Director for a Day

Today marks the beginning of a new semester, and thus a new start for everyone. This time around, our teacher has decided to structure some of the extracurricular activities differently. In addition to viewing our school's production of Fiddler on the Roof, we will all be required to see another outside production. Besides seeing productions this semester, we will begin reading additional plays of our choice, two to be exact. Then we set up another research assignment on children's theater because though we are all using Heads & Tales as one of our acting credits, we haven't been exactly involved in the process. Most of the time has simply been devoted to learning lines and rehearsing while our teacher would essentially tell us what to do. Our teacher is hoping that with this research we can bring more to our characters and develop them beyond their "toyness". In addition to research on children's theater, we have all been required to write up a character analysis on each of our own roles in the production. Since nothing much besides the typical rehearsal occurred today, I'll flush out a bit of character analysis now. Oh and before I forget, our teacher has decided to do this sort of round-robin routine where each day another student acts as director for the day. I actually completed my day as director a couple weeks ago when our teacher was out sick. The day I filled in as director was mostly dominated by working out blocking that we never had a chance to before. There wasn't much directing for me to do besides making the occasional suggestion and moving the rehearsal along. Overall everything went rather smoothly, since directing to me seems just like any other leader position in a group environment.

As "M.C."/Madeleine Claire formerly known as T.J., my character is definitely characterized by her youth. Though not completely naive, M.C. also seems to be an 8-year-old at times. Throughout my performance I know I waver in age as M.C. strives more towards a 12-year-old at one point while giving the vernacular of a child later on. M.C. definitely has a passion for creation, though not specifically school. She would much rather spend her time reading a story than doing some book report for class. It's almost as if school stifles her creativity. M.C. is always courteous and friendly in her demeanor, anxious at the opportunity to engage in something out of this world. She is not, however, lazy in the least sense as she constantly reminds the Professor of her ultimate assignment. As open as she is to new experiences, M.C. lacks the self-confidence to trust her own creativity. Even when the Professor compares her to famous women, M.C. shys away from the attention. Though M.C. lacks self-confidence in this aspect, I'm not quite sure if that should be portrayed from early on considering her character is gregarious.