Improv class #6: Kids!
We met at nine o'clock this morning in preparation of our class-end "show" that we're putting on in two weeks. And when I say "we," I mean all of the students...old and young.
Paul teaches three (?) classes on acting/improv, with most of them being for kids. I'd guess the kids ranged in age from 6 to 11, which may not seem that big of a difference to you, but if you've been around kids of these ages, you know it's huge. It's the difference between running around the room when you're not on stage versus sitting calmly in a chair watching the action. It didn't help that one little boy grabbed a Vanilla Coke from the other room.
Small child + caffeine = BAD
At least it was the last of the Vanilla Cokes. (Paul has a small reception area across the hall from the room with the stage.)
One girl was there first, and all three of the adults came in at the same time. Most of the kids came within five minutes of us, but a few others trickled in.
We started off playing a name game to figure out who we all were. It was the same game we'd done on the very first day of class, and we used the same names as we had before.
The players (approximate ages):
Paul Blue (adult)
Wayne Blue (adult)
(Me) Crimson (adult)
(Mom) Wine (adult)
Haley Pink (older--11)
Haley Tulip (younger--8)
Alejandra Tulip (11)
Josh Green (9)
Brianna Daffodil (9)
Kyle Orange (7)
Calvin Blue (7)
Maddie Rose (6)
Paul is proud of these kids, so we'd heard about some of them, specifically Josh and Alejandra. Josh is very natural and really good--he should stay with this acting stuff. Alejandra took tap dancing with Paul over the summer, so he always talked about her. Mom even said, upon hearing her name, "You took dance lessons here, right?"
We did the name game for a little while, clapping and snapping while saying each other's names. It took a few times for the kids to get to know everyone, but it worked out pretty well. Paul had Josh go around the room and name everyone (this was before Calvin and Maddie, who are brother and sister, arrived), and there were only a few minor mistakes--like, he'd remember a first name but not the color or flower.
Then we tossed the ball. Let me tell you, it was pretty different with a dozen people. (It was during the ball toss that Calvin and Maddie arrived.) Most of the kids had a good time, although it was hard to tell that Kyle was throwing the ball, and Maddie would always say, "I don't want it!"
Our first group activity was to go through an ice cream shop. Mom and two kids were workers in the shop, and the rest of us would come in and get cones. There is a storage room between the stage and the hospitality room, so the rest of us stood in there and waited our turn. Kyle, our little hyper child, spied an orange traffic cone and stuck it on his head but left it behind when he got his ice cream. I was the last one out, and I'd gotten an idea--traffic cone, ice cream cone, hmm... I grabbed the traffic cone to take it out. Kyle came into the storage room from the hospitality room and tried to take the cone away! I told him, I'll give it right back when I'm done, but somebody's mommy must not have taught him how to share. I did end up with it and the other kids giggled when I asked to have the traffic cone filled with ice cream--which eventually ended up all over the floor, meaning the kids had to come clean it up. Kyle, special child that he is, then pretended to be a dog and started licking at the ice cream to lick it up.
This was a running theme: Any other time Kyle was on stage, he was a dog. We named him Frank.
(I'm not sure I want to know--maybe his mom won't let him have a pet?)
The next few scenes I wasn't involved at all, so I got to watch the fun.
#2: Mom and Wayne are parents who have to leave three of their kids home while they pick up the fourth from the emergency room. Josh and Calvin played the boys, Kyle played the dog, and a pink blanket was the baby. Josh was really good, changing a stinky diaper and holding the baby; Calvin kept dealing with the dog, who kept coming back on stage even after Paul asked him not to. At one point Calvin blocked the off-stage door with a folding chair, but Kyle, messing around, knocked his head into it. We could hear wailing in the storage room. Poor Calvin--he kept saying, "I was just moving the chair!" To me it sounded like crocodile tears, but the other kids were a little freaked out. Paul left the room to attend to him, and everyone else sat there worried, but they came back in and all was fine and we set about doing another scene.
#3: The kids did a Goldilocks and the Three Bears scene with the girls. It was a little hard to tell what was going on; the girls aren't very loud, so you couldn't tell what they were saying. It's kind of sad when the boys offstage are louder than the girls onstage. At one point Paul had us take a break and talked to us about being respectful to the people onstage and such. Also, some of the kids didn't get the point of a group activity; if the group is doing something, then everyone in the group is doing the same thing.
