Club Revival (Open!)

[Robin Douglas]

Robin knew that there was a drama club at Hammel, she had been a member of it over twelve years ago. However, she wasn’t sure what it looked like now that she was in charge of it. She had some hope for the club, but at the same time she wasn’t sure how long it had been let go for. She needed to gather it back up again in order to see what kind of talent pool she was working with. After all she didn’t want to pick something that required too much or, worse, too little of the club. It was always better to push the boundaries of talent with theater than to fall back off of them.

Robin had sent out an email and had plastered up a couple of posters. She wasn’t sure how high school theater worked not, or how many clubs she was competing against for students. Hopefully what she had done already and the existing framework would be enough. She was sure she’d have enough time to put something on before the end of the year if she got any sort of showing. She was excited to get back into the spirit of all of it, and unlike her coffee machine her sewing machine was still holding up. That meant at least some chance at decent costuming.

Robin waited in the rehearsal room to see who would show up. She had been running through possible shows in her mind. She didn’t want to do anything that would require too much building or tech on the part of the students. Given where they were in the semester she didn’t think they would have enough time to do something huge. She would have to build it up piece by piece. The same went for the costumes, though they didn’t seem to be in bad shape there. She checked her watch.

Robin had made it pretty clear that this wasn’t an audition and just an initial meeting. With that in mind she was hoping she would still get a good turn out.

[Isaac Tilford]

Okay, so last year's production of Sweeney Todd didn't exactly ever get off the ground, but Isaac had made most of the costumes for it anyway. He genuinely liked being in Drama club, even if he wasn't the kind of kid to actually get onstage. Instead, he preferred to be in the background, fixing things backstage at the last minute and having most of his work done before dress rehearsals. It wasn't as stressful, and he still felt like part of the team. (And since he couldn't really join sports teams, because of his power, he liked it even more.) So when the new drama teacher had announced the club's reformation, he'd made a note of it and made sure to swing by. Isaac was graduating in June, so he wouldn't be there next year, but he could still get some drama fun out of the rest of his senior year.

He swung into the classroom a little early, grinning from ear to ear. Isaac didn't care that he was the first one there, if it meant he could get dibs on head costumer this time instead of it even being up for debate. After all, how many other students had their own equipment? (Besides Sidra, that is.) "Hey there, you're Ms. Douglas, right? I'm Isaac Tilford." He hopped up and sat on one of the tables in the room instead of claiming a chair. "I'd totally be in your drama class if I wasn't graduating this year. I need to finish all the required sh--stuff instead."

The senior took off his sunglasses--they were pretentious enough, being pink plastic, he didn't need to wear them inside--and kept talking, eager to claim his place in the club as soon as possible. "And I want to be head costumer for whatever we're doing. I did it last year for Sweeney Todd, I know how to work the machine in the costume closet, and I already know what's in there. I'm the perfect choice."

[Robin Douglas]

Minutes ticked by, feeling as if they were going far too slow. Robin was tempted to speed things up, as always, but she resisted. She knew that there was no reason to do that, but she was indeed at least slightly manic. As such she could not stand just sitting there at the moment. For her this was a test of her will. But it did last long because then the door opened. Robin attempted to look up, but as she already was this just consisted of a slightly odd head jerk. What did raise up were the eyebrows, out of surprise and not out of judgment. She hadn’t been near high school fashion in a while and couldn’t help but smile at the sunglasses.

God bless them, she knew that fashions tended to circle around but hopefully they would never have to brave the mini skirts and midriff baring shirts of her high school days. At least back then she had more or less had the stomach for it. However it was then that the boy in the pink sunglasses spoke. Robin nodded when asked if she was Ms. Douglas. She folded her hands on the desk in front of her and listened as he told her exactly what she wanted to do. The eyebrows tweaked up again in surprise, but Robin was pleased.

“That’s great Isaac, I wasn’t sure if there would be anyone interested in costuming so I’m glad I won’t have to do all of it myself. We’ll have to see if we can do something based on some of the stuff you did last year, did you say it was Sweeny Todd? That isn’t too hard of an era to replicate. I know it’s late in the game for this so I don’t want to push it too much. I want to really work with what we have but I assume we’ll have to so a lot of adjustments anyways.” Robin took out a piece of paper and labeled name, email, and grade at the top. She held it out to Isaac.

“Here, if you could just write down that information. I know you probably get spammed as it is so I’ll try to keep any messaged for club short.”

[swayyahs2]

Paris hoped she was heading in the right direction of the rehearsal room the flyer spoke of. She was still kind of new to Hammel so she was still fleshing out where everything was. She'd initially had no plans to join any clubs or sports teams, just to avoid the close proximity of other people. It was only hours before that she'd even made the decision to check out the drama club. She was a singer and not the in the shower kind either; she actually had a voice. She didn't think so much about the acting aspect of entertainment but she'd atleast try.

