Note to self: buy umbrella

The day started badly as I arrived at the Studio amid a drenching rainstorm. The cheap T-shirt I was wearing was so wet I just threw it in the garbage since I had some others with me, and at lunch I ran out and bought some more shirts, an extra pair of jeans, and an umbrella.

First class of the day: Movement Techniques with Joanne Edelmann. Strangely this is the class I feel the most trepidation about; what does it say that I'm more self-conscious about my lack of flexibility than my acting? We start with an intensive movement session that while it may not be yoga seems yoga-like to my inexperienced muscles. There's a kind of a free-form movement exercise that incorporates some of our Chekhov lines and includes a solo spot for everyone. Since I'm playing Trofimov in my scene that's the character I have in mind, but of course how does one portray such an intellectual character through movement? (Irish Guy follows me with the same character and does it brilliantly...)

The second part of the class is an exercise in the Alexander Technique and Ideokinesis. We partner up and take turns going through the exercises Joanne leads, which involves pulling stretching, and massaging various points to reduce tension. I'm partnered with a young woman from Nigeria who has some experience with the exercise, so there's not any awkwardness or messing up. When it's my turn to work on her I probably err on the side of being tentative, since when you're pulling someone's head up from their body you become very aware of your own strength. Joanne is our most "serious" teacher in terms of demeanor, and rides the ladies in the class about their hair falling into their eyes.

In our Voice & Speech class with Jason we read and discuss a poem by e.e. cummings, (see below) as a way of beginning to think about language and what actors can do with it. It's a change from lying on the floor breathing; not that that isn't valuable but I think everyone was happy to have a piece of text to work with. Jason told us in our first class that he studied literature, and he definitely seems to be interested in more than the technical side of acting.

My second crack at the Trofimov-Anya scene tomorrow...I feel ready....

i thank You God for most this amazing
day:for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and a blue true dream of sky;and for everything
which is natural which is infinite which is yes

(i who have died am alive again today,
and this is the sun's birthday;this is the birth
day of life and of love and wings:and of the gay
great happening illimitably earth)

how should tasting touching hearing seeing
breathing any--lifted from the no
of all nothing--human merely being
doubt unimaginable You?

(now the ears of my ears awake and
now the eyes of my eyes are opened)

- e e cummings