Quotations: Volume 16

Here are some of the educational, inspirational, and humorous quotations from my classes and rehearsals (including a few I missed from last semester...):


"I guess I think Shakespeare was a hippie. He allowed himself to be a hippie... sometimes." - Artistic Director

(Assistant Costumer explains design concept for The Winter's Tale.)
Assistant Costumer: It's not that we're wearing our parents' funny clothes...
Artistic Director: (warning him) Now you be careful with that.
Assistant Costumer: ...it's that we look hot in these awesome leather pants.

(Iceman, who is quite tall, was standing behind Director C, who is not very tall)
Movement Professor: [Iceman], don't hide.
Iceman: She can't hide me!

(around 9:30am)
The Pro: I need a drink.
Movement Professor: You need a drink?
The Pro: Don't be silly! Not until ten.

"In a time of crisis, it is more important than ever that we do this." - Artistic Director, on the importance of theatre in society

(Artistic Director speaks English with an Australian accent)
"With [Voice Professor], I try to tell her a joke, and I feel like maybe I'm not speaking English properly. But then she looks me straight in the face and says, 'It's not you. I have no sense of humor.'" - Artistic Director

"Don't need a director, because you will not get what you need from them." - David Brunetti

"Oh. You can watch if you want. I have to go somewhere and do something." - David Brunetti, on how you should be thinking about the audience before performing

"I was f***ing going crazy." - 2nd-Year SG, commenting on her own performance of "Dawn's Song"

David Brunetti: Have you been in any musicals?
O.D.: I was Milky White in Into the Woods. I was the front half. The guy in the back was a Jew, too. And Milky White is resurrected in the play. So we were like a Jesus cow.

"All I see is demanding. What if there were some pleading? Some reasoning? Some kidding?" - David Brunetti

"American acting is always spontaneous. British acting is always specific. But you need both." - David Brunetti

David Brunetti: What did you do over the summer?
2nd-Year KFH: I went Colorado, Minnesota, France, Latvia...
David Brunetti: You're kidding. Were you being chased?

"It's kind of like that Zoo Story thing, isn't it. The hamburger in front of the dog." - Leontes Actor, after Paulina put the baby Perdita on the ground in front of him (referring to a scene from The Zoo Story by Edward Albee)

Paulina Actor: This will change if the baby's going to cry.
Artistic Director: Actually, we COULD have the baby cry... [3rd-year DP]?
Paulina Actor: (to 3rd-year DP) Can you do a baby cry?
3rd-year DP: (produces an uncannily believable baby cry)
Paulina Actor: Oh my God! That should be on your résumé.
3rd-year DP: Oh, it is.
Paulina Actor: What else is? Other voice things?
3rd-year DP: Yeah, I do a lot of animal sounds.
Artistic Director: He's a gymnast, too. And a break dancer. That's what it takes to make it in this business these days. You've got to play the ukulele.
Paulina Actor: I can only do one thing, and I'm still working on it.
Actor-formerly-playing-Antigonus: Well... (lecherous voice) Practice makes perfect.
Paulina Actor: I was talking about acting! Not something dirty!
(Side note: 3rd-year DP plays the ukulele in The Imaginary Invalid)

"I love this scene. I get to tell men off... They all back off when I say so... Love it." - Paulina Actor

Paulina Actor: Sorry. I keep pronouncing that as it would be in Spanish.
Leontes Actor: Ignorance will serve you far better than knowing things. That's why I spent years not studying other languages.

Leontes Actor: Just a moment. Allow me to strip naked. (takes off top t-shirt, but has another shirt underneath)
Artistic Director: Now the play's getting interesting.
Leontes Actor: 'And then he came out with nothing but a tumbler in his hand, and sock garters.'

"Yeah, you're right. Sorry. I was thinking about a doughnut." - Director C

Artistic Director: (to Hermione Actor) This will be sort of a shocking image when you show up in court You'll basically be wearing a hospital gown, since you've just given birth. And no make-up...
Paulina Actor: That's so brave, no make-up. You'll get an Oscar.

"Let's bring out the Sword of Justice. Ooh! Did you hear the intake of breath? 'He's bringing out the Sword of Justice. Mum and Dad are fighting again.'" - Artistic Director

"I'm the George W. Bush of directors. Nothing is ever my fault." - Artistic Director

"Line! F***! Sorry. I hate myself. No, I'm fine. What time is it? I like myself again. Wait, what was the line?" - Leontes Actor

Artistic Director: Whoever has information has the hot spot, and we all keep surrendering the hot spot.
Leontes Actor: We all have a hot spot.
Artistic Director: The g-spot... Sorry.

