It's All About... Trust.
So we had Drama yesterday. To try building chemistry between all of us to get ready for our production, the seniors had us playing a trust game which included trust falling. I’m alright with trust games (we did them in NAS, so I’m used to it and have no problems placing my trust in a fellow actor) and so was my partner, who told me that she trusted me. Some of the others had a little more difficulty doing the game, but that was expected.
Well, moving on from the trust game, we also had some improv exercises which I won’t talk about since they were pretty lengthy and tough to explain. All I’ll say is that I still suck at improv, but hopefully that won’t be too much of an issue with me.
After all the exercises and whatnot, we all sat down to discuss the production pieces, the themes of which were “Star-crossed Lovers” and “Father and Child”. One of our seniors (you do realize by now that I won’t be revealing names, right?) who studies Psychology told us all to close our eyes, choose one theme that we had experienced before and focus on a moment when it affected us the most, concentrating on every emotion we felt, every word that was said in that moment. We would then be sharing our stories with the club. Of course, anyone who felt that they couldn’t fully trust the group just yet was somewhat excused from the sharing session, but only one person did so, saying that she didn’t feel close enough to the group. Now, I definitely won’t be saying what anyone else said, because I totally understand that it’s all very personal, plus I wouldn’t appreciate it if someone else were to tell others about my story either.
Another guy, (let’s call him ‘Hans’ for now, it’s close enough to his real name anyway) had left the room to answer a phone call during the period of time when we were all concentrating on our stories. Anyway, here’s a bit about him: He’s weird, in a nutshell. Every time he gets called up to act, he puts on this fake American accent that never ever suits the scene. Come on, I like to imitate accents and all, but his is so fake that anyone, and I mean anyone, would be hard-pressed to believe that he really does talk like that. And believe me when I say that he does not typically talk like that. It’s only when he has to act. Does he think that this accent makes him seem like a better actor? Or maybe he thinks that he seems cooler like that? Or maybe he thinks we’ll be in awe of his accent ‘skills’ and give him the respect he does (not) deserve? Well, sorry ‘Hans’, not working. He’s a year 3 (thank God) Law student, and every single time he comes in he does this strange martial arts thing. During breaks, or whenever he gets called up to act, he does martial arts. It’s pretty cool that he’s learnt many different kinds of martial arts, but in my humble opinion, if he wants to come in to the Drama Club and do martial fucking arts, I just wanna say, “Bitch please, get out. Go join the Taekwondo Club or something.” *Goes into full-rant mode* If you’re in the Drama Club, you act. You do not do martial arts, because you look like a fool doing it and it does not get you any respect. Plus, it actually scares us. Can you imagine acting onstage with some idiot who links everything, and I mean everything, to martial arts? Nobody, and I mean nobody, wants to act with him. We juniors only pair up with him sometimes because our seniors force us into it. Nobody will willingly pair up with him for anything. Maybe I’m mean, I’m being a total bitch and whatever, but sorry, I’m really just stating the truth. Plus, he’s considered a junior because he joined this year, and yet he seems to think that he has the right to diss everyone’s acting but his (ooh, I haven’t even ripped his acting apart yet, I’m looking forward to it) and even challenges the seniors’ instructions sometimes too! I don’t treat the seniors like they’re divine beings or whatever, we’re friends, not very close, but friends, and I certainly don’t try challenging the authority they have as our seniors, because I respect them. And yet, this is a concept that ‘Hans’ seems to have an issue with. Does he expect to get respect when he clearly does not bother to give it to others who are far more deserving of it? Bitch please, I’ll only give you the respect I think you deserve.
Back to story. ‘Hans’ came back into the room when most were already sharing their stories, many breaking down because it was extremely personal for them. You have to understand that we had to get the most emotional memory we had to share, because the emotions we went through would most definitely come in handy if we could tap into them for the production. Anyway, we heard many very personal stories, most of which, like mine, were about the “Father and Child” theme. I somehow think that yesterday’s session was like a sounding board for our emotions, and I know I saw many masks crack while their owners shared what they had to say.
