[Life][Random] Days I Miss
In high school, I spent three years in drama. I loved it. I loved being on stage, which is surprising to me now, because I was a very shy person in high school (and yes, those of you who know me now, I know it's hard to believe, shaddup). I was always nervous before the show, but that nervousness always dissapated. There were always lines that, for some reason, I could never remember to save my life, and inevitably even if I'd gotten those lines down in rehersals, on the night of the show I'd forget them again. Still, Aslin (drama teacher who always said if she called her "Ms. Aslin" she knew we wanted something) taught us all well, and I don't think I ever screwed up a scene completely. Forget a line, skip to the next one you remember. If you do it well enough, the audience will never know.
Especially considering we never did scripted plays. Aslin liked to do what we students dubbed "Aslin Originals," even though they were technically "Aslin and Her Students Originals." Freshman year, we had two Aslin Originals and the Pajama Production, which was just another Aslin Original except we all got to wear PJs to school and in the show.
An Aslin Original began with Aslin directing us in a word association game based on a theme. Themes I remember included "friendship" and "fairy tales." Once the words were collected, Aslin would begin a series of writing assignments, where we had to write poems around words in the theme, or one-acts, or essays or whatever she told us. After a few weeks, she'd the collect quotes from various pieces she liked best and assemble them into a semi-coherent production. These shows didn't have stories, there was no progression from beginning to middle to end. Just us, standing on stage or sitting on risers on stage (all of us during the entire production), delivering lines. Our very first show actually consisted of various students giving monologues from our favorite books from the summer reading list. Several students chose the same one I did, the ending scene from To Kill a Mockingbird.
At any rate, none of us really liked thid, but I, at least, enjoyed being on stage, and the fairy tale production was actually sort of fun (I got to deliver a monologue as a disgruntled fairy godmother, and ended up making the audience bust into laughter by saying a line in a way completely unplanned from the rehersals).
Sophmore year, we did Harolds, which is a structured sort of improvisasional show. I will admit, it could have been a lot more fun if we all had been more willing to let go and do what was necessary to make such a show work. There were very few of is 15-year olds who wanted to look like morons in front of the entire school, however. I think this might have been how Aslin chose her favored students, by seeing who those few were.
At the end of sophmore year, however, those of us who knew we would be in the junior year drama class BEGGED Aslin to let us do something scripted, something legitimate. Junior year, we arrived to find our wish had been granted, just not as we expected.
**Just a side note, as several students planned to have acting careers after school, we did take time out for Aslin to teach us the proper etiquette for auditions, how to choose a classic and a modern monologue, how to act while on stage transitioning between the two, etc. I just can't remember if it was sophmore or junior year.**
First, we were all girls. No guys, as the last two guys from sophmore year had moved on to better, manlier, less-gay things. So, first up that year: Top Girls. We were split into two or three groups (can't remember for sure how many), and cast in roles... I got to be Pope Joan, the British myth of a woman who was raised as a boy and became Pope, only to die by stoning when she had a baby in the middle of a parade. Wow. Yeah. There was also a Japanese courtesan, and other historical or fictional women, all gathered together at one dinner table giving our little monologues. And we only did the first scene of the play, not the entire thing. Needless to say, we 16-year olds didn't get it, didn't like it, and wondered why the hell Aslin wanted to torture us.
Our second big production that year was a musical called Quilters. A MUSICAL. There were a couple of girls in the class who were also in choir, but the rest of us wanted to shake Aslin and ask her if she'd lost her ever-lovin' MIND. Not only that, but it was a play all about settlers' wives, crossing the wilderness and having babies in snowstorms. MORE having babies, and of course, once again, I was cast as a woman who got to give a very long, embarrasing monologue about just that, having a baby in a snowstorm. Aslin decided to make us all sew our own costumes, as those of us planning to go into theatre would often have to do just that, and then, just to but the cherry on top, she staged the damn thing just like an Aslin Original, with the only difference being that we weren't all on stage all the time.
We kept wondering what the fuck she was thinking. Especially since we'd heard that the sophmore class, the sophmore class, had actually been given an entire scripted play, one with a real story, not just a collection of monologes. Why did they get to do a real play, when we were stuck with this monlogue-y, musical shit?
