Afterthoughts

Well, I'm home again.
I sit on my bed looking out at the blue sky peeping through the smoke letting my thoughts meander back to North San Diego county - to my friends, to the games, the fun times, the life I had there. I wonder how I can transfer that life here. I was free there - I could play and be a different person there. But now as I sit 750 miles away from those who taught me to be fearless. I am afraid to play. I am afraid to be fearless.
Its a hard thing to be fearless. To truly not fear anything. To not have a protective layer of strong armor over my heart. I thought I was fearless before I left but then I realized that it was just courage. I had the courage to cover up my heart and not let anything really touch it.
What is the Actor's Academy really? Its a real playhouse. Its a place where people come not only to find out whether they want to be actors or not, or to gain more experience and training, but it is also a place where you are taught to live and love better.
Of course, its not just the place - its the people. Out of about 100 applicants, only 30 are carefully chosen. And these are not just the 30 best high school performers. They are not chosen because they look good or because they manipulated the people in charge. No they were chosen because of their commitment and their talent and their overwhelming desire to be in such a program. And it is with these people, this ensemble, that you work with for the next 5 weeks, that you learn to love and care for in the next 5 weeks. There are no divas or superstars among us.
Yes, I miss it - I miss it terribly. I miss the freedom, the trials, the laughter, the songs, the open arms and the shoulders to cry on should the need arise. But it is nice to be home and to know that I can go and play with them and they will be there.
I realize that I haven't really said much here. But you asked for my afterthoughts, and I know it sounds sappy, but there aren't many thoughts left, just feelings and those are much harder to type.

Here it comes...

Well my friends, this is it. The hurricane of tech week now charges toward us. There is no stopping it. Next week is the last week I will be here. :( I don't have much time (I must go study and prepare for finals and such like), but I have one quick note for you all. If you are desirous to come see our production of Tewelth Night you can come this next Wednesday or Thursday at 7:30 pm to the outdoor stage at Mira Costa College. Since this is a masked performance we have two casts, one which will act while the other is speaking. If you come Wednesday night you will see the Rosencrantz cast (the cast I am in) on stage and if you come the following night Guildenstern will be acting for you.
You will not have to purchase tickets. However, they will be asking for donations and such like at the door. Also, since it is outside, please bring lawn chairs and blankets. Hope to see you there!

Happy 4th of July

HAPPY FOURTH OF JULY EVERYONE!
Hope you all have some fantastic and fun plans for this evening.

Well, I thought it was about time to give you all an update of what I've been up to. Classes have been fun and yet challenging. My instructors are constantly pushing me to make new discoveries about my characters or text. This past week and for all next week, myself and another girl are working on Act 4, Scene 3 from Othello, and we are constantly being pushed to understand the text better and better.

Miss Stienberg, you will be pleased to know that one of my favorite classes though, is our IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) class. IPA is the pronunciation guide for a word that appears directly after a word in a dictionary. It is SO fun! No one else really likes it, but it was really easy for me to pick up. (Thank you St. Andrew's for making me take Greek and Latin).

I also told you that I would be posting some pictures, so here are a few.

These next few photos were taken the other night at the DelMar fair. The first one is Aimee and Rachel and the second, going from left to right is Aimee, Justin (yes the same Justin I am staying with this week), and Karen. (This was taken just after we went on one of the scariest rides we had ever been on, thus the concerned looks).
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And this is Gedaly and Alexandra....


















This is Eve and Sassan giving us a wonderful performance of Truly Bad Opera. (My apologies for the poor quality. They were moving too fast for me to catch a clear shot and we didn't have the house lights on).
For those of you who are wondering, Truly Bad Opera is an exercise we do to help us with calling (producing a rich, round, full voice for speaking). We were instructed to do the scenes we were practicing in our acting lab in operatic voices. Some of it is truly bad, but it is also the funnest and funniest thing ever. Once you get up on stage and start singing no one has any worries about what they sound like, or what notes are coming next. They just drop their jaw, breath deep and let it all out.

Anyway, that pretty much concludes the highlights of this week. Next week we have a guest instructor coming from Chile to work with us in the mornings on movement and choreography-like exercises. So that should be interesting. Right now though, I'm off to Balboa Park to hang out. (Some of you are wondering what I'm going to do when I come home and have nothing to do. My only answer is I better have some pretty full hours to keep me busy or yes, I will be very bored. :D). Until next time....

-E.