Becoming a Regular Occurrence

Late Nights. I'm not a late night person. But...I'm a theatre person, so it's sort of required. I can do it when I need to, and I think--slowly--I'm getting into the rhythm of it.

I got out of rehearsal two hours ago, which is normal. It's rare to get out early. Anyway, I had a lot of homework. The homework load is definitely heavier this semester, which is expected but still tiring.

I had a monologue to memorize and a theatre history test to study for. I've been doing that slowly over the week. It's the longest test we've ever had in theatre history. I have probably 25 pages of notes on it ( I'm sure if I wasn't studying theatre that would seem like a normal amount of pages to be studying for a course test) and it covers at least 3 centuries.

I'd like to comment on the common misconception of theatre being an easy major though. It's the most difficult thing I've done in my life. I love every minute of it, but I love it most because it's challenging. There's so much self-exploration done in theatre, that in ways I think it's more difficult than a major that has lecture courses and weekly tests. There's constant memorization, and you're always putting yourself out there--allowing yourself to be vulnerable in front of people who are there to tell you how to do it better. It's not an easy A+. There's never a right answer, and there's always a different, possibly better, way to do something. It was hard for me to realize that what I love to do is satisfying in ways nothing else is, and at the same time I will always feel unsatisfied with my work.

I've come a long way after accepting that. But I digress.

It's late, I ranted, and I'm sure I'll do it again in the future--hopefully more eloquently.

Just to cover the bases:

Performance Tech: The class performed our individual songs today and then got notes. So we'll be doing them again on Monday. I think after that we'll be getting our final songs to start working on for finals. This class ends at midterms, and if we do well enough there's the opportunity of being put in the advanced section for the next half of the semester.

My song went a lot better than usual. I'm not much of a singer yet, but I'm slowly learning. I've discovered that performing usually frees my voice, so I often sound better in performance than I do in rehearsal. My movements were a little stilted, but it all comes with rehearsal, which I need to do more of. Good thing there's a weekend coming up.

Rehearsal tonight was Designer Watch, so it was fun to finally have an audience to play to. And we got to work in the space we'll be performing in! It's really exciting because our set has a lot of levels and it's difficult to move around them in our petticoats, so being allowed to practice in the space (instead of in a room with tape on the floor to signify set pieces) helps a lot. We worked on listening more and making bigger choices. It's always fun to remember to play around and not get stuck in repetition. Director said: It's a journey of discovery! And she's right!