back...that's disconcerting.

I know I'm thinking about this way too much. And I know that he doesn't expect an apology from me - it was moment-to-moment classroom work and in general, it was a great exercise. He probably went home thinking about it a lot, too - he's that kind of person. But I feel bad about it. I don't like being a bully. If I find myself in that situation again, I need to let my partner know that I don't like being a bully. See if they can see it, and then see where the exercise goes from there.

Masochism

2009-10-07T23:43:00.002-05:00

I had a great exercise tonight, and I'm still beating myself up about it.

I went up once in the warm-up game of tag and it was meh. I found myself wishing I would go up more, but honestly enjoying watching my classmates work so I didn't. If anything, I think I need to work on being more assertive in my classroom participation. And by break time, I was so nervous I thought I might vomit. Which, of course, means I had to force myself to go up in the second half of class.

The second half of class was not tag - one person would go up and choose who they wanted to come up with them. The point being, you're supposed to pick someone who you think will affect you and who will be effected by you. So I chose the guy who calls everyone out on their shit. I have not worked with him yet, but he was going to jump in and call me out on my shit when I almost had my release in the last class. And he was on a roll tonight, breaking just about everyone he worked with. So I called him up in the hopes he would push my buttons, call me out, not pull any punches. And he started out reading me okay, but as soon as I started reading him, he got really uncomfortable and the rest of the exercise was the two of us butting heads. Me trying to show him it was okay to...whatever, and him being afraid to...whatever. I'm not talking sexual impulses here. I don't know if he had any; I know I didn't. I saw that he was afraid, but he wouldn't explore that with me. I saw him hold back his angry impulses in the name of not physically injuring me - he swallowed them instead and then called me names. And by the end of the exercise, he was so off-balance, he said, "You don't know me," and I had to come back with, "You won't let me know you." At which point the teacher stopped us because we were too cerebral. I think we had gotten to the point where it was a draw. He wasn't going to budge and I was out of ideas on how to make him and he wasn't paying attention to how his closed-off-edness was affecting me and I didn't know how to show him that. So in that respect, I'm glad the teacher stopped us. I think we were done. Though I can't help but wonder if I would have started crying if he had let us go a few seconds longer. I was exasperated and tired and worn down and, let's face it, sad. I could feel that the tears were there. And I was disappointed that he didn't push my buttons like I wanted him to. One observation calling him out on his shit and the rest of the exercise was all about him.

On the one hand, it was a great exercise. We were both truthful and observant and we hit our impulses. And I kept up with him, which is something I'm kind of proud of. I affected him, which I'm also kind of proud of - that's my job. But I don't know how to feel about what happened or didn't happen in the moment on stage so I come home and I'm beating myself up for...missing opportunities to be understanding instead of belligerent, or for being too cerebral. I'm sure I could have made some of my observations simpler, and therefore, more effective. One of the biggest reactions I got from him - I said he was avoiding me and he repeated it like I was crazy and making things up, but I said it because he couldn't look at me, so I screamed, "You're avoiding me, you're staring at the floor!" And he was a little bit deflated as he repeated, "I'm staring at the floor." Simple observation. Concrete. Indisputable evidence to back up my previous assertion. And he knew I had him and that bothered the shit out of him. And I probably could have gotten tender there, but I didn't. He called me out on being angry (which I was), but he thought I was nuts for being angry and I called him on that and the exercise just kept going as two people yelling at each other and hating each other and not trusting each other and being wary of one another and calling each other names and trying to protect themselves because I think secretly, we both wanted to be able to let our guards down, but we were afraid of what would happen if we did. And I'm kicking myself for not calling him out on his fear and trying to show him that it was perfectly fine to be afraid.

I think about this shit too much. Which may be why I don't go up there more - I spend too much time analyzing it afterward. When really all I need to walk away with is, "I had a great exercise tonight. I affected my partner and was effected by my partner. I should work on keeping my observations simple." Instead, I'm wondering if my classmates are going to start to see me the way they see him. And I'm not sure if I want that.

Next Step

2009-10-03T16:36:00.003-05:00

Well, we got the kiss out of the way and it was wonderful and beautiful and exactly what I needed, but in a way I wasn't sure I needed it and then, of course, I fucked it up. I need to learn how to release effectively. I need to learn how to cry.

I'm not sure exactly how fair it is to try to judge my exercise in class today. In a lot of ways, I had an amazing class simply because I went and I participated. See, I fainted last night. No idea why. But it's really unsettling, to the point where I'm not sure if my head is still in an "I might pass out again" place or a really disappointed in myself and confused and sad place. I count on myself for everything. EVERYTHING. All the time. No matter how many times I've been let down by other people in my life, no matter the scale of the disappointment, I've always been able to count on me. So what does that leave me with when suddenly, I can't trust my own body anymore? It's frightening. And I know it was an isolated incident, but I'm not sure what caused it so I'm not sure how to prevent it from happening again. And I know I'm being overly dramatic, but see how you feel when one second you're taking out your contact lenses and the next, you wake up lying on the floor and you have no idea how you got there or how long you've been there, but the objects around you sure make it look like it wasn't a very pleasant trip down. It's unsettling. So today, I am unsettled. And I was unsettled in class. The minute I got there, I knew I wanted to leave. I kept getting the chills and I have that sinus-type pressure in my temples and I wondered if I would be able to sit there in class for two and a half hours without bolting to the ladies' room to vomit. But I stayed. And I observed. And finally, I got up to get into exercise. And the women I was working with just weren't getting it. They weren't getting me. And then this guy came up and he saw what was going on. And he was there for me. Completely there. And it manifested in a nervous crying laughter and culminated in a very sweet, very tender kiss that was (I think) more sexual for him than it was for me, and then he was offended that it wasn't more sexual and I still needed to cry but I was worried that he was now disappointed so I didn't go there. I had three chances to go there and I couldn't quite get there.

I need to get past the self-consciousness. I need to stop protecting my scene partner's feelings. And I need to ask the question, is it okay when an exercise focuses primarily on me? He was reading me and he was there for me, and I wanted to let him be, but I also wanted to read him and be there for him, which probably stopped me from having the release he and I were both looking for. I think I just answered by own question.

