Staging Game

In my drama class today, we were discussing possible audience positioning for our upcoming performance of Antigone. For this, we can literally have them sitting wherever in the space, circles, squares, in the traditional staging of them on one side, anything we would like.

So anyway, we have decided to have it as a traverse stage. For those that don't know what this means, it means that the audience sits on two opposite sides of the stage, essentially looking at each other, whilst the actors are performing in the middle.

The issue I had this is was not the actual staging itself. No, I actually like the concept of having two separate audiences; it keeps us actors on our toes. No slacking off on the job. Yes, this may be difficult and need lots of rehearsing, but as I said, that part was not the issue; the issue was in the name itself.

Traverse. The word almost has a tri- at the beginning. And tri means three, right? But in this traverse stage, there are two sides of the audience. So shouldn't it be a diverse stage? Or a biverse stage? Di- and bi- both mean two? Not three? I do not know…English is weird. But I seriously had a ten-minute conversation with one of the girls in my class over this, and neither of us could really come to any kind of conclusion. Made me feel a little stupid but this is a serious issue! Someone should be taking about this!

When we actually got to the rehearsal point of the class, we had to figure out a way for these two characters to dramatically kill themselves, and interchanging between fast and slow motion. The amount of crazy slow motion falls to the ground we tried was absolutely ridiculous. We had people carrying them, a dramatic tango dip dance fall thing, a back to back fall which ended with one person lying on top of the other (it was so bizarre and creepy, we didn't really consider that one for too long). We eventually decided upon the trust fall.

We all know this one, that split second moment when you have a heart attack because you aren’t sure whether the person will catch you or not? Well, just after the actors stab themselves, they fall quickly backwards, as if they have been winded, to then be caught by some member of the chorus and in slow-motion, lowered to the ground. It looks a lot better, and really powerful when going between the fast and slow movement.

This took 45 minutes to come up with. But, I still think it was 45 minutes well spent. It looks amazing.

Yes, you may think that my thought process here is wacky, or crazy, strange or weird. But let my tell you, weird is my defining character trait. You cannot have a proper conversation with me, without describing me so.

Bye bye for now.

P.S. In the play we are rehearsing at the moment (Antigone), there is a line in it that makes me giggle every time.

“To think that thinking men should think so wrongly!”

Try saying that ten times fast!!!

Parking Frenzy

I am writing this blog entry, sitting inside my car right now. Now, to some that may seem strange but I assure you that if you were in my shoes you would do the same. 

I am parked at Uni, and yeah you may be thinking why don't you just walk inside a building on campus? Why are you just sitting in your car, you loser? 

Well here is why. 

Parking at Uni at any time past 9.30 is almost impossible. This is not usually a problem for me because two out of the three days I go to Uni, I start at 9 anyway. However, that one other day I start at 11. And at 11, there is absolutely no parking, it is truly horrendous. So, every Wednesday, when I start later, I try to get to Uni about an hour early, so at about 10, so I can still get a goddamn parking spot!!! (And btw I did manage to get one this morning, in the ideal car park but literally right at the back. But that's cool, at least I got one!) This means, that now I have over an hour to kill by myself. I know for a fact that none of my friends are free to catch up at this time, so yeah it has to be on my own. And rather than sitting in the Agora (our food court type place), I am waiting in my car until an appropriate time to head for the computer lab that my class will be held in. 

And besides, my car is hella comfy, so everyone else sitting on those wooden benches should be jealous of me instead! ;) 

The only negative I see with this, is all the strange looks I get from people walking past me, sitting in my car. I totally get it. It seems weird and lonerish....well guess what people!!!! I am weird and lonerish!!! (Lonerish is not a word according to spellcheck but it is now, I just added to dictionary MWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHHA) 

See?? This totally works, I just killed 20 minutes trying to type this out on my phone!! Who's the weirdo now!!! 

Bye bye for now. 

P. S. Yes I know...I am still the weirdo..... 

Welcome

So, after long overdue chat with a friend that I haven’t seen for several months, I decided that I needed to start blogging again. I am not sure if these entries are going to have a particular theme other than rants and rambles that I deem fit to share with the world. But for now, this is all you need to know about me.

I am a first year University Student, making me 18 years old. I have just got my licence, so there may be some spontaneous driving stories to tell. I am Australian. Very Australian, actually. Yes, I am your typical blonde haired, suburban living bogan (well, not quite) from down under. I could be so cliché and tell you that my life is hard, and I struggle to make ends meet, and although that is true, that whole story is overplayed by a long shot. So instead of being all, OMG my life sucks #whatislife; I am going to try to tell you about the side of me that is-to some people-funny, crazy and hella awesome. ;)

To get things started, I’ll tell you about the other day.

So, I was just relaxing at home. I was just about to make myself a cup of tea (my right before bedtime drink) when there was a knock on the door. Now, I was babysitting my little brother that night, and I was the only adult at home, so I had to answer it.

Thankfully it was not some creepy murdering dude, or something selling something. It was two of my best friends. After the initial shock, I let them in and asked what the hell they were doing. One of them had just received their licence and wanted to flaunt that to as many people as possible, so grabbed a friend and came to me. After the congratulations, (and hellos as my mum had just returned home, relieving me from babysitting duty), we decided to go on an adventure. I grabbed my car keys and we both drove over to another friends house. It all felt very Fast & Furious, us driving and following each other. After collecting said friend, we did what every Aussie should after getting their licence, the classic initiation, the tradition; went for a Maccas run.

It was all well and good until my friend started messaging their boyfriend. So then, of course, we made the logical decision of buying and delivering him some Maccas as well. After buying an apple pie, we headed off again, starting to feel a bit like a gang of irresponsible teenagers, we headed to the boyfriends house. Only problem was, we had no clue how to actually get there.

After several wrong turns, and a pit stop to buy donuts (one night special, 10 for $10, it was so beautiful, seriously, real tears of joy), we did eventually make it and deliver the apple pie, and shared around the amazing nutella donuts.

All of his family were in PJ’s (his dad in these awesome skeleton stretchy pants, which I totally want to get my own pair of) and it made us all really uncomfortable, crashing his house, and we kinda realised how strange we were being.

We left after that, driving manically down the main road back towards the general direction of all our own houses. (Okay, it wasn't manically, but it sure felt like it, because once again we had no clue which way was really the way home).

I didn't get home that night until about 11 o’clock, and considering we left around 8, that was fairly late.

So yes, all that petrol money was wasted, and it was a crazy night. However, it worked out really well in the end (for me).

I didn't realise until I got home, that they left all the donuts in my car. J All in all, and excellent night out.

Bye bye for now!

P.S. Two days later my family had actually eaten all the donuts so after all that it didn't matter L