theatre reflection

I’ve been involved in theatre for one whole year, and I have learned and improved a lot during this on-year experience. In the beginning, I took Dramatic Arts during which I start my journey of studying theatre. I learned about many aspects of theatre including monologues, technical theatre, and directing etc. Also, I participated in our winter musical Footloose, although I was only in ensemble, the experience still means a lot to me because I understood how a musical was rehearsed and how satisfying it is see the result which everyone was devoted to. Then I did the spring show Fifteen Squared which was the first time I did playwriting. Because the that show was completely original, it requires more creativity and commitment, and I
Took more responsibilities this time. Because of the great experience in school, I decided to study more about theatre in the summer so I went to the theatre program at Columbia University which was fascinating. We spent six hours each day to learn about different aspects including acting, directing and playwriting. And for the final show we divided ourselves into different groups and each group needed to come up with their own original 10-minute play. This experience definitely helps me gain more knowledge and confidence in theatre, also, I become more passionate about theatre and desire to explore more about it.

There are so many great things about theatre, and one that appealing to me the most about theatre is that it is not a subject that only requires talents, but you have to be interested and devoted to it. In fact, if you shows great dedication, they will gain impressive improvements instantly. From my experience, during this summer, I was focused on honing my acting skills, so I attend different acting workshops. Before, I was nervous to present my selves on the stage, but I constantly challenge myself by seizing every opportunities to perform in front of my teachers and classmates even if it’s just a small monologue practice. Although my performance still needs to be improved a lot, I find myself not afraid to perform anymore which is truly rewarding for me.

In my opinion, the most challenging part of theatre as a performer is that you have to embrace mistakes which is not very easy. There is no single performance that is perfect, so everyone has to make mistakes in order to improve based on the experience from mistakes. But it can be frustrating at first. I remember that when I was rehearsing for the final performance for the summer program, I could not express my character completely, so my scene took a long time to rehearse because every time the director had to stop me and ask what my intention was or why did I say this at this time. I was afraid that it wasted too much time for my group, and because I have to worry if the director will stop me again or not so I was depressed. But my teaching assistant told me that it is not embarrassing to make mistakes, instead, it helps the performance to be better and no one will blame me for trying different things. So I decided to listen to him and started to analyze my character. Eventually, I finished my rehearsal and felt satisfied.

In this year, I want to improve my acting skills mainly and also want to work on directing which I haven’t learn a lot about.
- Participate in class more, be confident to share my perspectives
- Watch more plays and analyze
- try different characters
- try to playwright