Checking the Bases
Pre-Christmas show: check. Individual Events:
check. One Act Competition: Check. Christmas: check. Planning next semester’s
show: in progress. Planning the lessons for Semester Two: I’m getting there. Processing
competition scores: well, there’s the rub, now. Teaching my students how to
deal with their competition scores was brought home to me very sharply when our
troupe received their overall score for their recent One Act entry, a Caryl
Churchill whimsy called ‘Heart’s Desire.’
Many hours rehearsing, a student built set
(including some very fine over-sized kitchen cabinets), impeccable student
stage manager, an audience who was totally into it and loved every minute of
it.
We achieved a score of ‘Good.’
Well, ouch. Brave face, everyone. I don’t
think the judges got it. Maybe it was the wigs.
Scratch that. Looking at the judges’ sheets: They
got it. Well, three out of four did. They just didn’t think much of it. (One
out of four did give us a high ‘Excellent’, 24/30. Thanks!)
Getting to Acceptance
It’s one thing to coach your students through
processing a bad score. It’s another thing entirely to be able to remember how
to apply those pearls of wisdom to yourself, and understand why you got the
score that you did. It’s very similar to the five stages of grief; actually,
it’s completely the five stages of grief! We’ll capitalize them too: Denial,
Anger, Bargaining, Depression, and Acceptance. I think it wise to keep these in
the forefront of processing a disappointing score. You can read up on them
elsewhere, I won’t bore you with minutiae.
Because we live in a Social (Overconnected)
Media century, and because I’m fairly social, it was interesting to see how
other troupe sponsors in my district dealt with their respective scores. It was
interesting, because it really helped me a lot. The wisest ones didn’t post
anything, and just kept it to themselves or actually talked to, like, real
people, because that’s what wise people do. If you win big or get hugely
disappointed, nobody really wants to see it plastered on Facebook (That one’s
for free, and not the original point of this blog, but it is kinda related, so
I won’t edit it out).
Actually, that’s not exactly true. We don’t really want to see it, like we don’t
want to see an excruciating car chase and crash in the movies, but we can’t
help ourselves and just can’t pull our eyes away.
I digress. Horribly. I went through the five
stages, had negative thoughts for several hours (more honestly? Days), but then
made a stunning, all-of-a-sudden leap into stage five: acceptance.
What Does a Score of 'Good' Mean, Anyway?
I was a professional actor. And I was very
skilled. This isn’t to brag, I am very skilled in that line, however I lost the
majority of my hair by 30 and haven’t had the discipline to stay in the best
shape and I made some pretty horrendous life choices in my mid twenties, as
well as the normal way of professional acting in that there are only so many
roles that you are truly, truly fit for due to looks, and that is absolutely
fine by me. If I never acted again I’d still be pretty satisfied with the roles
I did play. I am extremely satisfied that I stumbled into teaching as I did, as
it suits my stage of life needs very well indeed.
The catch, however, is that I still feel,
after five years of it, very incompetent at teaching.
Teaching, unlike acting, does not come
naturally to me. It’s going to take me time to learn how to do it, and I’m
worlds away from Year One of teaching, and I relish the challenge, and let’s
also face a reality, in this job we get to be artistic directors on a full-time
basis and produce (within community standards) whatever we and our students
please! You can’t get that in the professional world as regularly as this! It’s
really something I have to work hard at to do well. Or at least resemble
competency.
So here was my Acceptance: the One Act score
of ‘Good’ is a blessing. The judge’s comments and scores focused on acting
issues; I need to be a better acting teacher. They focused on the overall
‘statement’ the director was trying to make with the play; I need to work on my
directorial vision somewhat. They focused on projection, costume, and one or
two other niggling things; I need to work on those aspects of my teaching too!
You see how this is a gift to a new theatre teacher? Right there are my
professional development goals for the next five years, or more! Getting
slammed has never been so beneficial! This gives me so much stuff that I can go
away and work on with my students, as we both learn how to be better in our
roles.
(The judges did repeatedly say ‘bold choice
of script’ and a ‘difficult’ text; I think that’s praise, as my cynicism tends
to interpret those comments as a euphemism for “Dude, this is high school! What
were you thinking?” But that’s a topic for another time. I’ll accept their
comments at face value.)
Right now, I’m happy to have found my way
through my own disappointment. I’m happy I can take my experience and coach my
students through theirs. What’s best, I’m super happy that I have an amazing
opportunity to grow and develop into a better version of who I already am. That’s
a gift worth sharing with anyone, new theatre teacher or old.
And yes, we won't use wigs like that ever again.
Happy New Year!