Introducing "The Performing Walnut"

As those who know me know, I am was a closet performer. Though I would burst out singing at random times and sing in the shower or my room, as well as acting out skits or friendly impersonations (hahaha), I still only did these things within my comfort zone. I wouldn’t sing too loud in public or act out in front of strangers (much), but now these random takes are not the only time one might hear or see me perform. I am currently taking acting as well as singing lessons to increase my ability to perform and at the very least make me better and give me the balls to show everyone what I’ve got!

I’ve been taking classes for about seven months now, and about 3 months of voice lessons and I have been loving it. Though when I’m instructed to sing a note, or act out a monologue in a certain way, I feel my brain do contortions in order to deliver the song, note or line the way instructed. But in all the time that I’ve been learning from my teachers, I have never felt the way I’ve felt this week.

This Sunday, I took my usual Sunday acting class with Jay Michaels and I delivered the monologue “Dance 10 Looks 3” from “THE CHORUS LINE.” In the monologue, Val is telling her story of why she felt she had to get plastic surgery in order to be a dancer on Broadway. After about five minutes of trying to deliver it as instructed, I got so frustrated tears started leaking from my eyes. I know five minutes sounds like a short time, but five minutes of saying the same 3 lines over and over again seems like forever when I’m trying to get a “scene” right. But Jay knew what he was doing in having me repeat, and repeat, and repeat those first few lines. He wanted to get the emotion of a jaded woman who wanted to basically spit in the face of those who she auditioned for, because it was people like them who made her have to change her image. In essence, I had to remove my preconceived notions of what the monologue was about. I simply took it as a funny story and tried to deliver it that way. What I learned from Sunday’s class, on a more real/personal level, is that as actor, one has to peel away the layers of their role in order to deliver that monologue as a real person, not as an image. The image is what the audience sees. An actor has to be the person. Sunday’s class was the hardest class I’ve ever experienced with Jay. The walnut was cracked Jay! Oyyyy, but I still love ya!

Today was my voice lesson with Mary Elizabeth MiCari, and again, it was a tough lesson. To me, singing is a lot like acting in my need to connect and invoke emotion from and through the song/monologue/scene. However, I think singing is more physical for me in that if I’m feeling tense then my voice is like a log, and boy oh boy did I feel tense today. Even certain warm ups felt like I was reaching for the highest mountain top with a bag of bricks on my back. But I got through it and again, I felt as though I was cleansed of my negative energies through the hour of concentration on breath. It’s almost like yoga for my soul.

In taking these lessons I hope that I have become better at what I used to just do for fun. I hope to grow in both skill and ambition. Since I started taking lessons, I’ve done one play, one reading and was featured in GENESIS REPERTORY’S season debut show “GEN 10.” There are more shows/plays to come, including a show featuring songs from THE AMERICAN SONGBOOK and a debut of my acting class at an Off-Off-Broadway location. I was made for performing. I just have to break out of my shell and give it all I got!!