A bit of video I shot while at University of Southern Mississippi for the Mississippi Theatre Association Festival in Hattiesburg Mississippi January 10-13 2008.
Tag Archives: mta
Mississippi’s…Finest Actor
A word from Mississippi’s Finest Actor to other aspiring actors in the magnolia state.
SETC Recap
I was in Atlanta from Wednesday through Sunday. We had a blast. I saw a lot of good theatre. I’m still mostly theatre illiterate and I really enjoy any opportunity to see good theatre. With the best community theatre shows from 7 other states in attendance, I was in for a treat.
The first one I saw was Tennessee’s Escanaba In Da Moonlight by Jeff Daniels. It was hilarious. The set was great and these southern actors had the upper Michigan accent nailed. I thought I was gonna die during the slow motion fart.
I also saw a broadway caliber show from the Manatee Players out of Florida. They did a version of Sweeney Todd that was amazing. I wish I had been a little more familiar with the show, since it had to be cut to no more than 60 minutes in length. But regardless, the poor stage at Spelman college just wasn’t big enough for this production. Apparently, they have something like a $900,000 a year budget. And they are building a 12 million dollar facility. I wish I could say that they bought a win, but aside from a few technical snafus, this show was smooth and the cast was outstanding.
These two shows won and will continue to nationals. There were other smaller, simpler shows that were still very strong. At MTA, I would have been shocked if we had not won. I imagine this comes from my inexperience of attending MTA and not coming away disappointed or upset for the last 20 years. I don’t mean to sound like a cocky jackass, but we had a really good show and I saw all the rest, and while good, they just weren’t quite as tight as ours. But at SETC, out of seven shows that were our competition, I could only say with confidence that I thought we were better than one show.
With all that said, we came in runner-up, which is 3rd place. If one of the other two shows drops out, we would go in their place. Best of luck to Tennessee and Florida, bring it home to the south. Yeehaw! Also, two of my friends and castmates won Outstanding Performance: Madeline Golden (Vera) and Krista Vowell (June). The awards were well deserved. One adjudicator told Madeline that she was the best Vera he’d ever seen. He also told Marcus Vowell that his Stanley was the strongest he’d seen. Another adjudicator told Krista that if he ever wanted to know how to feel about what was going on at that point in the show, he would look to June since she embodied the spirit of each moment. Starkville’s got mad talent, yo!
Otherwise, I ate a lot, managed to swing one ball game at the SEC Championship (where my Bulldogs lost), saw Andie MacDowell, went to an improv jam and hung out with my wifey and my SCT family. It was a great time.
South Eastern Theatre Conference and PodCamp Atlanta
Since SCT won at the Mississippi Theatre Association festival, we’re headed to Atlanta for SETC next week. We will compete against 9 or 10 other states. It oughta be a good time. We leave on Wednesday. It’ll be my first big theatre dealie to go to and I’m excited. I hope to hit a few workshops and what not.
The following weekend I will return to Atlanta for PodCamp Atlanta. I have been asked to be on a panel for video blogging. There will be a handful of us on the panel from what I gather and it’ll be a Q and A type thing. James and I will go to hang out and meet people. So Good Commitment will be in the house. w00t. That oughta be a good time as well.
I’m not doing Lab Rats this semester. I don’t really have time and also I’m not taking a class so technically I’m not supposed to be a member. I’m enjoying what I’m doing now but I do miss my friends and doing the ‘prov. I went to the Lab Rats show tonight for the first time as a spectator. Well, sort of, I did kinda go as crew since I video taped the show. Everyone did great and they have a talented new crop of performers.
Starkville Cleans Up At MTA
The Mississippi Theatre Association festival/competition was this weekend. Starkville Community Theatre took Smoke on the Mountain. This is the show we did last season. It was a smash: 14 sold out performances. The play selection committe decided to resurrect the show for competition, so I got to dust off the overalls and play Dennis again. I was really excited about the prospect of getting the Sanders family back together.
We had to recast one part due to the previous actor moving to another state. Anyway, let me just get to the results and I’ll give my thoughts afterwards.