In any case, I left early because I don't trust my own body right now. I need to make peace there. And I feel much better now that I'm home and I don't have to leave here until 7am Monday morning if I don't want to. I like that kind of freedom.

Ow

2009-09-30T23:00:00.003-05:00

I don't know how to start this other than to say I'm fucked up.

I had a good class tonight and I had a horrible class tonight. It was good in that I followed my impulses and I got angry and I was hurt and I pissed people off. I affected and was effected, which is the goal in these exercises (right after living truthfully). I missed an impulse to kiss my partner - the thing about kissing is that once you do it once, you want to do it again, and not necessarily in the same exercise, but it's one of those things where if you don't kiss anyone for a very long time and then you get a chance to kiss someone, you remember how much fun kissing is and how nice it can be and you really start to miss it and you start to wish you had someone to kiss regularly and if you don't, well, then you just get sad - but this time the exercise didn't die in that moment. We kept it alive. I think because he wanted to kiss me, too, but didn't because he didn't think I wanted to so he got frustrated with me and with himself and we were able to connect on that. So in that respect, it was a great exercise. The teacher let us go a long time and we ran the gamut of emotions until we kept getting into this pattern of closeness followed by self-doubt followed by frustration based in miscommunications and so on and so forth. It was a great exercise. I felt really good about it when I sat down.

But then I didn't get back up again. Part of me was pissed that a woman I worked with earlier had grabbed my scarf and choked me and when I got angry with her for that, another guy jumped in and called me irrational. Irrational. For being angry that someone choked me with my own scarf. But this other woman then came in and she got it. She saw that I was hurt and my hurt was manifesting as anger. She said, "Misunderstood," and I think a little part of me fell in love with her. And I wanted to write about everything, I wanted to pour it all out so that maybe I could be understood somewhere because I'm not in class, so I sat for the rest of the class. I could say I was tired and cold and my tummy was feeling a bit ooky, but I knew that my impulses were telling me to keep my ass in my seat.

And the whole way home...my head just hurts. I don't know how to get people to understand me. And then my first impulse is why should that bother me so much? I'm tough. I'm strong. I'm independent. But as much as I fancy myself Superwoman, I had to admit to myself in my car on my way home that I need someone to understand me. I need someone in class to realize that when it looks like I'm picking a fight, I'm trying to engage. I'm trying to call you out on your shit, and I need someone to call me out on mine. Yes, I am strong. I made myself strong because I was repeatedly hurt as an adolescent. It wasn't abuse any worse than what your typical teen has to deal with, but every single thing I did was wrong - I dressed wrong, I showed my emotions wrong, I chose the wrong life path, I befriended the wrong people, I just in general behaved wrong. I was criticized everywhere I went. I was probably praised, too, but I remember the criticisms more. That's just how I work. I can't build on the positives - yes, I'm smart and funny and pretty, but its hard to be more smart or more funny or more pretty. You venture into "trying too hard" territory. But you tell me where I'm fucking up and I can work on that. Tell me I need to open up more. Tell me I'm not following my impulses. Tell me I'm a bitch. Those are things I have control over. But tell me enough of that and I build up a thick skin. It's a survival thing.

I've been saying for years that I'm looking for a challenge and I feel it. I feel that it's right here and it's going to happen any second, but it hasn't happened yet. Someone is going to call me on my shit and I'm going to lose it and have a break through and be completely vulnerable and that will be that. It will be my catharsis. It will be what will keep me sane for the next year.

And I hate having to admit that I need someone. And I'm afraid of how people will react to that. I just told you all that I'm broken and scared. You know what? I am broken and scared. Who isn't? But I don't need somebody to fix me. You can't "fix" a rape victim, or someone who was beaten as a child - that's not what recovery is about for those people. It is about acknowledgment and acceptance. I am broken and scared and I just need someone to sit with me for a minute while I am broken and scared and just let me be broken and scared. There is nothing wrong with being broken and scared. Those things don't need to go away. I think it is wonderful that I am broken and scared and that I can admit those things and I'd really like someone to see those things and just say, "Okay." I don't want to talk about why I'm broken and scared. That's not important - I know why and how to deal with it. But a refusal to see me as broken and scared means I'm something else. It means I'm the strong one or the intimidating one or the smart one or the one with a ribbon in her hair or the quiet one or the confrontational one or the girl with the annoying/wonderful laugh. I don't want to be any of those things. I want to be a person. I want to be acknowledged as a person and accepted as a person, flaws and all. I don't want the flaws to go away; I want them to be celebrated.

So I come home, hating that I have admitted to myself that I need something from someone. I come home not knowing how to get that. I come home wanting to be able to go there in exercise with someone in my class, but not knowing yet who I can trust with that, even though I know in my heart I can trust all of them with it and they will love me that much more if I show all of that. I come home frustrated and tired and hurty and broken and annoyed with myself and satisfied and irritated with my own contentment with being okay. I come home in desperate need of a hug and a good cry. And I come home with the knowledge that I will be fantastic tomorrow because of everything I learned while sitting on my ass in class today.

Emotional Depth

2009-09-23T22:15:00.004-05:00

I have never once in my life playfully tackled a friend sitting on the couch next to me. The two or three times in my life when I have had a "boyfriend," I always felt stupid resting my head on his shoulder. And yet, both of those things have happened in class. I tackled this woman tonight. Playfully and nobody got hurt - it was a sweet moment. And later on, I hugged her. Kind of forcefully. I kind of pulled her to me instead of going to her. No, it was not a sexual thing. She was uncomfortable and I was going to comfort her come hell or high water. So I pulled her in for a hug. And then I got so angry with her for not letting me be there. I was literally screaming in her face - yet another something I (almost) never do.

And I liked it.

I like being free to make squawking noises and guffawing when someone deflects or says something stupid. I like being free to wave my arms in the air. I like being free to let a piece of string piss me off. I like being free to say what I see and to feel what I feel and to be allowed to take things personally. It makes me live truthfully. And in my normal, everyday life, I don't get to do that. Almost never.

