Intensive Week 2: RIP 2 Scene Work

We were told that week two of the intensive was going to be about physicality, but that's not all it's about! It's about environment, character-work, and group-work. Physicality and patience are the bridges we're going to have to cross if we want to make it to those goals. Hilariously, our instructor Eleanor Hollingsworth is about as different from our week one instructor as can possibly be. She asked us if we had any questions at 11;10 in the morning and when she was met with silence she said, "Really?! Really?!" and then dropped into the James Brown splits and yelled more. The words "dope" "meatsack" and "poophole" are scattered throughout any instructions that we're given. It's almost a shock to the system after last week's very thinky lessons, but it's a welcome change of pace.

Physical stuff is the kind of stuff I spend a lot of time on, so the wheels are still turning for me on how I feel about things. We did a lot of full group exercises and everything we tried today was something that I'd done many many times before. I feel... unfulfilled(?) by the things we did today. The promise at the start of class was that we'd spend way more time on things than would be comfortable, and after managing six exercises (including the warm-up) over the course of five hours, that has to be true. Less stuff that blew my mind today, but maybe tomorrow will be different.

Here are some quotes:

"Flawless is not the point."

"There is no next better, there is only what you're doing."

"Follow your body, not your mind."

"Panic creates speed. You want to create a new thing but newer won't be easier because you'll be starting from scratch. Sit in what you're doing and dig into it."

"I'm not trying to make you feel self-conscious, but I'm trying to make you feel conscious of self."

Those are wayyyyy more hippy-dippy than I remembered them sounding in the moment, probably cause I edited the curses out of them. Eleanor is fantastic and hopefully the speed with which we're moving through the material means we'll get to do more tomorrow.