Finally arriving at the door that read "Rehearsal Room", Paris sucked in a deep breath. She didn't know where the sudden nerves were coming from. She was a very outgoing person naturally so it wasn't meeting people but rather being in close quarters with people that had her on edge. She had no control over her power yet and it pretty much activated itself whenever it wanted to.

Paris couldn't worry about it now though, she was determined to meet new people. She pushed her apprehension to the far corners of her mind and put her hand on the doorhandle before giving it a twist and opening the door. Stopping just inside the door (for caution), her eyes took in the two bodies currently occupying the room.

She plastered on a smile and mustered in a sweet voice." Hello, I'm Paris. This is Drama club, correct?".

[Isaac Tilford]

"Yeah, there's a bunch of period stuff in the closet, but there's other stuff from previous years in there too. Depending on what you want to do, almost all of it can be adapted for...whatever," Isaac said. He grinned at the teacher, pleased that she seemed happy to have him take over the costuming. It was the part he enjoyed most about drama club, and he really hoped she wasn't the kind of teacher who insisted everyone also get a stage part.

He took the paper and put it on the table next to him, then dug through his bookbag until he found a pen. Then he scribbled down his information. (Hopefully, Ms. Douglas could discern lazy-senior-who-types-everything-important-ish.)

When the door opened again, Isaac looked up. He didn't know the girl who poked her head in, but that wasn't really unusual. He didn't pay too much attention to the younger students, particularly since he'd be graduating soon. He waved cheerily at her, glad to have another person there. It would be a really sucky drama club this year if the only person there did costumes. "Hey! Yeah, this is Drama. I'm Isaac."

Nice and to the point.

[Robin Douglas]

Robin’s mind was already off and running. If they had the stuff to do Sweeney Todd she could adapt that easily enough. There was not enough time left to put on Sweeney Todd, and she didn’t want to dive into something that would be too intensive over the summer. That was mainly because she remembered how it was in the summer in the Auditorium at Hammel. It was hot, and no one wanted to run tech in full costume when it was near 90 degrees outside. However, if she could whip together something…. very quickly then that might work out. Instantly her mind went to plays that would be less intensive. That meant no musicals, not for the moment.

Robin glanced up and over when the door opened again. She smiled over at the girl sticking her head in, and repeated after Isaac. “Yes, yes, this is Drama club. Come on in, I’m Ms. Douglas, I’m the faculty advisor.” She was already edging towards the closet. Then Robin stopped herself and headed back towards the paper again. She motioned to it and looked at Paris. “Would you like to come sign in? The sheet is right over here.” Then Robin paused for a moment and thought.

“You know what I’m thinking,” she started. “I’m thinking that we don’t have an awful lot of time, so we do need to do something simple if we are going to do anything at all. I was thinking that The Importance of Being Ernest would fit well into that era if we brightened things up a little, but I don’t want to risk the setting either looking or being shoddy. What do you think of Our Town? It’s simple and we avoid the set problem because of the pantomime.” She was half inquiring and half musing aloud, hoping that she still might get an answer regardless. She knew how teenagers were now, or at least she thought she did. It was the whole Glee thing, right?

“We’re limited by time but that doesn’t mean we can’t get a little something together and onstage!”

[Nick Tseng]

Standing in the doorway, Nick listened to her ideas for plays. He leaned against the door-frame, still unseen, before striding boldly into the room, making a dramatic entrance. With a small bow, he stood back up and strode over to the sign in sheet. He casually looked back over his shoulder.

"Nick Tseng. And what about The Diviners? It's simple, low-key on set, and highly character-intensive." He picked the pen up in his left hand and scribbled his name quickly, then turned and faced the three others in the room.

"I'd rather direct than act, if you guys don't mind." Stage just wasn't for him. He acted all the time, why act while acting? "I'm more interested in directing than acting. But there's this awesome scene in it I've been mulling over in my mind. Essentially, the main character is handicapped because as a child, he partially drowned. Since then, he's been terrified of water, and when he finally is convinced by a traveling preacher to bathe in the river, he drowns again. What I was thinking for that scene would be blue gels over the lights, and alternating slow-time / normal time pieces. If the lead actor does it right, the parts where he's underwater would be slow-time, accented by a slow heartbeat over the speaker system. The other characters on stage would move slowly and would move their mouths as if talking, but nothing would come out. Then, as he emerges from the water for a moment to scream for help, the women and men on the shore would scream and yell and praise the Lord, all drowning out Buddy's screams. It's powerful..."

He raises his arms, which have goosebumps. "Look, it's got me all tingly already."