Summer in Washington

Hello everyone!

So sorry for not writing in...well, almost 4 months. The last semester of school was absolutely insane and I did not have any time to write at all! The school year ended well, and along came the "holy-shit-I'm-a-senior-in-college" panic. But I'm not worrying about that right now.

I am currently living in a little town called Friday Harbor, WA (located in the Washington San Juan Islands). I am stage managing a production of William Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew this summer. I've been on the island since May 30th. Rehearsals have been going on since June 1. It has been an interesting summer so far, to say the least. I have a cast of 13, ranging in ages from high school to seasoned pros. We go on tour on Friday and then officially open the show July 11.

The island itself is really cute, and quite a fun place to spend my summer. I am living in a cabin on the water. I work outside near a lavender farm, and have been adjusting to the "island pace"-including, but not limited to, no fast food restaurants whatsoever, one drug store, and a grocery store that isn't open 24/7. It has been relaxing not having to keep up with the city pace. It's nice being able to wake up and look over the water and neighboring islands, smelling lavender as I drive to work, and spending most of my summer outside.

That's all for now. Hopefully I'll be able to add some pictures soon!

Tata for now!

Halfway There (Spring Break!)

Alrighty folks I have officially made it to the halfway point of my semester and I couldn't be more relieved. I have been SLAMMED with projects (which I'll talk about below). I also have been sick again so I haven't been up to much other than working on my various projects and sleeping. Hopefully I'll be more rested after spring break so I can tackle the rest of the semester without too many problems!

The first major project I've been working on, and completed, was a wood grain block quilt for my scenic painting class. The goal of the project was to teach us step by step how to paint a realistic wood grain. At first, I was TERRIFIED of this project, but watching my professor doing the steps each day made me realize how actually it actually is.

The first step is to obviously lay out the design you want on a primed piece of wood or flat. You then take your base colors and lay them out in haphazard but neatish stripes in order to establish the direction of your wood grain.

The next step is to actually paint on your wood grain. There are several different types of wood grain tools out there in order to establish the figure grain you want. For our borders, we had to paint a figure grain, and then the inside pieces are straight-grain. These were accomplished by swiping a dark brown type of paint on the board and then using the various tools to achieve the look you want.

The third step is to lay out what my professor calls the bright glaze over the top of your wood grain. The bright glaze is responsible for the warmth look that your wood has. As you can see, there are going to be 3 different types of wood color schemes in the end product. 

The final steps are to add the dark glaze and to outline your shapes in a marker to give it a clean finish. The dark glaze adds the final dimensionality and the woodsy feel of the wood. This is my final wood grain block quilt. Needless to say, I am quite proud of it!

The other project that has been eating up my time is a 1/4 inch scale model of a set we had to design for a play we read in our Intro to Theatre Design class. The play we were given is Two Sisters and a Piano. We had to read the script, and come up with a ground plan for how our dream set would look like. We then had to take that ground plan and build a full-color model of it in 1/4 inch scale (and for those of you who don't know what that means: 1/4 inch on my model is equal to 1 foot of the actual set). I struggled a bit with the making of this model as I had never really worked with or made such tiny pieces. All in all, I am happy with the final result!

"Two Sisters and a Piano" Set Model

Like I said, I haven't really done anything other than those few projects in the last couple weeks. I am currently in the airport waiting for my flight to go visit my grandparents. I won't have anything for a couple weeks but as soon as something exciting happens, I'll let you know!

Almost Half Way There--Week 7 Begins

Hello Everyone! Sorry for not writing for awhile. I have been very busy with shows and school work and have had literally NO FREE TIME. But that's what had to happen for me to get ahead with school and everything. But now I am free of shows until mid-April so I am very much looking forward to this break...

Not that it will be much of a break. Now that we are past the first part of the semester, theoretically we have learned things and now have a bunch of projects and papers to do in order to prove that we have been paying attention. The three classes that I anticipate making me want to go crazy over the next 2 months are drafting, scenic painting practicum, and theatre design. Drafting is getting complicated now that we are drafting curved 3-dimensional objects in a 2-dimensional drawing. It's a lot of math that I haven't touched since high school. But the professor is fairly understanding and is willing to work with us outside of class to develop the concepts we don't grasp during class. Paint practicum is kinda stressful because I don't have much of a background in painting but I'm turning out to be pretty decent of it. Here is the first step of a woodblock quilt we are painting. I did this all by myself!

