So, I’m following all you lovely folks on Tumblr, and I’ve decided I want to keep up with you and keep blogging, just about my mundane every day life instead of my Chicago experience. I got a new Tumblr, which is

ebullientblues.tumblr.com 

I will attempt to follow all of you! Follow me, too! I won’t be posting here anymore, but feel free to come back and visit and read. Love you all!

Hopefully, this will be my last post on this specific blog. All that’s left is the showcase and the actual Comedy Studies farewell. It’s been a month, so perhaps I’ve gained a little perspective on the whole experience? I can’t believe it was only 5 months ago that I was starting this blog. It all flew by so fast. What a brief, beautiful moment.

At the end of Comedy Studies, I was really struggling. I felt like the showcase didn’t show what I had been doing at Comedy Studies, and everything I had learned. How could a few scenes encompass the wonder that was The Second City? At a certain point, I felt like a lot of us, especially myself, felt swamped by the process, and it’s hard to tell if what you’re doing is even funny anymore. It really shows how lucky Second City is to develop their shows in front of an audience. More on this later. I also was left feeling like I didn’t belong, like this wasn’t for me, and that this kind of process didn’t thrill me at all.

Before the final showcase, we all had personal evaluations with our teachers. This was something a lot of people were dreading, but I was super excited about it, because honestly, I love to hear how I can improve.

• Gellman noted that I shouldn’t let outside shit into the performance space, and he found that my ‘dress rehearsal’ performances were more energetically on than my actual performances of scenes in his class. 
• I knew it would happen; Norm was the first to make me cry. He told me I was a joy to have in class, and to never lose my curiosity. He also said I needed to stop being so enamored and take charge of my art, because ‘you belong here.’ I started bawling! 
• Jet said that I was a great person to direct, because I had no walls up, but that I needed to bring more choices as an artist.
• Andy gave me a huge compliment, and said I was the most engaged person he’s ever had in a class, and that I listen and articulate so that I help others learn. He also agreed that I needed to work on me, and not worry about being responsible for anyone else, and for my next project to be about me. 
• Anne agreed and told me it was ok to crush creativity once in a while, and that directing might be something for me to look into. And that everyone would be there for me.

It was so wonderful to hear that I’m on the right track, and I’m not a screwup. I think most of all, I’m going to miss those wonderful fantastic people I was lucky enough to call my teachers. I’m tearing up just thinking about them. 

Opening night was great. The place was buzzing with energy. OUR energy, as well as the knowledge that we’d be performing on a stage where tons of our idols have performed in front of the people we cared about most. We’d worked hard, and we could barely contain ourselves backstage as everyone took pictures, tried to relax, and chatted about how many people were there. Jet came in and said something I’m sure a lot of us won’t forget…”Guys, this is it. Press pause, because it doesn’t get better than this!” Norm came back there and basically just told us all to relax, because we had done the work, and it was a show we could be proud of. It was so cool, because Group 1 (my group) was the opening class. Jason flowers blasted Ke$ha before we went onstage. I really don’t like Ke$ha, but now I have to love her, since she is synonymous with my Comedy Studies debut.

Performing the show was nothing short of incredible. Everything pretty much went off without a hitch, and if it didn’t, none of us remembered or cared, because we had what we had been waiting for…laughs. It all boils down to this, folks. Nothing, I tell you, absolutely nothing, is more rewarding than hearing people laugh, scream, clap, and stomp with joy at your performance. We were all reaffirmed. Everything we were doing was right, it wasn’t mediocre or bad, it was GREAT. I don’t think any of us even expected the response we received. I know I couldn’t have been more proud of myself and my fellow classmates. I’m telling you, it was an indescribable feeling. The best show I’ve ever been in, hands down. Or at the very least the proudest I’ve been to be in. The feeling was euphoric as we took our bows and exited the backstage, only to be greeted by everyone at intermission, hungry for more. It was fantastic. The second group did an incredible job as well, and were just as well received. Stellar.