#4: Kids, again, this time a two-parter. First they drove to a water park, and then they went down a slide in tubes. Most of the girls and Josh did okay with that. They were cute in pretending the water slide curved and dipped and splashed cold water on them. Calvin, however, wanted to surf and was kind of unhappy that that wasn't allowed. Maddie didn't understand that she was supposed to watch the people going down the slide. Kyle wasn't too bad--we had the dog go down the slide, too.
#5: Adults only at first--we went through our space shuttle scene almost as if it was just us. But the younger kids were clearly bored by that--Calvin kept trying to walk onstage. We did it a second time with Josh, Alejandra, and older Haley...and the dog...and it worked pretty well. Then we tried it with everyone except for younger Haley, who was perfectly fine talking to somebody on a fake phone. She didn't seem put out by not joining in, so whatever. The space shuttle with everyone was all right mostly; that third time, the kids ran the ship. However, Calvin didn't understand that when we're in the shuttle, you have to be strapped in. Kyle was along those lines but not as bad. Somehow I think Calvin and Maddie's mom wanted them to take the class, instead of them wanting to take it. I don't think they're ready for something like this, but Paul is not going to turn away customers. (Their mom seemed perfectly nice, but also of the kind of clueless suburban soccer mom type.)
The parents started arriving as we were doing the last shuttle scene. Despite not seeming to want to be there, Calvin and Maddie didn't want to leave! Maddie insisted in helping us set up for the adults-only scene, a repeat of the bed scene from last week. They finally left and we ran through the bed scene again, and then Paul gave us scripts to study for next week--the actual one-act of the bed scene. We finished by 11:30 because Wayne had to go. (He probably had to go take an aspirin.)
Little stuff:
Some of the kids kept leaving the room if they weren't on stage; that kind of annoyed me. And it wasn't because they were going offstage through the stage door. Clueless soccer mommy had brought cookies, and there was more pop in the hospitality room, so they kept getting snacks. It wasn't too bad but it still would have been nice if the kids had been more aware of what was going on.
Kyle, dear special child, apparently always grabbed a Coke during class. He set the can and a cup on Paul's table, where he keeps his notes and his stereo. Kyle poured the Coke into the cup but overfilled it, leaving a small puddle on the table. It wasn't too bad until we hit the Three Bears scene, where Kyle decided to play with the puddle and it got perilously close to the equipment. Wayne and I both ran for paper towels and averted disaster.
Mom was jealous of Kyle; *she* wanted Vanilla Coke. The remaining pop included Squirt, Diet Barq's, and 7-Up, but no Coke. She actually grabbed a cup and was going to pour some of the Coke from the can into her cup but thought better of it. I told her good, because maybe she would start acting like a dog and pretending to pee on everything. :)
Paul had stopped by the farmer's market before class and bought a bunch of apples. Some of the kids grabbed them, but it was kind of hard to gnaw an apple and act at the same time, so we ended up with half-eaten apples all over the place. Great. While Paul was talking to the kids' parents, the adults cleaned up the room, getting rid of extra chairs, pop cans...and apples.
A lot of Paul's props come from Goodwill. We know this because he doesn't remove the tags. :) He picked up, among other things, a kiddie-sized green plastic table with two matching chairs. The littlest kids liked to sit in the little green chair; we only had one of them in the acting room. They brought it onstage during the driving to the water park scene, but one kid sat in it...and SNAP! One of the legs broke off. Doh! Paul wasn't upset that the chair broke, but the leg splintered into several sharp pieces and we found them even after we thought we'd gotten them all. At least they were big pieces.
Since we got out of class earlier than usual, traffic was a little busier than we were used to. Instead of being able to turn left out of the parking lot due to backed-up traffic, I had to turn right. There's a cross street right there so I turned on that...and immediately faced the farmer's market, which was on the next block. Mom wanted to go so I pulled into a nearby parking lot. The first booth there was this guy selling bread, and he noticed my sweatshirt--"North Central! I went there!" "Are you going to Homecoming?" I asked. He replied curtly, "No." Strange. Mom wanted coffee, so we walked to Panera in the adjacent strip mall. She sprung for a scone and hot chocolate for me, a low-carb bagel and coffee for her. She then wanted part of my scone, so we ended up sharing food.
It was cool outside--mid-50s, I would say--but sunny, so we decided to walk around the Riverwalk with our drinks. I love nature and I love taking pictures of nature, so I snapped at least a dozen pics of various spots along the path. There was even a white heron/egret (not sure) hanging out by the dam. I got a picture of it from one angle, then had to change film. To make sure I got a picture of it, I decided to shoot it on the new roll, but I was at a different angle. The bird kindly turned so I could get its head. :) No kidding, it's like the bird knew I was taking its picture. We ended up walking around for about an hour before going home.