Then, I actually went to see the sophmore show. I believe it was called The Golden Door, and it was set during one of the World Wars, I don't remember which one. Strangely, I can't remember any of that. What I do remember, very clearly, is that I was blown away by their performance. They were incredible. Especially for high school sophmores. That's when I realized the reason Aslin had given them the real play was because they could handle it, and they would work for it. While in the junior year class, there were girls who had yet to memorize their lines the night before the big show. Our class wouldn't have worked so hard or done nearly so well. Some of us would, I know I would have, and I know my friend Maidie would have, because she loved drama and the class as much (if not more) than I did.
Still, that was the last year I took drama class. Though I understood Aslin's reasons, I didn't want to be involved in another year of monologues with a group of girls I mostly (with a couple of exceptions) couldn't stand and couldn't stand me, people who wouldn't work as hard as I would. Girls who had done incredible jobs during their psuedo-auditions, but wouldn't put forth any effort during actual productions, probably because they didn't like what Aslin gave us to do. Well, neither did I, but I'd still done the work. And if they'd have buckled down despite their dislike for the material, then Aslin would probably have given us better material to work with. Why should she trust us to do well with better material, when we apparently wouldn't expend any effort on the shit?
Senior year, I didn't want to leave without being on stage one more time. So though I was still somewhat shy (better than in earlier years, but I didn't really break out of my shell until college, and in many ways I'm still dusting off old pieces of myself), I put together and rehersed on my own time a monologue, which I used to audition for the senior class' talent showcase, That Senior Deal. It was a little surreal, considering the faculty advisor and judge for the auditions was also the art teacher, who had given me consistently lower grades than warranted for not deigning to comform my drawing style to his specifications. After my monologue, though, he looked at me as though he'd never seen me before and said something along the lines of "Where have you bene hiding this?" making it very clear he thought my acting ability far outstripped my artistic ability.
So I performed my monologue in That Senior Deal, and have not been on stage since.
I've thought several times of attempting to audition for something with a local theatre group, but can never manage to take the step. Do I remember all the right steps for a proper audition? Are they even the same as they were more than ten years ago? Am I too fat for any of the groups to consider me for any part? Am I really even that good? Would I be able to commit myself to any production even if I were cast, considering I have basically two full time job and RPG commitments (I take my RPing very seriously, shush)?
What brought all this on?
I just finished ready Without You: A Memoir of Love, Loss and the Musical RENT by Anthony Rapp. His description of how RENT wove its way into his life, his friendships with the other cast members, and how the music moved him from the start and never stopped made me want to be part of a production of RENT very badly.
Too bad I can't sing worth a damn.
Though, I think I don't do too bad on Mimi's parts in "Another Day."
Still, it just brought back all those old memories, and the love I had for memorizing lines, blocking out the scenes, and being up there on stage. I do wish the theatre could be more a part of my life somehow.
Especially considering we never did scripted plays. Aslin liked to do what we students dubbed "Aslin Originals," even though they were technically "Aslin and Her Students Originals." Freshman year, we had two Aslin Originals and the Pajama Production, which was just another Aslin Original except we all got to wear PJs to school and in the show.
An Aslin Original began with Aslin directing us in a word association game based on a theme. Themes I remember included "friendship" and "fairy tales." Once the words were collected, Aslin would begin a series of writing assignments, where we had to write poems around words in the theme, or one-acts, or essays or whatever she told us. After a few weeks, she'd the collect quotes from various pieces she liked best and assemble them into a semi-coherent production. These shows didn't have stories, there was no progression from beginning to middle to end. Just us, standing on stage or sitting on risers on stage (all of us during the entire production), delivering lines. Our very first show actually consisted of various students giving monologues from our favorite books from the summer reading list. Several students chose the same one I did, the ending scene from To Kill a Mockingbird.
At any rate, none of us really liked thid, but I, at least, enjoyed being on stage, and the fairy tale production was actually sort of fun (I got to deliver a monologue as a disgruntled fairy godmother, and ended up making the audience bust into laughter by saying a line in a way completely unplanned from the rehersals).
Sophmore year, we did Harolds, which is a structured sort of improvisasional show. I will admit, it could have been a lot more fun if we all had been more willing to let go and do what was necessary to make such a show work. There were very few of is 15-year olds who wanted to look like morons in front of the entire school, however. I think this might have been how Aslin chose her favored students, by seeing who those few were.
At the end of sophmore year, however, those of us who knew we would be in the junior year drama class BEGGED Aslin to let us do something scripted, something legitimate. Junior year, we arrived to find our wish had been granted, just not as we expected.