Tonee, Mack, and Taylor all came to visit and see the show…which was just…phenomenal. I am SO LUCKY to have such wonderful friends. Seriously. Also, Sarah Beth and Annelise drove from Timberlake! I couldn’t believe it. In fact, neither could the Comedy Studies kids. They were shocked that my friends would come so far to see me. I’m so incredibly blessed. Ain’t nothin’ like that Southern bond! That being said, it was so nice to have people I trusted there to tell me what they thought of the show. They absolutely adored it. I was actually really surprised at their response, just because the material was so stale to me at that point. They said they were pleasantly surprised at how awesome it was, which made me beam with pride. I had been doing something worthwhile. 

The second show was great, too, of course!

The last day we had a farewell pizza party, and our teachers all gave us a farewell message. I think we surprised them by our unity and our bond as a group, and the fact that for the most part, we were all really good hearted people. Also, I think Anne’s message will probably stick with me, which is the fact that you’re improvising your life. Make Discoveries. Yes, and! And that you don’t have to have a plan. Just the next thing. It was beautiful. Of course I bawled again. After everyone got done, Anne looked right at me and hugged me first, which may have meant nothing in particular to her, but it meant the world to me. She’s such a wonderful woman, and a wonderful teacher. All of them are, and I couldn’t believe I was saying goodbye to them, as well as my friends. Norm escaped out the door without so much as a goodbye or hug for anyone. I followed him out the door, and with my soggy eyes asked him if he was just going to leave without saying bye, and he said, “I’m not worried. You’ll be back.” He said it with such confidence I’m afraid he might just be right.

We had at least three farewell parties, but I’d have to say my favorite was my last night at Paige’s house. It was warm, and I was enjoying my signature Woodchuck on the back porch in the dark with a good chunk of Comedy Studies folks. We were all quiet and relaxed, speaking in soft voices and chuckles. Not a rager, not a sobfest, but there was definitely a somber energy out there that night. We kind of talked about summer and life plans, light hearted stuff. When it was time to leave, I sobbed again. Not because I didn’t think I’d ever see any of these people again, but for the end of another era. Another chapter. I cried because I had done something wonderful, something I said I would do, something I wasn’t sure if I could do. Because I had been lucky enough to meet such wonderful people that taught me so much.

So that’s it. I’m actually afraid to even end this entry. There aren’t enough words to fully describe this experience, this time, this blessing…so I’ll say goodbye to Second City and Chicago for now…and thank you. This is not the end. It was only a moment. And I lived in it. I lived so hard. 

So, I haven’t really posted in a long time. The end of Comedy Studies was a maddening and beautiful spiral that tumbled out of my hands so quickly! I’m going to try and wrap up this blog, so hopefully it will be a little product to show to everyone, as well as future Comedy Studies students. I don’t know if it’s quite as useful as I would have hoped…I mean, it’s no Mick Napier Mainstage journal or anything.

The last time I wrote, we had finished our context finals, and our mini sketch shows. Here’s what we had left:

• Writing- The completion of our final video projects; Doing funny videos is just not my thing. Even though I was show runner, I really bowed out on the project. I had a couple of things to work on, but I wasn’t really inspired by them, and I was more concerned with trying to make sure everyone else got their shit done. It was frustrating for me, personally, to deal with being what I knew as organized, and dealing with a lot of creativity…and let’s face it…laziness, including myself. I’m not here to call anyone out or anything like that…just to talk about my experience. Coming from Shorter, it was really hard to adapt my theatre/uptight/organizational methods to what we were working with in this video. I come from a place where people BUST THEIR ASS. and don’t quit. They don’t have a choice. I know what hard work is. And I know what working too much is. I think that we didn’t work hard enough on this video. Myself included. This was also a big lesson in group work…but more on that later. Our video was completed, and it was actually not bad (this statement coming from the knowledge that it could have been a whole lot better…), and was only completed thanks to our editor staying up all night. And really, it’s done. There isn’t much more to say about it, except I didn’t learn much about creating videos as I did about working with people. Which is just as important if not more so in my book.
• Movement-working on accents and dialects; This wasn’t really a voice lesson so much as it was a lesson in taking risks. As with most things in Improv and comedy, if you half ass it, it shows. If you give it everything you have, either you’ll be awesome, or you’ll suck, and the audience will laugh because you tried so hard. We chose an authentic accent to copy for a little monologue in class. I chose Yael Naim, the girl who sings ‘New Soul’ from the Macbook Air commercials. She was born in Paris, and was raised in Israel, and now lives in Paris. Her accent was a cool blend of French and Israeli. Here’s the video I watched. We wrapped up the class with a round of soundscapes…on the train. Now, this was something I had been dying to do ever since Jet mentioned it. Now that it’s over, I’m not sure if I want to ever do it again. First of all, our soundscapes have been slowly sucking it up lately. In my opinion. I think everyone was thinking about it too much. We had a good run (my personal favorites were when Dave Asher came and played with us), but it’s been a rough road for a while. And that was in the movement room, which is all echo-y and pretty, and it’s just us. On a train, the sound goes nowhere. It sounds ugly and gross. And there are other people there, changing the energy, and sucking up the sound. Our soundscapes were weak, quiet, and not pretty at all. Especially the first few. Which is another lesson in DON’T HALF ASS. Also, Jet really wanted (as did I) to create something angelic and beautiful, but it was strugnation. Regardless, we had a marginal amount of fun, and it was definitely a lesson. Favorite moments include the guy who got off the train in a huff, exclaiming, “Not at 10 in the morning, guys!” (it was noon)/the guy that said as we got off, “They WOULD be getting off at Sedgwick.”/the little Asian man that followed us all the way from the train stop to Piper’s Alley clapping his hands with glee…It just goes to show, for 10 people who you piss off/judge you, there’s at least one that had their day made.
• Acting-finish our scenes; Tasha Velde was my scene partner, and she went to a wedding the weekend of our final, so we didn’t have to go right away. I would have watched the final scenes, but then Andy, my writing teacher, asked if I could baby sit, and I wasn’t about to miss out on playing with sweet Clementine! I regret not seeing the scenes, though. Tasha and I did our scenes the following Monday, and that day was a rough day for me. I let someone make me cry, which you should never do! I let that get to me in my performance, and Gellman noticed. I didn’t even realize my energy was so low until he pulled me aside afterwards. Another lesson in not letting outside shit affect your performance or rehearsal. We also had to write a paper, which was a letter to an actor who was about to perform in a Neil Simon play. I wrote mine to Nick Mason, even though he never read it. Haha! I got an A- on it. I basically just wrote down everything Gellman said, which seemed to work.
• History-We did Stand Up! Everyone did an awesome job. Sheldon Patinkin actually came to see us (He also talked to us about the start of Second City later that afternoon!) and he said mostly everyone did a great job, and if there were issues, it was not in performance, but in material. It was so fortunate that most of us got to do stand up in front of the Comedy Studies crowd for the first time. No other group of folks could have laughed harder. I talked about my pets…I think I could have been more successful had I had more time; we only had 5 minutes. I’d be interested to hone mine a little more. It definitely seems more appealing to me than other comedic outlets. We also had to write a paper on a comedic influence post 1950, and I chose Amy Sedaris. I feel like it was only fair, since she led me here! I thought about doing just Strangers With Candy, but I felt like it narrowed my paper. I actually really enjoyed writing and learning even more about Amy. My presentation was fun, too, because I spent most of it talking about Amy with Anne because she actually knew her. Hysterical, right?
• Improv-getting ready for our showcase; wow. this should be an entry by itself. It all happened so fast! One minute we were bringing in scenes to choose from, and the next, we were making our running order. It was great and sad because we had so much good material, a lot got cut. What we ended up with was pretty solid though, for the most part. And we also had a lot of variety, which was really nice. After we got our running order, Norm pretty much left us to our own devices, and told us to run the show at least 20 times before the following Monday. Jet told us before we left her class, to make sure and enjoy the process, because that’s a great part of it, too. We rehearsed some at the training center, but we also rehearsed a lot at Paige’s apartment in Wrigleyville, which was fun and interesting. I feel like we left our mark there, for sure. It’s places like that you don’t forget…cooped up somewhere for 7 hours. As far as rehearsing, we were fairly productive. I found it really difficult with this kind of work, because we created it, we could change it whenever something wasn’t working. It was nice, but at the same time, I personally felt like we had too much freedom. As Andy said, there’s a reason someone gets paid to come in and direct. There has to be a final say. In our case, that right kind of went to whoever wrote the sketch, which was fair. I think we did alright about not arguing about anything for too long, but I still think we could have used our time a little bit more wisely. Also, the beauty of doing comedy work, is that A) you don’t want to run anything too long, you want it to stay fresh, and B) you don’t HAVE to run it a million times, because you have the beauty of improvisation. You don’t worry about what will happen on stage, because people are ready to laugh, and you can improvise through anything, no matter how horrific. It was comforting. All in all, it was a pretty good process…

