Success!

This past week our class was assigned a “blank script”. In reading it, I found that it was a really general conversation broken into parts. There was no background information, no characters, no situation, no scene… nothing. All of those things were up to us, the students. We broke up into partners.

My partner and I decided that we were going to play an old man and woman. We gave the scene a setting, gave our characters conflicting goals within the scene, and wrote a subtext. Then we practiced, and laughed, and felt silly, and kept on practicing.

The day we were to present the skit before the class we came early to practice together. For some reason, I felt like I wasn’t connecting at all. I wasn’t playing this old lady well. People were going to throw fruit at me if I didn’t fix something. My mind was running through all the stuff I read in our book. It wasn’t until just before I got on stage that I figured it out. Who is this old lady? What kind of woman is she? What’s her background? Once I knew who I was playing, I new the sorts of mannerisms to use, and facial expressions and how she would respond to those around her. Then, I came up with an “as if”. It worked! When we went on stage, I connected!Plus, my partner did amazing! We nailed it! Nobody threw any fruit! Success!