I look at my niece, who is the most beautiful little girl in the world and I envy her. When she is happy, she smiles. When she is not, she doesn't. When she wants to suck on her arm, she sucks on her arm. It is beautiful and impulsive and even if she had language, I don't think she could explain why she does the things she does. She just does them. We all do those things as babies, and it is because of those things that we find babies so fascinating. But at some point, we learn to not pay attention to our impulses. It becomes inappropriate to stretch in public. We all learn to put on these poker faces that say, "Everything is fine and I'm not at all offended by the fact that you're mocking my entire lifestyle because you're my superior and I'm supposed to just let you." And I know why we learn those things and I know why we behave the way we do, but sometimes, it just really pisses me off that we have to.

In my first exercise tonight, I missed an impulse. I didn't act on an impulse. I felt it - I wanted to move towards my partner at one point, but I didn't. And the exercise died because of it and the teacher called me out on it (as he should have). The last time I saw the guy I have a crush on, I hugged him goodbye and I wanted to give him a kiss on the cheek, but I didn't. And the exercise died. I tried to get it back after the fact, but the exercise died. What would have happened if I had followed that impulse, just like what would have happened if I had moved towards my partner in the exercise tonight? Emotional life! Sure, either one of them may have rejected me, but it would be emotional life. It would be true and honest and I wouldn't come home feeling like crap even though the instructor said that in general, both of my exercises tonight were full of excellent work and I showed a lot of genuine emotional range. I mostly just want to cry now. And even though I'm sitting in my apartment in the dark with my cat, it feels somehow inappropriate to cry. Though I have absolutely no idea why.

This class is intense and wonderful and frightening and I wish more people could experience this and I wish I could let some of this bleed into my normal life. I kind of like being the person with impulses to go towards other people. I like being the person with emotional range. I like being physically active. I like connecting.

Maybe that's why I want to cry. I have to go back to my regularly scheduled life tomorrow.

Maybe

2009-09-21T09:04:00.002-05:00

So I haven't written anything about Saturday's class yet because I've been unsure about what to say.

In general, I like the class. In general, I like the people. I just have absolutely no idea how I am doing in the class. On Saturday, my first exercise was deemed good. In my second exercise, I think we had a bit of a break through on the topic of my vulnerability - I need people to like me. In my third exercise, I dunno. I felt like crap. I feel like crap a lot in class (which most people tell me is a good thing), but I also don't know that that crappy feeling is ever addressed. My partners get hurt and angry, but if I express negative emotions, I feel like they get angry and frustrated right back at me. I don't know. Maybe I need to learn to sit in the negative emotions a little better. Maybe I need to stop trying to fix things. Maybe I need to let my partners be upset when they need to be upset. Maybe I need to take down my walls and let myself show that I'm hurt when I'm hurt instead of getting defensive.

On the other hand, I seem to be really good at helping my classmates have good exercises. I'm not sure what that means, but there are several of them who have been having problems with one thing or another, but when they get up there with me, they do really well. Maybe I'm calling them out on their crap really well. Maybe I am being communicative and expressive. Maybe I'm just really easy to work with, or maybe they trust that it's safe to go there with me.

It is starting to show a little bit that some people are progressing faster than others. You start to see some of the same comments show up in exercises a day or two apart, with different people. I hope I'm one of the ones that is progressing. I think maybe what I need to do is make sure I get in on an exercise with one of the other people who is, too, and see what happens.

Blah

2009-09-17T09:58:00.002-05:00

Well, I think we're all in the same boat together, which is nice. I talked to some of my classmates last night and we all feel like we're doing awful. If nothing else, we can all take comfort in a level playing field, yes?

I didn't feel like working a lot last night, which is fine, though I ended up going up twice. I started and exercise and I followed someone in on her exercise. The first one was interesting - I was working with a woman I haven't quite been able to figure out yet. I don't know if the exercise helped me see her better or made her more mysterious. Though it did serve to illustrate a point that the teacher was wanting to make, so in that respect, I think it was good. And it was a rather physical exercise - lots of movement. The second one, I think I screwed up from the get-go because I went to enter the scene at the same time as someone else which broke my focus from the woman already up there, and changed her truth, but I proceeded with what my original observation had been. I should have observed her anew when I entered. And that one was just...odd. I dunno. The teacher didn't say much to me in that one.

One thing I am noticing though, is that often times, what I'm feeling is not what is being read by my partners or the instructor. Which makes me wonder what I'm hiding and how I'm hiding it. They do see something in me, though it's not always what I'm feeling - they see playfulness in my move for power, or they see fear in my frustration. I can see how they would see those things - they are more textual than subtextual if that makes any sense. I think I would like to open up enough that they can see the subtext in addition to the text. Might help them get a better reaction out of me. Up the stakes, so to speak.

I dunno. Like most things, I just have to keep plugging away at it. One day, it will all click and be amazing.

Yes and No

2009-09-12T17:38:00.002-05:00

I had one good exercise today, out of the four I went up for. I was a smidge behind on my impulses, but in general, it was deemed lovely. I had one exercise where I lost all emotional life. I had one exercise where both of us just kind of stopped. And I had one exercise where...I dunno. I just didn't do well.

On the positive side, I jumped up to work a bunch, without necessarily waiting for someone else to go first. I worked with both men and women. And I worked where I started things and where I joined someone already on stage. I helped one woman in class get to (in the teacher's words) the most honest place she's been so far, so I think that's good. I got better at following my impulses. I kicked a phone which was not good, but I knew it wasn't going to go far enough to hurt anyone.

But I dunno. I don't feel good about the work I'm doing in class. Maybe I'm trying too hard to connect with people or have different exercises each time or hit all of these weird mini-goals I set for myself (like working with both men and women, being the instigator and the instigatee, etc). I probably need to just relax and be. That's what this is all about. I need to get rid of my own agendas and just do the exercise and see what happens. And/or I could always talk to the instructor and see what she thinks of what I'm doing. Find out if I'm a lost cause. Find out if she thinks I need to work on the same things I think I need to work on, or if I'm missing the boat completely and need to head in another direction.

I don't think I'm the only one who is struggling in class. Though somehow, it's cute when the one girl won't (or can't) admit that she wants to climb into the guy's lap, but it's frustrating when I'm not having any impulses, if that makes any sense. Like I should be doing better. Maybe I'm just being too hard on myself.

