In class today we went over the scene about two times. In those two times we found some great stuff. I stayed with Mr. Carter’s age being 55. We interacted well with the living and the living interacted well with the dead. I will say that Abbi and I have more of a connection now being one of the older people in the dead.
Basically working on the scene until performance time. I was also deathly ill because of Blues, but I pushed through it. It was a long process because the more important scenes had more time to go than the others.
We went over the scene again, and I made a realization that maybe my character is older than 45. I was playing him like he was in his later 50s, maybe even 55. I played with this notion in class and found out that it worked for his character and made his monologue at the end of the play make sense.
Today in class we went over our blocking of the scene in class. It was a long and tedious process, but we accomplished some great things in class. I learned that my character, although he’s 45, he is content with being dead and happy for the most part. When he goes into the monologue about his son Joel he is reminded of how life used to be. Remembering brought back the joy he had when he was alive.
I wasn’t in class today because I had to take a real estate exam. Wish me luck!!!!
Today in class we had to prepare information about New England in the early 1900’s. One thing that I found interesting was the way they dealt with the dead. Instead of having a wake in a funeral home, they would prepare the body inside the house and basically have a viewing inside the home. This meant that the dead stayed inside the home where they were found dead for at least a week before being transported to the funeral home. Honestly, this concept would creep me out. I’m trying to sleep in my room upstairs knowing that there is a dead person in my living room space just lying there.
Today in class we went over information about our scene that we are doing as an ensemble. The scene we are doing is Act 3 from Our Town. This scene is very difficult because a lot of pertinent information has been disclosed in the other acts. We had to read the whole play in order to understand what was going on here. The scene I thought was beautifully written because the dead interacts with the living, but the living necessarily don’t interact with the dead. I know I’m going to have fun playing a dead man.
Today was the final performance and I can honestly say that this was our best yet. Abbi knew all of her lines and we connected throughout the whole performance. Enough said, it was great performance.
Today in class when Abbi and I had to perform our piece, Eric spent the whole class focusing on each other’s character. The question he brought up is how do we feel? This question wasn’t for the actor, but for the character. Ivan, the name that I’ve chosen for the character, he was dealing with a pile of shit. He has AIDS, plus his family has now abandoned him. I had to figure out how to bring that to the table. I also, had to find out what to do instead of shunning Abbi’s character away. Finding ways to connect with her was so hard for me.
Today in class Abbi and I went over our performance again. She was still on book and I found it hard to connect with her. Throughout the performance I was struggling with navigating the character’s thoughts and actions. It was just a bad day in general for us.
The Creative Critic Attempt 