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Gabriel Caro |
self-medicate |
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March 28, 2002 Thursday morning. A glorious day, finally sunny. My parents are going to come to Boston today from Framingham to visit. It will be interesting to have them both at the same time in my Lilliputian apartment. My dad will absolutely love the North End, and he’ll be making friends left and right. And my mom will also enjoy spending time with me, as I will with her. As I was frantically cleaning my place last night, I found a bunch of books that I had forgotten I own. There’s an interesting series of books by Taschen about theater production, costumes, lighting, and stage managing. The semester is rapidly drawing to a close. I’m going to miss taking the acting class, which is something I’ve never said, I don’t think, of any other class before.
April 2, 2002 It has been hard to write entries to the journal during break. Why is that? Things have been moving along in a strange way. Spring is here, and people start behaving differently. Everybody opens up, and becomes more receptive to everything around them. Or at least, that’s what I would like to think. Kim spoke at church on Sunday about forgiveness, and it being the first step in loving thy neighbor. The service was uncommonly Christian for a Unitarian Universalist service. I guess many historical figures can teach us about forgiveness, Jesus included. No matter how one feels about him, or through what ideological filter one chooses to see his significance. Thinking about the biography of my character has been very interesting, as it kicks your imagination to full gear. You can write a small book about somebody who you’ve made up. I suppose that is what writers count on to pay the bills. But it is interesting to start from the character instead of from the plot, or storyline. For my other class I’m doing a small animated film based on Bizet’s Carmen. I’m animating a ribbon dancing to “Habanera”, and at the end the ribbon engulfs itself on fire in celebration. All done with computer animation and special effects. I have to storyboard this to the class, and I hope they don’t think it’s too outrageous.
April 11, 2002 STRAIGHT ACTING It’s been a while since I last wrote something here. Last week we had an interesting (acting) class. We spent some time discussing the trials and tribulations of being a stage actor, how they never ever have jobs, how when they do the pay sucks, etc. This was balanced though with a good discussion about how being an actor is not really about the money, and how a lot of people just do it to have fun. This is the reason why I took the class, to have fun. To talk, touch, share, and observe other people in different situations. That is a luxury that in its simplicity we have forgotten. After the discussion and some personal stories we agreed to improvise a scene where all of our characters would be interacting. Since most of us were playing wackos, it was natural that the setting for such encounter be the Park Street T Stop in downtown Boston. If you want to see real theater on a daily basis, go there. After the class Summer, Joseph, Josh and I had dinner, which was delightful. Then us boys went to Harvest for a couple of drinks. Joseph wanted to share what he had written about his character, Ruth, with us. He had written a complete biographical sketch in the form of an interview. I thought that structurally it was wonderful. He really got into the character and built some marvelous circumstances for her. I suggested that if his character is neurotic, as it seems to be, his style of writing ought to be more scattered. He thought it was a nice idea. Josh accused him of too much of Joseph showing through. Although he did so in a polite way, I did not agree with him, and neither did Joseph. Thinking about it, Josh strikes me as somebody who’s still very much trying to get the acceptance that his father never gave him, as a result, he tends to have very high, when not unreasonable expectations about himself. Freud has left the building… Speaking of slips, the teacher for my other class, whom shall remain nameless, wrote in his review of my homework, perhaps by mistake: “Good job. Love you.” This is both hysterically funny, and very inappropriate. Somehow it’s been one of the funniest things that has happened to me in the past month. I am still debating what monologue to do. Tony Kushner looms, and there are brilliant parts in that play, but I just read Edward Albee’s The Zoo Story and kind of fell in love with it. I may do that instead, in the principle that I should think OUTSIDE the box and not play somebody who’s gay. Act straight, if you will. I can’t believe I just wrote that. That will be the title of this journal entry. I’ve been reading Stanislavski, and find him too pedantic. I wonder if it’s related to the time and style when he wrote these books. I am having the hardest time getting into them. Ugh! |
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© Copyright 2003 Gabriel E. Caro |
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![[Lucian Freud]](images/Freud.jpg)
