Performing "working" at I-Poly

So far, this month has been a busy one for me. I have been so busy of model assembly and final performances at my Mentorship, but nothing can compare to my independent component 1. As soon as thanksgiving break was over, the drama team went straight to work. it was the week of the performance and and everyone, including me, have to stay long hours on Monday and Tuesday to do the last dress rehearsals before the performance on Wednesday. During the last rehearsals, My drama teacher, Mr. Hogan, went through every scene of act 1 and 2 to make sure everyone had there lines down and all of the big choreography went well. During that time, many of the actors make some mistakes and we have to work on one particularly scene to get it right. As for me, Hogan told me that I just needed slow down my monologue since I speech so fast when it comes to presenting to someone and work a little bit more my movements of building blocks. Luckily I was getting a little bit help from my speech teacher name Diana Jimenez to help me to work on my speaking skill during my lunch time on couple of Thursdays for the last few months, which help me a lot.

Anyway, After long hours of dress rehearsals on Monday and Tuesday. The day of the performance finally came. Almost everyone one was nervous of how the play would go and Hogan told everyone that we work so hard on this and wish us luck. As soon as the play begin, I felt so much energy within me that I could do anything on stage. During the performance, every scene went very well, including the choreography scenes. When they got to my monologue scene, I felt little bit nervous at first but when I began, every line I said came out naturally for me since I was practicing my monologue a lot for the last few months. After the performance. Everyone was glad that the show went very well and everyone in the audience love it.  We then perform it again on Thursday and Saturday and it went better than I thought. Many people of the audience were giving complements to the drama team  for putting an outstanding performance. There were even some, including Mrs Ortega, who were complementing and congratulating me on my performance, which made me really happy. Even though the play is over, the drama team will be performing it again in March at the Fullerton Festival , which I can not wait for. This will give me and the others in the drama team the time to make performance even better.

Everyone is busy to get everything done before the next day of the performance. As you can see, you can see Shoemaker working really hard to get the truck prop done and it was a lot of work for him. Luckily he had help.

On the last day of the dress rehearsal, Hogan was giving some points to everyone to see if any of us needs to improve something in our scene and giving us notes of what to expect tomorrow for the performance.

Everyone on the stage was doing pretty well and the way we were singing was awesome, I couldn't believe that we can sing really good on the performance seen we kind of sing horrible during rehearsals. But everything went well.

This is the scene where I do my monologue as a stone mason.while pretending to build a wall out of brinks. The way of the position I was in, it kind  look like I was doing a hamlet scene of to be or not to be, which is kind of funny because I did a monologue of it last year. 

This was technically the ending scene of the show. This was the the difficult one for us for this scene, since we only practice it only a few weeks before the play, but before you know, it turn out very well at the end.

Another Picture of me doing my monologue.

This was the scene of end of act one where everyone comes in together to sing the song called 'If I could've been"

This was the pamphlet of our play that was given to everyone who came to the play.

Final Performances of "The Best Christmas Pageant Ever."

During the weekends of December, My Mentor, Paul Larson, and the whole group of the play had been busy of working and performing the play that they had been working on in the last two months. They made sure that everything went smoothly during the play and everyone new exactly what they were doing. As for me, I pretty much stay back stage to see if they need any help, but most of the crew got everything under control. Not only that, I was able to observe the actors getting ready before going on stage and what they need to do. Some of the actors, including My mentor's assistant directors, Dona Rice And Lisa Lanier, gave me some helpful acting tips that I can use to do better in my acting skills and help me to answers my EQ later on. Finally on 12/21, which was the last performance of the play, my mentor decide to let me be up in the light booth to see a better view of the play. During the performance, I get to see how well the actors were doing on stage and by the looks of it, they have really improve a lot ever since the rehearsals. I did notice that some of the actors forgot to say a few lines that I remember during the rehearsals and one of the actors sound sick, since that actor was sick, but they kept going on through the play and didn't stop which really amazes me of how actors would continue on and act like nothing happen and the audience will never know, which is all part of being an actor.  What really hit me was at the end of the scene where they talk about what Christmas is really all about and it hit me right in the heart and I kind of feel a little emotion of how well the actors were describing of what Christmas is all about. After that, everyone congratulate one another and my Mentor gave a speech to everyone of how well they have done since the last two and a hal months  and wish  us a merry Christmas. Even though the play is over, I am going to continue on helping the chino community theater to get more better understanding of acting and learn more from my mentor who is willing to help me to continue in the theater.

Just to let you know, I was unable to take picture of the performance of the play, but luckily my Mentor was happy enough to send me some pictures of the performances of the play that were taken by professional photographers that he hired, so yeah that was pretty awesome of him for doing this for me.

Usually before they perform, it is tradition for the whole team of the play to gather round to form a circle to do what my mentor call it the "energy circle". what it is that everyone forms a circle and hold hands. My Mentor dose is that he starts the energy circle by squeezing the the left hand of the person that s next of to him and continues to do the same thing to the other. once everyone heads gets there hand squeeze and comes back to my mentor, everyone lift up there hands to the air and make a screams to cheer everyone up. My mentor told me that the purpose of doing this is to fell everyone energy so that way they'll have the confidence to do better on stage. 

My Mentor gave a few points of what to do during the performance and not to be worry if the performance doesn't go well. And he also said the most important thing while doing a play is to have fun, which made everyone cheer up.

Evryone in the light booth, including my mentor who is wearing the red shirt< are making sure that all sound and lights are working fined before the performance begins.

Looking down of the audience and it looks like its a full house.

This is suppose to be act 1 scene 1 where these two actors playing two characters name Alice (left) and maxine (right) who were complaining about the trouble making kids called the Herdmans who cause a lot of trouble in the neighborhood. The way they were speaking to one another makes the audience believe that they are actually complaining. 

This Act 1 scene 6 where the Heardmans plan to make the Christmas Pageant with there own ideas, which could lead to disaster. I like it how they were presenting to the audience without turning there backs and make it look like they are huddling together to share there ideas.

This is one of the scene of act 1 where the adults were worrying about that the heardmans are in the play and might ruin it. I like it how the way they were expressing how they feel and look like they are miserable and concern, which is good acting since they they want the audience to believe.

This was the ending of the play where every actor comes out to the stage to bow down to the audience and here the audience applauding to them. If you are wondering what they are doing, they are waving to the audience.

During 15 minutes of intermission, My mentor, who is the one with the red shirt, perform a ukulele Christmas songs with a group of people he was working with for a while. It true of what some of the people in the theater told me, he is a very talented man. 

On the next day after the the last performance on 12/21. I help my mentor and the team to take down all of the sets of the play since there was another play that will be needing the stage soon.

This is the posters of the play which turn out really great. I'm sure going to miss the people I work with in this play and made friends, but I am going to continue helping the theater and hopefully see some of the people I work with and make new friends.