All 3 of A.B.L.E.’s ensembles officially kicked off rehearsals last week. Though our teens and adults are all working on different projects this semester, the goal for week 1 of rehearsal is the same for everyone: to come together as an ensemble! Read on to see what our classes got up to…

Teen Ensembles (Monday & Friday)

This semester, our young adult ensembles are collaborating on an adaptation of Comedy of Errors, developed by A.B.L.E. teaching artist Braden Cleary. Shakespeare’s wacky tale of long lost twins and mistaken identity is sure to highlight the comedic skills of our entire ensemble. This week, we had to lay some serious groundwork.

If you’ve never seen one of A.B.L.E.’s classical plays before, you should know we do things a little differently. Our actors share roles, with each playing 2 or 3 different characters throughout the performance. This gives everyone a chance to be “the lead” and also lets actors show different sides of their personalities onstage. But that means that every actor needs to get to know every character to decide who they’re interested in and who they want to audition for. There are THIRTEEN different characters in our adaptation, so we spent the bulk of class getting to know each of them. Actors took turns trying on signature costume pieces and embodying the different personality traits of our many characters. Then, we made tableaux to explore the different relationships between the characters.

At the end of class each week, we share our “roses” and “thorns” - the things we really liked or didn’t like about rehearsal. There weren’t many “thorns” this week - everyone was excited to be back together! Our big “rose” this week was the return of two fabulous actors - Hannah and Sam P! Both had to take a break last semester, and we were so excited to have them back with the group. Hannah dedicated her checkout to the ensemble saying she is “honored to be here and to be a part of this family.” We feel the same!

Adult Ensemble (Tuesday)

This semester, our adult ensemble will devise an original show. Devising takes a lot of imagination and a lot of teamwork, so this week’s class laid the groundwork for those skills. After a great check in where we set out our goals for the semester, we played several ensemble building games including To Be and Yes Let’s that got our energy up and got us listening to our ensemble members.

After that we played several rounds of Story Starter! For this activity, actors work in partners and trios to improvise short scenes. We picked just the first line of a scene out of a hat, and then had to build a story from that one line. Some lines included “We are so lost”, “What a beautiful day” and “Let’s go see a movie.” Andrew, Lawrence and Peter got lost on the way to the movies, and climbed a cliff and swam a raging river to get there. Claire and Justice walking their dog, Mick Jagger, to the park on a beautiful day. And Nette Emily, and Sam went to see that hot new musical “Mary Poppins Returns to High School.” We enjoyed making each other laugh.