Stage Fright

On Tuesdays I've been taking a theatre class. It's been interesting and challenging.
We never know what we'll be doing in class.

Our first class had us acting as if we were a machine,all with different movements and sounds. In another class we created dialogue based on scenes from postcards. In November we focused on improv.

I think December is classical theatre, whatever that is. All I know is that today I had to memorize my lines from Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme, and perform WITH my fellow actor, not just NEAR her. So all week, I have been muttering my lines on the metro and while walking down the street. I've been receiving many odd looks, and I have to say that I don't care. That's the beauty of the big city. I'm just another anonymous crazy person.

Today I entered class late and the other two students were engaged in a serious piece. The teacher was constantly stopping them and criticizing and changing something about it. I was glad to just watch for a while.

Then, it was time for our dialogue in Bourgeois Gentilhomme. I was scared, but decided "what the Hell, give it your all, sister." And I did. I lost my place once, but felt that I stayed "in character" and was not afraid to be silly or project my voice.

I'm glad that I'm still taking the class. My mind tells me to quit sometimes. It's harder than I thought, because the teacher always asks more of us, and sometimes I have to be a character that I don't understand. I stumble over the words at times. My feelings have been hurt. I've been accused of not staying "in character" by another student. Sometimes I zone out, and have no idea what everyone is talking about. Sometimes for the life of me, I cannot properly say a word. (The word was "trou". I can say the "ou" sound fine on its own or in conjunction with most other consonants, but the fact that the "ou" followed that nearly impossible french "r", totally did me in. My fellow student kept trying to teach me, and i kept trying, but to no avail. "Can we just move on please!" is what I was thinking.)

Today's piece was even more comical because my character was giving a phonetics lesson involving the proper way to pronounce the vowels in French. I'm glad I stuck it out, because it was fairly fun, and the teacher didn't tear us up (this time).