Lewis & Clark Moodle

Something Taylor and I were having trouble with before the dress rehearsals was making the space best-suited to represent the interaction between Callie and Peter. At first, we had six chairs lined up side-by-side, but then Fabi gave us the idea to put two rows of chairs at a 90° angle so that we don’t have to put ourselves in awkward positions when talking with each other. After that, the ideas just kept coming and we pretty much set up the entire set and designed most of the blocking based around that. In summation: Thanks Fabi.

I wouldn’t say we felt confident going into the dress rehearsal on Tuesday, but we weren’t necessarily stressed out either. I think both of us really needed to hear what other people thought about the scene and our decisions regarding the blocking and given circumstances. We really didn’t know what to do about the pauses and how long we should make each one to truly draw out the awkwardness that should be present between both of us without it becoming excessive. The advice from everybody and Rebecca actually helped this question and many others we didn’t even know we had. We're really excited to take the advice and move on to the entire scene!

Today was yet another one of those times where I worry about something too much but it turns out to be completely fine. 

I was super worried that I wouldn't get the beats right or something, but to my surprise, I apparently did really well?

Rebecca also said that I'm much more grounded which I guess goes along with the fact that I'm a lot more comfortable here than I was at the beginning of the year, which is really good, because I can't say the same about many other aspects of my first semester in college. 

So, doing something that scares you, that thing turning out to not be that scary, and having an amazing time because you tried. 

Trying to follow this idea is basically my entire life struggle; I mean, it's what I wrote my college essay about at least! And, to be honest, taking this class was kind of part of that too. I've noticed in life that some of my best memories are from times I stepped outside my comfort zone, and for someone who hasn't done acting stuff since elementary school (aside from some amateur voice acting projects in high school) taking this class was definitely a step for me!

The thing is though, even though I know I need to stop worrying, I can't seem to do it.  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

And that's kind of the thing about acting. You just need to trust yourself and do what your gut is telling you. It's really nice; being in this class has helped remind me about what's important in life, and the lessons I've learned here are more than applicable to life in general. I'm really grateful to have taken this class, learning all these life lessons, having a non-judgmental environment to come to, and meeting all of you awesome people!

The truth is, it's been kind of an anxiety-ridden semester for me, so it's really nice to have this space where I can relax, trust myself, and be supported. I'm really gonna miss this class!

Today was yet another one of those times where I worry about something too much but it turns out to be completely fine. 

I was super worried that I wouldn't get the beats right or something, but to my surprise, I apparently did really well?

Rebecca also said that I'm much more grounded which I guess goes along with the fact that I'm a lot more comfortable here than I was at the beginning of the year, which is really good, because I can't say the same about many other aspects of my first semester in college. 

So, doing something that scares you, that thing turning out to not be that scary, and having an amazing time because you tried. 

Trying to follow this idea is basically my entire life struggle; I mean, it's what I wrote my college essay about at least! And, to be honest, taking this class was kind of part of that too. I've noticed in life that some of my best memories are from times I stepped outside my comfort zone, and for someone who hasn't done acting stuff since elementary school (aside from some amateur voice acting projects in high school) taking this class was definitely a step for me!

The thing is though, even though I know I need to stop worrying, I can't seem to do it.  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

And that's kind of the thing about acting. You just need to trust yourself and do what your gut is telling you. It's really nice; being in this class has helped remind me about what's important in life, and the lessons I've learned here are more than applicable to life in general. I'm really grateful to have taken this class, learning all these life lessons, having a non-judgmental environment to come to, and meeting all of you awesome people!

The truth is, it's been kind of an anxiety-ridden semester for me, so it's really nice to have this space where I can relax, trust myself, and be supported. I'm really gonna miss this class!

Over the past week, meeting up with Elizabeth outside of class to rehearse has been super helpful for me. Going over our scene and trying to implement new tactics each time has really helped me become more grounded. In some ways, rehearsing can feel like a science experiment. Sometimes, Elizabeth and I feel really grounded in our scene, and at other times, we feel disconnected from the given circumstances and ourselves. With more practice, I think the results and grounding will become more consistent. 

Our scene feels a bit tricky to work with at times because the emotions that our characters are feeling are unspoken and complex. Callie and Sara are not only afraid of being rejected by each other, but they are also afraid of how society might view them if they were to be together. While we have been rehearsing, I have been trying to keep all of this in mind. Given circumstances are so important!

Right now, I'm trying to focus on and improve my volume and the specificity of our beats. I think that these things will help with adding some more tension and context for our characters' relationships with one another. The feedback that we got in class was super helpful and I'm looking forward to working on our scene more!