**Just a side note, as several students planned to have acting careers after school, we did take time out for Aslin to teach us the proper etiquette for auditions, how to choose a classic and a modern monologue, how to act while on stage transitioning between the two, etc. I just can't remember if it was sophmore or junior year.**
First, we were all girls. No guys, as the last two guys from sophmore year had moved on to better, manlier, less-gay things. So, first up that year: Top Girls. We were split into two or three groups (can't remember for sure how many), and cast in roles... I got to be Pope Joan, the British myth of a woman who was raised as a boy and became Pope, only to die by stoning when she had a baby in the middle of a parade. Wow. Yeah. There was also a Japanese courtesan, and other historical or fictional women, all gathered together at one dinner table giving our little monologues. And we only did the first scene of the play, not the entire thing. Needless to say, we 16-year olds didn't get it, didn't like it, and wondered why the hell Aslin wanted to torture us.
Our second big production that year was a musical called Quilters. A MUSICAL. There were a couple of girls in the class who were also in choir, but the rest of us wanted to shake Aslin and ask her if she'd lost her ever-lovin' MIND. Not only that, but it was a play all about settlers' wives, crossing the wilderness and having babies in snowstorms. MORE having babies, and of course, once again, I was cast as a woman who got to give a very long, embarrasing monologue about just that, having a baby in a snowstorm. Aslin decided to make us all sew our own costumes, as those of us planning to go into theatre would often have to do just that, and then, just to but the cherry on top, she staged the damn thing just like an Aslin Original, with the only difference being that we weren't all on stage all the time.
We kept wondering what the fuck she was thinking. Especially since we'd heard that the sophmore class, the sophmore class, had actually been given an entire scripted play, one with a real story, not just a collection of monologes. Why did they get to do a real play, when we were stuck with this monlogue-y, musical shit?
Then, I actually went to see the sophmore show. I believe it was called The Golden Door, and it was set during one of the World Wars, I don't remember which one. Strangely, I can't remember any of that. What I do remember, very clearly, is that I was blown away by their performance. They were incredible. Especially for high school sophmores. That's when I realized the reason Aslin had given them the real play was because they could handle it, and they would work for it. While in the junior year class, there were girls who had yet to memorize their lines the night before the big show. Our class wouldn't have worked so hard or done nearly so well. Some of us would, I know I would have, and I know my friend Maidie would have, because she loved drama and the class as much (if not more) than I did.
Still, that was the last year I took drama class. Though I understood Aslin's reasons, I didn't want to be involved in another year of monologues with a group of girls I mostly (with a couple of exceptions) couldn't stand and couldn't stand me, people who wouldn't work as hard as I would. Girls who had done incredible jobs during their psuedo-auditions, but wouldn't put forth any effort during actual productions, probably because they didn't like what Aslin gave us to do. Well, neither did I, but I'd still done the work. And if they'd have buckled down despite their dislike for the material, then Aslin would probably have given us better material to work with. Why should she trust us to do well with better material, when we apparently wouldn't expend any effort on the shit?
Senior year, I didn't want to leave without being on stage one more time. So though I was still somewhat shy (better than in earlier years, but I didn't really break out of my shell until college, and in many ways I'm still dusting off old pieces of myself), I put together and rehersed on my own time a monologue, which I used to audition for the senior class' talent showcase, That Senior Deal. It was a little surreal, considering the faculty advisor and judge for the auditions was also the art teacher, who had given me consistently lower grades than warranted for not deigning to comform my drawing style to his specifications. After my monologue, though, he looked at me as though he'd never seen me before and said something along the lines of "Where have you bene hiding this?" making it very clear he thought my acting ability far outstripped my artistic ability.
So I performed my monologue in That Senior Deal, and have not been on stage since.
I've thought several times of attempting to audition for something with a local theatre group, but can never manage to take the step. Do I remember all the right steps for a proper audition? Are they even the same as they were more than ten years ago? Am I too fat for any of the groups to consider me for any part? Am I really even that good? Would I be able to commit myself to any production even if I were cast, considering I have basically two full time job and RPG commitments (I take my RPing very seriously, shush)?
What brought all this on?
I just finished ready Without You: A Memoir of Love, Loss and the Musical RENT by Anthony Rapp. His description of how RENT wove its way into his life, his friendships with the other cast members, and how the music moved him from the start and never stopped made me want to be part of a production of RENT very badly.
Too bad I can't sing worth a damn.
Though, I think I don't do too bad on Mimi's parts in "Another Day."
Still, it just brought back all those old memories, and the love I had for memorizing lines, blocking out the scenes, and being up there on stage. I do wish the theatre could be more a part of my life somehow.