Theatre design is challenging simply because of the pace we are moving at. We were assigned a play to read a week and a half ago (Two Sisters and a Piano in case anyone is interested in reading it--it's really good!). This week we are making ground plans and designing a set for it. Once our ground plan is cleared with our professor, we then have to make a 1/4 inch scale model of it--which I have NEVER done before so who knows how that is going to turn out. If it turns out decent enough I'll post pictures of it.

Oh something exciting happened that not many people know about yet. I GOT A SUMMER STAGE MANAGEMENT JOB! I am being hired by a company in Friday Harbor, WA called Island Stage Left to stage manage their production of Taming of the Shrew (one of my all-time favorite Shakespearean plays). We start rehearsals in early June and have performances all the way through mid-August. I even get a chance to take the show on a mini-tour! As nervous as I am for this, I know I will learn a lot and become a much better stage manager. It also gives me a chance to explore a new part of the country. I will only be a few hours from Seattle and I have a few friends there who want to show me Washington. I can't wait for this adventure!

Other than that, there isn't a whole lot going on in my life. I turn 21 in 5.5 weeks which I'm looking forward to. And now my pile of untouched homework is calling to me so I should sign off and start tackling that.

Peace out!

End of Week 4

Hi Everyone,

Sorry for dropping off the grid there for awhile. I have been INSANELY busy and literally have had no time to write at all. School has been going well. While my classes are challenging me (drafting and scenic painting) I am having fun and learning a LOT. My old high school math is getting a brush up as I'm forced to use it in drafting (however my professor enthusiastically called me "fantastically anal retentive" when it comes to the quality of my work---a compliment of course), and I'm being forced to improve the very little artistic ability I have in painting (we are currently making a color wheel--pics will be up when it's done).

Two Trains Running opened last weekend and has been having great runs since then. I am so happy I had the opportunity to work with such an amazing cast and crew. I still pop in and see them whenever I can. Now I'm on the crew for SU Drama's production of Top Girls. I am one of the dressers so I am learning a lot about the 80s style of clothing and hair (I can't believe how much work girls put into their hair to make it look like THAT). We open on Friday so hopefully that'll be good.

Other than that, there isn't a whole lot going on. Just trying to keep my head above water as my days fill up and go by.

Hopefully I'll have time to write (and have something exciting to report) next weekend!

Week 1...Really only 1 week???

Well it's Friday afternoon and I have officially survived my first week back in Syracuse and holy crap it has been a looooooooong week!

I have rehearsals for Two Trains Running Tuesday-Sunday which are interesting because I've never worked on a "professional" show at this level before and my cast is great! An awesome thing about this experience for me is that the stage manager of the show actually graduated from the program I'm in (I don't remember if I mentioned this or not) so she knows exactly what I'm going through and gives me time to recollect my thoughts after class before joining the rehearsal process in the afternoon. I have learned a lot so far from her since my style of SM and hers are different. It's great to see a different person handle situations as they arise and compare them to how I would handle them. I think I'll probably learn the most from this SM when we get into tech (where we add lights, sound, the set, and costumes) since that is the most stressful time for a stage manager and I want to see how she handles and oversees the tech process. I'm also excited to see all the pieces come together instead of just being in a rehearsal room (which is nothing more than a glorified classroom). It amused me on the first day of rehearsal when I found a cup in the collection that had my name on it. It wasn't until that moment that I really felt like I was a part of this particular show.

The classes themselves are a mix of interesting and boring. My schedule is as follows:

Monday: Performance Techniques and Intro to Design Part 2

Tuesday/Thursday: Intro to Theatre Part 2 and Intro to Crafts Part 2

Wednesday: Drafting for the Theatre, Intro to Design Part 2, and Lab

Friday: Scenic Painting Practicum

All of the part 2 classes are going to be pretty boring for me (I think--I know for sure intro to theatre will be...crafts and design have some potential since I have different instructors this semester). Performance techniques is really the first non-intro class that pertains to my major so it'll be interesting and it is being taught by the Syracuse Stage Production Stage Manager so he definitely knows what he is talking about! Drafting will be fun but tedious. The professor is great but I'm not looking forward to all of the work that comes with the class. Paint practicum is honestly the only class that I am scared of. I am not very artistic when it comes to painting and whatnot and about half of our grade depends on artistic ability. Oh well...I'll give it my best shot and hopefully the professor will see that I really am trying. 

I have two jobs this semester. I am continuing to work in the Syracuse Stage production office which will help me to further my knowledge and experience on the production side of putting up a show. The second job that I added to my already insanely full plate is a job at the library. It's only a couple hours on Friday mornings so it won't take up too much of my time. I'll essentially be manning a desk and area where professors and graduate students can check out videos. Easy work and I'll be able to work on homework in my downtime.

