Gala for Metamorphoses is on Wed! I’ve been in the pool ( which they built onstage) so much I feel slightly water logged.
But mostly I am nervous. The rest of my life is sort of a blur leading up to the show opening.
Here’s some info if you want to come see it!:
http://www.newpaltz.edu/theatre/productions.html

More to come this week!

View of my street from a window where I live!

What’s not to like about Halloween in New Paltz?  Nothing that’s what. Halloween is quite the affair in New Paltz. I have never seen a town get so festive! Before I came to college I thought such town spirit only took place in TV towns like the Gilmore girl’s Starshallow. First off  everyone dresses up Everyone! I’m saying I once saw a pet goat (yes I said goat) was dressed up! There’s a huge Halloween parade that shuts down the whole of Main Street.   Being such an artsy town the costumes are beyond fantastic! After the parade people can go over to Hasbrouck park where they turn the entire park into a gigantic haunted house. This year the theme was Malice in Wonderland!  They do less scary kids version as well. As you may be aware New Paltz is home to Huguenot street the oldest street in America with the original structures still standing on it. Being the oldest street in a America it is bound to have some ghosts on it! You can take a tour of Haunted Huguenot street and hear all the ghost stories, be prepared to be spooked though! After you finish your tour and are ready for something yummy you can go to my favorite place and my next door neighbor the Bakery! The Bakery hosts a pumpkin contest and gives out free cider and pumpkin bread. There are kids and adult division to the competition with prizes given to the best painted, best carved and so on and so forth. They pitch a huge tent ( right outside my window!) and  set up tables for the pumpkins there is music. There were so many people my street got closed!

Things I’ve learned include do not try driving/ going to the Laundromat  during Halloween. Find another day to do your Laundry because with all the people something that would take you five minutes will take you 30 minutes!

After all that there are still shin dings to attend at people’s houses. My apartment hosted the theatre department for the night.

Pictures to come!

True life- I survived midterms week. This was with out a doubt the most stressful week of my semester thus far and will remain as such ( I hope so at least). I feel an overwhelming wash of relief now that they are D O N E.

I did nothing more than study, rehearsal, and work. I realized I had sunk to a new low when I was getting home from the library at 2:30 in the morning, showering and then putting on my clothes for the next day. That way when I woke up early , I could just roll out of bed and study. Definite low point.

More interesting stuff next week I promise

Everyone knows the best part of Gala is the free cheese.

Okay just kidding, but the free cheese is a huge draw. No really Gala is the night before the opening night of main stage shows where all Theatre majors and minors get a free ticket. Everyone gets fancy and has cookies juice and of course cheese after! Gala is the theatre major’s night to step back and breath a little after all the work that goes into putting up a show.

David and Anna looking quite radiant for the occasion.

Playwright Professor Jack Wade with Rachel! who played Angela ( and is doing a fab job at that!) and Director Professor Stephen Kitsakos pose together.

Jo’Lisa ( who plays Angela’s wise talking friend  Martha)  chats with the play’s choreographer Professor Yoav Kaddar. Even though the play was not a musical it is strongly influenced by music and movement from the time.

Me , Chris and Kristin. We are missing our other apartment mate Phil. We decided to dress 1940s style.

Sam was Master Carpenter on the play and Kelsey was Props Master.

Set designer  Professor Shelley Barish poses with technical director Sarah

Stage Manager Liz and Sound designer Renee glow after the performance.

Everyone is doing such an amazing job on this play! And if you are looking for some good theatre or just a way to kill a few hours go see Red Masquerade you will not regret it!

This week marked the world premier of Professor Jack Wade’s play Red Masquerade! In a throw back to one of my earlier entries you may remember the play follows the time lesbian photojournalist Angela Calomiris spent working as a spy during world war two and cold war era culminating as Angela Calomiris being a star witness in the famous Communist eleven trial.  In many ways like our own country Angela finds herself torn between extremes on the right while attempting to maintain her equilibrium somewhere in the middle.Parallels between our own time and the cold war are both striking and a true cause for us to reflect.