And now I have about a half an hour to prep for an audition tonight. I'm using a new piece and I'm not sure how it's going to go over. I don't know that I have prepped it as much as I probably should, but my older monologues are so dusty; I really don't want to pull that crap out again. Besides, if it scares the crap out of me, I'm probably doing the right thing, right?

Kind of Sad

2009-09-10T09:00:00.002-05:00

I had signed up to take the physical theater movement workshop again this term, but the class didn't fill, so it was canceled. This makes me sad for many reasons.

I was looking forward to some intense physical activity one night a week (something other than running in place in my apartment).

I need to work on following my physical impulses, and this class over the summer really helped me do that. I wanted to be able to continue this work.

I think it is a nice complement to go from a physical Meisner class to a verbal Meisner class. Yes, both classes hit on both (a little), but I think the two work well together. You learn how the physical inspires the verbal and how the verbal inspires they physical. As actors, we need to use every tool available to us, and these both need to be developed and focused on and utilized.

But I think it mostly makes me sad because of the potential commentary on the state of actors in this city. We're all too lazy to take a physical movement class. Everyone wants to be an actor, but nobody wants to develop their physical skills. What gives? Isn't half the fun of acting the play of it? Running around and behaving like children? I guess this is why we see so many half-movements on stage (i.e. people who lean into their scene partner and yell as opposed to moving towards their partner and getting in their face, or people whose arms are glued to their bodies, or people who only act with their hands and voices) - nobody took the time to develop their full body physical impulses. That makes me sad.

And the selfish reason - if nobody else signed up for the class, I don't get to develop my physical impulses either. Drat.

What I Wanted to Do...

2009-09-09T22:26:00.002-05:00

When I got up there, I was going to be in the space and adjust the chair, and maybe notice the flower. And I was going to be open and receptive and let them see me just being and I wasn't going to force anything and I was going to follow my impulses and I was going to be nervous and giggly and brilliant and sad and I was maybe even going to cry.

When I got up there, I fixated on the bear. Almost instantly. I tried to connect with the bear. I felt sad for the bear. I tried to reattach his leg. I got tired of him and felt half an impulse to do something else, but the impulse left so quickly that I missed it completely so I did nothing but return my focus to the bear. Exactly what I didn't want to do. Exactly what I shouldn't have done.

I feel like I did not do well in class tonight. I didn't jump up instantly, like my first impulse told me to -- I waited until a bunch of other people took their turns. And I fell into a comfort zone when I got up there instead of being open and vulnerable and living truthfully. And I know exactly where that came from. Right now, in my everyday life, I have to fight every impulse I have with everything I have in me just so that I can get by. So I don't say things I'll regret later. So I can keep a job. So they don't throw me in the loony bin. Right before I left work, I had to leave my boss' office very quickly (after fighting the urge to tell him he was full of crap) so that I wouldn't either cry or start throwing things. And I have to do this every day. Every. Day. And within an hour of class starting, I'm supposed to turn all of that off, take down every defense mechanism, and live truthfully, following every impulse. There was part of me that just wanted to go up there and cry about the day I had. There was part of me that wanted to just go lie down and suck my tongue and twirl my hair. But I fixated on the bear because he was there and he was safe and I didn't have to look at the rest of my class and I didn't have to let them see that I'm a wreck at the moment.

I came home thinking maybe I'm not cut out for this. Maybe I'm too afraid to actually be any good at this. Knowing that this is what I really want to be doing, but afraid that I just plain suck at it and always will. Like that feeling that maybe you never will meet your Prince Charming. You know he's out there, but he's already married or lives somewhere you've never been and never plan on going. I want to be in this class and I want to be good at this. I want to be great at this. And the only way I'm going to do that is to learn to live truthfully.

If I just randomly start yelling one day, I'm just practicing. Just so you know.

...

2009-08-11T22:17:00.002-05:00

Ho

Lee

Fuck

I can't even begin to describe tonight's class, but of course, I have to try.

I was tackled. I was thrown. I was kissed. I was embraced. I was leaped over. I was crawled under. I was spun. I was pinned. I was scared. I was loved. I fell in love. I fell out of love. I disgusted. I frustrated. I excited. I amused. I hurt. And now I do hurt - I'm achy all over. Everything from my little toe to my spirit, but my spirit is achy in the good way. I hit so many emotions today, and pushed them as far as I could take them. I broke down and cried at one point because I just had to. But then I came back, got myself together, and threw myself back into the fray.

There was a moment when my arms wanted to move, so I moved them. There was a moment when I wanted to twirl, so I twirled. There was a moment when I wanted to do the doggie break, so I tried, but my partner didn't quite get it so we did this weird feline rubbing thing. There was a moment when I needed to move my upper body in circles parallel to the wall, so I moved my upper body in circles parallel to the wall. I don't know if I can tell you what it feels like to be that free. To follow every impulse. To speak when you need to, and to stand still when you need to. I'm not advocating this kind of behavior for every day living necessarily, but just try to imagine how well you get to know yourself when you are listening to everything your body is telling you to do. And when your body is telling you to do things based on the other people and objects around you. And then you connect with that person in that moment and you both do what your bodies tell you to, be it dance or jump or roll or kiss or melt and crumple and laugh.

It's funny. I was talking with the teacher before class about how the class is going and what I'm getting out of it, and I get buzzed talking about it. As the class was progressing, he was getting buzzed watching us. You could see it when we would talk about an exercise - he kept losing his words he was so excited about the work we were doing. I have to give him a lot of credit for creating that environment, and for letting the class go where the class needs to go, the same way our movement goes where it needs to. He put his faith in us as actors, and as students, and in return, we put our faith in him and in each other. I wish everyone, everyone, could experience that once in their lives. To be somewhere you are trusted and loved and accepted and given license to go to those scary places knowing that you are still trusted and loved and accepted when you get there and when you come out on the other side (as long as you don't actually cause physical harm to anyone else). And scary places can be places of lust or love or tenderness, too - they don't just have to be about fear or anger or pain. It all depends on who you are and where you are in the moment.

