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Montreal & Classes
I spent Saturday at Imago Theater’s Stage Combat workshop to benefit Artista, their free mentorship program for young women. It was given by Anita Nittoly (from the John Stead workshop) with help from David Chinchilla, both super talented and from Toronto. The morning was spent learning unarmed combat, followed by an afternoon of swordplay, which was awesome. I really wish I had paid more attention/remembered more in previous stage combat classes, but I am making up for it now. This was a workshop for beginners, which was exactly what I needed. I am so lucky to be able to participate in all kinds of incredible workshops and trainings, but it…
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Back, with Knaps
After two weeks off, it was nice to get back to Stage Combat on Saturday. We learnt strikes (punches made to look fake for the stage), as well as a few combinations of the 5 of them (jab, straight, cross, hook and upper cut). It was a lot of fun, especially when we were doing them with a partner (as opposed to just striking into thin air). Does that make me a terrible person? It’s just a lot easier when you have someone to interact with and play off of. Unfortunately, my upper chest is not so pleased with being back. In stage combat, the noise you create to make…
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Chase Your Dreams
After a week off, we were back in class on Saturday, learning some more Stage Combat. I rushed in at the last minute after watching my cousin’s circus show. I am always amazed when watching those kind of performers, just like when my dad has me watching American Ninja Warrior with him, because they are crazy talented. Part of me always assumes that they have been training since birth and I would never be able to do any of the stuff they do. Which is probably true on most fronts, but at the same time, nothing is impossible. My cousin, who is currently touring the province in a circus show,…
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Work, Class, Combat, Magic
Already halfway through August. Summer is fading fast and I am nowhere near where I had planned to be by now, but I am still keeping busy. I have worked a few days at McGill, which is always fun. One day I was playing a woman who had just given birth, while also writing a story about a character in the same situation during our breaks. This definitely put me in an interesting head space, and I personally think it made the acting and the writing a little better, because they could feed off each other. I went to see two movies in theatres, both action/adventure films that I would…
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Nanos, Auditions and Combat
I have completed another Camp Nanowrimo, although my word counts keep being less than what I need to actually finish the stories. This means I will have to up my target word count and write more come November 😉 I also ended up writing a completely different story than the one I had originally intended to. I might need to work on writing what I need to rather than what I am inspired to. Or perhaps just find a way to reconcile the two. In addition to a lot of time spent writing, I worked on my demo reel, caught up on shows, got inspired by a multitude of acting…
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Meetups, lines and movies
I have some lines to memorize, some scene work to do and should probably be getting to bed to prepare for my early start tomorrow, but instead, I am writing this post to let you know what has been going on with me. Selfless determination or semi-productive procrastination, you be the judge. In acting/ text, we are working on points of concentration. For instance, we had to do simple tasks, but Debbie would come and whisper some kind of information to us. Sometimes it was environmental, like the time of day, the weather and general atmosphere of where you are. Other times, it was more emotional, like she would tell…
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Adieu French King
I can’t believe today is the last day of January. I am already done my fourth week in London, which is crazy! On Monday, Debbie had us working on our monologues, and she saw me standing there with my arms crossed, so she told me to stand more open, and to take up more space. Harder said than done for someone who tries to take up the least amount of space and go unnoticed most of the time, but I was determined to try. In stage combat, after we spent most of the class practicing what we had learnt and adding more things to it, we were asked to do…
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JEDI – Just Effing Do It
This week was really interesting as far as classes were concerned. Mostly because I learnt a valuable lesson. Or at least put it into practice. Thanks to Bonnie Gillespie for the awesome acronym 😉 You see, I truly embraced the concept of not hesitating and just doing it, even if I’m not ready and even if it scares me. Actually, especially if it scares me. On Monday, we were working on qualities, and one of the activities was a staple of drama schools, where you pretend to be an inanimate object. In this case, leaves. I was in a group of 4, but all the other groups had 3, so…
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Back in Class!
This past week has been pretty busy for me, and I love feeling like I am actually doing something. On Thursday, I went back to class with Suzanna Lenir, and did in fact get to catch up with some friends who were there before I left, and also meet some new ones. I arrived there almost a half an hour before class, but spent the whole time talking with my fellow classmates about my trip to LA and our acting journeys. It’s nice to know I’m not the only one who feels overwhelmed by all the decisions and figuring out we have to do 🙂 I was given a scene…