We Are Women, We Are Strong...

That is part of what we chanted as we walked the path with our audience members to our performance space (to the tune of Frere Jacques):
We are women, we are women.
We are strong, we are strong.
We say no, we say no.
To the bomb, to the bomb.
It was really great. Our production of The Common Chorus went up on Friday and was wonderfully received. We knew that, in the end, we had a beautiful project to share that was important and relevent. Whatever our feelings on the actual script or subject matter, we knew we had a huge responsibility to the women that dedicated their lives to Greenham Common to tell that story with sincerity and heart. That is exactly what we did. Sarah Hipperson, the woman that we met and toured around Greenham with, came to see the show and sent us all into a teary frenzy! It was incredible to have her there and she was so appreciative of us bringing her story to life on stage. I am so proud of the bonding that took place within our group and the end product that was created. Hats off to us on our first public performance together, as a group. We also recreated a section of the wire fence that the women used to attach personal items and signs to (1st pic) and a few of the worker bees (2nd pic) - from L to R, Louise, Miranda, Jenni, Sandra, Niki, Rachel, Fiona, Linda, & Jess:


We now move onto our next projects, which will go up a the end of term (late March). We are split into 2 groups. One group is doing the Ariel Dorfman play Widows and my group is doing Fen by Caryl Churchill. I am really looking forward to starting something afresh. :)

I can't believe I forgot to talk about the two shows I saw last weekend! I saw a new musical at a nice theatre called the Greenwich Theatre called A Model Girl. It was about a notorious story in British politics' history. The British Minister of War in the 60's was a man called Jack Porfumo and he had an affair with a showgirl named Christine Keeler who was also then sleeping with a Russian spy. This was huge and this story could have had such dramatic potential. It didn't. It was terrible and boring to boot. Oy! However, as a clear balance, we also saw Alan Bennett's The History Boys. This was, perhaps, the best show I have ever seen. It was smart, funny, clever, engaging, well written, well staged, well acted, etc, etc, etc...I was floored and am thrilled that there is this kind of theatre happening in the West End. Yay! And it didn't even matter that we had standing room tickets and had to stand for 2 and a half hours! :) Well worth it indeed.

That's the latest and the greatest. Another set of birthday wishes to Rachel Keylin on the 14th and Michael Holtzman on the 15th. Oh, and happy belated Valentine's Day to you all! Love, love, love...

Snow, Snow, Snow, Snow (White Christmas Style!)...

Yeehaw! More snow!!!! This past Thursday, we were dumped on! Something like 6+ inches fell on lovely Londontown and it was glorious. It wasn't a snow day though...the tutors made it in, so could we. The pic above is on my walk to school. It was a good day. Some of the Stage Combat course boys made a gigantic snowman! We began our day with Stage Combat and our continued work with swords! We did a little pirate choreography and swash buckled our way through class. It was fantastic.

The rest of the week was much of the same - rehearsal. We go up on Friday and are in a really good place. The whole show is blocked and we ran through it in its entirety already so we are pretty set for next week's rehearsals. We did have an amazing experience on Thursday afternoon. We ended up morphing into a mass improv with the whole group. It began with Rhys (our director and head of year) "hot seating" everyone in character. This means that he asks probing questions of you as your character and really tests how committed you have been to learning the back story of your character and how they would react in all situations. Very helpful. Through no coaxing of his own, we all ended up in an improv together, as a group. We were chatting up a storm with each other and really getting a feel for Greenham, as we know it. The women ended up having a group meeting (at Rhys' suggestion) and the men, as guards, soldiers and policemen, came in to break it up (also by Rhys' hand) and tell us that we weren't allowed to be meeting there at that time. Well, that's when it all got serious. The women became a unit! We linked arms and spirits (cheesy, I know, but true). The men tried to drag us off and we gave them nothing. We gave them dead weight for them to carry off, we clung to each other as if our life depended on it, and it, for all intents and purposes, was Greenham Common. It bonded us like nothing else could have and it was a much needed exercise at an important stage in our rehearsal process. *sigh* I love the theatre...

Digging Out of the Snow...

Sorry it has been a couple of weeks since my last post. I have been buried. Under snow? For one day, yes, but that was it. This is the East 15 campus, blanketed...



Anyone who knows me well knows that I love snow more than anything in this world, so I was thrilled!

Other than that day of snowy bliss, it has been a really tough 2 weeks. We had a 3000-word essay due this past Monday so everyone was so stressed and focused on getting that done and turned in. That was obstacle number one. We were then cast in our roles for The Common Chorus. I was cast as the loud, brassy American, Lampito. I know, a real stretch! No, it's very cool and I am looking forward to working on it. For our characters, because they are so loosely defined, we had to create them pretty much from scratch. All we have are the words on the page and they are not such a huge help as they normally could be. In order to do this, we had to create a character biography to turn in tomorrow. This could be in the form of a scrapbook, diary, book, etc. I opted for the scrapbook. Another shocker. It took me hours but it is done and it is pretty! On top of these two big projects, we have had our regular skills classes of voice, singing and movement. However, there is a new skills class this term - STAGE COMBAT!!! It rules and our teacher, Rachel, is a rock star! I have learned a lot of unarmed combat moves (punching, slapping, hair pulling, etc.) and now we have moved onto sword fighting. Oooh, it is good times!

So, that's the scoop from over here. Just a lot of work, nothing too exciting. I haven't even been out to the theatre lately. I will do, this next weekend. A belated shout out to my mom for her birthday on the 26th of January, Jaimee for hers on the 27th, Brendan for his on the 28th and to Aliana and our cat, Oreo (wherever he is, alive or not), for theirs on the 1st of February! A lot of celebrating I tell you!

I will leave you with a gorgeous picture of my Mark and I at a friend's 20's/30's themed birthday party - a night of relief in a sea of chaos!