I had a moment tonight when I broken down and cried. There were only three of us in class tonight which was, in a way, wonderful because we were able to establish that comfort level and we were all able to work a lot. But there was a moment when we had all been fighting and pushing and shoving and pulling and just all kinds of angsty. And it ended with the three of us kind of in a heap and I just cried. It was a release of sorts, a frustration with all of the negativity. But then I also had to deal with the reactions my partners had to my crying. Did I want them to comfort me? How did it feel when they did? I think there are the seeds in there of something I need to look at in me. On the up side, even though it took a lot out of me to go there, I was able to get myself together and dive back in. The problem a lot of actors have with this kind of work is that they can't put it on the shelf when the exercise or class or performance is over. They take all of that with them and dwell on it and stew in it and question who they are and whether or not they are worth anything and all of that stuff. It is, essentially, why Heath Ledger died - he couldn't separate himself from the Joker which led to the anti-depressants which led to the overdose and there we are. The up shot being, that's not me. The down shot being, that's a lot of actors out there. I get afraid for them sometimes.

I wish you could experience this because I'm not doing it justice. Just know that I came home energized and exhausted and knowing that this is exactly what I am supposed to be doing. And that I have the potential to be really really good at this.

And thus begins the next wave of relief tears.

New Session

2009-08-05T10:02:00.000-05:00

So this session of classes is ending a bit abruptly for me. Last week's Wednesday class was canceled due to instructor conflict (she had a show opening that she had to go perform in), and I can't go tonight because I'm in tech for a show of my own. I'm glad to be in a show - I can't even tell you how good it feels to be performing again - but I feel like I didn't really get an ending to this class session. Our Tuesday class this week was postponed to next week, too, due to instructor conflict. I think it might feel weird to go in for just one more class. I dunno. It does leave me looking forward to the next session when I can get in there and really start working, you know?

I got something in the mail that I can't tell you about yet, but that had me kind of bouncing off the walls with glee. More on that later.

Scraped and Sore

2009-07-29T10:15:00.002-05:00

Wow. Last night was an intense physical and emotional workout.

We started out by giving the teacher some feedback on the class so far. Nobody wanted to say anything, so I started out by saying I'd rather not do the class barefoot, partially because I'm not big on being barefoot most of the time, but mostly because the floor that we're working on has god knows what all over it - dust, dirt, nails, paint chips. It has already cut my foot once, someone else's foot once, and I think something snagged a hole in my shirt when we were doing floor exercises last week (either that, or the shirt had a hole in it when I bought it which would make me very sad). I understand that we either need to all be barefoot or nobody can be, but I'd rather not be. Which then got the ball rolling - people asking questions, making comments. I never thought of myself as an instigator or a leader, but I guess sometimes, when I have to be, I can be. I'm not sure how I feel about that.

The rest of the class was incredible. We started to make progress - taking the things we had done in previous classes, and applying them to story and character and dialogue and improvisation. There was still lots of running and jumping and playing, but there was also fighting and fury and fear. The good kind of fear. I don't think anyone was ever concerned about their own safety. I did, however, manage to scrape my arm on the wall, and I did something in a fit of rage that left my right thumb feeling, well, not right. But it was great. I loved being able to tap into all of those emotions.

We also had an opportunity to watch our classmates work (we were split in groups, so we watched the other group) which allowed us to provide and receive feedback on what we were doing. I found this extremely helpful. One of my issues with the first repetition class was I wasn't sure if what I was doing read to the audience. Last night, I got feedback that some of the things I was doing were reading, and were reading really well. So that is encouraging.

It was also interesting to see the different personalities of my classmates in a very real setting and very real situations. Up to this point, we have interacted with one another on a very physical level, but with almost no verbal interaction. Last night, we had to discuss our ideas and plan out our scenes. It was interesting to see what ideas people come up with, who is more dominant, who is a leader, and who is a follower. I left kind of wondering what my other classmates thought of me.

I like this class. We have next week off, but then one (possibly two) more. That should give the scrape time to heal, and should perhaps give me time to build up a thick enough skin that I don't even notice next time I cut my foot.

My Vulnerability

2009-07-23T08:10:00.002-05:00

Last night was weird. I had a lot to say about it when I got home, but somehow, I just couldn't put it into words which is why I'm writing today instead of last night.

I don't know if it was carry-over from the night before, but I felt strange and out of place last night. Out of my league. Unwelcome and uncomfortable. But I made myself get up and work anyway after a little while and I didn't last up there very long before someone jumped in and took my place. To be honest, it was a relief - I was having a hard time reading my partner. There was some interesting stuff that happened in the exercises last night. For a while, I thought that every exercise was going to turn into people making out. Fortunately, that didn't happen.

After the break, the teacher had me go up and paired me with a man - the first time I have worked with a guy in class. I don't know if that has been intentional on my part or not. When I go up to start an exercise, it is usually a woman who jumps in and when a man goes up to start one, someone else gets in there before I do. But the teacher had me work with a man. I think she wanted to test my vulnerability and my willingness or unwillingness to explore that. And within a minute of being up there, he told me that I was sexy and beautiful, and he could see that I don't like hearing that and he felt bad for me. And it's true - I don't like hearing that. I really don't like hearing that from total strangers. This is one of my issues based on the fact that my physical appearance is not the best of what I have to offer. It's not. No, I'm not hideous to look at, but when you put my physical appearance on one side of the scale, versus my wit and charm and intelligence and caring and generosity and kindness and yadda yadda yadda on the other side, the yadda yadda yadda side wins. There is a LOT more over there that outweighs my physical appearance. And I have always felt that my yadda yadda yadda side is what wins people over and attracts them to me. Granted, when people first meet me, all they have to go on is my appearance and it is kind of nice that it doesn't make them want to vomit. But here is a man looking at me very intensely, reading my everything, and the best he can come up with is that I'm sexy? That makes me uncomfortable. I'm sorry, but it does. I don't connect to that. I don't feel that. And to have it pointed out suddenly makes me acutely aware of...everything about my physical being and I as much as I like to think I am aware of my physical being and it's position in space and in relation to other people, I'm really not used to other people wanting to interact with my physical being in that sort of a way. Let's face it - I've had some bad experiences with men and intimacy. Okay, I have baggage. But why do I have to be reduced to my physical appearance? He started out so well, calling me out on my trepidation and such, but then BAM! Right for the one thing that is going to make me uncomfortable. I guess kudos to him for being able to read me so well and find my button like that. And kudos to me for, in a very small way, letting him. He hugged me and I let him. It was a very intense, powerful hug and when I started to let it in, I got uncomfortable and pulled away and deflected and the teacher called me out on that. I kind of wished she would have let it go a little longer, but I'm kind of glad it didn't because I got to talk about what was going on, identify what was happening, and then sit down.

