End of the Year Reflection and Hamilton

While I didn't managed to complete all of. My goals, I am thrilled with my progress in this course. In the beginning of this semester, I didn't expect to do half of the things that I have completed. I would never have imagined that I would be able to direct and teach a song from Hamilton, let alone being able to work with people who were so enthusiastic about it.

I believe that I was challenged in this course by having the task of being a student director. I think that hardest part about being a student director is trying to get other students to take you seriously and to pay attention to the direction you give. For example, I struggled with trying to get people to stay off their phones or in their spots when directing the Hamilton number. While at times it is frustrating, I learned how important it is to stay patient and to be assertive at the same time. It's hard to balance these two, but if you can, it will make you a great director who people respect.

I loved being a part of this class. It taught me how to act through body language, how to give proper and clear instruction, and how to work with others. Most of all, I think that this course really taught me how to compromise in acting. It is important to hear everyone's suggestions, and therefore, as an actor, you have to find a balance between what you want and what they want to do in a scene. In the end, your scene will be better due to collaboration.

I am going to miss being in an acting class next year. While I am excited for IB Literature and Performance, I will miss our acting classes and working alongside such talented classmates.

https://youtu.be/5tq3EzyA-WE

Theatre Review and Final Project Proposal

I loved being a part of “Comedy Tonight”! My favorite moments from the show was when Jack threw the baby swans and of course when I got to be Hilliary and Mr. McBreen. Being able to play real people really helped me work on my character acting. It made me be more aware of Mr. Mcbreen’s mannerisms and his accent in class, and it made me even watch the way he walked.

Every single person that I worked with was amazing and extremely talented. I loved getting the experience of being a student director and I hope that I have the opportunity to do it again in the future. It gave me a new perspective on theatre, one of which I loved.

In addition to student directing, I loved being able to collaborate with Grace, John and Mrs. Guarino. When you share ideas, and work with each other’s opinions, it allows you to create a unique scene and it teaches you to be patient.

Each scene had great blocking, comedic delivery, and most of all, wonderful energy! That was what I loved the most about the show. Every moment that an actor had the stage, they managed to maintain a wonderful and a very high level of energy- much like the energy we saw on “School of Rock”. I thought that many students had great diction, and enunciation. Backstage, everyone was quiet and excited to perform. It was wonderful to be surrounded by such energetic people.

Performing in this show was one of the highlights of my year! It was a great experience and I will not forget it. I really appreciate Mrs. Monahan’s and Mrs. Guarino’s dedication and patience with this show as well. I look forward to doing theatre again next year, and working with more wonderful casts.



For my final project, I chose to perform “Burn” from Hamilton. I love how many emotions the character Eliza portrays in this song and how touching her performance is in the show. Because I respect the actress who plays her, I feel very passionate about doing this song. I hope it goes well!

ALEXANDER HAMILTON

At first, I was nervous and excited with the idea of having our class tackle the opening number from Hamilton. While I knew how much I loved the song, I assumed that it would not be right for our class and that they would dread doing this piece. So naturally, imagine my relief, and surprise when every kept begging to work on the number, to go over rapping parts, and to dance!

I do think that this was partly due to the number being completely different from anything that we have done in our class so far. While some members of our class were more comfortable than others when it came to singing, I really think that every single person did a phenomenal job performing. Everybody was eager to learning the music and dancing, and this made me feel like a great director.

If I were to do something like this again, I would try to do more of a ‘mini-audition’ day. That way I could learn what everyone’s preferences are, how they act when singing, and who would want a solo. While I love my casting choices (mostly because I was able to see new sides of people and their abilities with musical theatre), I can't help but feel that some people who did not get solos should have.

Another thing that I wish we had done was character development. While Hamilton is a complicated story with complex stories, I wonder if people would have acted differently on stage knowing more of who their character was/is.

Doing choreography is extremely challenging, especially for the first time. While at times it was hard to get everyone to focus, I respect everyone’s dedication to learning my on the spot dance moves. More personally, I was so exhilarated when I realized that I would have to choreograph this number. I don't think of myself as a good dancer, let alone coordinated, and it is something that I have always wanted to get better at. Even though my dance moves were not sophisticated I had a wonderful time creating them. Even more so, I loved getting input from everyone in class. It made me feel as though people were engaged in our number and that they cared about what they were doing on stage.

Despite dancing, the rapping is BY FAR the hardest part to this number, especially because of its rhythms, and subject matter. Going into this project I knew that it would be difficult for those unfamiliar with this musical (even though I play it out loud. Every. Day. In. Class.). Naturally, I was surprised again. People came into class the day after we did the first run though and were memorized. MEMORIZED! It took me so long to learn the lines to the first number and to say the least I was stunned by everyone’s ability to learn the lyrics so quickly.

Overall, I had an amazing time teaching everyone this number. Evenmore, I am so happy that everyone loves the music and dance moves. The enthusiasm that they show every day is so inspirational!

Inception Evaluation

I think that John's scene came out very well. The movie clearly showed everybody in class's hard work and proved that all of our hard work has paid off. I do think that it is important to note just how hard John has worked for this scene. From picking it, doing filming, staging and even having to fill in last minute for Ryan, I really admire John's dedication to making this movie. All of his hard work really shows what a great director and actor he is. In addition to John, everyone was able to memorize their lines in an efficient and timely manner, and they were able to get into their characters. We has a great cast for this movie; each person did an awesome job!

One part that I was pleased with in my performance was my posture. I know this might seem simple to some, but it has always been something that I have struggled with in the past. Sure, it would have been nice if John and I could have filmed the scene in one take, but I was more pleased than disappointed with our scene.

Another part of the movie that I thought was well done were the choices of locations. Having the variety in the movie made it more visually captivating and interesting. I also really enjoyed how everybody’s lines were clear and perfectly picked up by the ipad. Therefore the audience did not miss out on anyone’s lines and could clearly follow the plot.

Overall, I really enjoyed being in this scene and watching the final result. It was a great experience and although the material was challenging at times, I am happy that I was able to be a part of it and to watch it all come together. Again, it is clear that all of John’s hard work really did pay off, and because of it, his scene was greatly executed.

Inception: A Reflection

I loved watching John’s Inception scene come together. Because I have never seen the movie, I found the scene to be interesting, even if they were confusing at first. Because I did not know the plot of the movie, the characters, or any of the scenes, I found it hard to develop my character. I did watch the scenes that Mal was in, however I only found out little about her. However I know that performing in this scene was great experience.

Inception is an incredibly complicated movie. Therefore I found it very hard to memorize my lines. I could hardly understand what my character was actually talking about. Because of this it made it hard for me to memorize my part. When I was struggling in the beginning of learning the scene, I found great strategies that helped me memorize my lines. Even though it is simple and sounds basic, I found that going over one line over and over again while gradually adding another really helped me. I learned that now I have a clever and helpful way to make me learn my scene.

One thing that I would change if we did this scene again would be to stage it earlier and run through it more. I strongly believe that staging a scene helps actors to “get into” their performance. It creates a more serious and formal environment, one where actors become accustom to their final actions. For example, every time I had run through the scene with John/Ryan we were in the hallway, and each time the scene stayed at the same emotional level: calm and collected. Yet when on stage (while we were filming), John was able to get into the scene and at one moment he flipped from very calm to yelling. While this created a natural reaction from me, I didn't know how to deliver my next line. If we had gone over the scene on stage more often, I would have tried to focus on how we could have raised the energy.

However I was very pleased with our final performance and look forward to seeing how the overarching scenes will look all together.