Paul teaches three (?) classes on acting/improv, with most of them being for kids. I'd guess the kids ranged in age from 6 to 11, which may not seem that big of a difference to you, but if you've been around kids of these ages, you know it's huge. It's the difference between running around the room when you're not on stage versus sitting calmly in a chair watching the action. It didn't help that one little boy grabbed a Vanilla Coke from the other room.
Small child + caffeine = BAD
At least it was the last of the Vanilla Cokes. (Paul has a small reception area across the hall from the room with the stage.)
One girl was there first, and all three of the adults came in at the same time. Most of the kids came within five minutes of us, but a few others trickled in.
We started off playing a name game to figure out who we all were. It was the same game we'd done on the very first day of class, and we used the same names as we had before.
The players (approximate ages):
Paul Blue (adult)
Wayne Blue (adult)
(Me) Crimson (adult)
(Mom) Wine (adult)
Haley Pink (older--11)
Haley Tulip (younger--8)
Alejandra Tulip (11)
Josh Green (9)
Brianna Daffodil (9)
Kyle Orange (7)
Calvin Blue (7)
Maddie Rose (6)
Paul is proud of these kids, so we'd heard about some of them, specifically Josh and Alejandra. Josh is very natural and really good--he should stay with this acting stuff. Alejandra took tap dancing with Paul over the summer, so he always talked about her. Mom even said, upon hearing her name, "You took dance lessons here, right?"
We did the name game for a little while, clapping and snapping while saying each other's names. It took a few times for the kids to get to know everyone, but it worked out pretty well. Paul had Josh go around the room and name everyone (this was before Calvin and Maddie, who are brother and sister, arrived), and there were only a few minor mistakes--like, he'd remember a first name but not the color or flower.
Then we tossed the ball. Let me tell you, it was pretty different with a dozen people. (It was during the ball toss that Calvin and Maddie arrived.) Most of the kids had a good time, although it was hard to tell that Kyle was throwing the ball, and Maddie would always say, "I don't want it!"
Our first group activity was to go through an ice cream shop. Mom and two kids were workers in the shop, and the rest of us would come in and get cones. There is a storage room between the stage and the hospitality room, so the rest of us stood in there and waited our turn. Kyle, our little hyper child, spied an orange traffic cone and stuck it on his head but left it behind when he got his ice cream. I was the last one out, and I'd gotten an idea--traffic cone, ice cream cone, hmm... I grabbed the traffic cone to take it out. Kyle came into the storage room from the hospitality room and tried to take the cone away! I told him, I'll give it right back when I'm done, but somebody's mommy must not have taught him how to share. I did end up with it and the other kids giggled when I asked to have the traffic cone filled with ice cream--which eventually ended up all over the floor, meaning the kids had to come clean it up. Kyle, special child that he is, then pretended to be a dog and started licking at the ice cream to lick it up.
This was a running theme: Any other time Kyle was on stage, he was a dog. We named him Frank.
(I'm not sure I want to know--maybe his mom won't let him have a pet?)
The next few scenes I wasn't involved at all, so I got to watch the fun.
#2: Mom and Wayne are parents who have to leave three of their kids home while they pick up the fourth from the emergency room. Josh and Calvin played the boys, Kyle played the dog, and a pink blanket was the baby. Josh was really good, changing a stinky diaper and holding the baby; Calvin kept dealing with the dog, who kept coming back on stage even after Paul asked him not to. At one point Calvin blocked the off-stage door with a folding chair, but Kyle, messing around, knocked his head into it. We could hear wailing in the storage room. Poor Calvin--he kept saying, "I was just moving the chair!" To me it sounded like crocodile tears, but the other kids were a little freaked out. Paul left the room to attend to him, and everyone else sat there worried, but they came back in and all was fine and we set about doing another scene.
#3: The kids did a Goldilocks and the Three Bears scene with the girls. It was a little hard to tell what was going on; the girls aren't very loud, so you couldn't tell what they were saying. It's kind of sad when the boys offstage are louder than the girls onstage. At one point Paul had us take a break and talked to us about being respectful to the people onstage and such. Also, some of the kids didn't get the point of a group activity; if the group is doing something, then everyone in the group is doing the same thing.
#4: Kids, again, this time a two-parter. First they drove to a water park, and then they went down a slide in tubes. Most of the girls and Josh did okay with that. They were cute in pretending the water slide curved and dipped and splashed cold water on them. Calvin, however, wanted to surf and was kind of unhappy that that wasn't allowed. Maddie didn't understand that she was supposed to watch the people going down the slide. Kyle wasn't too bad--we had the dog go down the slide, too.