So I went out with some of my classmates afterwards, for the sake of being social. If one of my problems is that I'm afraid to let go and let people in on stage because I don't know them and, perhaps more importantly, they don't know me, then I should try to get to know them so we can trust each other on stage. It was fun, but a little odd. I was reminded of how much of an introvert I am. Not in a bad way, but there was lots of conversation going on, very revealing conversation some of the time, and I had a lot to contribute, but I didn't. I was content to sit and listen to most of it, only throwing out the comments or anecdotes that seemed most appropriate. I think one of the men was really trying to connect with me or get me to "come out of my shell," so to speak, but I was trying to show that I'm not really in a shell. I'm just letting other people have the spotlight for a little while. I don't need it most of the time.

It was a good class and a good night, but a strange class and a strange night. I'm really looking forward to starting an 8-week session in the fall so that hopefully, I can get over some of my comfort and trust issues and I can really go balls out in the exercises. And I'm looking forward to getting to know this new group of people. Slowly, of course, and on my terms (at least partially). But I think I could get a lot out of hanging out with these people.

Moving in Circles

2009-07-22T08:33:00.000-05:00

Last night was movement class again and I left feeling very unsatisfied. We did a lot of the same things we did last week - walking, running, jumping, stopping, dropping, improvising, making images, using our bodies to build stories - but I just didn't feel as good about the work I did this week as I did last week. I didn't feel like I connected to the other people in the class as well, and I don't feel like they connected to me as well. There were a couple of exceptions to this, like this five minute long mirror/dance moment that happened with this one guy that was pretty intense and really wonderful. But there was also the addition of a new element with which I didn't connect at all, and I think that flavored the rest of my work. I know at times there will be things or people that I have to work with on stage that I don't connect with and I either have to try to force a connection (which feels wrong), or just push through without a connection (which also feels wrong). I'm not sure which is the lesser of two evils.

But I...I dunno. I just didn't feel as good about last night. Maybe I went in with an agenda that was not fulfilled. Maybe I was afraid of getting injured like I did last week and that limited my movement. Maybe it's just because a lot of what we did wasn't new.

We did a few trust exercises, like falling back on someone and playing a version of light as a feather, stiff as a board. That was cool, and very fun. Rather odd sensation, but really fun. And I did get to tap into my own anger a bit - that was good. I have problems dealing with anger sometimes.

I dunno. I guess there will be good classes and there will be not as good classes. This is what is to be expected in any sort of learning process.

Thoughts

2009-07-15T22:23:00.000-05:00

Another great class. I find myself not working as much as some of the other students, but I'm getting a lot out of the observation as well. By "much," I mean "frequently." I don't jump in much on other people's exercises, and for some reason, people don't really jump in on mine. I don't know if that is a good thing or not. You're supposed to jump in when you see something that isn't being acknowledged, so if people aren't jumping in on my exercises, maybe that means we're connected and in the moment? I know there were things in my exercises tonight that weren't acknowledged. I halted some of my own impulses. I had a partner who wasn't reading me.

I think a lot of people are still going into this with an agenda. "I am going to have a moment." "She is timid so I'm going to comfort her." And if something happens that is contrary to that agenda, it seems like most people have a safe place to which they retreat. One guy sits down. One woman gets defensive. I don't want to be safe! I want to be safe in that I'd rather not walk out of there with shards of glass in my skull or anything, but I don't want the exercise to feel safe. I want to be scared and challenged and pushed beyond my own boundaries of safety to see what lies on the other side. That's one thing that I have always admired about one of my favorite dancers in Chicago - he dances outside of his own comfort zone. I want to act outside of my own comfort zone. And I think in a way, the class is set up to be kind of strange. A few of the people in there know and have worked with one another before, but a lot of us have not. And this is the kind of work where you really have to trust your partner. The second you decide to censor yourself and not go there, the exercise loses it's momentum and energy, and can become an exercise in frustration for the other person. Honestly, I don't care what these people think of me as a person. My performances in class do not define me as a person. Because I'll admit it - I go in with an agenda, too. I go in with something in mind that I want the other person to read and if they don't get there, I try something else. And if they start going somewhere else, I try to keep up. I would like to think that my goals are about my partner. Driving home, it occurred to me that this exercise is like sex. The first time you do it with someone, it can be strange and awkward as you try to feel the other person out. Neither person is comfortable asking for what they want or what they need, and both are afraid to fully invest themselves and be vulnerable. And sometimes, you get so wrapped up in trying to let your partner have a moment that you forget to participate on your own personal level (or you get so wrapped up in having your own moment that you forget to work with your partner). The more you work with someone, though, the better you get at it. Sometimes. Sometimes, you work with someone so much that the two of you get complacent and comfortable with one another and all of the tension goes out of the room. There are a couple of people in the class who when one of them goes up, you can pretty much bet that the other one will jump up a minute later, and I was kind of glad that the teacher called them out on getting conversational because I really didn't want to watch them flirt and make out again.

And then there was a guy who was too conversational, to the point of almost avoiding the exercise. Which might have been interesting if he was good at thinking on his feet, but he would get flustered and lost in words instead. The whole point of this exercise is that the words don't matter. You don't say one until something makes you say it and then you repeat that word until something makes you say a different one. If you can't think of a new word, it's probably because nothing has inspired you to find a new word and that's fine - just keep repeating the last one. But the moment you step into your head and try to come up with some interesting, clever way to say something that will elicit a response in your partner, you stop giving your partner anything to work with. You disconnect with them as you connect to yourself. I'm not saying you shouldn't be aware of yourself and your impulses and what you are feeling about certain things, but you shouldn't find yourself sitting in it. If someone calls you nice and you don't like it, stop being nice. If someone turns you on and you want to kiss them, do it. Don't sit and think, "If I kiss him, he'll take it the wrong way and then we'll feel awkward and now I'm conflicted because I want to kiss him but I don't want to kiss him and wouldn't it be nice if he wanted to kiss me instead?" Act! Not in the "be an actor" sense, but in the "just do it" Nike kind of a way.

