“Shannon?” sophomore Kayleen Nordyke said.
“How about Anonymous?” said sophomore Natalie Standridge.
“No you can do so much better!” Nordyke said.
A shout from Sara Capule, the drama teacher and director, quiets the room in a flash.
“PEACE!” Capule said.
“PEACE MAN!” the whole cast yells back, almost repeating it as though it were a routine.
And then the happy- go- lucky atmosphere becomes a hard-working one, as everyone rushed to do their assigned tasks. They turn to the board with all the leftover names listed for roles, and begin to flip through their script to find the lines. Most of the members of the cast go to the corners of the room and become their role, acting out various gestures that go along with their scene. Some sit in a chair in deep thought, pondering their next move to portray the characters. Others joke around about what role they’ll get next.
This is not what you’d first think about a behind the scenes look at a cast of supposed strangers playing emotional dramatic roles.
You’d expect a awkward atmosphere considering they are all strangers, and nobody really knowing each other at first glance. And when such a delicate play comes into the mix, in this case the “Laramie Project,” which comes out on November 16th, and has a cast of twenty six people; is based on a real life murder of a gay man in a small town, not many people would have the courage to talk to one another in the cast, and just focus on the play. People don’t realize the effect and work put into the process of this play, and how much they try to bring everything together in so little time.
But the cast of this rendition of the Laramie Project says otherwise.
“Everyone in the cast is very friendly, however because we haven’t known each other very long yet, we are working on building our relationships,” sophomore Esther Chang said. “But because this is an emotional play, we want to make sure we all have each other’s backs and support, which is probably why we are all so close.”
Hima Tammineni, a sophomore, another member of the play, and now a closer friend of Chang, says the same thing when it comes to the cast.
“Everyone gets along, I know some of us are still trying to get to know one another, but the cast still generally gets along with each other.” Tammineni said.
So the rehearsal continues onwards, and the auditions for additional roles starts. People are slowly being called up one by one to do a rendition of how they would play that extra character. And even though there are less roles then there are people, everyone is still giving tips to one another. Not even trying to help themselves, but helping their fellow castmates along the way to becoming a better actor. The rehearsal finally ends with everyone having been read for their roles, hoping that they’ll all get it. They all leave, saying each other with goodbyes as they leave to go home, even though they see everyone of them tomorrow at the same time —
3:08 p.m., in F104, till 5:30 p.m.
According to Chang, people may not see the hard work and effort that each and every member puts into the play. They stick together through and through, from set bonding and building, to even the simplest acts like today, where individuals members of the cast helped one another with picking out a role they had wanted to play. Not only during every rehearsal do they work on every aspect to improve their acting and others, but they bond together as a group, a second family.
So what’s really behind the scenes of a rehearsal of the Laramie Play?
It’s simple really. A group of 26 people, who are strangers, yet somehow family. When the play comes out on November 16th, most students will sit in the audience watching what they’re supposed to. They’ll be unaware of all that occurs behind the curtain.
