Warm Return

Hello, all!

As I'm sure you all (AKA the one person who probably reads this) know, it's been a year since my last post. My apologies; there's just been so much going on. Here's a nice, concise review for you:

- We performed Arsenic and Old Lace, directed by my friend Rachel Plantz, in which I played the drunk surgeon Dr. Herman Einstein.
- We also performed Father of the Bride, and I was lucky enough to secure the title character!
- You remember my close friend Crystal, from my last post? We went to Prom together. and I asked her out less than a week later. Just a week and a half ago, we celebrated our one-year anniversary :) I love that girl.
- School let out, and I wasted a good portion of my summer (Which is a very important thing to do!)
- School got back in, and I got some very challenging courses added for my Senior year. I can't complain much, though, since I signed up for them!
-Our new tech director, Mr. Kaiser, put on the show I Never Saw Another Butterfly as part of his Masters thesis from UNC. It was an amazing performance.
- We performed The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, and I was the "Comfort Counselor" Mitch Mahoney, as well as Logainne's gay father Dan Schwartz and Olive Ostrovsky's father.
- We went to the Thespian Conference in Denver, which was very enjoyable. We saw a performance of Spelling Bee there, and it was different enough that we could compare the things we liked that they'd changed and what we didn't.
- In the Spring, we performed The Sting (yes, like the film). After doing a small-cast play, our director Mrs. Estrada went back to a big one. And I mean huge. I was the Co-Assistant Directer as well as FBI Special Agent Polk. I got to fire a gun! Granted, it was fake, but it was LOUD.
- My girlfriend Crystal and her best friend Lindsay student-directed the play The Education of Angels. Considering the small amount of time we had to get it all together, along with zero budget, we did an amazing job! I played Dave, an obsessive-compulsive guy who's about to get married and gets some help from above.
- In theatre class, Crystal, Lindsay, Jillian (our main costume lady), and I vented our own personal problems about Estrada after we finished a pointless project she had us do (FYI, we don't like her teaching "style" all that much). Some of the comments: she's deceptively hateful, she doesn't really teach us anything about acting, she gets in over her head, she's a self-centered hypocrite, she's never on top of things... the list is infinite. I personally hope that Kaiser replaces her in theatre. His play, Butterfly, also had a short time frame to be put on, and it was phenomenal. He's a great teacher, who knows what the heck he's doing.

Anyhow, that's the review. School's about over, we're just about two weeks from graduation. I'll miss some things from this school; other things, not so much. I'm gonna be going to the University of South Dakota in the fall, and possibly major in theatre :) maybe minor, though, so I can earn a Bachelor's degree that will allow me to get a real job haha. They also have something called the "Student Theatre Cooperative" which is theatre run by students. I definitely planned to get involved in that!

Until next time!

Take a Breath

Another one of my ideas, which came to me just a little while ago, is a musical about Cystic Fibrosis. For those of you who don't know, Cystic Fibrosis (CF) is a genetic disease that affects your respiratory, digestive, and reproductive systems. I was born with CF, and it's been a handicap of mine. Anyway, recently I was listening to my iPod, and a couple different songs came on that got me thinking about it. My thoughts got to roaming, and I wondered aloud, "Why not make a musical about CF?"

So that's what I'm doing. The basic story is a boy's transformation to a man, while dealing with problems like school, relationships, and most importantly, his Cystic Fibrosis. When he dies at a young age, his family and friends realize that they should live their lives as he did, loving every minute - because you never know when your time will be up.

At the moment, I am taking a hiatus from working on "Breathe". I am trying to focus on my most prominent piece right now, but I will most definitely finish "Breathe".