COME
PLAY WITH US!
URBAN ODYSSEY, Theater Performance, Directed by Wayne S. Turney and Rick Shartzer
WEEK TWO
The Theater Performance unit of Urban Odyssey is well underway. We began in Week One with Linklater voice work, various Spolin theatre games, analysis and performance of Shakespeare sonnets and original monologues related to Cleveland's part in the Underground Railroad.
In week two, we have moved on to scene work, while intensifying work on theater games, monologues and we even added some time for a bit of set building. Can hanging lights and painting be far behind? Thursday a Field Trip with Parents to Actors' Summit Professional Theater to see the Off-Broadway Smash I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change. This hectic three-week schedule is gruelling and not for everyone, but those with the talent and perserverance are richly rewarded.
We're coaching each student individually and everybody gets a chance
to critique each other. 
And
we play lots of games. The popular game Tuesday was "Freeze"
in which you improvise a scene until someone sees something physical she
wants to do with the scene that's totally different from the scene you're
playing. When that new person yells "Freeze!" both people do
as they're told and freeze; the new person assumes the posture of one
of the two, takes their place and starts the new scene until someone else
yells "Freeze!"
Both players have to really stay loose and concentrate to make
all this work. Molly, Tamicka, Mae and Debbie take to this, as they do
to all the games, like pros. Once she got a chance to see what was happening,
our guest, Sahara, fit right in.
Voices are getting perceptibly bigger and more flexible, imaginations
are sharpening, and at last, the work is turning into fun. fun.
Of course, we always emphasize
glamor and poise -NOT!
