During Week #6 of rehearsals, actors continued to work on their scenes, playing with Gesture and Genre to bring them to life.
The ensemble will have a hand in shaping every part of our version of Romeo & Juliet Remix. They are designing their own costumes and making or finding their own props at home. They are choosing music for their scenes, and choreographing fights and dances. That means we are all thinking about Romeo & Juliet outside of class too. Here are Maddi and Lucas showing off the vision boards they made for the Wedding scene:
It’s good that we take some time for reflection outside of class because our Zoom sessions always seem to ZOOM by so quickly! We try to include several different activities into every lesson plan so that we’re not just stuck sitting at the screen for 90 minutes. We build in opportunities to get up and move, to sit and focus, and to just have some fun too.
After our normal dance party and warm ups, our actors thought about a serious check in question this week:
Juliet’s parents want her to marry Paris and threaten to kick her out of the house if she disobeys. Juliet refuses to follow her parents rules. Have you ever disagreed with your parents?
Though quite a few people say they get along with their families, we’ve had our share of disagreements too. Some actors complained about unfair curfews, chores, not being allowed to watch the shows they want or listen to their favorite music, and even favorite foods.
Sedona, Jenna, Colleen, and Ben rehearse the Balcony Scene.
From there, we went straight into coaching sessions Last week, we explained how we cast Romeo & Juliet Remix, and how each actor has been paired with a member of our teaching team to coach their moment in the story. This week, we spent time in breakout rooms to draw more movement and emotion out of the scenes. For some actors, this meant choreographing a movement sequence, or writing song lyrics. For others, it meant finding actable words in their speech. For example, Claire has a very famous Juliet monologue from the moment when Juliet is waiting for Romeo to sneak to her on their wedding night. Claire’s job was to pick two words from each line and create a big movement for each.
Take a look at this part of the speech; which words move YOU?:
Gallop apace, you fiery-footed steeds,
And bring in cloudy night immediately.
Spread thy close curtain, love-performing night,
That runaway's eyes may wink and Romeo
Leap to these arms, untalk'd of and unseen.
When not with our coaches, we spent time playing lots of different games in the breakout room. We also practiced our choreography for the Capulet Ball. Here’s Christian K from Friday practicing his moves and showing off his beautifully decorated masquerade mask:
Christian dances while showing off his costume for the Capulet Ball.
We only have 4 weeks left to rehearse and film all of our scenes! Time keeps galloping on, and we’re so excited to share Romeo & Juliet Remix with you!
Remember, we want YOU to be a part of Romeo & Juliet Remix!
Watch our #SignSaturday videos on YouTube or IGTV to learn the Prologue and the final couplet from Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet in American Sign Language as translated by ASL Master Crom Saunders. You can also watch this tutorial with our Founder and Executive Artistic Director, Katie:
Record yourself performing 1 or all 4 sections and share your video on Facebook or Instagram using the hashtag #ABLEremix or by emailing remix@ableensemble.com by Tuesday April 20th .
