Monday night, the eight of us went to see The Duck House at the Vaudeville Theatre. Nick Hutchison got us £5 tickets. While my 6th row seat was fantastic, the show itself was messy. It is a satire/farce about British politics circa 2009 when the public became outraged over their politicians' uses of government "expenses." The audience guffawed liberally at the mention of real-life political name-drops, all of which went straight over my head. That left me out of the humor loop initially. Had the physical, slapstick comedy been executed better, it might have made up for my lack of political education. Unfortunately, the physical jokes oftentimes went slightly awry. When they did, the actors appeared alarmed, sometimes giggling nervously along with the audience. In all, I think they broke character 5-6 times throughout the evening making the production seem messy and unprofessional.
Tuesday was the CWRU alumni event at RADA. Case alumni were invited to mingle with our faculty and us. We presented a short clowning piece that we had prepared under the guidance of Jeremy, the wisest, hippy clown I will ever meet. I think we really surprised the suit-and-tie alumni with our strange, outlandish production. Our presentation was made up of a series of vignettes that Jeremy helped us develop into a cohesive "story" of images. My featured part in the piece was hiding in a giant bag for the first five minutes and then slowly emerging as if hatching from an alien egg. I then got to tell the audience and the other clowns in gibberish about a war on my home planet and how I was launched into space and landed among the clowns. Like I said, it was an incredibly weird little skit. The most meaningful thing I have gotten out of clown is to always include the audience. Whereas many directors and acting teachers tell you to direct monologues and performances to the exit signs, our professors here (and especially Jeremy) strongly advocate openly and unabashedly communicating with the audience. Anyway, the alumni themselves were slightly sparse and lackluster men who had gotten law degrees or masters degrees from CWRU. Most knew nothing about theatre. Of the 6 or so alumni who showed up, only a woman named Daniela really bonded with our group. As it turns out, Daniela used to room with a couple of the dancers from inlet Dance Theatre, where I studied over the summer. We were able to talk for a long time not only about the dancers, but also about specific works in the company's repertoire. It was exciting to find someone overseas who has such a common knowledge base. I think Daniela, the other girls in my program, and I are going to get tea and make crafts one day at a shop nearby that does craft classes!
Time Out London advertised cheap tickets to a new show called The Cement Garden for this week, so my friend Cat and I bought tickets for Wednesday. We were really excited because the theatre is located under a tube station, and we thought it sounded mysterious and adventurous. Unfortunately, we ended up arriving ~10 minutes late due to the trains and were graciously given tickets to another show running at this theatre, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. For anyone familiar with the Hunter S. Thompson book or the Johnny Depp film, it's a really terrible, non-story about a couple guys running around Las Vegas out of their minds on a dangerous cocktail of at least 5 different drugs. It was pointless, uncomfortable, and extremely self-indulgent (i.e. totally unnecessary nudity).
Tuesday was the CWRU alumni event at RADA. Case alumni were invited to mingle with our faculty and us. We presented a short clowning piece that we had prepared under the guidance of Jeremy, the wisest, hippy clown I will ever meet. I think we really surprised the suit-and-tie alumni with our strange, outlandish production. Our presentation was made up of a series of vignettes that Jeremy helped us develop into a cohesive "story" of images. My featured part in the piece was hiding in a giant bag for the first five minutes and then slowly emerging as if hatching from an alien egg. I then got to tell the audience and the other clowns in gibberish about a war on my home planet and how I was launched into space and landed among the clowns. Like I said, it was an incredibly weird little skit. The most meaningful thing I have gotten out of clown is to always include the audience. Whereas many directors and acting teachers tell you to direct monologues and performances to the exit signs, our professors here (and especially Jeremy) strongly advocate openly and unabashedly communicating with the audience. Anyway, the alumni themselves were slightly sparse and lackluster men who had gotten law degrees or masters degrees from CWRU. Most knew nothing about theatre. Of the 6 or so alumni who showed up, only a woman named Daniela really bonded with our group. As it turns out, Daniela used to room with a couple of the dancers from inlet Dance Theatre, where I studied over the summer. We were able to talk for a long time not only about the dancers, but also about specific works in the company's repertoire. It was exciting to find someone overseas who has such a common knowledge base. I think Daniela, the other girls in my program, and I are going to get tea and make crafts one day at a shop nearby that does craft classes!
Time Out London advertised cheap tickets to a new show called The Cement Garden for this week, so my friend Cat and I bought tickets for Wednesday. We were really excited because the theatre is located under a tube station, and we thought it sounded mysterious and adventurous. Unfortunately, we ended up arriving ~10 minutes late due to the trains and were graciously given tickets to another show running at this theatre, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. For anyone familiar with the Hunter S. Thompson book or the Johnny Depp film, it's a really terrible, non-story about a couple guys running around Las Vegas out of their minds on a dangerous cocktail of at least 5 different drugs. It was pointless, uncomfortable, and extremely self-indulgent (i.e. totally unnecessary nudity).
Friday night was an open mic night at RADA where we got to bond with the students from NYU who have their own study abroad partnership with RADA! They are very friendly, and we are all glad to be making some new friends outside our insular group of 8.
This weekend was incredibly busy...lots of great touristy stuff. Hopefully, I'll have time tomorrow to officially catch up!
This weekend was incredibly busy...lots of great touristy stuff. Hopefully, I'll have time tomorrow to officially catch up!