Leontes Actor: Did you say seersucker pants?
Artistic Director: This is me, totally sober and well-rested. And I suddenly have no credibility in the room.
Leontes Actor: I just can't stop thinking about your pants!

Leontes Actor: You know what? No... What the f*** do I know? You should direct. You're the director.
Artistic Director: Oh really? Is that how it works?
Leontes Actor: It's true. I looked it up.
Artistic Director: Well it's a little late in the day for that.

"I don't feel like sticking hot spikes in my eyes." - Artistic Director

(Looking for a prop, discovers some of Autolycus' kinky wares)
Leontes Actor: There are all sorts of dildos back here.
Artistic Director: Dildos?
Paulina Actor: Are you suggesting we bring the dildos to the chapel?
Leontes Actor: It is traditional.

"O thus she stood? Thus she sat. Thus she laid there. O thus she stood there on one leg." - Leontes Actor, trying to remember a line.

(Two-Shots-Up trying to convince our grandfather-aged Dance Instructor to come to our New Year's Eve party)
Two-Shots-Up: [Dance Instructor], do I have to tell you what I'm wearing? Six words: Blonde wig. Pink tights. Glitter. Everywhere.
Dance Instructor: But that's what I'm wearing.

(At the understudy readthrough of The Winter's Tale)
Antigonus Understudy (3rd-year SO): 'Weep I cannot, But my heart bleeds; and most accursed am I to be by oath enjoin'd to this.'
Leontes Understudy (3rd-year JP): That's so unprofessional.

(At the understudy readthrough of The Winter's Tale)
Me (Paulina Understudy): 'That shall be when your first queen's again in breath. Never till then.'
D-Train (Autolycus Understudy): B****!

(at a rehearsal for The Imaginary Invalid.)
3rd-year DY (Claude Actor): "Madmoiselle, that sympathy has thrust its head out of the rich soil of this first meeting, and is growing too fast to wait."
Analysis Professor (I.I. Director): There's no double-entendre in that at all, [3rd-year DY]. He's not smart enough for double-entendre. 'It's growing! It's hard! We have to get married because I've got an erection!'

"Welcome to runway." - Dance Instructor, when we were doing a combination across the floor

"If you stop, move." - Thrill, giving advice on waltzing -- if you're still, you're doing something wrong

"We have a new syllabus. It says 2009. Yeah, I double-checked that one." - Voice Professor

"I know I'm going to get the time, date, and month wrong, so I go for the year." - Voice Professor

"I put the word 'intimate' in quotes. I don't know what I was thinking. I think I was winking when I wrote it, too." - Voice Professor, explaining "'intimate' scenes" on our syllabus

All-The-Way: (to Acting Professor) Ooh, I like your ensemble. (Acting Professor looks mildly confused) I mean your outfit.
Acting Professor: No, you are the ensemble.

"What I've noticed is for some reason all the other theatre people I've worked with in my life are richer than me." - Acting Professor

"You must ask yourselves, 'am I imitating an object, or am I growing the soul of an object?'" - Acting Professor

(after doing a physical/vocal warm-up called "Rock Like Roy Hart")
Voice Professor: Those are some beautiful drugs.
Big Show: You have beautiful drugs, and you're not sharing?
Voice Professor: It's called Rock Like Roy Hart.
Big Show: Oh, well, yes.
Iceman: Side effects include dry mouth.

(going into various physical positions that help you find your vocal support)
Big Show: This one is a little moon-like.
Voice Professor: A little moon-like, although it makes me feel like Jesus. And I'm not very comfortable with that.

(During Two-Shots-Up's professional skill demonstration of a massage therapist, her client, D-Train, begins to moan)
"If you close your eyes, it's like an erotic movie." - Russian Friend of Acting Professor (he was observing that day, and he thought he was whispering this)

(D-Train holds out his hand to Newbie for some of the food that she's eating)
Newbie: And what do we say?
D-Train: Please?
Newbie: That's better.
D-Train: I just figured that the 'please' was implied in my eyes.

(After Newbie demonstrated her Stapler observation)
Newbie: You should have seen me practicing this last night for my boyfriend. 'Honey, do I look like a stapler?'
Acting Professor: And do you still have a boyfriend?

(After D-Train demonstrated his Cigarette observation)
Acting Professor: Why a cigarette? Why not a cigar?
Thrill: Cigars are for champions.