Here’s something cool about the play Angela was a real person. After the trial ended she wrote a book and became a lecturer about Communism in America. Even cooler however is that playwright Professor Wade knew her!  When she passed away in 1995 Jack inherited a ton of her photographs and articles she saved. As one of the dramaturge on the play this was some sort of heaven. Earlier in the semester my flatmate and co-dramaturge ( he also assistant directed and is the wardrobe supervisor) spent hours pouring through original documents. She kept every single clipping! Even napkins from book parties. I think my favorite thing we unearthed though was a little sheet of paper that had a not so nice thing written on it to her. It just made her so real that she would keep something like that for all those years. To me it represented that she did feel, have remorse that it wasn’t just a clean cut decision to testify. To see more of my Dramaturge work I helped put up some display cases in the library along with the museum who has some great pictures from the photo league.

EVERYONE SHOULD GO SEE THIS FANTASTIC PLAY! For more info go to:

http://www.newpaltz.edu/artsnews/news.cfm?id=4950

I’m going to post pictures from the Gala in another entry!

Thanks for reading!

My morning in mohonk mountain adventure was born out of Metamorphoses rehearsal. We were all sharing our inspiration for our characters when my friend David mentioned Split Rock to our director. She became very interested in the spot and wanted to see pictures of it. David volunteered to go into the mountains early in the morning and take pictures. Both my friend Pat and myself also volunteered. David borrowed my camera to take pictures for Nancy so all photo credits go to Pat!

Wednesday morning was just one of those textbook examples of what fall should be with the scent of it and the colors of it just penetrating through straight to your center. There is nothing better than Autumn in New Paltz (though I might feel differently come spring).  There is nothing better than spending time with friends somewhere beautiful.

As I’ve mentioned before, I am a declared double major in Theatre (performance concentration) and Communication Disorders. I knew right when I came in this is what I wanted to do, though I have not been unwavering in it. Being a double major in two 52 credits major has been tough and sometimes certain professors have been less than supportive. But for every naysayer professor I have received an overwhelming amount of support from at least three others. My professors in theatre have been beyond incredible in their support of my dual major. I do not know what I would do without Dr. Turk who is my communication disorder’s major advisor. I bug her at least once a month about credits and classes. She always makes time to sit and help me no matter what crazy hair brain scheme I’m throwing out there. In my comdis major though Professor Bower is my ultimate inspiration. Every time I get frustrated and question why am I making myself crazy with the two majors she reminds me. I hope every one gets to experience a professor as special as she in their time in college. My friends too are fantastic, when I melt down from the stress they are always there for me. They also remind me to let go and have fun when I’m being too uptight about it. I must say though my parents are my driving force. When I went to college is when I truly learned to appreciate them. They are phenomenal in the amount of faith they put into me is faith I don’t deserve. I’m so afraid of disappointing them.
Apart from all the positive things which help me through there was an negative experience which makes me work so hard credit wise. I had a professor tell me during orientation that the completion of a double major in communication disorders and theatre was impossible. I would have to choose between my passion and what was practical or I might be in college for the next five to six years.
Wrong.
For the past two years now, I have never had a credit load lower than 17 credits since my freshmen semester where I was still at 15. I’ve also taken summer classes for the past two summers. Winning a scholarship last year and the unparalleled support of my parents has allowed me to take the extra classes during the summer. This summer in addition to working here I was taking 12 credits. And luckily with New Paltz’s credit transfer policy I was able to receive quite a few credits for college and AP courses from high school. I came in with a semester done. That being said I am now a semester ahead and looking to study abroad the last semester of my senior year, if I’m allowed to. I want to study abroad in Spain and take courses that have nothing to do with either theatre or communication disorders.
Right now the idea I’ve been throwing around in my head ( totally apt to change) for post college is take the two majors and combining them. Writing a thesis on the effect of certain acting techniques on people with disfluency. But I’m not really certain about what it is I want to do when I graduate anymore. I’m learning to be okay with that ambiguity.
But I guess all I’m really saying is a double major while crazy is possible and don’t let any one else tell you otherwise!