High School Theater

i don't really consider high school to be a particularly eventful period of my life which might explain why i'd never made a video talking about any of my high school experiences well until now that is let me tell you about my most cherished memory high school theater as most of you probably already know i really enjoy watching theater performances and it's one of the things that i've been missing dearly the past year i didn't grow up with a background in performing arts but i'd always wanted to be a part of the stage i can't sing so musicals were out of the question but i had the opportunity to participate in two stage plays in high school and they were honestly the best parts of the little memory i have of high school so in junior year the first play i auditioned for was called the absence of a cello to sum it up quickly it's a super old play about a family man named andrew who desperately wants to land a big corporation job and in order to appeal to the personnel chief in charge of evaluating him he tries to present himself and his home as classy as possible by hiding everything that made his family interesting he takes advice from his young neighbor perry who's attending business school and is seemingly the most qualified person to teach andrew the ways of appealing to corporate snobs perry is also hopelessly in love with andrew's daughter joanna who pretty much just strings him along so he can help her dad get the job there were of course a bunch of other students auditioning for the play one of them being my friend kate and a girl who we'll call bethany bethany was the type of girl who for some reason always felt like she needed to be a step ahead of other people even if they were her own friends if bethany saw someone drawing she'd always be the first person to give unsolicited criticism but if someone did the same thing to her she'd get defensive and snippy like if you're aware of how annoying it is then don't do it to other people come on if bethenny found out that one of her friends had a crush on a guy she'd go out of her way to try and steal attention from them as if she were suddenly in direct competition with her friend this happened multiple times and if bethany wasn't the center of attention or if things weren't going her way she'd throw a hissy fit and make her displeasure as noticeable as possible to the people around her to put it kindly bethany was the worst uh think like sharpay or regina george except take out everything that made those characters iconic not fabulous not fetch just kind of rude and entitled anyways she's gonna come up again later just hang on since this was my first audition i was really nervous and it definitely showed from the way i was delivering my lines coupled with the fact that i didn't know how to project my voice the play director mr c could have easily dismissed my lackluster audition but he was really kind and actually offered me some helpful advice let's say someone was taking your phone right up in the front row how would you say hey hey great let's say the same person is taking your phone but all the way to the back of the room hey perfect notice how you're projecting from your diaphragm you want to make sure your voice reaches the farthest audience member now let's have you try the lines again with that in mind i thought it was probably unlikely that i'd get cast since my audition wasn't very good but i was of course still hopeful so the next morning i headed over to the theater building where the casting list was posted and saw bethany walking from that same direction oh did you already see the list you got understudy i got nothing should should i apologize sure enough there was my name right next to understudy even though it technically meant i wasn't guaranteed a role since an understudy was just a replacement in the event of a dropout i was still really excited to show up to rehearsals every day and it seemed like the stars aligned for me because in just a few days the girl who was cast for the part of joanna ended up dropping out due to conflicting schedules so i was officially joanna my friend kate was also cast and she was given the role of perry turns out not enough guys had auditioned to fill all of the male roles so perry's character was changed to a lesbian named paris who was still hopelessly pining after joanna since i needed to practice projecting during lunch and rehearsal days kate and i would go outside and practice delivering our lines while standing far away from each other so that we could get used to projecting eventually we'd gotten so good at it that we were the loudest both on the stage and off the stage i was worried about how stage fright might affect my very first stage performance since i'd gotten so used to performing for an empty room but i figured out a hack i'm blind as a bat and i figured since i had the staging directions memorized from rehearsing them so many times i didn't really need my glasses to see anything on stage and if i took them off i wouldn't be able to discern faces in the crowd and it just looked like one multicolored mess it'd be as if i were still performing for an empty room take that stage fright but even with the nifty no glasses hack it didn't stop the pre-performance jitters from getting to me mr c was also the ap art history teacher in addition to being the play director so i had a class with him at the end of every school day on the day of our opening night mr c announced to the art history class that the play would start that evening and encourage them to come see it especially since one of their fellow classmates would be performing once the realization that there'd actually be an audience finally hit me i started quietly tearing up at my desk i know i know what a little wuss it's a minor role in a high school production emily it's not a big deal now i don't consider myself an anxious person by any means but i couldn't help but start worrying for the worst like what if i flip a line or mess up or what if nobody shows up and all those perfect rehearsal days had gone to waste just then i felt a tap on my desk and when i looked over jesus the guy who sat directly to my right had placed a chocolate bar on my desk it was one of those skinny chocolate bars you see students selling for fundraisers i didn't really know or ever talk to jesus and he hadn't said a word when he put the chocolate on my desk and to this day i still have no idea if he did it because he could tell i was feeling nervous or if it was just a good luck tonight chocolate but it was a really nice gesture