SETC - Day 1

The first day of the 61st Annual SETC events (for me at least--3/4/10) was extremely fun. Arriving at the conference center at 12:45pm we got checked in then headed straight to the High School Play Competition just in time to see Pinecrest High School in Pinecrest, North Carolina perform At the Bottom of Lake Missoula.

After a tornado hits her house, Pam loses her entire family, her life only spared because she decided to leave a day early for college. The 30, or so, minute play follows Pam through her grief and overcoming that hardship. This particular performance was especially innovative. They used flashlights in such a way as to make it more industrial. Using them as spotlights, or for special effects, I'd give them an A+ for creativity. This was actually the second time I had seen this show performed by this group, the first time being at the North Carolina Theatre Conference (NCTC).

After that show we headed to the Commercial Exhibits and Education Expo. After talking with a man who was extremely touchy and personal at a lighting design booth and exploring the rest of the exhibits we headed to our first workshop of the day.

Walking into the "Movement for the Actor" workshop we instantly felt out of place. Seeing everyone in workout clothing and doing some extreme stretches we decided it wasn't for us, and left.

A quick dinner led us to our next workshop, "Linklater Voice: Body, Breath, Vibration". It was a very nice and a great learning experience. Though we had done a lot of the exercises before, it was still a great workshop to start with. We began with a milling and seething exercise and that lead to a breathing task then added our voice. It was fun but not very challenging as far as learning new things.

Shortly after the workshop ended we were at the next High School show Bake Off by Musselman High School in West Virginia. This extremely short (18 minutes) show was enhanced by projections and the use of a Pillsbury Dough Boy costume! The show opened with a display of the setting up of a Pillsbury baking contest. We soon met the two competitors that the show focused on, shortly after that we learn that the woman (#16) has a hatred for men in the competition (mainly #15) and takes out her anger on the Dough Boy. Needless to say the show ended abruptly with #16 getting banned from the competition. I wasn't a big fan of the show. There was more "spice" than acting.

The next show was Jadem das Seine performed by Spain Park High School in Alabama. This show was both written and directed by Jesse Tilton. Before really knowing what this show was about I was handed a very odd looking program. IT was shaped like a folder and when you looked inside it was laid out like a profile for a criminal or something. It had a mug shot picture, and a few pages stapled in as background info. This story was told from a Nazi scientist/doctor's perspective and was based on the events of the Buchenwald concentration camp. I got goosebumps as the German's herded the prisoners into the camp when they were all screaming and crying. They used a lot of fog and some stage guns with blanks as special effects. They had an amazing use of the stage and their set. I was so impressed with this show. It's the only one I gave a standing ovation, so far.

The last show of the night was a Brief version of The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee by Gulf Breeze High School in Florida. This cute little musical left you with a happy feeling. Though, I've never seen this show performed before I was informed that they had to cut quite a bit out to fit into the 45 minute time-limit. The vocals were all performed really well and their use of costume was really good. These High Schoolers really looked like elementary school kids. I was impressed with the vocal range of these guys.

So that was a summary of my first day of SETC. Tomorrow's schedule looks even more packed than today was starting at 9am with a workshop on improvisation. Get excited!!