Why I didn't become a ballerina

I used to take a lot of classes as a kid. Ballet, jazz, gymnastics, skating (which is probably why I burned out later and stopped taking classes altogether). Jazz was my favorite, but when I was five or six I also enjoyed ballet quite a bit. My class wasn't competitive: we would just perform something at the end of the year at a showcase. The dances from the various classes usually weren't connected in any way, but twice we ended up putting on short versions of an actual ballet, with various ages and skill levels.
The two ballets we did were "Nutcracker" and (a year later) "Sleeping Beauty". I enjoyed both, but my favorite was Nutcracker. In it, my class (there were a bunch of us...twelve or fifteen little girls) had two parts: as guests at Clara's party, and later as the "bonbons" at the end (which I'm pretty sure was a part they made up for us).
I liked being a candy, but somehow I enjoyed being a guest more, even though there was barely any dancing involved. It was more like role-playing, which was my favorite kind of game at the time (I called them "adventure games" later). I had a lady who was my pretend mom, and me and my pretend sisters would come to the party and play with the other guests via a short dance sequence. I liked the unity I felt with my pretend family, even though it felt weird to have a different mom. I wished I got to participate more in the story (we were pretty much just extras), but even with the small role it was a lot of fun. Before that, my only experience with acting had been a very lame Kindergarten play (I was the sun, mainly because I didn't want to be an animal), but this felt more real. My first actual play would be six years later, but with this I was off to a good start.

And that's why I'm an actor and not a dancer! The end.

Titus Andronicus

I went to see Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus yesterday evening. Holy cow...so intense, so unsettling. But so good. Like I said after it was over, "I think I'm traumatized, but in a good way."

I really didn't expect to like it very much...while I'm into dark books, I'm not into dark movies (so I figured it was the same for plays). I expected to hide behind my program for most of the play. But no...I was staring intensely at the stage. Even for the parts that I had to look away, I ended up looking back with horrified fascination.

Congrats to all the actors, including the understudy who had to play with a script but was still really good.

I also loved the music...it fit very well. And the costumes were awesome. The play was set in a sort of post-apocalyptic Rome, so the costumes were a mix of ancient Roman toga-type outfits, and modern punk and army clothes.

So...Titus: really dark, really intense, really powerful.

There once was a flying SmartCar...

That was the beginning of a story we attempted at the daycamp. We were playing one of those "one-sentence-at-a-time-story" games. It was supposed to involve the Himalayas, too. That's one story I would've loved to hear. I think it would turn into a story about the Magic School Bus' sidekick, the flying Smart Car.

Anyway. Although I missed the first day of the camp, today was awesome. It's an acting camp, and we're putting on a scene from Shakespeare's "Comedy of Errors". I got the character I wanted too, so yay! I do kinda wish I had gone to the first day, because then I would've gotten to know the people a little more, but I'll catch up.

As you can see by this short post, I'm much better at theorizing about books and the like than talking about my life. Oh well, hope you liked it anyway!

BTW, I have a longer post coming up at the end of the week. See you then!

Sunday: Auditions and the good old days

The last day of WLBC! We made it! I'll write a "closing notes" (as well as a survey) post tomorrow, so I'll just make this a quick "yay": Yay!

Now, onto today's post. I actually have two things to talk about, but I'm not sure which one to go for first. So...I'll flip this pencil. *flips* Ok, auditions it is.

The next play our teen acting group will be doing is The Tempest (which I might blog about later, but I want to keep this short). And this time there'll be auditions. I'm really worried, because, although they changed two roles to girl roles (so now there are three), one is already taken, so that just leaves two. And there are, what, eight girls auditioning? AND we can't play for guys. So...seriously nerve-racking. Good luck to the people auditioning, even though 99% don't read my blog!

The second thing I wanted to mention was that I've been re-reading a lot of my early posts from 2005. It's funny how my writing style changed in three years. I think back then I viewed a blog like a diary: where you write about stuff that happened to you...or, failing that, you write about current interests. I talked a lot about Myst, and internet adoptables, but you somehow never really found out what I was like. What I thought about the world, or WHY I liked the Myst series so much (hmm...that could make an interesting post, actually). That's what a blog is to me now.
So...what about you? What makes a blog interesting for you, and (if you have a blog) how is your style different now compared to your earlier entries?

Well, I'm done with the blogging challenge! See you tomorrow, where I talk about celebratory things and plan for future challenges. =)

Hathaway House

Hey, sorry I haven't written in a while. It's not because I can't think of anything to post (that's usually what happens)...I've just been lazy. I have a bunch of things to write, and I promised myself I would write them this weekend. So...here we go. I'll just split the things into several posts because then it looks more productive. :)
First off, I wanted to say that my friends and I are putting on a play, called Haunting of Hathaway House. I can't remember who it's by....*grabs script*...ok, it's by John Murray, apparently. I haven't heard of it before we put it on, but I'm not really a script person (as you might've guessed from my "Script Frenzy" post), so that's not saying much. Our play is actually part of 3 one-act plays. I like the idea of a bunch of short plays, rather than one long play, if only because more people get to take part.
Hathaway House is sort of a ghost story, but it's not very typical for one. It's more about the atmosphere than the story, and the 3 scenes don't really connect all that much...well, they do, but not as much as one would think. It's pretty creepy, too...that's always a plus in my book!
I've been in two plays before, but it feels like the last one was ages ago...I've really missed it, so I was super excited when I was invited to take part. I love acting (although I don't know if I'd want to do it professionally). For me it's very much about making friends and having fun as well as the actual production. So...yay!
Wow, this post sounded so much better in my head...oh well, it's not horrible and it kind of makes sense. That's always good.