Not What I Expected

Well, I spent quite a bit of this weekend stressing about Tuesday, and Tuesday came and went without a fuss. Made it through my voice class just fine. Still not sure I nailed that South Korean accent but I gave it my best try, and was able to sound reasonably informed whilst talking about the differences in our speech patterns.

After spending all day Sunday traipsing to various book stores, scouring the library and the internet my scene partner and I decided on a scene from Vincent in Brixton. I had read the play previously and Vassoula took it home to read Monday evening. We ran through the scene several times on Monday and then during lunch on Tuesday, and were actually feeling ok about what we were bringing in to class. Our teacher has discouraged us from blocking the scenes out so that we can really play with them in class. So basically we just needed to be comfortable with lines, and clear on what was going on in the scene. Done! Well, when class time rolls around our course leader comes round and informs us that our acting teacher is stuck on a train in Brighton. So class was postponed. So after all that and we have another week to work on our scenes. Ah well.

Then Tuesday evening my amazing photographer roommate took some pictures for me. I had booked a session for the following Monday just in case these pictures didnt work out. But if there was even a chance that I wouldnt have to lay down 200 quid for new photos I was going to take it. So, not including set up time, we spent maybe an hour all told on pictures. And you know what, I think they actually turned out pretty great. I was really pleased. My roommates and I narrowed them down to 4 finalists and I took them in to class this morning. I was a little nervous about showing them to my course leader, because he dismissed my other photos out of hand. He had good reasoning behind why they wouldnt work, but he made up his mind very quickly. But he ok'd them (I decided to omit the fact that my roommate took them in our living room the evening before). They passed muster with friends, family and teachers alike. I was sold. However... and heres the catch. When I got home this evening my roommate informed me that he had made a mistake. He was working with his new camera, and he had the camera set on a lower resolution setting. So I am not sure the pictures are going to be of high enough quality. I am hoping he will find some way to fix this, or that it is not as bad as he made it out to seem, because I really liked these photos. I think he is willing to take more if need be, but it is still a bummer. Also I cancelled my session with the fancy professional photographer because everything looked good. Crossing my fingers that things will be ok. We have until November to get everything settled, so theres time.

Wednesdays are getting a bit better. In rehearsal things are actually starting to shape up. We are preparing a piece for veterans day, based around the words and voices of soldiers. We are each presenting some sort of monologue or story from past soldiers, and there will be a few actual soldiers who come and join the production as well. Up until now we have spent all of our time collecting material. Today was the first time we solidified who was doing which piece and put them in a semblance of a structure. We have quite a bit of work to do to make sure the show stays interesting the whole way through, but today was the first time it felt like a cohesive piece.

Wednesdays have become a class social night. We are halfway through the week, and Wednesdays are often tough for a variety of reasons. So it is really nice to have a bit of time just hanging out with my course mates. Tonight we actually banned talk about Theatre, otherwise we would have spent the whole evening talking about class. It was nice. I hope we keep it up.