Wednesday, October 21

VOICE
Today was our first day playing around with "operatives", which are the words in a sentence that you really use/play in order to get the point across and obtain your need. They are usually the most important words in the sentence.

Here are some things we discussed about identifying operatives:
- There is a vague, often broken "Rule of Three", which states that there are no more than three operatives per sentence.
- Look for active verbs, as those are a good place to look for operatives
- Frequently words that come at/near the end of a sentence are most operative.
- Avoid marking operatives that are close together, as one usually detracts from the other.
- "Red Houses" (phrases/images in which more than one word needs stress) count as one operative.
- Look to the direct object, as that is sometimes an operative.
- If you stress everything, you're stressing nothing, and the effect is assaultive to the audience.
- If a word is something that you wouldn't bother typing in a text message (or sending in a telegram), then it's not going to be operative.
- If an image/concept/word has already been established in the speech, then it does not need to be reestablished with operatives.
- Lists often take care of themselves and don't require operatives because of the natural build. Occasionally, the last item in the list will contain an operative.

Voice Professor is also allowing us to use "colored words", which are not operatives, but carry a little extra weight.


MOVEMENT
I asked questions about the things we've been learning because I keep forgetting what they're all called, and which term applies to which move. Here are the things we've discussed so far (that I can remember):

- battement
- chassé
- dégagé
- demi-plié
- frappé
- pas de bourrée
- pirouette
- plié
- port de bras
- relevé
- rond de jambe
- tendu


MYSTERY PLAYS
There was a lovely picture of Newbie and O.D. in a local paper today!


Woo-hoo!

We had a rehearsal from 1-4pm, in which we got notes, ran the show, and got more notes. My big note with Amanda-the-Agent was "don't get bored" (I over-corrected from last time, when I was too excited). My big note with Lucy-the-Lawyer was "don't start a new beat on the last line."

The lovely crew of 1st-years moved all of our set and props during our dinner break, and we began the slow, arduous process of tech-ing this very complicated show from 7-11pm. It's going to be a rough week.