Tonight was totally intense. I went to Kat’s movement workshop and it was really really freeing and really intense. First, we did this really simple exercise where we just watched the other actors walk across the space, while they were fixed on a certain point. I felt like I learned how they approach things, had an understanding of their intensity and personalities. Will, Matt, Belinda, Gatsby, Liz, and this new girl Missy was there (not blonde Jewish Missy who lives below me, but Asian Australian Missy).
But the most intense thing was yet to come. Then we did a contact exercise. You had to stay in contact with a partner for the entirety of the movement across the floor. Kat immediately jumped at being my partner. I cannot really explain in words what happened when we did it, but I felt a real electricity between us. We did it twice. We kept ending up on the floor, rolling over one another… It was the most sensual experience I’ve ever had… And to have these intense feelings towards someone and then have that opportunity. There was safety and danger… I really hope she feels the same way. She thanked me for it all later, saying that you don’t often get to use your body in that way in theater. She smiles a lot, and laughs at all my stupid comments, my bad attempts at being funny.
I just really enjoyed the whole thing. We also did a game like the Portrait Game, where we moved to music. It was such an amazing experience. It started with a fast song, and I did what I usually do to faster songs: dance like crazy. I was dancing so hard and so fast that I barely registered what was going on around me, except when I occasionally interacted with people. I eventually winded myself moving so quickly, and I had to stop and slow down. Everyone was standing up, so I investigated movement on the floor. I did a body brushing thing to myself, and then snapped up as if I was in a dream, and I think Matt was standing there, and he didn’t even notice me there, and it was like “wow, there’s a person right there!” And then I thought, “Whoa, there are people ALL around me.” It was like waking up from a dream… so I went with it… what if I woke up in the Cement Box Theater with all these people doing all these crazy things around me? I would be scared! I saw the exit, I grasped the exit door handle, and looked around me, so ready to escape, but I realized that I should stay… see what’s happening… if I leave this world, I might never be able to come back to it. So enjoy it while you have it…
So I started watching everyone else. I looked at them from different angles, in the most childlike ways. Doing bridges with my body, just moving my head a few inches to the side… Everything was new. I was looking at the world through the eyes of a child, something I haven’t done in so long. Just looking at the lights and the wires, I thought “Wow, those go to generators so far away! That’s amazing!” Everything was amazing and new and that’s such a valuable experience. There was no self censorship, no judgment. Because there was none of that, we wanted to give everything to everybody, and as a result of giving so much, and so freely, we had so much to GIVE!
We all really enjoyed it, and later Kat said something that really made an impact on me – “The root of acting is being a person, and giving that to the audience.” I think it sounded better when she said it.
Gatsby being there was really cool too. I remember at first that kid got on my nerves. I realized it was because he sort of acted like a child sometimes… not like a petulant brat, but seeing the world through these kid-like eyes, and getting really excited about small stuff… and what’s REALLY wrong with that? Why do we have to act like “adults” all the time? What’s really the value of that? I think that’s a lesson I need to learn from him.
Also, Missy said told us that being in this giving, loving environment was so different from the year she spent in Brazil with a really non-affectionate family, that eventually threw her out onto the street and said that she “was the problem.” She said that this session was “better than any therapy.” We gave her a big group hugs and kissed her on the head. It was so sweet.
It was after that that I should’ve trusted my gut again. Kat laid belly down and leaned against me and I really should’ve taken that as a cue to put my arm around her. I didn’t, and oh well. I’ll have more opportunities I think.
I’m just really excited about all this. It’s like things are really coming together for me, and it’s really exciting. Tomorrow, vacation. The day after? THE WORLD! :)
God I’m cheesy.

Hi everyone,

I just got back from Laramie Project rehearsal... That is probably one of the most powerful pieces of drama ever conceived. Thank you Moises Kaufman. Thank you Tectonic Theater Project. Thank you Matthew Shepard. And last and certainly not least, thank you Kat Henry for casting me, and allowing me this amazing opportunity.

At Queensland University, a student was raped with a broomstick for being suspected of being gay. There needed to be protests to have the perpetrators expelled. This is the community that we are addressing. We have a monumental responsibility here.

When I first read the play, I was absolutely floored by it. I full on sobbed at least three times, and I was in an extremely tense, taut emotional state when I wasn't an absolute mess. As I prepared for my audition by reading my monologue again and again, the reality became obscured by the craft of acting, by the belief in the imaginary circumstance that I needed to create to breathe life into words that I had to memorize through brute repetition. So it seemed less real.

We did a read through at rehearsal today, and it came back to me. Hearing it come to life in my mouth and the mouths of the performers around me was so powerful, dangerously so. I almost cried again, and had I perhaps been listening to a recording in my room, I probably would've. I don't cry well in front of people, anyone who really knows me, knows that.

I feel blessed.