Just to give you a break, I’ll write about the showcase and leaving Comedy Studies in another post. Pictures also coming soon! 

Tonee is here!!!! (Taken with instagram)

From the wall of fame in the ETC (Taken with instagram)

Molly Kearney in another video from our video projects…

Uncle Fatty’s

Hello again! 2 Posts in one week? Who am I??! 

Major events that happened this week include the completion of our Context finals, which turned out to be a lot of fun. In case you forgot/I never explained the assignment, I’ll go ahead and talk about it. Basically, we were all assigned a ‘medium’, if you will, and then we had to become an ‘expert’ on it for our midterm. Some of the topics/mediums people got assigned were music, mime, magic, animation, sound design, advertisement, puppetry, etc. Mine was Fashion. It actually turned out to be a good topic for me, because I’m such a visual person, and I love clothes (at least looking at them, anyway). I’m not necessarily up on the latest trends or anything, but I love analyzing people’s styles. Alright, I’m going to stop defending myself on how Fashion was a good topic for me. Like I said, for the midterm we had to do a presentation on our topic, and for the final, we had to do a five minute performance with our medium and present a satirical point of view. For my final, I did a mini fashion show, and had people were outfits that held significance in their lives. I think it was cute, but not a lot of work went into it. I feel a little guilty about it. I liked the idea, though. I just hate that we only had 5 minutes. Some people did really neat things. Some of my favorites were a guy named Keebler, who did a mimed dance that was really cool; Molly did a video that looked like a bunch of pictures taken and then put together; the students that had prank, Juliet and Kaitlyn, pulled off some pretty successful pranks that scared the shit out of everyone; Danny’s performance as Teazo the Clown; Sarah Brenner’s genius that was Jonestown The Musical…and tons more. Everyone did a fantastic job!

Andy also talked to us about our sketch shows, which he really enjoyed. He also talked to us about the idea that, in a sketch, when you have something that is absolutely shocking/hysterical/horrifying, you have to continue to play in that level, or amp it up from there. For example, I wrote a sketch about a girl hanging herself, and at the very beginning, you see her putting the noose around her neck and jumping, which is a very shocking and (in this case) hysterical image. Instead of ramping it up from there, the rest of the scene played out. It was fine, but the rest of the scene was almost a waste, because it didn’t get better or crazier from there. It made the rest of the scene seem anti climactic. 

Starring Xan Weinstein and Blair Britt.

(Source: thelaughtiestlaugh)

Molly Kearney and Colleen Gburek star in one of the many Comedy Studies videos.