I'm not pointing these things out to point fingers. I get wrapped up in my own thoughts, too. I second guess my impulses. I find myself wondering what is wrong with me that people react (or don't react) to me the way they do (or don't). There is a part of me that wants to take it back to the sort of odd structure of the class. These people don't know me from Adam, and are therefore afraid to get up on stage and take risks with me. I don't know how to let them know I won't hurt them, and that they can't hurt me. Or that it is okay if they hurt me. Or that if I yell at them in an exercise, it doesn't mean I don't like them. I want to put a disclaimer on the start of class next week that says, "I like you all as people. Nothing you can do or say on stage tonight will make me stop liking you all as people. If you feel the need to hold back for my sake, please don't. If you feel the need to hold back for your sake, I'm probably going to call you on it. If you let it all out, I will embrace it and be very kind to you." Or something to that effect. I want them all to know that.

Through these classes, I have also become acutely aware of my own gender. Normally, it's not really an issue for me. I'm a person. I work with people. I talk to people. I don't speak to men differently than I speak to women (generally). Perhaps it comes from years of rejections from men that I just go in assuming they're not attracted to me, so I approach pretty much every relationship from an asexual perspective. Yes, there are a couple of notable exceptions - men I have no idea how to talk to because I really want to talk to them in that sexy, flirty, confident way, but I don't know how or don't have the confidence to try. But for the most part, six days out of every seven, I'm a person, not a woman (if that makes any sense). But last week, one woman said she wanted to work with a certain man because he was a man. I've noticed that she has very different interactions with men than with women. She flirts with men and toys with them. She is standoffish with women and seems to go into interactions with women with her guard completely up like she really doesn't want to be there. There are a couple of pairs of men who have had really awkward interactions because it is as if they don't know how to talk to other men. And I realized tonight that I have not worked with any of the men in class, and that most of the interactions I have had with women are of a semi-nurturing nature. Seeking friendship and comfort and positive feelings (the notable exception being the woman who is uncomfortable working with women). But what this whole thing has done is re-acquaint me with my own gender and the hidden sexual potential (or lack thereof) therein (which honestly makes me uncomfortable and self-conscious). I don't know how the men in this class would react to me. I think a couple of the men in class last night found me attractive. I would even go so far as to say I think some of the people in this class are confused regarding my sexuality. Maybe that is threatening? They haven't been able to place me yet, so they don't know how to interact with me. In a way, yay. In a way, boo. Interact with me as I am in the moment in the exercise. Yay, though, because it would seem to imply that I have been different enough in each of my exercises that I can't be typed yet.

I don't know. I think I'm babbling now.

I think, too, that there is a difference between reality and truthfulness. This exercise is looking for truthfulness. If you feel like walking away, walk away. If something your partner did makes you want to hug them, hug them. In reality, first of all, we wouldn't be talking to each other in one word sentences like this. But also in reality, it is not always appropriate to walk away from someone you are having an intense interaction with, nor is it appropriate to hug a stranger. I think that while this exercise is excellent for finding truthfulness that you can infuse into the imaginary reality of a play, people need to remember that this is not reality. This is an exercise. You are feeling real things and doing real things and acting on real impulses that come from a very truthful place, but what you say and do is not going to look anything like how you interact with ordinary people in your ordinary life. This is a heightened reality - it's okay if your conversation doesn't make sense.

I dunno. I'm having fun. I'm loving being in class. The teacher noticed that I have made progress from last week to this week, and even between my exercises tonight. I think I cold be really good at this and I very much want to keep learning.

I need to remember to stretch, though. I'm still all kinds of sore.

Ow.

2009-07-14T22:55:00.001-05:00

Ow.

I am bruised. Literally. I was beaten. Literally. I am exhausted and exhilarated and excited. Literally. I am icing my feet.

I don't know if there is a way to effectively describe a theater movement class to someone who has never taken a theater movement class. I don't know if there is a way to effectively describe a Meisner class to someone who has never taken Meisner. So imagine the position I am in trying to put into words a Meisner based movement class. I don't know that it can be done. But I'll try.

We played. We jumped and ran and walked and stopped and squealed and pouted and crawled and spun and fell and grew and shared and touched and built and posed and felt and experienced. Pick an action verb, and we probably did it. Pick an action verb that does not result in injury, and we probably did it. Though I did get clocked in the face during one jumping session. And I spent so much time on my knees, they are all red and don't even really look like knees anymore. The thing is, you put six people in a room and tell them to move around and people will tend to do similar things. It's how we're raised to function in society, going as far back as babies learning social smiling. But in a theater movement class, or on a stage, it's not about doing the same thing as everyone else. It is about participating, but bringing something unique and interesting to the table. If everyone else is standing, find a reason to lie on the floor. If everyone is kneeling quietly, find a reason to skip. Add variety. Truthful variety - it has to come from somewhere and have motivation and purpose - but by changing things even just slightly, the whole picture changes and what was a funeral is now a boat ride down the river that ends with the overthrowing of an evil tyrant. And it all makes sense.

Everything that there was in the Wednesday class existed in this class, too - moments, connections, interactions, introspection - but most of tonight happened without words (as opposed to Wednesday that was mostly words). It really is an interesting combination of classes to be taking together. And maybe it's a good thing that the classes are back to back - maybe my work in the physical class will help me follow my impulses more in the verbal class. Because there is physicality in the verbal, and at the end of the night, there was verbal in the physical. It all comes together to make us live truthfully.

But I think I need to stretch now. I bent and twisted and squatted and ran and jumped so much - and for three hours - that I'm going to be horribly sore tomorrow if I don't. Even more sore than I already am, I mean. Literally, I'm icing my feet. I have a huge bruise and two scrapes on my one foot. My knees don't look like knees. My back hurts. My elbows hurt - I can't figure that one out at all. If nothing else, it's going to be encouragement for me to stay in better shape. I need to keep up with the other kids in class.

