OPENING NIGHT!

Opening night went swimmingly, folks. We were even featured yesterday morning on the news, check out the interview and scene clip RIGHT HERE!

I encourage everyone to buy a ticket, and celebrate Shakespeare's birthday with us this week. It will be a great experience for the lovers of Shakespeare, or a great first "Shakespearience" for our younger audiences!
It is truly a fun and uplifting play. Skip the cliche television sitcoms, ditch the movie theatre, and come see a LIVE PERFORMANCE!

The Final Countdown

Ahoy Mateys! "Tis but fortune, all is fortune." We have been soooooo busy here at TAMU-CC Theatre! It is almost time for our wonderful play to open. Tonight is our first dress rehearsal, and this past week we have been in technical rehearsals. I apologize for the lack of updates, it breaks my heart that I haven't been posting anything all week. We're going to have a GOOD SHOW tonight! We're excited, and I hope YOU are excited. WE WILL SEE YOU APRIL 20th!

Yo-ho-yo-ho!

Work Call

Today the cast and company of TWELFTH NIGHT was called to work along with the supporting students and faculty of TAMU-CC. We broke off into teams for sound, set building, costume construction, light hanging and programming, and also publicity! Check out the new promo video for our play!

Half of our theatre department is getting ready for the premiere of two Senior Capstones tonight(Alice in Wonderland, and The Prophet, an original play). The Twelfth Night cast and crew will be in the audience supporting these plays, as well as preparing for this upcoming week of dress and technical rehearsals.
It's going to be a tiring week readers, but our cast and company is working hard, and all of it will pay off April 20th when we open! ONLY ONE WEEK LEFT!
GET READY FOR TWELFTH NIGHT

Greetings Readers!

AHOY!
I hath some new production photos for thee.
CHECK OUT OUR SET SO FAR!



As Olivia would say, "...MOST WONDERFUL!" We are getting there everyone!
YESTERDAY, the illustrious Kelly Russel watched a run-through of the play in all of its Shakespearean glory.
This past week, Alison worked with the actors and tweaked significant details throughout the whole play from scene to scene.
Tonight, we are focusing on music!!! This is some beautiful stuff, and below you can listen to a rough clip of one of the many songs Ian and Cory have worked on for the shipwrecked scene.
WS_10009.WMA
Cory Kosel, actor who also plays Sir Andrew Aguecheek, has been pulling double duty onstage as a musician and a character in the play.

A photo of Cory with theatre technician, William Dean. SEE? WHO SAYS ACTORS AND TECHIES CAN'T GET ALONG?

Chain of Being

Good Morrow!
Today's post is all about THE CHAIN OF BEING (Cue epic trumpet flourish). Now some of you may be asking, "What the heck is that?!"Basically, in Shakespeare's time, The Chain of Being placed you in a specific class/ order of ranking. The interesting thing is that it was possible to work your way up the chain (which Malvolio tries to do in TWELFTH NIGHT). The belief in a higher power puts God (also referred to as Jove) at the very top. Angels are directly below God. After angels came nobility, the kings that rule over the land that answers God's will. After the king came everyone else, ordered from most valuable to least. Men technically came before women, but under given circumstances, a middle class woman could have a higher position than a peasant man. Unfortunately, musicians, actors, thieves and smugglers have a reserved spot as the lowest of the lows on The Chain of Being. Still unsure? You can see it illustrated in simplified terms below!

Come see TWELFTH NIGHT and discover where all our characters lie on...(trumpet flourish) THE CHAIN OF BEING!
For more information:
1. LINK: http://web.cn.edu/KWHEELER/Tillyard01.html

2.

April 1st, and April 2nd Rehearsal

Hello readers, I apologize for my lack of posting lately. I have been giving my full attention to stage manager duties while our Stage Manager is at a USITT conference. We shall hear more of that anon. I have missed blogging about the show! This week went quite well. Last week, our actors made more discoveries with the text, and we had a run of Act 1. We are slowly combining the elements. It's going to be an epic play you guys! RESERVE YOUR TICKETS, CAUSE THIS SHOW WILL BE SOLD OUT.
Music composers Ian Williams and Cory Kosel met for rehearsal on Saturday, and for this past week have been teaching the actors how to play their special version of "Come Away Death", a song that Feste performs for Duke Orsino. BE SURE TO COME SEE OUR LOVELY ACTORS SING THESE BEAUTIFULLY COMPOSED SONGS.
I think the wonderful emotion-packed scenes between our lovers will be awesome to counteract the work of our clowns in the play. Their comedy has had me and Alison doubled over with laughter in our seats this past week. Here are some great candid shots...