When it came to ‘Hans’, he told us first that his story actually had nothing to do with either theme, and so our senior (who is our production director, and was leading yesterday’s session) told him not to share it if it was irrelevant to the themes. I still can’t believe what happened
next. [NOTE: Swearing starts here]
He fucking interrupted her and said that we should hear him out. And then, he said that listening to our stories was boring. Fucking boring! I wanted so badly to just stand up and scream at him, but I was literally frozen with shock and anger. It seemed that everyone else was too, but our senior-director was furious. She calmly asked him to repeat what he said, and he fucking did, without any remorse or shame. That unfeeling bastard. She then (I love her for this) told him that he was ‘fucking rude’ and that he had ‘left the room while everyone was working on their stories, and you didn’t do anything, and then you listen to everyone sharing their personal stories and you say it’s boring?!” I wanted to slap him. I wanted to slap his arrogant, insensitive, uncaring, annoying, retarded, FUGLY face with a brick. One of the guys actually looked like he wanted to beat ‘Hans’ up, bless him. :’)
Yes, I’m being hateful, but think for a second. If YOU were sharing something very personal to you, something that you decided to trust others with, and you were reliving the whole memory, feeling every feeling as if it were for the first time, and you were doing everything you could to stop yourself from breaking down, and trying to keep some shred of control in you, and this bloody prick just comes and tells you that listening to you share your story, your memory, your feelings, is boring, I can tell you you’d be wanting to rip his throat out too.
And he still fucking wanted to share HIS story. I was thinking something along the lines of “FUCK NO, YOU BITCH.” And it seemed that I was most definitely not alone in my thinking, since most of our actors all had similar looks of disbelief and hate on their faces. He said how he couldn’t bring himself to actually care about anything and all that, but honestly, that didn’t give him the right to insult our memories like that. Nobody has the right to insult a person’s feelings or memories, ever.
So we just went on with the sharing, ignoring him, and well, I shared mine too, about my dad and I. I’m not proud to say that I completely broke down in the middle of my sharing, but I felt that I could trust the other members to understand and refrain from making judgment. You can ask me to tell you my story, but I just won’t be posting this online, because, (how should I put this??), it would probably make me sound like some emotionally unstable little girl, which is not who I am. I just get really, really emotional when I have to talk about stuff like this.
I’m sorry that this post turned out to be more of a ranting session than anything else, but hey, it’s a blog. It’s bound to contain some personal stuff anyway.
Well, moving on from the trust game, we also had some improv exercises which I won’t talk about since they were pretty lengthy and tough to explain. All I’ll say is that I still suck at improv, but hopefully that won’t be too much of an issue with me.
After all the exercises and whatnot, we all sat down to discuss the production pieces, the themes of which were “Star-crossed Lovers” and “Father and Child”. One of our seniors (you do realize by now that I won’t be revealing names, right?) who studies Psychology told us all to close our eyes, choose one theme that we had experienced before and focus on a moment when it affected us the most, concentrating on every emotion we felt, every word that was said in that moment. We would then be sharing our stories with the club. Of course, anyone who felt that they couldn’t fully trust the group just yet was somewhat excused from the sharing session, but only one person did so, saying that she didn’t feel close enough to the group. Now, I definitely won’t be saying what anyone else said, because I totally understand that it’s all very personal, plus I wouldn’t appreciate it if someone else were to tell others about my story either.