"I was working on this at home and thought, 'how dumb could this be?' But after seeing some of the ones today, I thought, 'okay.'" - Thrill, as a precursor to showing his Chair observation

"I want to see the mess that this is going to be. The cluster-f***. Let's have the cluster-f***." - Artistic Director (in his Australian accent, he puts the emphasis on "f***", not "cluster", making it particularly amusing)

"I there an O'Callaghan effect going on up there?" - Artistic Director, during a long scene change, referring to one of the actors

"All I need is a paper bag and some gasoline." - Iceman

(After Iceman demonstrated his Cow observation)
"I could not stop laughing when I was doing it by myself. It's the weirdest thing... Being a cow... Grad school!" - Iceman

(Big Show had left the room before the Cow observation, and came in during it. He watched from upstage.)
Iceman: [Big Show], did you get to see the cow?
Big Show: Just the tail end of it.

"Things go from black-and-white to purple. Or whatever color sex is for you." - Analysis Professor, on Sonnet 54

"Have the guts to stop when it's over." - Acting Professor, on not allowing our observations to go on for indulgently long periods of time

"He never comes out and says, 'Let's shtup, you and me.' But he does imply the potential for shtupping." - Analysis Professor, on Sonnet 54

Analysis Professor: This semester, I expect you to have a good understanding of each play, and to argue with me when you can show examples in the text.
D-Train: But we argued with you tons last semester.
Analysis Professor: But not well. Folding your arms and saying, "Is SO!" does not count as a valid argument.

"I'm talking to [D-Train]. [D-Train] is going to be my object of affection all class long." - Analysis Professor, when explaining Sonnet 54

"In Shakespeare, there is no subtext. There is none. There was no such thing as the subconscious in that society. It didn't exist. Shakespeare didn't use it. You can't use it." - Analysis Professor

"I warmed up twenty years ago, and I'm still ready." - Dance Instructor

(In sending-and-landing, when Voice Professor's hands were on All-The-Way's rib cage and stomach)
All-The-Way: Sorry. I get messed up when you're here. I'm going to pretend you're not here.
Voice Professor: Or pretend it's okay that I'm here.

(getting clarification on an exercise)
Iceman: What are you expecting?
Voice Professor: Perfection.

"Free your hands. You can move your hands wherever you want them to be. Don't strike me, though." - Voice Professor

(Voice Professor makes disapproving sound regarding D-Train's rib swing)
"I know. I didn't even breathe." - D-Train

(Voice Professor has been making hand gestures to convey things to D-Train all through class. She then puts on pink gloves)
Iceman: It looks so much more menacing with the pink glove on.
Voice Professor: I've never done it with the pink glove. (Turns to D-Train) Do you want to be my first?

Voice Professor: Did that offend you?
D-Train: Yes. A bit.
Voice Professor: Good. I was hoping.

(In a discussion of things to put on résumés that might help us get noticed)
"Not only willing, but prefer to do nude scenes." - Voice Professor

(In a discussion of what not to say to directors that you're keeping in touch with)
"I'm here to catch you up on me." - Voice Professor

Voice Professor: Use your rib swing.
O.D.: And by 'rib swing', do you mean...
Voice Professor: (interrupting) [O.D.], you know exactly what I mean.

O.D.: Oh look. There's [D-Train] eating something! How unusual.
D-Train: Are you calling me fat?
O.D.: Oh, no. And I know I shouldn't say anything about eating. I mean, I'm one to talk.
D-Train: Yeah, you fatty.
(Note: Neither of them is fat, but they both eat frequently.)

"One of an actor's professional skills is knowing how to wear a costume." - Acting Professor

"That work was absolutely beautiful, [Big Show]. I feel like you just had sex with that glass of wine." - D-Train, after Big Show's professional skill of winemaker

"For me, it was like '(head turn) Food?... (head turn) Is that another lizard?... (head turn) Food?... (head turn) I'm a really great lizard." - Big Show, on his lizard observation

(Directly after O.D.'s "Plant Propagation" demonstration, in which he took a bunch of the roots out of a plant.)
Acting Professor: Alright... What did you just do?
D-Train: I think you just killed Desdemona. That plant was innocent.

(On the way O.D. was examining the base of the plant)
Two-Shots-Up: Maybe, you know, if you did a better job of showing us what you were looking at?
Acting Professor: At one point, I thought that you were looking for treasure.

"I've learned so much from previous oracles." - O.D.

"...we've got that small domestic parrot that I can't pronounce." - Acting Professor, referring to a cockatiel