Lighting and Set updates: Our light design class has spent the past week hanging lights for the play, which is great for the actors to get used to the extra warmth of the hot lamps, and for us out in the house so we're able to see all the action onstage! The wheelhouse has been weathered/treated and the broken ship stage right and left are painted now too.
The past week some actors in the show have been arriving much earlier than their call time to prepare/warm up, and tune their instruments (both literally and figuratively). This dedication has not gone unnoticed, and will serve you future equity actors well.
STAY TUNED FOR AN UPDATE ALL ABOUT "THE CHAIN OF BEING". A very important aspect of Shakespeare's plays, and understanding the status roles in TWELFTH NIGHT.
For now, I bid you adieu!

March 30/31st Rehearsal

Hello to everyone!
This week, TWELFTH NIGHT is undergoing an "extreme makeover" with blocking as our actors play with new ideas, and subtext. Indeed, our actors were so creative that at one point when rehearsing the scene where Malvolio first finds Maria's letter, our clowns, Sir Toby, Sir Andrew, and Fabian rehearsed their blocking in slow motion with their lines! Ladies and gentlemen, Look out for TWELFTH NIGHT: In Slow Motion. (Okay, maybe not but it could be amusing.)Speaking of amusing, over Spring Break I was digging through a junk drawer in my old room and found something fun and fitting for our play's shipwrecked/pirate inspiration!...
I started growing him, my very own pirate, today! I intend to keep you all posted on the status of Peg Leg Steve.
I digress-
Today we had a makeup workshop for the actors as designer Sarah showed some tips and techniques to the cast, as well as how to apply their own makeup, testing out how everyone will look.


After makeup call, we wrapped up with some lovely music composed by Ian who is collaborating with actors Corey Kosel, Lindsey Hertel, Andrew Robinson, Taylor Whitmire, and Lucinda Rico to create an original soundtrack to the play. The music rehearsal was a time to polish and practice everything that has been composed thus far.

March 29th Rehearsal

Good evening ladies and gents
Hope everyone had a relaxing Sunday evening, and the music rehearsal last night was successful!
This weekend, set designer Phil with the help of his technical crew, worked vigorously on more of our shipwreck set. Here are some new photos of the work that is done.



The set now includes the base of the masts, hanging lanterns, a ladder to the crow's nest, and more steps, and supports.
More word on our actors: We have spent the past 2 weeks of rehearsal finding meaning behind Shakespeare's words, and blocking like the wind! Now our actors will work with Alison at a "snail" pace to polish and clean up blocking. While Alison directs, the actors must focus on enunciation, and projection. Voice and Diction teacher, Patsy Rodenburg is one of Alison's inspirations, and in the lecture below, she talks about Shakespeare and the 3 energies that help an actor with their voice. This is the clip she sent the cast.
With such a unique language, it is crucial that modern audiences will be able to hear every word the characters are saying. A great deal of work still left, the attitude has remained positive, and the hard work continues.
Maria, Sir Toby, and Sir Andrew's beginning scene was polished at the start of rehearsal, and actors defined their relationships to one another. Alison descried their friendship as the Seinfeld of their time, pulling pranks, and making fun, not taking life seriously. As the week continues, actors will be answering questions about their own characters. What is home for Sir Andrew? Does Sir Toby truly love Sir Andrew? If Sir Toby and Maria love each other, what is their relationship like? The answers to these detailed questions will make the show even richer.

March 26th Rehearsal

Happy Friday everybody!
Tonight begins the first of many run-throughs of our wonderful play TWELFTH NIGHT! Our designers attended tonight's run-through, and observed the play to incorporate their elements of design into the work of the actors.
Today has been a day for the designers to touch base with Alison. At our production meeting earlier today, Kathleen talked about her progress with costume designs, and meeting with Sarah so she can compare her makeup and hair ideas with the costumes she has pulled. You can find pictures of Sarah's makeup and hair sketches below.






Ian and Jacob talked about meeting soon to compose more of the music for the play, and to work with Cory Kosel (actor, playing Sir Andrew Aguecheek) who is making a makeshift xylophone out of glass bottles filled with water. Our set designer Phil is working with Samantha Dunaway (assistant set and props designer) on getting the mainsails built and onstage before the bulk of our design team leaves for the conference, USITT. When the folks going away for USITT return, there will be two more weeks for rehearsals left, leaving a total of 3 weeks after tonight!

