Week 4:
Don’t Rain On My Parade

July 8, 2021

It was a hot and rainy week in New York, and things at Stella Adler have really started to pick up in intensity now that we have passed the halfway point. Our teachers are pushing and challenging us as we enter the final stretch of the program! 

I was thankful to wake up Monday morning feeling so much better after a restful and restorative weekend. I spent much of my weekend in bed with my water, tea, and MucinexD by my side and practiced lots of silence so my voice could recover.

This week in Acting Techniques, we dove deeper into our characters’ pasts and were asked to come up with at least four specific memories for our characters to inform our choices in our monologues. It was a really cool exercise that I will carry forward when preparing for future roles because it brings many different layers and colors to the work. Chloe and I had the opportunity to rehearse our scene from Wicked with Dev twice, and each time he gave us some very active and specific blocking to help the scene be really dynamic. I appreciate his skillful eye so much and am so grateful for the extra rehearsal with him this week.

I loved our guest artist in the week’s Masterclass — Broadway veteran Nik Walker, who performed in Hamilton, playing Aaron Burr. He was so charming and warm in the room. Since I performed last week, I got to sit back, relax, take notes, and enjoy the class. A couple of days later, I performed again for Acting a Song class with BD Wong. I decided to challenge myself and bring in a new piece by a favorite artist outside of Musical Theater. I sang “Gone” by the artist Lianna La Havas and got some great feedback from BD on it. He explained that when a song goes to an obvious emotion (e.g., hurt, sadness, heartbreak), it is often a stronger choice to act against that. I left feeling really happy and proud of myself for pushing myself out of my comfort zone and trying something new.

Audition Skills and Strategies class met several times this week. We were asked to bring in the new class material, and I decided to sing Lady Gaga’s “Speechless” from her album The Fame Monster. Our teacher, Carol, said that she thought it was a “cool” choice but advised me to read the lyrics like a monologue to find the best cut with the greatest arc. We also had a mock audition session for which we had to prepare two contrasting pieces to fit into a 90-second timeframe. We were given a specific season of shows that we’d be “auditioning for” that could influence our song choices. I sang cuts from “Someone to Watch Over Me” from Oh, Kay! and Mama Cass’ “Words of Love.” I thought it went well, aside from my voice still being in recovery. For our final class this week, Carol again asked us to bring in new and bold material. I decided to perform a cut of “Gimme Gimme” from Thoroughly Modern Millie because it is a monster of a piece and requires a big belt! I sang through it, and Mark, the accompanist, and Carol gave me some super helpful feedback, saying that when you start a cut at the peak or climax of a song, you still need to give it shape and an arc. Carol suggested I try the cut again, starting quieter and building up to the big belty final note. I did my best to implement that note, and it went much smoother and felt better in specificity.

We focused on different important composers and lyricists in Musical Theater’s history in the Musical Theater History and Song Analysis class! There are so many of them that we could not fit talking about them all into our discussion. Voice and Speech class was great, and we learned several exercises to strengthen our articulators (lips, tongue, and soft palate). 

In other highlights of the week, I met up with fellow Cornellian Camille Wong Thursday evening for a delicious dinner at the Tick Tock Diner in Manhattan. And then, on Saturday, my best friend from Cornell, Zakkiyya Ali, came up on the bus from DC to visit me for the three-day weekend! We have had so much fun catching up, going out to the different boroughs, and hanging out.

I cannot believe that four weeks of the program are already over and that I have been in NYC for a month now! I’m going to have to savor these last two weeks at the studio!