Oh, in case it wasn't clear, I had a great time in this class and can't wait for next week. My injuries are badges of honor.

Pre-Class #2

2009-07-14T16:26:00.001-05:00

So as we all know, I was kind of disappointed that my class was canceled on Saturday, but it has been rescheduled for tonight! Hooray! Kind of. I'm really looking forward to going and moving and experimenting and playing. Tuesday nights just have a different feel from Saturday mornings, though, and this puts my classes on back to back nights instead of spaced evenly through the week. And tonight is the All-Star Game, which I had really wanted to watch. But I can always catch the game online at a later time. I can't always go somewhere and explore all of the wonderful things that my body can do.

I will admit that I'm nervous, just like last time. I don't think any of these people are the same as in the other class, so again, a whole new group of people to deal with. And what if they look at me funny because I'm wearing jeans? I know they said to wear something you can move in and I can move in my jeans. Besides, I don't really own sweat pants, except for my pajamas and I'm not going to go do this in my pjs. And I'm not going to wear spandex to class, either. I don't think it would make a very good impression on my classmates if I blind them in the first class. Plus, I will be uncomfortable and self-conscious if I'm wearing sweats or spandex. So I'm going to wear my comfy jeans and I'll have to deal with their strange looks.

You'd think I'd be used to strange looks by now...wish me luck!

Saturday

2009-07-11T10:24:00.002-05:00

Class was canceled today. I was looking forward to this class more than the other one, because this one was a physical movement workshop. Call me selfish, but I was looking forward to getting some strange kind of exercise on Saturday mornings for a month. Yes, I could still jump around at home and do something interesting, but it's not the same. I'm hoping the class either gets rescheduled or more people sign up for it.

In lieu of class, I might go play in the subway today. Might.

First Class

2009-07-11T10:14:00.001-05:00

My first class was Wednesday night. I haven't been that nervous about anything in a very long time. I didn't know what stage of the repetition exercise we were going to start with and what if I moved too fast or too slow or what if everyone else was much better at it than I am and I'm walking into a room full of people who don't know me from Adam and with whom I have absolutely no previously established level of comfort or trust and what if that taints everything and makes me too scared to participate? But that fear should make me participate, yes? And I should let them all see it because then I will be living truthfully in the moment and that is what this whole exercise is about. That is what acting is all about - living truthfully in the moment (under imaginary circumstances). I think that in general, I am a pretty truthful person. When I feel like doing something, I do it. When I don't, I don't. I'm pretty decent at expressing myself in one way or another. Granted, I'm not perfect at it and there are a few disingenuous things that I do (like my day job), but in general, I think I am pretty aware of how I'm feeling and what I'm doing and what impact those things have on the people around me.

So we started by playing tag. There wasn't a lot of actual tagging going on, often times, I think, because people were so engaged on what was happening in front of them that they didn't want to interrupt it. We all wanted to see where this was going to go next. The teacher told me to observe for a bit, and I wanted to jump in a half a dozen times, but I didn't until the second half of the class. There was one woman who just seemed to want to pick fights. There was another woman who would get flustered and in her head and would miss things in her partner. There was a guy who was TOTALLY in his head to the point where he wasn't giving his partners anything to work with, so they would start either projecting things onto him or making observations about themselves. There was a guy who would get protective and defensive, letting the energy fall out of the moment exactly when the moment called for escalation. And there was me. I don't think either of my partners were very good at reading me, which makes me think there was something I was doing to make myself unreadable. I thought I was being expressive and open, but I guess I wasn't. There is the possibility that my partners were also either projecting something onto me or that they came in with a preconceived notion of what they were going to find, but I can't change what they do. I can only work on what I do. And if it means I need to be more open and expressive and direct so that people understand me, that's something for me to work on.

I think a lot of people went into the exercise with an agenda, instead of just letting the exercise happen. "I'm going to make him yell at me." "I'm going to ask her to comfort me." Which made for a few false moments, I felt. Did you really see anger, or did you want to see anger? And then the other really strange part about it was that some of these people who so clearly had an agenda would choose very safe words to use. "Smiling" instead of "happy" or "uncomfortable." Instead of trying to get at the root of why someone was suddenly laughing, they would just say "laughing." Laughter doesn't always indicate amusement. People can laugh out of discomfort or as a defense mechanism or out of surprise. And while it is a 100% truthful observation to point out that a laughing person is laughing, I think it then becomes difficult for the laughing person to react to that. If you tell me I'm wearing sneakers and I'm wearing sneakers, I can't really feel one way or the other about that. It is a statement of fact. A true statement, but a safe, unqualified statement. If you tell me I am wearing ugly sneakers or fucking awesome sneakers, that will elicit an emotional response. I know that it is safer and easier to point out the obvious sneakers. My thought is that this exercise is about stepping outside of safe. I could be wrong. Or that could be another thing for me to work on - to call my partners out on it when they choose safe words.

In both of my exercises, my partner ended up disliking me and saying so. This is a personal comment, but it's not a personal comment, if that makes any sense. When we leave the stage, we go back to the place where they really don't know anything about me yet, nor I them, and I think we will get along just fine as regular people. But in the moment, in the exercise, they didn't like me. Looking back on it, I think it is because I was making them uncomfortable. I think one woman was frustrated with me and the other was just uncomfortable. Looking back, I think this was a good thing. I elicited a visceral response in my partners. I hope, in a very strange way, that I scared them. I think my classmates might have thought I was safe or timid, since I didn't really socialize before class. But I'm not an extrovert - this has been established and documented. I think they thought that would manifest on stage. And I think I surprised them with my honesty. Yes, I could be more honest, and I need to work on following my impulses more, but I think they thought working with me was going to be safe and easy and then it wasn't and they didn't like that. I dunno. Just a thought. Maybe I should try to get everyone in the class to not like me. Wouldn't that be interesting?

I'm looking forward to continuing with this. I don't think there was anyone in the class who was any better or any worse at this than I am. I think there is a lot that I can learn from working with these people and this instructor. I love it that I left with so much to think about. I think I may have found the challenge I have been looking for for the last ten years or so, and what's more, I think I'm up for facing it.