We finally had our Winter Showcase, huzzah! We were thwarted by the weather in December, but now we are back and more amazing than ever ;P
The evening started with Philip and Beth talking about the conservatory and its programs, then came the moment when they announced our names and we walked out onstage. It was an incredibly exciting moment, signalling the start of all of us on our journey to become professional actors and yet for me, it was very bittersweet. To hear my name, my name that I have chosen, called out and to walk onstage to my friends applause was glorious, but at the same time I was sad beyond words. You see, the person I wanted there the most, my mother (who has come to every production I have ever been involved in, whether onstage or behind the scenes), was unable to come due to automobilic and physical obstacles.
The evenings performances went off without too many hitches (most of which I'm sure the audience did not see. Except for poor Vinnie's concussion, :( ), and the applause as we took our last bow was gorgeous to hear. Then the rush as we changed out of our clown outfits and into our clothes and ran down the stairs to be hugged and congratulated by our friends and (for everyone else) family.
And also by each other.
ROFL, I'll never forget Mark coming up to me, shaking my hand, giving me a hug and telling me good job. I said good job back and asked if he was leaving. He said no, that he was just congratulating everyone. Awww. "And you're all sweaty and you just hugged me. Thanks dude, I really appriciate that. Really." Trust me to ruin a kodak moment ;P As the evening wore on, I was cuddled and congratulated the members of the ensemble. Again, awww. I'm in school with some pretty amazing people, you know that?
We are now in full swing for our next production, a piece by Neil Simon. And now, having just completed the read-throughs for "Brighton Beach Memoirs" and with rehearsals starting in about 12 hrs, I'm going to sign off with the words of Eugene Jerome:
"Puberty is over. Onwards and upwards!"
~Jack
3 comments:
One thing that happened to me during the Showcase is this, while standing upstage during the Shakespeare performance, I had a moment of exhalation and a fleeting thought which was, “this is what I want to do!” I think that I understood what makes actors do what they do because lets face it, it’s not for the weak!
Linda Merican
I felt something so "explpoding" in my body. We did the preformance before in class, but with all this wonderful people in the audienz the energielevel and this warm burning fever inside of my heart was so high, that I can not find -not in German and not in English -the right words for all my thoughts and feelings packed all in every single moment. A mix of passion, LOVE, thankfullness, freezing this moment forever, power and willing of giving all I can give to make the audienz auspicious, wanting to embrace Connor, Philip, Beth my daughter all the people in the audienz and the whole word, concentration on the highest level, my stage-fearness was hiding behind all this amazing feelings somewhere in my body, but I was aware of it.
Now I read the lines how I TRIED to explain what did go on with me in this moments...but there is NO WAY to explain it. You have to stay there and than I am sure you know what I am talking about.
It is too wonderful to discribe it, and yes Linda you are so right,..:"this is what I want to do too".
The showcase feels so far away from me right now that we are knee deep in 1937 Brighton Beach.
I do remember feeling the pulse of that elusive drug called performance through my veins, what Linda, Simona and Jack have all eluded to in their own ways. It has been far too long since my last fix, which made this showcase all the sweeter, save my mild head trauma, but I am no worse for the wear. As Linda said, "This is what I want to do" and this is exactly what we are doing right now. I look forward to seeing all of you in the audience this season, because you cannot really act in a vacuum. We all get something from every performance, and we want to share our hard work, our performances and ourselves with you all. So be there!
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