This week we got the whole scene up on its feet and running off book. We also added a few pieces to the set to allow for more movement and explored different ways to play the emotions of the scene, especially the in bit leading up to the final moments. The set is designed so that it is almost a mirror from front to back. This in a way reflects the two characters and how they are, in a sense, foils of one another. Both Callie and Peter love Sara and think that they are the best choice for her but they have very different was of showing it and also love her in very different ways. The dynamics of control and status in the scene are also really interesting and fun to play with. Both want to show that they are better able to care for Sara. Callie is coming at this alone, only knowing Sara for a couple months, while Peter has years of experience living with Sara and Sara's family on his side. Working with playing the objective and keeping the stakes in mind throughout the scene has helped me to find Callie's reason for fighting when it seems like the cards are all stacked against her. The more we run the scene the more we have found that one of the struggles of working alone is that we can't tell how the scene looks from the audiences perspective. I always wonder if I'm moving too much or if something is reading in a way that makes sense for the scene. Conversely, being alone makes it easier to create and make mistakes. I know that for our first two minutes I was too in my head and that negatively impacted my performance. Overall, things are going really well and I'm excited to show the class the whole scene!

Our first couple weeks of practice I feel like our production with me and Devin went really well. Before the showing of our two minutes off-script, we were able to meet up twice to discuss how our setup should be (with the stage and isle of seats), go over our script, and how our beats work with actual practice. One thing I personally(Jake)was really showing concern about was our beat with my laughter, I seemed(Jake) to have trouble with being able to show a good solid realistic laugh reaction from his statement, but being able to flip gears to surprised/stunned in a matter of seconds. The scene where Devin(acting as Avery)told me that he was hoping to own his own theatre someday. I responded as it was funny that he would think of a crazy idea like that. He responded as he was "sort of serious". At that point, I felt a beat change as I was "stunned". During class Professor, Lingafelter pointed out to show more of a realistic reaction to Avery, that's because, at that point, Avery didn't want to take any more crap from me (Sam). I believe I was able to improve in this part of me and Devin's conversation. 

After doing research about what makes good laughing, I found a couple of pointers according to the website ThoughtCo. The article's name was An Actor's Guide to Laughing on Stage".

The first thing I learned from this article is that "laughing naturally on stage is the big challenge".  I experienced this in my actment because I had a hard time finding something funny to think about, but also being able to express it in an appropriate way. Another thing I will take from this article in my rehearsing with my partner is to try many ways of laughing. It says s to try out "new laughs in which you have observed". This can be done by watching movies or theatre productions to see how actors use their way of "laughter". 

Because of happenstance Manu and I did our beat analysis and learned our lines independently. When we did meet to rehearse the scene for class it went extremely smoothly, we both knew the first two minutes very well. I will add that perhaps because we learned the lines independently we did not fully block the scene and while one of us said our monologues the other kinda just sat there listening, we do not yet know what physical action can be done along with our counterparts monologue. This is definitely something to work on. We also practiced having an audience, we preformed our scene in front of two of our friends. 

• Designed set
• Talked about several different blocking possibilities
• Compared beat analysis and examined different ideas of the text
• Attempted to layout the set 
• Read through the scene
• Acted through the scene
• Confirmed schedules for next couple of rehearsals

I'd say that our first rehearsal was a complete success in that we were able to figure out what we wanted to do with this scene as well as how we plan on accomplishing our plan. The future is what you choose to take from it.

• We started our rehearsal by talking about the set, costumes, and props. We still have a lot to work out, but we have a start! Below are some pictures of what we had in mind for the scene…

  • 2 chairs (rocking chairs, maybe?)

  • Small porch

  • Railing on at least one side

  • Table

  • No flowers or super fancy decorations

  • Cozy, homey, familiar, well used

  • We’re excited to look at what the costume shop and the furniture storage place have that will help us bring our ideas to life!

• We ran through the scene 3 times, trying out choices, and trying to acknowledge our actor impulses.

• We found out where 2 minutes into the scene was, for Friday’s class.

• The place we rehearsed (Holmes 5th floor lounge) was kind of a nice place to practice because there’s a wall of windows, and it was a beautiful sunny day. Maybe next time we might open some of the windows to get that brisk air feeling too. 

• However, the downside to this rehearsal space is that it might not be a good place to practice projecting our voices and then yelling. Perhaps next time we can use the Black Box and remember the the view of the residence hall lounge.

• It was a productive rehearsal. We got some things figured out, and the scene felt good!

• We plan on meeting either this weekend or Monday, before Thanksgiving break.