Last minute stuff for Monday's dress rehearsal

Cast and crew of "The Wars of 1812":

Good work on Friday!  If you haven't done this already, LEARN YOUR LINES!!

Soldiers:  wear dark pants and boots, please!  Everyone else, if you're playing a regular person, think of what your character would wear.  If you don't have anything appropriate, ask Rachel, Noa, or Marley if they could find you something in the prop room.  There are also boots there, but they might not fit you!

Please come to rehearsal as soon after the bell as possible!  We don't want to be rehearsing till 7.  A couple of the cast have a show on Monday evening -- "Village of Idiots" at the Gateway Theatre.  I hear it's great.  I am going to try to go after dress rehearsal, so we want to be done well before 6!

At lunch, we'll be practicing the set changes.  Everyone should come -- cast and crew!

Grade 8 students:  please remember to bring $5 to pay for your ticket to the play.  A Block will attend on Wednesday and D Block on Thursday.  It is really helpful to the Drama program if you can pay, because we are not funded by the school.  The sets, costumes, props and scripts are paid for through ticket receipts.

Grade 9's, 11's and 12's:  Work on memorizing your monologues! Think about what the character wants.  Make strong choices about emotional states (love is stronger than like).  Think about who is listening to the character speak.  Is the character telling the whole truth?

Journal Day tomorrow!

Grade 8's:  What should Ms. Kosar know about you?  Tell me about your past drama experience (if any).  Have you performed in public before?  Have you taken elocution lessons?  Do you have any concerns about the class?  Do you suffer from stage fright?  Tell me anything else you think I should know.

Grade 9's:  Who are you playing in your plot scenes?  Give your character a name if it doesn't have one already.  Describe the character in detail.  Age.  Family situation (married, orphan, alone in the world, rival to a sibling).  Personal qualities (rebellious, selfish, ambitious, manipulative).  What does your character want?  What obstacles stand in the character's way?

Senior Drama:  Whose monologue read through was most memorable for you?  Explain why you were impressed by it.

All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players.
They have their exits and their entrances,
And one man, in his time, plays many parts.

This is the recitation passage for Grade 8's.  More later!

Goodbye and good luck!

I bid all grade eights adieu and wish you well in Art.  I have really been impressed with your creativity and your hard work and I have enjoyed watching your performances which have been surprising and moving and funny.

Everyone else -- here we go with a brand new term.  You can still catch up on old work and why don't you all resolve (as I do at a new beginning) to do your best and learn as much as you can -- especially from your classmates.  We all have lessons to teach.

Grade 9's and 10's -- Make sure you work on your monologues!

Drama Club:  Good work today!  Let Rachel know if you can manage an extra rehearsal on Monday,  April 21  at noon.  Next week you need to ensure you are available for all the rehearsals -- we open a week from this coming Tuesday!  SOME of you are off book, but not all of you!  This weekend, you need to be sure you know your lines!!  Check the schedule on Facebook -- Wednesday at 1 and Friday at 3 we will be running the whole show.  Our last rehearsal is on Monday, April 28 which is our dress rehearsal.  Wednesday evening, April 30 is the understudy show.  It will be "pay what you can" and it will be advertised as the "understudy" show and I will explain that we are doing a switch of roles, so it will be lots of fun for everyone -- actors and audience.

Spring is like a perhaps hand   by E. E. Cummings III Spring is like a perhaps hand (which comes carefully out of Nowhere)arranging a window,into which people look(while people stare arranging and changing placing carefully there a strange thing and a known thing here)and changing everything carefully spring is like a perhaps Hand in a window (carefully to and fro moving New and Old things,while people stare carefully moving a perhaps fraction of flower here placing an inch of air there)and without breaking anything.

 Did you know that April is National Poetry Month?  I didn't (but I do now!)  It's a good month to choose, because spring brings out the poet in lots of us who don't normally write poetry.  Who wouldn't want to write a poem about a day like this that is practically a poem itself?  Here's a lovely little ee cummings poem to start you off.

