Interviewer: Maggie Hall
Maggie Hall: So, We The People, is obviously a very different show from traditional show structure, so why did you choose to audition? Kwani Taylor: You start? Ricky Hall: I’ll go, um, I chose to do it because I think it’s almost, it’s really different in the way that it’s constructed and I knew that it would be a challenge for us. I knew that it would be a challenge for me in particular because in regular theater you are used to “the norm”, which is you go in for the audition, you do some work of a famous playwright, or you sing, and you get cast from that audition. But I knew coming into this that it would be me as an actor, just being solely me and the issues and the prose that I have with them. Q: For me, it’s kind of like the plays that we do, the context they were written in, kind of like The Wizard of Oz, like it was written about the populus era, and with The Crucible it was written about communism and things of that nature, but nothing is really about what we’re going through now. The fact that we got to write our own monologues and then start writing scenes based around things that we experience every single day, it was kind of like a new experience as an actor, to actually write the thing you’re doing and then see it come to life, and about “the now” instead of being in the past. M: Thank you, and so, I know that a lot of people who auditioned going in didn’t know to the full extent that Ms. Dillard was planning this, with the site specific acting and things. What was your first reaction learning about the many facets of this show? Q: Well, I was the stage manager of MacB, so me and Ms. Dillard got a bit closer. So it was last year that I figured out what she was trying to do and she showed me the script. The We The People script that she showed me, she actually did for her high school. She told me the idea, and I was just surprised because a lot of the plays, we kind of like to do it in the auditorium and have a professional setting and have people sit down, we have ticket sales, and we are incorporating a bunch of tech. I thought about it, and I was like, I like having the feeling that this is acting in the now. In Actor’s Ensemble, we go through this Suzuki period, where you’re not acting, you have to act with nothingness. And you don’t always need a bunch of lights and sound cues and like a huge production for somebody to feel something. And I think that’s what we want, for people to feel something. We want people to get uncomfortable. We want people to feel comfortable. We want people to relate to the things we’re speaking about. And that’s what I really liked about it. R: Yeah, on top of that, like the honesty, when she initially told us, I’m not gonna lie with you, it intrigued me. It kinda scared me. I didn’t know to what...my biggest worry was that we would struggle with just the nature of the play and its honesty. And I knew that we, were mastering it now. We are slowly getting in that rehearsal process where we’re breaking it down and it’s just so natural. It feels like us, teenagers, portraying what we know as Enloe. M: That’s really cool. So what has been your favorite part of the process so far? Q: Probably hearing everybody else’s ideas, because literally when we first came in for the first rehearsal there was.. R: (laughs) Nothing. Q: (laughs) Nothingness. We all each had our own monologues of course and they’re not exactly incorporated but Dillard kind of had a few ideas from the monologues that she wanted to do. So we were like okay, there’s ten scenes. What do we wanna’ do, what do we wanna’ tell the audience in these ten scenes. And I think just coming up with everything and we had a blank slate and everybody else’s ideas and hearing everybody else’s...kinda being contributed into it. Like there was freshman and seniors, we were all like going in and saying like ‘Okay, yes we can do this. No, that’s not the best idea.’ And just that creative process, that peer communication, that was my favorite part. R: Right, I liked the fact that it’s twenty actors. That excited me because just looking at the cast list…a lot of people have never done an Enloe production, and this was really their moment to, I don’t know, just like, be in one. Because it was so natural and honest, of us getting that outlet for them, I think that, the twenty actors that she’s chosen, collaborate well together, they’re individual thinkers, which is fun. So that’s, that’s probably the best part. M: So, flipside, what has been the most difficult part of the process thus far? R: Ah...writing? Writing, because we came to the script with absolutely nothing, it was a lot of ideas were thrown around and Ms. Dillard did such a great job facilitating that, but like, having nothing and all of your ideas coming as one, it was, we wanted it to be honest. I know we say that word a lot, but it’s because if it’s not honest, people won’t buy into it and we really want people to be moved with the bare minimum. Q: The ideas that we started with, and there’s ten scenes, and there’s three writers each scene, so you only get one scene to write. And it’s kind of like, okay but, we kinda decide, we put on a sheet from about one to three, which one we would like to write the most. And, seeing another scene, you had this idea in your mind about what this scene should be about, there’s two diversity scenes, and it’s like I kinda wanted to contribute, but I don’t wanna take away from these other three writers, and they’re doing an amazing job, and I also have another idea that might be able to work just as well. And, just seeing everybody, kind of, making it their own. That was kind of difficult for me, just because everybody has this set idea in their mind about what they’re going to be doing and what they’re going to be writing. And um, just, like I said, my favorite part and the worst part was just the peer collaboration. M: Thank you so much. Okay, I know that Ms. Dillard, in the interview that I had with her, mentioned something about rotating shows? Is that, are there any updates on that? Do we know if that’s happening? Q: Um, I had an idea. I have a very extensive,(R and Q both laugh), a very extensive way of doing it, we just need to, just the blocking is going to be very important because they are site specific, so we can’t have two crowds running into each other. So once we finish blocking everything, and once we, all of the, ‘cause we just confirmed which actors are gonna’ be in which scenes, like it’s been, everything’s been going so fast, so we just confirmed which actors are gonna’ be in each scene, and you can kind of create it like that. But, you have to make sure that the two crowds don’t clash, and then there does have to be an intermission and some of the scenes are a bit longer, some are shorter, so it’s going to have to be fluently done, but I think all of the great minds in Enloe’s acting and technical programs, we can get it done if we want to, so, just because the first scene has to have everybody in it, because the first scene has all of the actors in it, so everyone has to watch it, and then the last scene also has all of the actors in it, so there can’t exactly be two shows at the same time. So if we do have two crowds, they’re gonna’ have to come in together and watch the first scene and then split off somehow. It can be done. ‘Cause it has been done before and I think we could be the school to do it. R: Yeah, and what we’re working so hard on are, right now, doing simply that. Making it seamless for the audience because I’m sure, as an audience member, this intrigues people, they have questions to ask, but I mean, what we’re working everyday, is to create this seamless experience for people and our transitions, and our collaboration, and just, it’s the type of theater where we wanna involve the audience a bit more.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
The Eagle's EyeBest of the Nest since 1981 Archives
January 2018
|