March 25th Rehearsal

Good evening,
Tonight, Act 5 was blocked, thus concluding our play! After blocking Act 5, we ran the whole second part of the show. Wow, the whole show has been tentatively blocked in under one week’s time. AWESOME! After the run of the second part, Alison gave her notes, and talked briefly about government in the setting of the play. She spoke about rulers and aristocracy of Shakespeare’s time. It boggles my mind to think about what these characters would experience, historically in their world, and as Alison put it we don’t know what it was like to live under Aristocracy, but the characters in this play do. She said for the actors to watch the movie GOSFORD PARK for examples of hierarchy. Here is the trailer!
New addition to the set! We have the beginnings of a crow’s nest upstage, center. To get the feel for height, we’ve placed a ladder beside it until it is finished.
Tomorrow night is our crew view/run through of the entire play. I wish everyone a GREAT first run through of the show! Let’s breathe new life into Shakespeare’s wonderful words.

*READER’S SURVEY: WHAT SCENE FROM TWELFTH NIGHT IS YOUR FAVORITE?
Leave your responses in the comment box. Keep it nice, and g-rated.

March 24th

Hello all! I really hope you are getting excited for this show, I know the cast is! We are all becoming much more familiar with Shakespeare's language. In further appreciation of William Shakespeare, and everything he did for our language, here is a link just for fun, of a Shakespearean Insult kit! Enjoy, and find new, witty ways to lovingly insult your friends! http://www.pangloss.com/seidel/shake_rule.html(My personal favorite taunt from Twelfth Night is a line of Maria's, "Go shake your ears!")
The themes of tonight's rehearsal were mistaken identities, and sword fights! Viola(Cesario) fights Sir Andrew, but Sir Andrew thinks Viola(Cesario) is Sebastian, and then Antonio comes to save Viola(Cesario) who also believes Viola(Cesario) is Sebastian, THEN Sir Toby attempts to fight Antonio, and then the officers find Antonio, and then fight him! Then we have Sir Andrew, who mistakes Sebastian for Viola(Cesario), and he tries to fight him with Sir Toby. Since it is Sebastian, he is able to defend himself and Sir Toby and Sir Andrew find themselves in a quarrel with him! Olivia runs out to save Sebastian because she believes Sebastian is Viola(Cesario)! Whew. We blocked 10 pages of the second act in the first part of rehearsal, and 15 pages of the second act over all. Stay tuned for more zanies!

March 23rd rehearsal

Briefly before rehearsal tonight, Alison handed me a book titled “Shakespeare In Performance”, and as I was thumbing through the pages that included TWELFTH NIGHT, I couldn’t help but notice the complete differences among every production that was pictured. Much like these pictures, our production will take on a completely different life. I think the actors in our show have a completely fresh and fun energy. The high energy that mimics the sitcom aspects I keep referring to. I think it will be reassuring to audience members who are skeptical of Shakespeare to get a glimpse of this energetic play! Some pictures from tonight's rehearsal for thee...



Rehearsal tonight started with a run through of Act 1. Congrats to the cast for getting through act one after only 3 rehearsals! The payoff of already having the frame for blocking and being off book at this point will be tremendous. Alison was pleased with each cast member’s work! Along with all of our blocking, the set is also piecing together! We started the week with taped off areas, and now there are raised platforms, and a hollowed box that Sir Andrew has used to enter his first scene through. The band is sitting upstage center, and they will be composing and underscore specific scenes in the play there. After running through act 1, blocking for the second act of the show began.
By Friday, our cast will have their first run-through of what is complete, and this will be videotaped. Looking forward to more adventure tomorrow night!