The only relatively interesting thing that happened outside of school is the weather. We officially got snow today (I woke up to this). 

And it snowed more throughout the rest of the day. It's really cold here. I know it could be worse but considering the fact that I've lived in California for the last 8 years, this is freezing to me. I basically have 2-3 layers on at all times and am going through socks faster than one could imagine. This is the predicted weather for the next few days....I'm going to have so much fun with it.

Anyways I need to go do laundry and get started on some assignments so hopefully I'll be able to write again soon!

Back for the Spring Semester

Well...I'm back in Syracuse. And already working even though classes don't start until Monday. But honestly, is anyone really that surprised?

What am I working on? I am the stage management intern for the Syracuse Stage production of Two Trains Running by August Wilson. I have now been to 3 days of rehearsal and don't hate it yet. Basically I make and maintain the coffee and hot/cold water for the cast and crew throughout the rehearsal, clean up at the end, and am on book and make notes of all the line mistakes the cast makes throughout the day. It's fairly easy work. The main point of me being on this project is to work with an Equity stage manager and to see how Syracuse Stage runs their process of putting up a show. What is especially cool is that the stage manager is a graduate from the same program I'm in so I am hoping to sit down with her one day and grill her about her time here and find out what she took away from the classes, found helpful, hated, etc. 

On Monday I start my crazy class schedule....which isn't really all that crazy minus drafting on Wednesday mornings but I'm going to pretend that doesn't exist until Wednesday. This semester is basically part 2 of all the classes I took last semester so it really shouldn't be that hard. And as far as working on shows goes, this semester will be much easier than last semester. Two Trains ends for me on Feb. 1 and then I'm just run crew on 2 of the SU drama shows...piece of cake.

Actually now that I think about it, my semester will still probably be crazy. 20 credits, 3 shows, and 1 (possibly 2) job(s)? Yikes. Wish me luck. 

But I have an awesome place setting so I can still be a child occasionally :)

End of the First Semester

Well I’m sitting in the Syracuse Airport (typing in Word because the internet connection is having issues this morning) waiting for my flight out of here! I am flying to North Carolina to visit Dad and Caleb and attend Dad’s retirement ceremony in a week. Next Saturday, Caleb and I will be flying back to San Francisco in order to spend time with Mom. In early January I will be traveling down to Santa Barbara to attend the first couple rehearsals of Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson and then I fly back to Syracuse early in order to start working on the first show of the semester, Two Trains Running. Have I mentioned that I am going to be attached to 3 different shows next semester? Yes, you read that right. THREE SHOWS.  I will be the stage management intern for Two Trains Running, a costume dresser for Top Girls, and a follow spot operator for Violet. On top of that I have 19 credits and a job. I am going to be so busy next semester!

But yay my first semester at Syracuse is done! The last couple weeks have been a mixture of up and downs. The definite highlight was being able to go backstage and have a tour of the set of the touring company of WICKED!!!! One of the supporting leads is a SU Drama alum and so he gave me and a couple of my friends a tour of the set after the show. It was by far one of the coolest things I have ever done! The first thing we saw when we walked inside was the Oz head, and immediately I was overwhelmed with emotion and knew I was going to be having some of the best moments of my life. Then I realized that we were standing on the stage. The techie inside of me immediately got excited so I started looking everywhere, starting to piece together how they did all of the crazy things that happen in the show. The actor explained how some of the key moments in the show are done and explained how the stage is set up so that it is easy for understudies and new actors to be able to step into roles without too many problems. He showed us where all the props and costumes are (there is a dress in the show that is literally onstage for only 20 seconds and it cost $15,000!) and then spent 20 or so minutes just answering our questions and talking about what it is like to be on tour with such a well known show. We, of course, had to ask him which part of his education at SU was most beneficial to him (where we found out he had 2 of the teachers I had this past semester—weird to think about because he graduated 25 years ago) and if he had any advice on making it in this crazy business. I was so thankful that he was willing to take the time to talk to us and renew our faith and hopes that we will make it. He ended the tour by saying that we could find him on Facebook and that if he was ever involved in a show we wanted to work on, he would put in a good word for us! After the tour I was completely in shock that we had just that and I started crying (good crying of course) because it was exactly what I needed. Talking to someone who had been me 25 years earlier and is now touring with one of my favorite shows made all my dreams that much more real. It IS possible and I am determined to be successful in this business. It will happen for me. 

I also had my finals--which I don't even really consider them to be finals. I had a final project for theatre design, a paper for intro, and actual tests in stage management and theatre crafts. I feel pretty confident about all of them!

Anyway-it's time to board now! I'll resume writing when I return to Syracuse in January! <3