The "Real" World

I had the rare opportunity to sit in on a professional rehearsal today! My Directing professor is directing a show at the St. Louis Rep that Carter Lewis (our WU playwright in residence) wrote, and she invited the six of us in her Directing class to stop by and observe anytime! So I was there for three hours today being a fly on the wall while they worked technicalities and trouble spots. It was soo interesting, but I also learned that what they do isn't much different from what we do here. Seeing them work made me so jealous, though. To think that they get to get paid for rehearsal and character study and that they have the rest of the time off without classes or homework just seems too good to be true. I was inspired by the adorable girl playing Evie to work on my character notebook for "Of Thee I Sing" that has been a little slacking due to the fluffy nature of the show and my character. 

The show was thought-provoking in typical Carter fashion. It is one continuous scene in real time, which is simple and refreshing. The scene shows a couple dealing with the news that their son took a gun to school (over an upper middle class suburban barbeque) interrupted by the visit of his girlfriend, Evie. I really hate to admit it, but I've always been morbidly interested in violence in schools--in a "I-can't-believe-this-actually-happens-how-in-the-world-does-it?" kind of way, of course. This show was particularly interesting, then, in that it explains how the son, Danny, and Evie came to this point. They are extremely humanized, and I began to understand the "how-in-the-world-does-this-happen?" question. It also brings up an issue that has always bothered me, which is the question of how much power parents actually have to control the behavior of their children. Can the ideal parents (who don't exist) still have a child who brings a gun to school? And can horrible parents somehow raise an exemplary child? I think the answer is yes to both, which is troubling. To think that truly scary situations can happen in average, well-meaning families is pretty terrifying. And I think Carter's play shows that they can and helps to explain how and why in a very believable way. That, my friends, is good theatre.