Monday, March 23

First off, congratulations to Big Show who went on in one of his understudy roles for The Winter's Tale last weekend!

Thursday, most of my classmates and I headed to the props storage facility (which is the biggest props storage facility I've ever seen in my life. How big is it, you ask? It's the building where the Conservatory USED to be, years ago. Props are stored in every classroom, studio, office, and performance space. It's insane. We went for the purpose of gathering props for our Chekhov project for Acting class. Among other things, we borrowed a fake baby, a mismatched Silver Service (assembled by All-the-Way), a hanging plant, and some picture frames (someone had the idea that we should put a picture of Acting Professor in one of them and treat it like he's our dead father -- I thought that was pretty great).

I have a costume for Másha that I borrowed from 3rd-year MT (she played Másha in her first year and still had her black dress), so I should be okay for tomorrow. I don't have a good hat for the character, but we have a substitute sort of rehearsal hat that I think will work for now until we can fill out the proper paperwork for the costume shop.

I read Orestes 2.O and A Nearly Normal Life by Charles L. Mee. Probably should've read A Nearly Normal Life (his memoir) first, as Analysis Professor recommended. But no, I'm a stubborn fool and insisted that I could understand the play without it. The play? Good. Confusing. And when I finished it, I felt dirty. The memoir? All about how Charles L. Mee had Polio as a teenager, and now he writes in a fractured style about imperfect worlds, because that's what is truer to his experience. It may be madness, and yet I see the method in it. (Yes, I just paraphrased Shakespeare.)

I did the IPA on the whole monologue from The Wood Demon. I literally looked up every single word (I figured it couldn't hurt). It wasn't TOO bad, although it made it clear to me that I DO have some of the Midwestern vowels that I thought I'd escaped (Voice Professor says I'm good with self-diagnosis). Mine are not as pronounced as most, which is why I haven't gotten much criticism on them, but they're there. It's difficult for me to say the word "man" with the correct vowel, instead of widening it and giving the "a" a hint of "ee" (if people have it strongly, "man" almost sounds like "mee-yun"). I've been working on it.

The most difficult words for me so far:
- calculating: 'kælkjəleItIŋ/kælkjʊleItIŋ (the "-cu" part should start with a "ky-" and have the vowel of "rut" or "foot", NOT "tube"... I keep incorrectly saying it like the "cu" in "cute".)
- for: fɔr (vowel is like the "aw" in "law")
- forestry: 'fɔrɛstri (first vowel is like the "aw" in "law")
- happiness: 'hæpInIs (sounds like "HAP-ih-nihs", NOT "HAP-ee-nihs")
- husband: 'h^zbənd (sounds like "HUZ-bund", NOT "HUZ-bind", "HUZ-band", or "HUZ-bend")
- married: 'mærid (first vowel is like the first one in "apple")
- more: mɔr (vowel is like the "aw" in "law")
- of: ɒv (has a 'v' consonant, not an 'f')
- or: ɔr (vowel is like the "aw" in "law")
- tormenting: 'tɔrmɛntIŋ (first vowel is like the "aw" in "law")
- very: vɛri (first vowel is an "eh" like in "met", not like "air")
- your/you're: yɔr (vowel is like the "aw" in "law")

I'm not sure if we're pronouncing the name "Sonya" as "'soʊnjə" or 'sɒnjə" (so that the first vowel sounds like "sew", or so that the first syllable rhymes with "on"). I also don't know if we're saying "laughing" as "læfIŋ" or "lafIŋ" (the first is like "apple", the second is decidedly more British... almost like "father"). I guess I'll ask tomorrow.

I tried to do some tumbling on my own, but there's just not really a safe place to do it. I did some donkey kicks, back bends, rolling, and cartwheels in my living room. I don't think it's wise for me to do much else without Movement Professor watching anyway.

I'm not as memorized as I probably should be on Three Sisters, but I hope it will be enough. The worrisome part is mostly just trying to remember cue lines. A lot of what Másha says are lines of random reactions to other people. So many people on stage at the same time makes things trickier than our usual whatnot in that class.

I hope I'm ready for classes to start again tomorrow. Tuesdays are always the hardest for me, as I have class from 9:00-12:00, student rep meeting at 12:15, and then class from 1:00-5:30. After two weeks off, it's going to be a rough adjustment going back to that.

~A~