All Star Cast Member, Marcus Vowell
Best Supporting Actor, Bruce Lesley
Best Actor, Kary Rogers
Best Actress, Madeline Golden
Best Director, Pattye Archer
Overall Technical Excellence
Warren McDaniel Award for the Best Production. As the recipient of the Best Production award, SCT will represent the State of Mississippi at the Southeastern Theatre Conference (SETC) in March 2007 in Atlanta.
Like I said, we cleaned up. This is the first time in 20 years that SCT has won. For my first go at competitive theatre at MTA, I’d say it went pretty well.
We knew we had a good show but we had no idea that we’d walk away with so many honors. We’re all terribly excited. Excited doesn’t even really begin to describe it.
First: the show. We had 30 minutes on the stage for rehearsal. We spent almost 20 minutes of that trying to figure out why the keyboard wasn’t working. We mocked up a keyboard to look like an old piano since that would be easier than transporting a real piano. It ended up being a bad patch cable but it was a very scary 20 minutes. We had time to spike the set and sing one song.
Now this theatre is literally 13.5 times larger than ours and we really didn’t have time to do a proper sound check. So we left the rehearsal without feeling very confident about how it would all come together in this cavernous new space.
After waiting forever for the speaker for the evening to finish, we took the stage. We had 10 minutes to set the stage, 60 minutes to perform and 10 minutes to strike. During setup the guitars fell and had to be retuned. We decided the demons of Ole Miss were after us so we had to cast them out (in the name of Jesus, amen).
The show went great. We all felt good about it. Comments from the adjudicators ranged from “great chemistry within the emsemble” to “I saw Sweeney Todd where the actors have to sing and play their own instruments. This was better.”
Now I had no expectations to be singled out, I stepped on the stage for the first time less than two years ago. I felt that my peformance was solid and if I was recognized at all, I might land an All Star Cast. Well, I didn’t. Another performer from another group said he loved my performace and that he’d cry if I didn’t win best supporting actor. I was flattered but dismissed it.
When I wasn’t announced as All Star Cast, I was honestly like “oh well, but not unexpected.” Then I recalled what the other guy had said to me and thought that my role was a supporting role, so technically I’d qualify for Supporting Actor, but Best? Nah. I left the idea run through my mind for an instant but was not surprised or disappointed when my name wasn’t called. Bruce Lesley’s name was called and I could not have been happier. He deserved it.
I leaned over to M during the applause and excitment for Bruce to joke how that guy must be crying since I didn’t win. Then I heard my name. I literally had no idea why they called it. I looked at M and said “Why’d they call my name?” Did I leave my lights on in the parking lot or something? She said “Best Actor!” Wha?!
Later I had many people tell me the look on my face was priceless. My winning Best Actor had not entered the realm of possibility in my head. Winning the biggest acting award at the biggest state festival made my mouth hang open. This is nice validation considering how I felt on opening night back in May and my last experience on stage knowing there were judges in the audience.
So now we get some time off and then refocus to go represent Mississippi at SETC in Atlanta. Go Sanders family!
Rehearsals and a new project
So I’m back in rehearsals. What? you say? School is over for the semester and SCT is currently doing an all women show, what could you be possibly be doing?
SCT decided to take Smoke on the Mountain to the Mississippi Theatre Association competition/festival in January, so I get to reprise my role as Dennis, the shy, singing, preacher boy. The role is a lot of fun but we have to cut an almost two hour show down to 60 minutes. It’s tough but we’ll get it done. This is my first time to perform at MTA. I did my first show that was judged this semester and it affected me more than I’d like to admit.
Theatre MSU performed The Madwoman of Chaillot for the regional American College Theatre Festival. For the first 10 to 15 minutes I just couldn’t get out of my head. It really pissed me off because I felt great leading up to curtain time. I really thought I would feel my best yet on stage, but for the first little while any thoughts of giving my best performance went right out the window. Knowing that there were people out there taking notes and judging the show and my performance really affected me more than I thought it would. I finally settled down and finished solid but being on stage and in your head blows.
So I’m hoping I got that experience out of the way when we go to MTA. I don’t care if I don’t get noticed or mentioned by the adjudcators, I just want to be in the moment.
Other things…I have a new project on the horizon. For the first time since starting an online presence, I’m going to commit to putting out content on a regular schedule. Be looking for an annoucement of this new endeavor soon.
Hey, have a great weekend. I’ll talkatcha soon.