Another guy, (let’s call him ‘Hans’ for now, it’s close enough to his real name anyway) had left the room to answer a phone call during the period of time when we were all concentrating on our stories. Anyway, here’s a bit about him: He’s weird, in a nutshell. Every time he gets called up to act, he puts on this fake American accent that never ever suits the scene. Come on, I like to imitate accents and all, but his is so fake that anyone, and I mean anyone, would be hard-pressed to believe that he really does talk like that. And believe me when I say that he does not typically talk like that. It’s only when he has to act. Does he think that this accent makes him seem like a better actor? Or maybe he thinks that he seems cooler like that? Or maybe he thinks we’ll be in awe of his accent ‘skills’ and give him the respect he does (not) deserve? Well, sorry ‘Hans’, not working. He’s a year 3 (thank God) Law student, and every single time he comes in he does this strange martial arts thing. During breaks, or whenever he gets called up to act, he does martial arts. It’s pretty cool that he’s learnt many different kinds of martial arts, but in my humble opinion, if he wants to come in to the Drama Club and do martial fucking arts, I just wanna say, “Bitch please, get out. Go join the Taekwondo Club or something.” *Goes into full-rant mode* If you’re in the Drama Club, you act. You do not do martial arts, because you look like a fool doing it and it does not get you any respect. Plus, it actually scares us. Can you imagine acting onstage with some idiot who links everything, and I mean everything, to martial arts? Nobody, and I mean nobody, wants to act with him. We juniors only pair up with him sometimes because our seniors force us into it. Nobody will willingly pair up with him for anything. Maybe I’m mean, I’m being a total bitch and whatever, but sorry, I’m really just stating the truth. Plus, he’s considered a junior because he joined this year, and yet he seems to think that he has the right to diss everyone’s acting but his (ooh, I haven’t even ripped his acting apart yet, I’m looking forward to it) and even challenges the seniors’ instructions sometimes too! I don’t treat the seniors like they’re divine beings or whatever, we’re friends, not very close, but friends, and I certainly don’t try challenging the authority they have as our seniors, because I respect them. And yet, this is a concept that ‘Hans’ seems to have an issue with. Does he expect to get respect when he clearly does not bother to give it to others who are far more deserving of it? Bitch please, I’ll only give you the respect I think you deserve.
Back to story. ‘Hans’ came back into the room when most were already sharing their stories, many breaking down because it was extremely personal for them. You have to understand that we had to get the most emotional memory we had to share, because the emotions we went through would most definitely come in handy if we could tap into them for the production. Anyway, we heard many very personal stories, most of which, like mine, were about the “Father and Child” theme. I somehow think that yesterday’s session was like a sounding board for our emotions, and I know I saw many masks crack while their owners shared what they had to say.
When it came to ‘Hans’, he told us first that his story actually had nothing to do with either theme, and so our senior (who is our production director, and was leading yesterday’s session) told him not to share it if it was irrelevant to the themes. I still can’t believe what happened
next. [NOTE: Swearing starts here]
He fucking interrupted her and said that we should hear him out. And then, he said that listening to our stories was boring. Fucking boring! I wanted so badly to just stand up and scream at him, but I was literally frozen with shock and anger. It seemed that everyone else was too, but our senior-director was furious. She calmly asked him to repeat what he said, and he fucking did, without any remorse or shame. That unfeeling bastard. She then (I love her for this) told him that he was ‘fucking rude’ and that he had ‘left the room while everyone was working on their stories, and you didn’t do anything, and then you listen to everyone sharing their personal stories and you say it’s boring?!” I wanted to slap him. I wanted to slap his arrogant, insensitive, uncaring, annoying, retarded, FUGLY face with a brick. One of the guys actually looked like he wanted to beat ‘Hans’ up, bless him. :’)
Yes, I’m being hateful, but think for a second. If YOU were sharing something very personal to you, something that you decided to trust others with, and you were reliving the whole memory, feeling every feeling as if it were for the first time, and you were doing everything you could to stop yourself from breaking down, and trying to keep some shred of control in you, and this bloody prick just comes and tells you that listening to you share your story, your memory, your feelings, is boring, I can tell you you’d be wanting to rip his throat out too.
And he still fucking wanted to share HIS story. I was thinking something along the lines of “FUCK NO, YOU BITCH.” And it seemed that I was most definitely not alone in my thinking, since most of our actors all had similar looks of disbelief and hate on their faces. He said how he couldn’t bring himself to actually care about anything and all that, but honestly, that didn’t give him the right to insult our memories like that. Nobody has the right to insult a person’s feelings or memories, ever.
So we just went on with the sharing, ignoring him, and well, I shared mine too, about my dad and I. I’m not proud to say that I completely broke down in the middle of my sharing, but I felt that I could trust the other members to understand and refrain from making judgment. You can ask me to tell you my story, but I just won’t be posting this online, because, (how should I put this??), it would probably make me sound like some emotionally unstable little girl, which is not who I am. I just get really, really emotional when I have to talk about stuff like this.
I’m sorry that this post turned out to be more of a ranting session than anything else, but hey, it’s a blog. It’s bound to contain some personal stuff anyway.
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