We had a visit from a hungry bear last night!  (That's a sign of spring -- the bears are awake and hungry!)  He (or she) went into the little building we have that keeps our recycling, compost and garbage and knocked over the bins and pushed one into my car and then sat on my car's trunk and selected tasty tidbits from the garbage!  We are now trying to think of a better way of securing the little building, because we don't want bears to think they can get an easy meal from our garbage.  Remember!  A fed bear is a dead bear!  When they think that humans can provide a source of food, they get habituated to us and aren't as afraid of us as they should be and then they risk becoming a "problem bear", which is a death sentence for them. I don't think bears are as much of an issue in Richmond as they are in Port Moody, but other animals, like raccoons and crows, like garbage, too, and you don't want them feeding on your scraps and making a mess in your yard and all over your street.

Enjoy this lovely spring day!  Go for a walk and listen to the birds.  That's a sure way to feel connected to the natural world!

Half the Battle

I think I have incorporated everyone's last minute journals and I will try to post your marks on the door on Monday.  Check to see if you think your mark is accurate.  I appreciate all your work this term.  If you are in Grade 9 or in Acting 11 and 12, this is just a sign post along the way.  Your final grade in June is the one that will stay with you! Grade 8's, your Drama mark will be averaged with your Art mark for your final grade.  Grade 8's, we will meet next week until Thursday and will do improv in teams until then.

 The Wars of 1812 run:
Good work today, cast and crew!  We are in the last push and we must PUSH together to get to the show.  Let's really try to clear out our schedules for the next couple of weeks, so we can really be ready for the show.  We still have a lot of work to do.  I really appreciate those of you who got on stage without scripts.  You know they're just a CRUTCH at this point, right?

I spent the evening cutting the script, so we don't go over TWO HOURS.  I know Rachel is trying to figure out a schedule for next week, but I would really appreciate it if we could all meet in the theatre at lunch on Monday in order to go through the script and record the cuts I've made.  If I cut something of yours, it doesn't mean you're not terrific.  I'm just looking for stuff that doesn't advance the plot.  Alyssa, you'll be happy to know I cut the baby.  I really wanted it in there, but you are right.  It isn't necessary.  If any of you are reading this, could you put it on the Drama Club facebook page?

Last Night

Journals:

Report cards are due on Tuesday!  Get your journals in to me by then, if you want that reflected in your midterm mark.

Senior Drama:  Those scenes about the painkillers are post apocalyptic.  The play is "Endgame" by our old friend, Samuel Becket (who wrote "Waiting for Godot").  I really loved the variety of scenes we saw today -- well done!

Two parts to your journal this week:  If you knew the world was coming to an end today, what would you do with your last day?  (There is this great Canadian movie called "Last Night" directed and written by Don McKellar, who is a really quirky and enjoyable actor, and it is about a bunch of people in a city like Toronto and what they do with their last day.  Everyone has known for a few months that the world is going to be destroyed on this particular day and so  they all make decisions about what they want to do.)

Part 2:  Write about your monologue character.  The plays I chose your pieces from are all fairly well known, so it shouldn't be hard to find out some things about who you are and why you're talking the way you do.  You can write about the character's age, in what time period she lives (and how that might affect her), her family situation, his hopes and dreams, his relationship with the person to whom he is speaking, whatever else you think is important.

Drama 9:  What does a person need to be happy?  What qualities in people cause them the most trouble?  Give reasons for your answers.  (Here's an example of an answer and I think it might be what I think although I might change my mind tomorrow!)  I think one thing a person needs to make them happy is work that they enjoy and value.  I enjoy teaching drama (although sometimes I find it really hard and I know I can improve in a lot of ways) -- I think it's important to teach young people to appreciate the arts and I think drama really helps us understand and empathize with others.  I like to talk about great performances and how we can improve and I love to see what you think of when I give you a project -- it's just very interesting and absorbing work for me and it makes me really happy.  I think one thing that causes people trouble is fear.  Fear stops us from doing what is right sometimes and sometimes it makes us do things that are wrong.  Sometimes we let fear cripple us.  We want to try something new, but we're afraid we might look silly or fail and so we don't even try.  I think fear is one of the sources of bullying and racism.

Drama 8:  Whose speech was the most memorable?  Explain why.

Grades 9, 11, and 12:  Bring your monologues on Monday!

Grade 8:  Learn your lines!