that stuck with me and it genuinely made me feel better long story short the play ended up going great both nights the day after the last performance i was walking with bethany and another friend i watched the play yesterday oh you did did you like it well i was carefully observing your performance in particular and i felt like your delivery was kind of weak to be honest if i was playing joanna i would have shown a lot more emotion during the scene with paris like i really felt like you weren't expressive enough but it was okay uh-huh okay well bethany the next time you get cast is joanna you can feel free to deliver her lines however you damn well please like i said the worst fast forward to second semester and i'm at the auditions for the second play of the year mr c being the non-conformist that he is picked a shakespeare comedy from 1594 called the comedy of errors so quick summary the comedy of errors is about two sets of identical twins who become separated and unknowingly end up in the same city where mistaken identity related shenanigans and confusion ensue i'm pretty sure he picked this play because luckily for him he already had two sets of identical twins in his drama class one of the pairs being sole and kate so the twins of course had their roles guaranteed to them i auditioned in the hopes of landing the role of either adriana the nagging stressed-out wife of one of the twins or her sister luciana the sweet and meek single maiden that the other twin falls in love with this time around i was way less nervous and more excited at the possibility of being on stage alongside some of my closest friends bethany was auditioning too because of course she was the next morning i discovered that i'd be playing the role of adriana and bethany would be playing the role of luciana i was so excited adriana had some pretty lengthy monologues and i was looking forward to memorizing all of it plus i got to play the part of soleil's nagging life although as it turns out it wasn't the casting that mr c had originally intended after the first day of script reading mr c pulled me aside so i made a bit of a mistake and i accidentally mixed up adriana and luciana's names while i was typing up the casting sheet i meant to cast you as luciana and bethany his adriana oh uh did you want me to switch roles well if you like to play the role of adriana you can keep it it's just it's not that i don't think that you can play a mean character i i just don't know if bethany can play a nice one mr c was that shade just now i was genuinely excited about the idea of playing a moodier character and to be honest the pettier side of myself was well aware that adriana was a bigger role than luciana and i wasn't about to let bethany rub that in my face for the following weeks so i told mr c i wished to keep the role of adriana to which he agreed this play was especially exciting for us because we got to take measurements for period costumes we were really upping the production quality this time around and i was pumped the cast was a lot bigger than the last play and the script was a little harder to decipher because of the shakespearean english but almost everyone did a pretty good job with showing up to all the rehearsals and going off book in a timely manner i say almost everyone because one person was really slacking no it wasn't bethany they had a fairly small role so they didn't have nearly as many lines to memorize as the rest of the cast but for whatever reason they frequently ditched rehearsals and when they did show up they messed around and seemed overall pretty disinterested which led to them still needing the book weeks after the rest of us had already gone off book this really annoyed soleil who was quite frankly busting her ass at every rehearsal and memorizing a bajillion lines since she was one of the main characters and one rehearsal day just a week or two before opening night that one problem actor still didn't have their lines memorized and solely had just about had it the air was really tense that day and solei was staring daggers into the guy who was holding the playback the scene we were rehearsing that day just so happened to be the scene where her character threatened to gouge out my eyes all the other times we rehearsed this scene it felt more comical and fun but this time her fury was genuine and everyone could feel it say wherefore didst thou lock me forth today and why dost thou deny the bag of gold i did not gentle husband lock thee forth and gentlemaster i received no gold but i confess sir that we were locked out dissembling villain thou speak is false in both dissembling harlot thou art false in all an art confederate with a damned pact to make a loathsome abject scorn of me but with these nails i'll pluck out these false eyes that would be [ __ ] this oh by didn't fight him let him god come near me as we should have expected the slacker ended up dropping out of the play just days before we were supposed to perform and since there was no understudy this time to cover on such short notice we had to get someone on the team to read the lines off the book for that particular character of course mr c was pissed but aside from that blunder the whole show went amazingly on both nights and if you're curious about how bethenny did as the sweetened bashful luciana i'll admit she actually did a really good job at the end of the school semester mr c handed out these cute little awards and he gave me most improved and best memorization which honestly made me happier than any a plus i'd ever received from any school test that year if you're looking into extracurriculars and maybe want to buff in your confidence stats i definitely recommend theater personally i think it's a lot of fun and a great learning experience especially if you have a good drama teacher it showed me that i genuinely love performing sort of like how i'm doing now i guess does this count by the way the sponsor of today's video is raycon i've owned my pair of recons for a year now and they're still holding up and i somehow haven't lost them yet recon offers their wireless earbuds in a range of fun colors and patterns a variety of fit options and no dangling wires or stems to get in the way of your daily activities i've been trying to take better care of my skin recently by avoiding contact between my 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Channel: Emirichu

Views: 904,243

Rating: 4.9895215 out of 5

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Id: lrgmfSW0Fuo

Length: 13min 3sec (783 seconds)

Published: Wed Apr 28 2021