#5: Adults only at first--we went through our space shuttle scene almost as if it was just us. But the younger kids were clearly bored by that--Calvin kept trying to walk onstage. We did it a second time with Josh, Alejandra, and older Haley...and the dog...and it worked pretty well. Then we tried it with everyone except for younger Haley, who was perfectly fine talking to somebody on a fake phone. She didn't seem put out by not joining in, so whatever. The space shuttle with everyone was all right mostly; that third time, the kids ran the ship. However, Calvin didn't understand that when we're in the shuttle, you have to be strapped in. Kyle was along those lines but not as bad. Somehow I think Calvin and Maddie's mom wanted them to take the class, instead of them wanting to take it. I don't think they're ready for something like this, but Paul is not going to turn away customers. (Their mom seemed perfectly nice, but also of the kind of clueless suburban soccer mom type.)
The parents started arriving as we were doing the last shuttle scene. Despite not seeming to want to be there, Calvin and Maddie didn't want to leave! Maddie insisted in helping us set up for the adults-only scene, a repeat of the bed scene from last week. They finally left and we ran through the bed scene again, and then Paul gave us scripts to study for next week--the actual one-act of the bed scene. We finished by 11:30 because Wayne had to go. (He probably had to go take an aspirin.)
Little stuff:
Some of the kids kept leaving the room if they weren't on stage; that kind of annoyed me. And it wasn't because they were going offstage through the stage door. Clueless soccer mommy had brought cookies, and there was more pop in the hospitality room, so they kept getting snacks. It wasn't too bad but it still would have been nice if the kids had been more aware of what was going on.
Kyle, dear special child, apparently always grabbed a Coke during class. He set the can and a cup on Paul's table, where he keeps his notes and his stereo. Kyle poured the Coke into the cup but overfilled it, leaving a small puddle on the table. It wasn't too bad until we hit the Three Bears scene, where Kyle decided to play with the puddle and it got perilously close to the equipment. Wayne and I both ran for paper towels and averted disaster.
Mom was jealous of Kyle; *she* wanted Vanilla Coke. The remaining pop included Squirt, Diet Barq's, and 7-Up, but no Coke. She actually grabbed a cup and was going to pour some of the Coke from the can into her cup but thought better of it. I told her good, because maybe she would start acting like a dog and pretending to pee on everything. :)
Paul had stopped by the farmer's market before class and bought a bunch of apples. Some of the kids grabbed them, but it was kind of hard to gnaw an apple and act at the same time, so we ended up with half-eaten apples all over the place. Great. While Paul was talking to the kids' parents, the adults cleaned up the room, getting rid of extra chairs, pop cans...and apples.
A lot of Paul's props come from Goodwill. We know this because he doesn't remove the tags. :) He picked up, among other things, a kiddie-sized green plastic table with two matching chairs. The littlest kids liked to sit in the little green chair; we only had one of them in the acting room. They brought it onstage during the driving to the water park scene, but one kid sat in it...and SNAP! One of the legs broke off. Doh! Paul wasn't upset that the chair broke, but the leg splintered into several sharp pieces and we found them even after we thought we'd gotten them all. At least they were big pieces.
Since we got out of class earlier than usual, traffic was a little busier than we were used to. Instead of being able to turn left out of the parking lot due to backed-up traffic, I had to turn right. There's a cross street right there so I turned on that...and immediately faced the farmer's market, which was on the next block. Mom wanted to go so I pulled into a nearby parking lot. The first booth there was this guy selling bread, and he noticed my sweatshirt--"North Central! I went there!" "Are you going to Homecoming?" I asked. He replied curtly, "No." Strange. Mom wanted coffee, so we walked to Panera in the adjacent strip mall. She sprung for a scone and hot chocolate for me, a low-carb bagel and coffee for her. She then wanted part of my scone, so we ended up sharing food.
It was cool outside--mid-50s, I would say--but sunny, so we decided to walk around the Riverwalk with our drinks. I love nature and I love taking pictures of nature, so I snapped at least a dozen pics of various spots along the path. There was even a white heron/egret (not sure) hanging out by the dam. I got a picture of it from one angle, then had to change film. To make sure I got a picture of it, I decided to shoot it on the new roll, but I was at a different angle. The bird kindly turned so I could get its head. :) No kidding, it's like the bird knew I was taking its picture. We ended up walking around for about an hour before going home.