March 22nd rehearsal

Sitting in the Warren theatre today as we start rehearsing scenes between Sebastian and Antonio, our dashing males, out for adventure. Actors Brad Baker and Kelsey Clay are developing their bromance to incorporate another dynamic relationship into a play that already contains a variety of unique characters. During their very first scene, Sebastian spills to Antonio about his sister being lost at sea. Antonio takes interest in Sebastian, "But come what may I do adore thee so, that danger shall seem sport and I will go." Hmm, looks like someone has the hotts for Sebastian.
We then move on to Viola's famous ring speech, performed by Sarah Thomas. The ring speech is Viola's moment to interact with the audience. She finally gets to break loose, as she is discovering Olivia's love for her as Cesario. This speech is one of Shakespeare's most famously written, right up there with Hamlet's "To Be Or Not To Be".
Along with famous speeches, the famous lines "If music be the food of love play on" could not be more important in TWELFTH NIGHT. Music underscores the majority of our show, and our musicians, Ian(the composer), Isabelle, Cory and Lindsey have made great use of all of their instruments. Tonight I took some video of Act 1 scene 3. In this scene, our clowns are goofing around and playing music, disturbing Olivia's steward, Malvolio played by actor Jeremiah Clapp. The actors came up with this great bit. ENJOY!

March 21st Rehearsal

AHOY MATEYS! Welcome back to TWELFTH NIGHT, it has been a refreshing break. I have fabric pictures for you, straight from Kat, the costume designer! The fabulous purple is for Orsino's court, The pink and green is for the lovely Olivia, and the blues are for the fine Viola. YOU MUST CHECK THESE OUT!



Finally, the cast has started rehearsals in the Warren Theatre! Today the set got taped out, and you will see pictures of that BELOW!

Today at six we met with our cast, and everyone was reunited and excited to work. Feste, played by actress Lindsey Hertel spoke about some of the coin tricks she is performing in the play, Sir Toby, played by actor Gary Turman discussed with our makeup designer Sarah and with Alison about whether he will be shaving his head for the role or keeping it long, and people have returned from break with a glowy tan! Things are coming together. Rehearsal began with blocking act 1, experimenting and adding in the fun props from our properties designer Cody! Alison is working with the cast to find beautiful moments when the actors can work on bits, and timing to make TWELFTH NIGHT as much like a sitcom as possible. Stay tuned for all of the action!

March 12 Rehearsal

First order of business, the fancy layout with the pirate ship is the product of our stage manager Ashley White. Thank you for helping with the great new background!
Second, today, the design team of TWELFTH NIGHT met with Alison for a production meeting in the lovely new gazebos just across from the Center for the Arts on campus. Alison and the designers sat down for some discussion of our play's set, sound, costumes, props, and more. Alison said she was “thrilled to death” to work with all of the designers, and will be available to her designers any time they want to discuss the show. Kathleen Ludwig will be designing costumes, Phil Johnson will be designing the set, Jacob Henry is sound designer, Sarah Thomas will be designing makeup and hair, and Cody Lindley is our properties designer. Everyone is working hard and is ready to make Illyria come to life! Phil, our set designer brought in a model of the set, and Kathleen our costume designer brought some rough sketches! Take a look…

Alison's goal for the play is to make TWELFTH NIGHT like a sitcom (Think FRIENDS set in the 1600s). This evening, I sat and watched the development of Sebastian, Sir Andrew, and Sir Toby's sword fight scene. The actors spent a portion of rehearsal practicing their fencing moves, and choreographing this comical duel in the play. Tonight, we also worked on Olivia's first scene with Sebastian. Since there is little interaction with Olivia and Sebastian in between Act 2 and Act 5, Alison is working to make the romance as juicy as possible in their two scenes. With this nice mix of action, and romance, there's not much missing from our epic play.
After tonight, our cast won't be rehearsing until after Spring Break. It will be a nice break for everyone, and we are prepared to hit the ground running when we get back.

March 11 Rehearsal

TWELFTH NIGHT rehearsals are well under way, and we have gotten quite a bit done in such a short amount of time! It's very exciting to see all of the elements coming together. The actors have been very energized at each rehearsal, and some of our designers got to show off their work in progress at the work call this past Saturday, March 6th. The musicians in our play have already composed music, and there are songs they have already recorded. It's no surprise that people are asking about our rehearsals in social hours, given the copious amounts of music and laughter that can be heard each night outside the walls of our rehearsal space.

Pictured are some of the cast mates, studying their scripts, and discussing scenes in the play at a read through last week.

This week of rehearsal in the Wilson theatre has been ALL ABOUT THE TEXT. Actors have been reviewing with Alison about the language, and what they feel their character is saying in their scenes. This has helped everyone fully understand Shakespeare's words, and this will make it easy for a modern audience to fully understand. For the actors, it's all about what they will do with the words, to activate the language, and to make the audience understand what is going on. With Shakespeare, his words always have more than one meaning, and this is when our actors step in to animate, and illustrate the script!